Mattel makes dolls with many different features and skin colors, which are commonly sold in the U.S.

Little girls naturally play as they see adults play.  Playing with a doll or making its clothes is normal healthy behavior.  Who cares if the doll is made of vegetable husks, rags, or plastics?

And people are resourceful and naturally seek out ways to produce goods and services--and also seek to profit from it. 

I’m surprised at how quickly something like dolls available that reflect clothing prefernces for different culture is reduced to a conspiracy theory and an attack on the free market.

I think these little girls are lucky to have dolls that appear similar to themselves so they can identify with them on a deeper level as they develop. 

Mattel makes a product people want.

... who, but Mattel, maintains that a little Muslim girl’s playing with western perpetuated mass-distributed propaganda about the American Dream, modified to be an acceptable goal to be pursued by the rest of the world, is such a beneficial contribution to her growth and maturation? - rage

LOL!

Barbie is a global whore and Mattel is her pimp. Here, these Muslim women are just telling her what to wear to lure over the locals.

I agree with rage.

The little bit of value toys really give a child’s development is debatable. Kids who grow up without toys turn out none the worse for it.

This same brand of idiot working in marketing for Mattel once encouraged slavers to sell parents real boys and girls to be used as toys for the children of wealthy white plantation owners and slave holders. The slavers called them living dolls. To make them more socially presentable for the rich plantation folks, southern mommies dressed these ‘dolls’ in their children’s cast-off clothes.

Sound any-what familiar?

“Not that I expect “rage” to read this, but it certainly has come to my attention that some people are so concerned with throwing around fifteen-dollar words in every antiestablishmental sentence that they miss the point entirely. The point of the matter is, this doll is made by a mother (NOT a Western company) who doesn’t want her little girl to begin imitating something that goes against common decency in her country. By creating this doll, she’s also opened up an opportunity for little girls who were perhaps not allowed to play with Barbies for the above reason to actually have a doll to play with. “ by Chelsea Clark on 10/15 at 11:02 am

Some Muslim mother mass produced plastic white females so her daughter could have a toy? I think NOT. All this woman has done was make doll clothes that will make mass produced plastic toy white women more presentable for little girls in Islamic culture. Mattel mass generated these dolls in China and Taiwan. So, before throwing around your nickel word defense, don’t ignore that the point here is money. Barbie is the best selling product of Mattel. Mattel is a global trader out to put its dolls in every girl’s hands. I have not missed a beat here. After all, who, but Mattel, maintains that a little Muslim girl’s playing with western perpetuated mass-distributed propaganda about the American Dream modified to be an acceptable goal to be pursued by the rest of the world is such a beneficial contribution to her growth and maturation?

Say what you will, Chelsea, but these Mattel-made globally marketed idolatrous plastic icons of white American femininity are little more than a money maker for everyone involved with getting them onto the minds of ALL girls. This Mattel trademarked product is not the cottage industry of Muslim mothers, who, YES, are very offended by the media-warped perceptions of womanhood in American culture these coy and crass idols represent. These Muslims mothers are covering up a contemporary western image of womanhood they don’t want pervading their indigenous culture and society, even though they want what little monetary benefits everyone hopes to continue to enjoy from selling this Mattel Free Market trade agreement product. This is not about a child’s toy. It’s about cost and profit. What does this product cost a targeted society? Who stands to profit? Seriously, with what toys did little Muslim girls play before Mattel targeted them as a lucretive foreign market for sales of Muslim Make-Over Barbie?

As I understand it, it’s not “the globalist Mattel” that is making and distributing these dolls. They’re being made by a concerned Muslim mother.

I admit, when I first read about these dolls, I was skeptical about how they could be interesting or, even, very pretty with such modest clothing. However, after watching a news clip of Sukmawati Suryaman making her dolls and seeing some pictures of the vibrant, well-made, beautifully colorful dresses, I changed my mind.

And what, indeed, “is this Muslim makeover of an American icon” really telling little girls? Has anybody considered that it might be telling them that their traditional clothing can be pretty, too? They can be beautiful and modest. They don’t need crop tops and boy shorts to be attractive.

Not that I expect “rage” to read this, but it certainly has come to my attention that some people are so concerned with throwing around fifteen-dollar words in every antiestablishmental sentence that they miss the point entirely. The point of the matter is, this doll is made by a mother (NOT a Western company) who doesn’t want her little girl to begin imitating something that goes against common decency in her country. By creating this doll, she’s also opened up an opportunity for little girls who were perhaps not allowed to play with Barbies for the above reason to actually have a doll to play with.

I have no objection for a girl under the age of twelve to play with dolls. However, I do object to a woman over the age of twelve playing with dolls. How would it look if a grown man was playing in the dirt with a toy truck and he looked underneath the truck?

I really like this idea.  I was one of the first girls to have a Barbie doll.  My mother wouldn’t buy me one, so I earned the money by doing extra chores for neighbors, like raking leaves.

Back then, everyone in my neighborhood sewed, and I (with my mother’s help) made all sorts of outfits for her and my little friends and I created all sorts of make-believe vignettes.  One friend had the Barbie bed and game, and she shared her toys with me.  I absolutely loved the old Barbie game!

I passed Barbie on to a younger relative, and about 5 years ago, she actually mailed Barbie back to me--in almost mint condition!

I never noticed her shape, really, although when I was around 13, my friend started keeping her Barbie doll in the Barbie bed with a Ken doll and we laughed and laughed at the pure naughtiness of it!

Normal little humans.  Great memories.

This break into the Islamic toy market by the globalist Mattel just seems absurd and obtuse to me. It’s so culturally unfeasible. Barbie wasn’t originally intended to be a toy for American girls. It was more the outrageous aspiration of glamor, success, and physical beauty a handful of powerful European American males decided every woman in the free world had to strive to become to assure their personal entitlement of wealth and happiness. This coy and facetious idiocy of the cult of Barbie is, while all too reflective of the illusive shell game we herald as the American Dream, is delusional. Furthermore, the surreal pretense of Barbie does not translate further than an offense to other cultures where womanhood is viewed and esteemed differently.

What toys did little Muslim girls play with before proselytizing this liberated icon of modern American womanhood from westernized humanistic rationalism into the Muslim faith and Asian culture? What is this Muslim makeover of an American icon really telling Muslim little girls about themselves and girls from other belief systems and world views?

Awesome idea!  I have no doubt they will sell at least 3-5 of these.