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Growing up, I had the requisite number of Barbie dolls. I was only 5 years old when Mattel debuted the iconic Barbie in 1959, and she was instrumental in most of my fights with my younger sister. Always in sibling competition over doll clothes, Barbie took me to exotic worlds in Life magazine and the gazillion women’s magazines that flooded my house in my childhood.
Few leaders of government were women in the early 1960s, but I innately knew that if Barbie wanted to, she could be one. With her absurd physical dimensions and a neck too tiny to properly support her head, Barbie still contained magic powers beyond my imagination.
She was a feminist before Bella Abzug taught us what the word really meant. Barbie convinced me that the world held no limitations for me even though few ceilings had been cracked and women couldn’t get a credit card or buy a house on their own.
Barbie Land was real; at least, Barbie convinced us it could be real. We knew our feet would never look like hers, but if we worked hard, we could become an airline pilot, astronaut, physicist or even a rabbi.
Still inspiring millions of kids, Barbie Land is based on ambition, determination and the belief in oneself. Barbie makes it seem so easy, happy and we can wear as much pink as we like.
Barbie refused to teach us to bald-face lie, cheat the system or ignore the law in order to win. Barbie Land is the universe opposite of Trump World.
President Barbie (all seven of them) would never stage a coup, promote storming the U.S. Capitol to stop certification of electoral votes and persuade followers to burn it all down. She would never threaten the Justice Department or rant tweet in the night about being persecuted for breaking laws.
Sure, some of us mutilated our Barbie’s hair and learned the hard way you couldn’t reattach her head, ending up with our own Weird Barbie. But not once did we covet a Dictator Barbie or even an Indictment Barbie, complete with 78 felony charges and accompanying gaggle of lawyers all named Ken.
We girls of the 1960s grew up, navigated real world patriarchy, and some of us did get elected to office. One even became vice president of the United States. It was tougher than just having perfect hair and perfect pink pantsuits. We knew that if we broke laws, we were cooked. Even those of us named Barbie didn’t get second chances, especially if we bragged about our sexual abuse grabbing or hid national classified government documents in gilded bathrooms.
Call Barbie what you want in all of her contradictions but, undeniably, she never taught her owners to lie. Or steal. Or encourage others to lie about elections. Even in Missouri.
In December 2020, 54 members of the Missouri House of Representatives, including future Speaker Rob Vescovo, signed a resolution declaring no confidence in presidential election results in the states of Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. They insisted that fraudulent votes there would change the outcome of the presidential election and that Missourians would be harmed. Many of those signers still serve in the Legislature, some now in the state Senate.
In addition to passing the resolution, they invited Rudy Giuliani, one of Trump’s former lawyers, to testify in a December 2020 Special Committee on Government Oversight hearing about fraudulent ballots that stole the presidential election.
But here’s the truth: The election wasn’t stolen.
Rudy Giuliani lied. His voter fraud allegations had already been debunked by government officials, law enforcement, judges and the media, and still he bald-faced lied in his testimony. He admitted in a court filing last week that his allegations were false — that he knew he lied.
He lied, committing perjury, according to the state witness form Giuliani signed. His Missouri comrades knew at the time that he lied. They also knew of the upcoming Jan. 6t insurrection to overthrow the U.S. Capitol, and some even skipped opening day of the 2021 Missouri Legislature to attend.
Giuliani recanted his lies about a stolen presidential election, but none of the other Missouri elected officials have. In fact, not one Missouri statewide officeholder, including both of our U.S. Senators, has stated that the 2020 presidential election was fairly won. They know the truth, but they can’t handle the truth.
Barbie Land gave us dreams but simultaneously emphasized reality and the value of telling the truth.
Nowhere in pink plastic Barbie Land has it ever advocated bald-faced lies in order to steal elections. Or will it ever. Unlike that former guy’s world.
Maybe Barbie, special counsel for the U.S. Department of Justice, has a nice ring to it, no?
Stacey Newman, a former Missouri state representative, is the executive director of ProgressWomen, a statewide social justice group focused on justice and equality issues.
