Okay, that's a trick question. It's hard to make an adequate representation of anything, and have it appeal to a mass market. Interestingly, creator Stacy McBride-Irby came up with the doll redesign out of a desire to have a doll that reflected what her daughter looks like

"They mean so much to me because they did come from a positive place," McBride-Irby said. "My daughter loves the dolls. I've had dads thank me for creating this line of dolls that represent their little girls. These dolls are for girls all over the world."

Over at Racialicious, I had two separate submissions, begging to disagree.

Seattle Slim wrote:

Mattel, you disappoint me. What was wrong with giving these dolls from your S.I.S line natural hair, dark brown eyes, and features that fit with most of the particular demographic, black girls, that you are looking to cater to?

If you guys think that these dolls don't mean shit, might I kindly ask you to check out the Doll test?

You should not be lauded for this, Mattel. I appreciate you thinking of us and all, but you dropped the ball on this.

Even if you wanted to keep these dolls, that's fine. I've already described my grandfather and family history here. Where is MY doll? Where is the doll with the Afro? Where is the doll with twists? Where's the doll with the lowboy? Where's the doll with the dark brown eyes, and the flatter nose, and the voluptuous lips? Where's the doll that has all of those things, not just some? Where's the doll for little girls that look like me?

Let me be more clear, these dolls (except for Kara's crazy lace front) are not terrible. I think they are actually perfect for little girls who have a mixed background. These pretty much cover a broad aesthetic and look like plausibly like someone with mixed heritage. In that respect, these dolls are perfect!

However, for the little black girls that look just like ME with unmistakably Afrocentric features, these dolls appeal to the tried and totally untrue, but respected, hip-hop beauty ideal that has become an "exotic girls only" industrial complex. So not only are young girls bombarded with those images on television, if their parents aren't careful, they are basically kicked while they're down walking through the toy store.

Tami, the editor of Love Isn't Enough, opened by explaining what she likes about the dolls. However, she still had heavy reservations:

Like a lot of women, I am uncomfortable with Barbie and her role in the development of young girls. It's not all Barbie's fault. It is the space she occupies in the universe of things that influence how girls grow up to be women: what goals they ultimately have, how they see themselves, how they judge their self worth and how they define womanhood.

I also have a beef with the word "authentic" to describe the three acceptably "blackified" dolls. Let's face it, these dolls don't represent any sort of break-through in representation of black faces. The skin tones and facial features fall within a narrow range that is acceptable within Eurocentric beauty standards. And to say that their hair is "curly" like that of most black women (as McBride-Irby does in this video on the consumer page for the new dolls) is being a wee bit disingenuous. Most black women have hair that is more kinky than curly in its natural state. (These dolls ain't no nappy heads.) Of course, most black women chemically straighten or weave up, which makes the dolls an accurate representation. Fine, but don't try to market them as some representation of "authentic" black physicality.

I also note, in the linked Mattel page above, the use of vaguely "urban" music, a gold, blingy necklace and a backstory that involves Barbie's friend Grace moving from California to Chicago, where she hooks up with Kara and Trishelle. The story and associated imagery is relatable for many black girls, but not all. What about the many, little black girls who live in the burbs? Of course, these dolls can't be everything to every child. But again, the use of "authentic" is a marketing fail. The urban experience is no more "authentic" to black folks than the rural experience.

This idea of authenticity permeates the whole line - each of the dolls has an optional hair styling kit, which includes a curl spray, clip in extensions, and a curling iron.

(Pause here for a second. The dolls come with activator and a weave. Both! Even Régine on Living Single didn't go this deep and she was checking for a Chocolate Ken!)

The reactions to both the pieces raged back and forth - some people thought we should appreciate the effort, the steps taken, and the fact that a black designer created and conceived the S.I.S. project. Others thought that anything that reinforces eurocentric beauty standards is still damaging, even if it is created by another women of color.

But the strength of the reactions - both for and against the dolls - showed what's really at stake here. While some people might say that all of this attention toward Barbie is silly and misplaced, the fact is Barbie still occupies a certain, exalted place in the cultural consciousness. Even as the Barbie brand is falling out of favor, she remains a symbol of (white) femininity and desirably, and unreachable ideal that far too many girls still find imprinted on their psyches.

The truth is, we don't want to change Barbie, or Trichelle, Kara, and Grace. We want to change the culture that says we must look a certain way in order to be beautiful.

But changing a culture is difficult. And even as we grow up, and leave our Barbies behind (or decided we never liked them in the first place), the painful truth remains: we all want our beauty to be validated.

And in our own, individual way, we're trying to influence the world to do just that.

New Black Barbies Get Mixed Reviews [CNN]
Mattel Falls Short With S.I.S (So In Style) Line Black Barbies [Happy Nappy Head]
I'm Saving My Cheers For New, "Authentic" Black Barbie [Love Isn't Enough]
Barbie So In Style Stylin Hair Grace Doll [Amazon]

The confessional-style documentary, which premiered on HBO last night (schedule of upcoming screenings can be found here) follows McCabe (who narrates the film) n her quest to uncover why so many people will subject themselves to injections, surgeries, and peels to regain the appearance of youth. It is a siren song that McCabe is well aware of: At the age of 38, she reveals she has been scrutinizing her body ever since she came across her father's slides from his plastic surgery practice.

Refreshingly free of moralizing, McCabe establishes early on that she, too, struggles with the idea of aging. Setting a precedent for the rest of the film, she begins by analyzing how much money she dedicates to the pursuit of youth:

I found it amazing to watch her dollar costs unfold. McCabe, a smart woman who acknowledges up front that she is not making a wise decision, still cops to being close to $70,000 in debt, makes about $30,000 a year as a temp, yet finds $200 every six weeks to keep her gray hairs at bay.

As the viewer is reeling from the cost, McCabe says, "I may drop my health care coverage, but I'd never stop covering my gray. It may be insane, but it's the truth."

And...it is. Covering gray isn't something I am currently dealing with (and I think a silver afro would be kind of fierce), but I could completely relate to making bad financial decisions in the pursuit of beauty or fashion. How much money have I given to Zappos that could really be earning interest in my Roth IRA? Yet and still, I find myself trading long term financial security for a series of short term beauty boosts.

Looking specifically at the dollars and cents of it all, I am reminded of a series called the Cost of Beauty. PHDork examines the price women pay in pursuit of prettiness, noting:

[W]e can fairly surmise that the majority of harpies–70%–spend between $101 and $1000 per annum on beauty costs. Those numbers fit with both the mean and the median.

As to what sucks up all of those HarpyBuxx (they're not just good for abortions anymore!): our lovely, lovely tresses: 43% of expenditures go towards hair cuts, coloring, or other services. Make-up takes up another 29%. The rest:

Hair removal: 8%
Nails: 7%
Other products: 7%
Spa: 4%
Appliances: 2% [...]

A number of you expressed surprise at your spending, comparing it to X months of rent or groceries. It does add up: what else you might spend $613, or even nearly $800 a year on?

What else indeed? Most of us will never know. We're too hooked on beauty pimps and their products.

One person, who comes to illustrate how far people will go in their quest to find the surgical fountain of youth is Sherry Mecom from Texas.

(Is it just me, or does Sherry sound a lot like Ruby from the Style network?)

Sherry seems determined to use money to correct the past. She was once overweight until she had gastric bypass; she continually works on her body; and she is obsessed with the waterfalls and LG dishwashers she procures for her home. She alludes to a poor upbringing and being unhappy, but it feels like she is unsatisfied. Instead, she plans the next big purchase in her quest for a total life upgrade.

In the course of her travels, McCabe meets another daughter of a plastic surgeon - Erica Rose. However, the things that Erica has internalized about self-improvement differ dramatically from Mitch's low key messages from her father:

The quest for perfection is punishing, and not just for women. Youth Knows No Pain also reaches out to men in pursuit of camouflaging their ages. Men have their own hang ups, that just manifest differently and at an older age. The focus is more on hair transplants, face lifts, and lipo, less about botox and wrinkle creams. In an interview with New York Magazine, McCabe discusses some of the more obvious gender differences:

The women in the film were self-critical, and it was the men who were judgmental of others. What other gender differences did you notice?

We asked women why they were scared of aging, and everyone said, "Being alone. Being alone." You never heard that from men. Society is changing so much, and it's becoming more competitive and we have to stay in the workplace longer. Aging is affecting men in different ways, especially if they're in sales or something. When it comes to aging, men are concerned about being destitute, or in a nursing home. And being alone, but more in the sense of not having someone to take care of them.

However, it is interesting to note that the men seem more invested in critiquing the looks of others. While the women show a lot of competitiveness over beauty and aging (there's a great scene where McCabe asks the doctor if she has less wrinkles than one of his other, slightly obnoxious clients (cough, Mary Rambin, cough), and then cheers when he agrees), the men see no problem with informing women exactly what is wrong with them. Gary Baldassarre, one of the patients profiled, is documenting his own journey to regain his hair through a really graphic hair transplant operation. Yet, he sees no issue armchair analyzing women on television:

Another man, Norman Deesing, is an interview subject because he paid more than $50,000 to essentially look like Jack Nicholson. However, he has no qualms about turning to McCabe at some point during filming and pointing out to her that she's "let herself go [...] from the neck up." Admirably, McCabe brushes off the comment.

After the first hour of the documentary, the focus shifts a little from exploring what is happening to exploring why we seek these remedies. Who wants to go to a Botox party, being injected by a dentist who carries around the toxin in a cooler? Why do we pay so much money to distort our faces? Part of the answer lies in our need to conform to what society says is appropriate:

While most of our issues may stem from low self-esteem, "internet celebrity" Julia Allison's offhanded comment about "having an expiration date" struck hard. While she doesn't seem inclined at all to fight this idea of disposable women, it accurately summarizes the feelings of a lot of women in the documentary. They want to stay young in order to be relevant, to be seen as beautiful, to have access to society. It is this fear of obsolescence that drives the industry, which goes hand in hand with a fear of mortality. Some women, like How Not To Look Old author Charla Krupp, have acknowledged their enemy and have committed to fight literally to the death:

I laughed when I heard Dolly Parton unabashedly admit she was going to "get nipped and tucked until [she] is in a pine box," but for some reason, every time I watch this clip of Krupp, chills run up my spine. Are we really moving toward an era when it will be unacceptable to show any signs of aging?

And what happens when the potions and creams and procedures stop working?

Near the end of the documentary, McCabe sits down with Sherry. It has been three years since they first met, and Sherry went through a rough year. Sherry often uses plastic surgery as a mood boost, and after a bout with depression is actively planning her next procedures. McCabe switches between the first and third meeting to provide some insight into Sherry's development, while Sherry openly discloses her fears about not having the money to keep up the fight against time:

Youth Knows No Pain was engrossing, depressing, and thought-provoking, made even more poignant by the candid self-examination of its creator. After chronicling her memories of her father and her longtime fascination with mortality, she ends the film with an astonishing admission: after all that she's seen during filming the documentary, McCabe decided to take the plunge and start on injectables like Botox herself.

"What about spirituality? Inner peace?...Well, that didn't work." After struggling to make sense of why women subject themselves to beauty treatments instead of aging gracefully, she succumbs to the promises of younger looking skin and a small chance at cheating time.

McCabe's documentary ends with her undergoing different bizarre treatments. Watching her take a needle through the mouth in order to puff up some flesh in her cheek, I kept coming back to her opening admission: It may be insane, but it's the truth.

Youth Knows No Pain [HBO]
Youth Knows No Pain - Full Schedule [HBO]
The Cost Of Beauty, Part 1: The Research [The Pursuit of Harpyness]
The Cost Of Beauty, Part 2: The Numbers [The Pursuit of Harpyness]
The Cost of Beauty, Part 3: The Alternatives [The Pursuit of Harpyness]
Youth Knows No Pain Examines Anti-Aging Industry [New York]

Earlier: NonSociety Nincompoop Mary Rambin: Abortion Is Just Like Botox
How Not To Look Old Author Doesn't Look Old, But She Does Look Stupid

As Viv Grosken writes for The Guardian:

Under the guise of the Muffia, they started asking questions of their own. Why don't we resent the way the media portrays women? Does no one care that women are mutilating themselves with cosmetic surgery? Why do so few young women know what feminism is?

They started out dressing up to look like the beauty stereotype they decry, and then flashing hairy armpits or their merkins to freak out the folks that are staring; they also dressed up once like construction workers and scratched their balls while heckling men. But their more standard routine goes something like this.

Dressed as the Muffia, they usually stand in the street writing messages on each other's body stockings, such as "Lose a few pounds" and "Eating disorders or a society of disordered eating?" O'Brien explains that their aim is "to use our bodies on the street to generate ideas and engage with people." To this end, O'Brien also once staged a one-woman performance outside Topshop, mixing up a pink concoction and then vomiting it into a bucket, to protest against the prominence of ultra-thin models.

Sometimes, they help people think about feminism and beauty standards while other performances are watched by men that are happy to ogle a couple of attractive women in body stockings. But they say they're not particularly focused on that aspect of it.

Most of all, they want to enjoy themselves. "I feel really liberated by flashing my merkin," laughs King.

Meet The Muffia [The Guardian]

Related: The Muffia

The Olympic Committee solicited applications and received more than 5,000 from women in Beijing and Shanghai. The women were required to be between the ages of 18 and 24 and enrolled in or graduates of colleges. They also had to be between 5'5" and 5'8" and "plump but not fat" with good skin. In addition, their eyes had to be 3/10ths as long as their faces, the widths of their noses had to correspond to the lengths of their faces, and the widths of their mouths had to be coordinated with the distance between their pupils while looking straight ahead.

Once they met the physical standards, the women were trained to stand unflinchingly for several hours in heels, while balancing things on the tops of their heads and squeezing paper between their thighs, as pictured here. They had to learn how to smile while only showing eight teeth, which is accomplishing by smiling holding a chopstick positioned between their canines in front of a mirror. When they were done with that, they were asked to run 1,000 meters every day to keep their "plump but not fat" bodies in shape.

Not that the hostesses are the only eye candy for men at the Olympics — from the cheerleaders ringing the track in their white outfits and cowboy boots at the opening ceremonies to the dancers in bikinis at the beach volleyball tournaments, the Chinese want to make sure that they showcase some ideal of feminine physical perfection — and the fact that more than half of China's medals are coming from its female athletes is not, apparently, enough.

Perfect Hostesses Outclass Sexy Cheerleaders At Games [Reuters]
Sex, Sand And Shoots Raise Beijing Olympic Temperature [Breitbart]
Day 13: Chinese Women Hold Up More Than Half The Sky [People's Daily]

Probably the former. Yes, families where both parents are present in the children's lives are more stable and ultimately create a better environment for children, but Grove is implying that parents need to not only be married for children to thrive, but the man needs to be working and providing ("responsibility") for his young while the woman stays home and cares for them. Why not promote a society where single mothers can provide for their children on their own? Grove says that the Conservative government will provide a maternity nurse service for families who need help during the first days after childbirth, but there is no mention of this service being available to single mothers (or fathers) who have a newborn. An emphasis is placed on the relationship between the father and mother, implying that they are together.

And what does Grove think of women's magazines? While he condemns lad mags' presentation of a "narrow conception of beauty and a shallow approach towards women," he praises women's magazines (and their publishers) for addressing their readers "in a mature and responsible fashion." So, being obsessed with materialism, being fearful of any beauty "imperfection," and constantly being reminded that the attention of men is necessary to live a happy lifestyle is "mature"? Has this dude ever looked at a women's magazine?

Lad Mags Linked To 'Social Ills' [BBC]
'Lads Mags' Condemned Over Images Of Women [Telegraph]
Poll" Do Lad Mags Make Men Feckless? [Guardian]