There’s no arguing that Barbies have improved when it comes to inclusivity, as we’re no longer only seeing the same straight-sized, blonde, white dolls that were first introduced in the late 1950s. Now, we have Barbies that are representative of different shapes, sizes, and skin tones, which is certainly a step in the right direction. However, Mattel just released its latest rendition of the iconic toy — and a lot of people are not happy with it. The reason? The black doll’s hairstyle.
Posted to Barbie’s style Instagram, the doll in question is shown wearing a half head of black cornrows and a blonde curly weave next to two white dolls wearing their hair in ponytails. “Movie night with my girls to watch the @Hulu premiere of the new @Barbie documentary,” reads the caption.
A post shared by Barbie®(@barbiestyle) on Apr 27, 2018 at 4:53pm PDT
People were very quick to comment on the photo with their feelings, most of which expressed deep frustration over the doll’s hair. “Who’s bright idea was it to style the AA Barbie’s hair like that. All of these beautiful brown women in all industries, you couldn’t find ONE to look to for hair inspiration? You need to remove her and start from scratch IMMEDIATELY!!” wrote one user. “Maybe some have worn this style but it doesn’t represent the majority,” and “the Black Barbie hairstyle is horrid,” are just a few of countless comments that derided the look.
Others didn’t seem to take issue with Black Barbie’s look. “There are other black dolls on this same page with different hairstyles that represent how folks choose to wear their hair,” one commenter said. “The hypersensitivity and the ‘ready to pop off’ is on display.”
Another user echoed the sentiment, noting that the black Barbie dolls on the Instagram page had a wide range of hairstyles representative of how some black women choose to wear their hair. “@barbiestyle [has] dolls to fit all different types of women. You act as if you have never seen a black woman wear their hair braided on the side with curls or weave on the other side. They didn’t just pull this hairstyle out the sky this is a hairstyle that some black women wear.” Though the user did note that she wasn’t particularly a fan of the color of the hair.
Still, the general consensus was negative, so time will tell if Mattel takes that into consideration in the future.
