how many things are wrong with Sports Illustrated’s Barbie swimsuit cover?

Wed, Feb 12, 2014

The magazine that long ago decided that ogling women in skimpy swimsuits counts as a sport has found a new way to reduce women to objects:

That is ~~the real~~ a promotional alternative cover for Sports Illustrated’s annual swimsuit issue, out next week.

Just two of the kinds of awful this encompasses:

• a Barbie doll is interchangeable with an actual human woman
• a children’s toy has been sexed up

How many others can you come up with? It’s fun, try it!

Think SI will put a Ken doll on the cover of an upcoming issue, as stand-in for a male human being? No, me neither.

Via The New York Times.

share and enjoy

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Hank Graham

Wed, Feb 12, 2014 5:40pm

Well, it does rather undercut Sports Illustrated’s claims that they’re not interested in turning women into objects.

Seriously, though, I think what we have here is just some misogynistic trolling and frankly, I’ve seen better.

bronxbee

Wed, Feb 12, 2014 6:20pm

“The Doll That Started It All”… both vague and ominous. Started what? What “all’? Covers of magazines with unclad women that have nothing to do with sports, or whatever else the subject of (any) magazine is?

MaryAnn Johanson

reply to bronxbee

Wed, Feb 12, 2014 6:51pm

Um, the doll that turned women into pieces of plastic AND kicked off the sexualization of little girls?

Hooray.

Danielm80

reply to bronxbee

Wed, Feb 12, 2014 7:21pm

We’ve got objectification of women, product placement, and a publisher that values sales more than content. It’s everything I hate about America on one magazine cover.

Danielm80

Wed, Feb 12, 2014 6:50pm

Here’s what Nerissa Nields said about Barbie (or “Barbi,” for legal purposes):

I think that I shall never see

A woman as lovely as Barbi

Barbi, with her ski jump nose

Standing tall on tiny toes

Impossible boobs that will not droop

To conquer Kenn, she need not stoop

If she were mortal, she would be

Six foot five and a hundred and three

She’s so tall, I could not feel shorter;

Small wonder I have an eating disorder

She sleeps in her camper next to my bed

With visions of traveling filling her head

She wishes she could sing like me

But she can’t.

Her mouth is painted on.

And her eyes won’t shut

And she never bleeds

And she never cuts

And she cannot read or count or cry

And she’ll never age

And she’ll never die

And I think that I don’t want to be

Staring straight ahead for all eternity.