Gay barbies

Let's face it: "Barbie" was going to be gay. Maybe not gay enough, according to some gays. Maybe too gay, according to anti-gays.

The fact is, this is a movie about Barbie, and wherever Barbie goes, some characteristic queerness will move, too. As a kid, I recollect wanting to be Barbie's best queer friend - I imagined we'd hold some pretty amusement sleepovers in her Dreamhouse. I also imagined some lovely fun sleepovers with Ken.

So now that "Barbie" is a splashy, pink-soaked blockbuster, director Greta Gerwig serves up a feminist fantasia in which a diverse group of Barbies, including several played by LGBTQ+ actors, reclaim their planet from their Ken-ruling counterparts. As a gay boy led into gay adulthood by strong women, I am on board with all that girl control in Gerwig's "Barbie."

I also appreciate that the film, starring Margot Robbie as the leading Barbie and Ryan Gosling as the head Ken, is complete of queer subtext that has sent right-wingers into a anti-queer meltdown because, god forbid, dolls should be for everyone. Fox News reported that a Christian news site "warns" that the film '"forgets core audience' in favor of trans agenda and gender themes."

Let them have their bigoted

How Barbie's Boyfriend Ken Became an Accidental Gay Icon

"He's always read gay," said Dan Savage, internationally renowned columnist and podcaster, in an email, "but has he ever interpret gayer than he did with a gay sex toy around his neck?"

Savage originally wrote about Earring Magic Ken in the summer of 1993, when much of the pop culture earth was having a good laugh at Mattel's lack of understanding that while little kids saw what Prince, the members of Right Said Fred or Madonna's backup dancers were wearing simply as "cool," the adult world was clued in to how gay it was.

"It was hilarious that they idea the earring was going to be the headline-making aspect of Ken's modern look," said Savage.

The doll flew off the shelves, especially since gay men, including Savage, rushed out to get a Ken doll. The kitsch factor drove Earring Magic Ken to turn into the best-selling Ken doll at the time.

We reached out to Mattel for comment multiple times — to detect out just how well the doll sold and whether it remains the No. 1 Ken, as well as for the current regime's take on this piece of corporate history — but they did not return our requests.

Tho

A doll! A doll! William wants a doll! Don’t be a sissy said his best friend Ed.

Those lines are from the song “William’s Doll,” based on the Charlotte Zolotow and William Pène du Bois book and sung by Alan Alda and Marlo Thomas on the 1972 “Free To Be You and Me” album.

Of all the songs from this groundbreaking record helping children better understand gender, race and other issues from what we today call a “woke perspective,” it is the only one whose lyrics I recall by heart.

There’s a reason: Like William, I was a boy who played with dolls.

“Barbie,” the new movie on the ― at times ― controversial doll has reminded me that I was a gay Barbie Young man in a heteronormative nature, something I did not yet know, even if through my fascination with dolls, others did. Cue outdated psychological nonsense if you want, but at home, I lived in a largely female environment, with three sisters and an older brother with autism spectrum disorder. My father was distant, and like many fathers at the time, not often home. Together with my mother and aunt, my close role models were female, the young ones playing with Barbies.

Barbie was an early agent of progress for my siblings and

Author's Personal Journey in Collecting

Source: Peter Danzig/Personal Collection

In the world of collecting, passions often run intense and defy conventional expectations. That’s a good thing, or else I don’t think I’d hold a job as a geek therapist and toy analyst. On the other hand, I also wouldn’t have found a marvelous community of toy collectors worldwide. One such fascination that has intrigued clinicians, theorists, marketing departments, and collectors alike is the affinity that some gay men have for Barbie dolls. It might seem unconventional or even paradoxical, but a closer and more affirming examination reveals a complex interplay of personal self, intersectionality, diversity, cultural influence, and psychological factors.

Nostalgia, Identity, and Representation

Let's be clear: No theory can speak for a whole population of people. Yet, after 6 years of research, podcast interviews, and consulting for toy companies and innovation departments, one thing is clear: Barbie is for everyone. For many gay men I’ve interviewed or supported in therapy, collecting Barbie dolls represents a celebration of identity and a connection to a formative part of their childhood