Berry, Berry Troubling

So, as you can see, the latest toy from my girlhood, Strawberry Shortcake, has gone through the equivalent of Stacy and Clinton's three-way mirror and come out looking a little more like Hillary Duff than Raggedy Ann. At least she doesn't have cleavage, I suppose (I'm not sure whether her hair still smells like strawberries -- or strawberry Crush, which is what it really smelled like -- but I would be very disappointed if it didn't). Her cat has been replaced by a cellphone because of course, we should be teaching our 4-year-old daughters the importance of being in constant contact with the rest of the world at the earliest age possible. Modern, indeed.

There is something ultimately icky about this, in my opinion, though: We're talking about a doll who NO ONE thought of actually emulating when we had her as kids. She was a cute little mini-figure -- a nice alternative to Barbie who could hang out next to my Smurf figurines -- as I suggested, a 1980s rag doll/Raggedy Ann/funny looking little girl who lived in a fantasy world. She played with a friend whose hair smelled like apples and rode around on a giant turtle (oh, Tea-Time Turtle, what will they do with you? Turn you into a purse dog?). 

Marketers apparently have decided that she would be more appealing in the new millennium if she is dressed in clothing that little girls might actually want to wear and talking on a cell phone that little girls might actually want to talk on, too. So really, the fantasy world is gone and we're left with a product that looks and acts like a real little girl. 

Get it now? This isn't about modernization of a nostalgia product. It's about marketing to girls who are younger and younger in order to get them to literally buy into their role as a consumer at the earliest age possible. (By the way, I fully expect agencies to come up with a way to target beauty products at fetuses within the next few years.) 

I know, I know. Some people out there would say that I am going to be the meanest mom alive if I don't get my little girl the new Strawberry Shortcake doll (or Bratz, or Barbie, for that matter), and what other options do we have for dolls anyway? Nothing is realistic, after all. I really do think that we have the power to stand up to this blatant product whoring to children, and I do think that we can turn against images that portray little girls (and dolls) as sexualized, adult, cell-phone-addicted mini-women. Just don't buy (into) it.