With ‘Barbie’ reaching $1 billion at the worldwide box office, becoming this year’s biggest blockbuster hit is certainly within reach. Girls from all around the world have come together, wearing their best pink outfits to the cinemas and greeting each other with a cheery “Hi, Barbie!” in a display of what true womanhood is about—our shared experiences bringing us together. But not everyone was enamored with the pink-clad doll. Among them is Piers Morgan, whose claim that the new Barbie movie’s portrayal of Ken is “an assault on not just Ken, but all men” only further propagates the outrage surrounding this film. He argues that, in comparison to all the Barbies, who are seen to take on prominent roles in Barbie Land and have distinct personalities of their own, the Kens seem to operate as mere accessories to them. For this, he reasons that the movie encourages an anti-men narrative and is, in fact, a showcase of misandry rather than feminism. Yet anyone who made the effort to watch the film with an open mind would realize that Barbie is by no means anti-men but rather the complete opposite.
The beginning of the movie depicts Barbie Land as a predominantly female-led society, where the men seem to be “just Ken.” The Barbies hold all major positions of power and have great influence over every aspect of their society, while the Kens simply have ‘beach’ as their occupation. When the two first arrive in the real world, however, they are greeted with a society that flips everything they know to be true upside-down. Ken quickly realizes that, here, it is the men who have the authority and respect that only the Barbies were subjected to in Barbie Land. While Barbie is forced to face the harsh reality that women face in this world, Ken relishes in his newfound discovery of how the patriarchy operates. By highlighting the inequality present in both worlds, wherein one gender is always left unhappy and taken advantage of as the other thrives and flourishes, the film draws attention to how flawed it is to believe that things would be better if the roles were reversed in our world.
Despite what some may believe, Ken was never meant to be the villain of the movie; his redemption in the end is proof of this. Even after destroying Barbie’s home and taking everything dear to her, she never holds it against him, even when most might have expected her to. The film acknowledges Ken’s desire to have an identity of his own outside of being Barbie’s boyfriend, just as Barbie did. He simply went about it in the wrong way. Barbie’s empathy and forgiveness were the catalysts in Ken’s embarking on his journey of self-discovery. Whether it was in Barbie Land, the real world, or even Kendom, the systems set in place are seen to be flawed and unfavorable for at least one gender.
One might argue that, yes, the Barbie movie is an attack on all men—just not in the way others might think. The film attacks their misogynistic views of thinking and forces them to open their eyes to the reality every woman must face. It attacks the idea that only women suffer from the patriarchal system in our society. As Matt Bernstein put it, “While showing how patriarchy hurts women, the movie also explicitly argues that men deserve better than to derive from rigid, nonsensical performances of masculinity.” It is only when we realize that everyone, not just women, can be victims of misogynistic ideals that we can take the necessary steps to abolish a system that inescapably benefits no one.
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