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| Yes | 42% | 147 votes | Total: 348 votes | |
| No | 58% | 201 votes |
Yes
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Add to FavoritesI first encountered Bratz Kidz many moons ago, when my female companion and I did our late night loitering routine at Wally World (that's Wal-Mart for those of you not up with the hip lingo.) We had a shared affinity for checking out the dolls, goggling at the Barbies, critiquing them based on their dress and overall manner, and cracking jokes on the baby dolls that either happened to be really ugly or just out right creepy. Seriously, some dolls belong in a Stephen King movie, not on children's aisle shelves. And so it was that my late-night partner-in-crime exclaimed, "OH MY GOD! You've got to come look at this!"
To my surprise, it was a cardboard baby riding a plastic banana inside of a clear box that read "Bratz Babyz! Sweet Seat." We were both quite in utter disbelief: The little blond darling had one hand up in the air, her legs spread with the other hand resting snugly between her inner thighs, on top of this half peeled banana. And what was this? A bit of the peeling still resided at the tip of the exposed fruit; this "Sweet Seat" was very allusive to a man's genitalia.
The full sized Bratz Dolls I've never really had a problem with. Sure their style of dress teetered on the side of a bimbo, copycatting Paris Hilton with their dog-in-a-hand-bag slung over their shoulder, and their giant heads being very disproportionate to their bodies compared to even the zaniest of Japanese characters, but my word, they never displayed them in a manner such as these Bratz Babyz. Comparatively, the older counterparts are quite conservative. At least the Babyz line had one thing going for them: given their small stature, their heads definitely sat more proportionate on their neck.
So who was this product for? Certainly not for kids. These dolls and their accessories had to be for adults. They resembled too much the Japanese fetish dolls collectible statues based on popular animated women from pornographic shows and PC dating games, that grown men have been known to idolize and even, to put it moderately, let loose on (don't believe me? Look it up on Google.) And who is responsible? With their skimpily clad bodies and sexually provocative poses, I half expect the same offenders behind the controversial, now defunct, Non-Nude child model sites to be behind this phenomenon.
No, Bratz Babyz are more up the alley of porn tycoons and child molesters. Certainly, never would I suggest its consumption by children. I'd sooner give a Kewpie doll to a child than that. And maybe I'm over-reacting. The Chuck Jones Looney-Tunes were very much ridden with innunendos, such as his classic grownup version of Little Red Riding hood, with her low-cut dress and affinity for showing some skin. However, come to think of it, Chuck admitted his cartoons were made mostly for his own laughs, and it's quite well known that most early animation was made to entertain the older crowd. These toys, these Bratz, on the other hand are explicitly marketed towards children. Mortifying, isn't it?
In the end, my female companion and I found it all so very funny. I'm sorry, but we couldn't help but laugh. However, we did fearfully acknowledge the lingering question of, "how will these toy's young owners turn out?" Only time will tell.
Learn more about this author, Jason Payne.
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No
Bratz dolls aren't particularly positive toys for girls, and Bratz Kids aren't any better (in fact they're probably worse, because they are aimed at younger girls)
To see the less-than-positive impact Bratz dolls can have, consider other dolls:
Most dolls designed for very little girls are baby dolls and little-girl dolls. They have sweet faces that mimic the faces of babies and small children, and when young children play with the dolls they practice important nurturing skills that can usually only be practiced through doll play.
Life-like baby and little-girl dolls invite real-life little girls to pretend to feed their "children", dress them, bathe them, and take them for rides. Pretend children (dolls) get to have birthday parties, go to school, and play with other pretend children. When little girls play "Mommy" and "Teacher" or "Tea Party Companion" they are feeling positive emotions and using their imaginations. When girls play with dolls they're also imagining what they may be like when they grow up and have real babies.
There is even something very nice about the feeling a little girl has when she is admiring how cute her doll looks in an outfit or imagining what a nice little girl her doll is. Thinking about how nice it is to be a nice little girl can lead little girls to think about being nice in general, and to think about what makes anyone nice. Whether a little girl imagines being a wonderful mother to her "baby", or gets practice scolding her pretend child for some pretend misdeed, a child gets to sort out a lot ideas about right and wrong, good and bad, and learning and teaching when she plays with her dolls.
The experience that little girls have when they're playing with their dolls is a positive and enriching one.
When girls outgrow baby dolls (and sometimes before) they will usually graduate to Barbie dolls (or dolls that are similar). No longer concentrating on nurturing and playing "Mommy", girls begin to enjoy the appeal of fashion. More importantly, they get to imagine life as a grown-up girl. Through imagining girls again get to process any number of ideas related to life as a grown-up girl. Although Barbie has had the occasional outfit found too sexy by most mothers, the Barbie doll, in general, portrays a wholesome image.
When I was researching an article on Barbie dolls I actually ran into studies that mentioned that there are a number of girls who hate Barbie because of Barbie's "perfect" image and pink-sweet accessories; but having some girls hate Barbie's perfect and wholesome image doesn't make Barbie's image any less positive.
The study to which I refer was conducted on college-aged young women, and it revealed that plenty of young girls hated Barbie and even enjoyed "torturing" the doll. Still, the Barbie doll was not designed in a way to discourage girls from being kind and nice. If Barbie's wholesome and perfect image inspires hatred and meanness in some girls the root of the problem is not in the doll's design.
As with earlier doll play, girls who love Barbie get to grow through imagining the things that Barbie does. (My Barbie dolls were a group of the closest friends, and once they had all lived through enough shopping, beach parties, and proms; the single friends got to share in "Blond Barbie's" wedding, move to a new home, and baby (the outfit, "Barbie Babysits" came with an adorable baby that looked just like "Blond Barbie"). Girls get to imagine Barbie doing anything - and in doing so, they are realizing what the options are for all young girls.
Bratz dolls ("regular" or Kids) evoke a different set of emotions. Their somewhat grotesque style and exaggerated features don't evoke nurturing instincts or dreams about what girls can be.
The name, itself, sends the message that these aren't particularly nice girls - grown up or kids. Bratz dolls are, for the most part, the "anti-Barbie" (and now the "anti-Barbie's Little Sister"). Born, presumably, to be marketed to parents and girls who find the sweeter image of more traditional dolls less than appealing, Bratz dolls' image is "cool", non-traditional, and not the least bit sweet.
Perhaps their manufacturers understand something about today's children and parents, because, after all, the dolls are popular. We live in a time when "nice" and "sweet" are no longer fashionable. Being "cool", appreciating "cool", and aspiring to be "cool" are what many girls and their parents favor today. Who wants the same old kind of dolls when there are these new, different, and more contemporary dolls?
The trouble is that the type of doll girls have can alter the kind of play in which they engage. A doll I was given as a child can be an example. When I was a kid an aunt, known for never taking life too seriously, gave my cousin and me each shirts that came with dolls. The dolls wore striped dresses that matched the striped shirts with which they came. These dolls were made like a large, baby squeak-toy; and they had angry eyebrows and were clearly supposed to be fresh little girls.
Since they weren't like the sweet-faced dolls we were used to, we didn't quite know how to play with these unconventional dolls. For the most part we didn't play with them until one night, during a sleepover, my cousin and I got the idea of putting the "fresh" dolls in a blanket, stretching the blanket between the two beds in the room, and tossing them up so they would crash into the ceiling. Ordinarily very kind and sensitive little girls (believe it or not), my cousin and I couldn't stop laughing, as the "mean-faced" dolls crashed into the ceiling and then onto the floor. I was a little girl who never mistreated dolls or stuffed animals. I was the kind who always kept them dressed, always put coats or blankets on them if I took them out in cold weather, and never left any of them lying face-down anywhere. To this day, I'm still the kind of person who picks up stuffed animals from store floors. The only time in my life when I found joy in being rough with a doll was that time when my cousin and I saw no reason to be nice to the mean-faced dolls.
My point is if a child like I was could be "inspired" to treat that "fresh" doll differently, chances are that Bratz dolls (maybe to a lesser extent) have a similar effect on the way today's girls play with them (and think while they are playing with them).
Not long ago a lost picture of Helen Keller and Ann Sullivan was discovered. It is believed to be the earliest picture found of Helen to date. In it she is eight years old. In the picture Helen looks like a classic Victorian girl, as she holds on her lap the doll made famous in the story, "The Miracle Worker." The doll Helen treasured - like Helen - is dressed in classic Victorian clothing. Even a child who cannot see or hear can form that fundamental attachment of, and interest in, a treasured doll. That much is in the nature of both girls and dolls.
Dolls, their hairstyles, and their clothing have changed over the course of time. Today most Victorian dolls remain collectors' dolls, while little girls play with dolls that more resemble the style of today's little girls. As we often ask if life imitates art or art imitates life, we could ask if dolls imitate life or life imitates dolls. Over the decades since I played with little-girl dolls, doll fashions have changed but their image of being a sweet baby or nice little girl has not - not until Bratz showed up.
Bratz dolls came along as new and different and a little edgy. "Edgy" is fine in art, but it may not be the best thing in dolls. Bratz kids have come along, which means that the littlest of girls need not be left out. Bratz dolls - in all their contemporary "coolness" - aren't like plain, old, dolls of the past. It may not matter whether dolls imitate life or life imitates dolls. Either way, the Bratz phenomenon is probably not a positive one. Bratz Kids just mean there's more Bratz for more and younger kids, and more of anything that moves young children away from the positive things conventional dolls have always offered is not a good thing.
Learn more about this author, Lisa H Warren.
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