I saw the Barbie movie a few weeks after it came out, so I had seen the uproar and the discussion surrounding it (and now I, obviously, have my own thoughts on the Barbie Movie). I read article after article about how deep the movie was (the everygirl) and the powerful moments in the movie (buzzfeed) so I thought I was going to walk in, watch it and not experience anything that I hadn’t already read about I felt like it was going to be the time I knew how the sixth sense had ended so I didn’t feel any surprise when it was revealed.
Boy was I wrong.
Here’s my Thoughts on the Barbie Movie
The beginning of the movie, where we pan over Barbieland and the Barbie’s in it, in their careers and lives, happens sort of quick. You don’t get a chance to view President Barbie, the Supreme Court, Doctor Barbie, etc for very long. It’s a quick glimpse of this “everyday” life so by the time some of the lines processed in my brain we were already on to the next Barbie but what struck me beyond what they were saying, is how they were saying it. These powerful lines weren’t delivered powerfully, they were delivered unceremoniously in this every day montage which spoke to how normal, how understood, how fundamental they were.
When the Nobel Prize winners say “I worked hard for this, I deserve it.” I had this abrupt thought that went something along the lines of that’s not very humble and then this overwhelming feeling of BUT THEY DO DESERVE IT SO WHY ON EARTH SHOULD THEY BE MODEST ABOUT IT.
Before I could process that we go before the all women/Barbie Supreme Court and listen to Lawyer Barbie say “This makes me emotional and I’m expressing it. I have no difficulty holding both logic and emotion at the same time, and it does not diminish my powers. It expands them.”
I burst into tears.
We’re like under 10 minutes in and I’m already crying. The entire first 15 minutes are just scene after scene of feeling SEEN. Feeling seen in ways that you hope men see and understand and you hope other women feel too.
I’m an attorney that regularly gets emotional about some of my cases and I’ve always felt like this is to my detriment. I’ve mainly felt that way because I’ve been told I shouldn’t get emotional and it would make me a bad attorney if I did. But here’s the thing, I know that I can be both logical and emotional at the same time, and I’ve felt like it made me a better attorney but it wasn’t until you hear someone, even in a movie, say it matter of factly that it resonates.
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Same goes for the working hard so you deserve an award or accolade. This is true and one doesn’t have to feel shame or guilt in saying that you DO deserve it! There is a line between being humble and being conceited and it is okay with living in that middle zone. In fact, we should live there, in the astute assessment land. I could see a man saying “I worked hard for this, I deserve it,” so why does it make it wrong for me to say it? My gender does not make a phrase wrong and I need to embrace that.
When Barbie and Ken are roller blading and she describes being self-conscious as “I don’t have a word for it, but I’m conscious that it’s myself that I’m conscious of... I very much sense an undertone of violence.” This quote has stuck with me in a few ways: 1. it’s the perfect way to describe being self-conscious and Margot Robbie delivers it in a disarming way and 2. Barbie didn’t know the word ‘self-conscious’ not because she is so beautiful that she’s never felt that way before but because in Barbieland she was never meant to feel self-conscious. I mean even when she got flat feet or cellulite she didn’t dress different to hide either of those things she was just aware of it. 3. the violence addition is a way to call attention to the fact that being made to feel this way is showing how we (women) do not feel safe when we are feeling self-conscious.
I had to look up America Ferrera’s monologue to fully process what she said because I just kept saying ‘Yes yes yes yes YES yes YESSSS yes yeeeeesss yes’ during it. I’ve read it a few times, and if you haven’t read it lately google it and take a look because it’s just so good. The main idea I took from that monologue is that being a woman right now is full of contradictory expectations so feeling lost is perfectly normal. It’s normal to feel pulled in multiple directions and it’s normal to feel like you’re failing, BUT IT SHOULDN’T BE NORMAL. We should not have to live in that world of not feeling like you’re enough and recognizing this is the first step to not feeling like the goal is always moving. It also helps to call yourself out from those thoughts when you recognize yourself having them.
I took that to heart in two ways: both personal and professional. The personal is obvious but the professional speaks to how women feel imposter syndrome all the time. When I wrote about combating imposter syndrome I suggested that recognizing those invasive thoughts and changing how you speak to yourself is very important.
One of the main lasting thoughts I got from the Barbie movie was that extremes are negative, for men and women alike. We see how the male centered world is bad and negative for women but what we also see glimpses of is that a woman only centered world would be negative for both men and women as well. When there is a gender the world is centered on there is one eclipsed and that is not healthy. We have lived for so long in a male centered world that efforts to bring that center away from men are looked at as if the center will immediately go straight to women centered instead of the reality that it will bring the world more “center” centered.
I feel like Barbie is going to be a yearly rewatch for me and if we have kids, boy or girl, they will be watching it too. TM is going to watch it with me and I can’t wait to her his thoughts on it and to see what resonates with him.
What have been some of your thoughts on the Barbie movie? Or did any of my thoughts resonate with you?
PS Buzzfeed labeled the Barbie Movie as “an adult woman version of a baby sensory video” and omfg yes
PPS if you want to wear pink at the office make sure to check out how I style pink for work
