Barbie has been a staple in the American home for half a century. It is also one of the most criticized toy for her completely unrealized proportions. If Barbie were a real person she would be 7'2”, weigh 101 pounds, have a 19” waist (same as her head), would wear a size 4 dress, and would have a FF cup breast size. Because Barbie's neck is twice as long as the average human's, it would be impossible for her to hold up her head. Her legs are 50 percent longer than her arms, (the average woman's legs are only 20 percent longer than her arms). She'd also have to walk on all fours (her feet are so disproportionately small, her chest would pull her forward onto her toes). The average women's height is 5'4”, weighs 140 pounds, has a 30”-34” waist, wears a 12-14 size dress, and has a B cup breast size. This toy that has long been an icon for femininity and ideal female beauty has distorted our perception of attainable beauty for women. To look like Barbie proportionally, a healthy woman would need to add 61 cm to her height, subtract 15 cm from her waist, add 13 cm to her chest, and 8 cm to her neck length. Not only is this completely impractical and virtually unobtainable, it is also extremely unhealthy.

But Barbie, along with other pressures from the media and advertising, has continued to make its mark on girls self esteem. In a study conducted by the University of Arizona on cultural standards of beauty found that white girls painted a per portrait of their ideal body image as Barbie, 5'7” between 100 and 110 pounds, with blue eyes and long flowing hair. The white girls had a very fixed image of what beauty is. And because the girls didn't match up—as few of us do—they felt very dissatisfied and frustrated with themselves: reports anthropologist Mimi Nitcher, Ph.D., who led the three-year study of the white girls. Almost 90 percent of the white teens told the researchers they were dissatisfied with their weight. Though Barbie is not entirely responsible for white teens idea body image, the toy is reinforcing it.

Barbie has number one selling doll on the market for a long time. So her influence on body image affects almost every American girl at very early ages. Parents discover that sex stereotypes in toys begin very early in life, even before a child is walking. One Manhattan mother, who asked not to be identified, said she was extremely upset when a friend gave her year-old daughter a plastic shopping cart as a birthday present. The cart, Playskool's Steady Steps Little Walker has big pink wheels and comes with plastic groceries: a soda bottle, a milk carton and a jelly jar. It is so stereotypical of a female role, the mother said. My daughter does not need a toy that relegates her to the role of housekeeper.

Dr. Bruno Bettelheim, the widely respected child psychologist, says children do not have an innate need for certain kinds of toys, depending on their sex. I don't think it is very important for them to play with gender-stereotyped toys, Dr. Bettelheim said. Children should be free to play with whatever toys they want. Some parents say that although they would like to let their children have all kinds of toys, it is virtually impossible to buck the tide of social influences. I wanted my kids to be raised with a higher degree of consciousness, but you can't force it, said David Zaslow, the father of a 7-year-old daughter and a 4-year-old son in Ashland, Ore. I tried to get my daughter to play with G.I. Joe and my son to play with dolls. It didn't work. My daughter's favorite toy is Barbie.

Gloria Jacobs, who lives in Manhattan, said: I was one of those mothers who swore I would never buy Barbie. I didn't want my daughter to think that women had to have big breasts, long legs, slim hips. Nevertheless, thanks to birthday presents from a grandmother, her 7-year-old daughter has amassed a collection of 10 different versions of the Barbie doll, which after 30 years on the market has lost neither its beauty-queen figure nor its lofty standing in the toy popularity contest. Barbie is like a security blanket for my daughter, Ms. Jacobs said. It makes her feel that she is like everyone else, that she fits in.