There was information in the news that some adults want to take and ban the Barbie doll. “What an absurdity!” – says our regular columnist, writer and psychologist Tatiana Ogneva-Salvoni.
I didn’t have a Barbie. In that period of my childhood, when it was supposed to play with dolls, they had not yet been brought into the environment around me. I didn’t even know about them. In my 6-8 years and beyond, we played a kind of prototype of a Barbie doll – asexual smooth dolls, without emotions on their faces and even without hair. The hair was only convexly marked with a punching machine, they say, there should be a bob haircut. In general, these were good pupae for those times and very rare.
And once a tragedy happened. We with my friends and a brood of our dolls went for a walk to the playground. At some point, my toy lost a hand. I mourned for a long time my one-armed sexless bandit, and then I came with my childhood trouble to my grandfather. And he said:
– Nothing, we’ll buy a new one. Don’t cry.
– But I need exactly the same! She has a house, a car, and dresses! Only there is no handle.
– I will find! – the veteran grandfather promised and left early in the morning for the Children’s World.
Grandpa was gone for half a day. I waited impatiently. And he returned with a cloud on his brow. I shut myself up with my grandmother in the kitchen, and there his pain and his impotence, and anger, and despair began to speak. I heard out of my ear. And I felt sorry for my grandfather that he was so upset about me.
It is good that the grandfather was a carpenter from God. He carved a kind of doll’s pen out of wood, fitted it to a plastic body, and I began to sew dresses for her only with long sleeves.
Many years later, many years later, I became a mother. My son was born. I bought him a lot of toys: cars, helicopters and toy soldiers. But one of the first toys that I allegedly bought for my son was a Barbie. In a simple pink dress, with bend arms, with long legs with pink stilettos. And I knew already at the time of purchase that in fact I had not bought it for my son. And for that girl inside me with a broken doll. And probably also as a tribute to those feelings of the veteran grandfather. That is not in vain, that now you can buy any doll. Or not?
The other day, adults started talking seriously about the barbie ban. Does the doll not respect any values, imposes its own? Oh well! Then you can also ban Peppa Pig, Paw Patrol, Paulie Robocar and all monster dolls with coffins, generally created entirely according to the patterns of the aesthetics of evil. But what result will we achieve?
There is nothing easier than shifting the responsibility for raising children onto a doll, prohibiting it and putting a tick in front of the line “they took care of the moral character of the younger generation.” But to play with the kids with dolls, to teach them to create something with their own hands, to play together various life situations … this takes time, patience and an ocean of love for your child. The world of toys, after all, it reflects the existing world … Oh, these adults! They seem to be big, but they play such stupid games!