Barbie's House of Horrors

Barbie has long been criticized for setting unrealistic beauty standards, and rightly so. Few women are 11.5 inches tall and made of plastic. The one area where Barbie has gotten a free pass, however, is with her accessories. Throughout the course of her seventy-two different careers (Job hop much?), she amassed quite the real estate portfolio. She has dream houses and campers and horse farms and secret underground nuclear bunkers. (The latter was from the brief but unsuccessful Barbie-G.I. Joe merger, which led to the eventual release of Divorce Attorney Stacie and Deadbeat Dad Snake Eyes). But have you ever taken a closer look at those properties? They’re an abomination of building code violations and bad taste. Barbie won’t lead young girls astray with her dysmorphic body proportions; she’ll do it with her crimes against architecture. After taking a closer look at my own daughters’ Barbie “dream” house, I was devastated by what I saw—and by what it means for young women everywhere. Without further ado, here’s a tour of Barbie’s house of horrors. Note that’s “horrors” with an “h”. The one with a “w” would lead to a very different Barbie article.

Bathroom

Let’s start with the downstairs half bath, since the blueprints for this Barbie house are only fit to be used as toilet paper. Too bad you can’t flush them here. That’s right: There’s no toilet. Since I’ve never seen Barbie’s Dream Outhouse playset, I can only assume that Barbie doesn’t go to the bathroom. What a terrible message for young girls. They’ll grow up thinking real women don’t poop, which will turn them into ticking turd time bombs. You do NOT want to be around when they finally go boom. The dream house bathroom still has a sink and a mirror, though, so Barbie can do her hair and makeup. She might explode in a catastrophic fecal detonation, but at least she’ll look her best before she does. Priorities.

Another flaw with this particular bathroom is that there’s a car in it. I can’t blame my kids for their confusion. With no toilet, what else are they supposed to think it’s for? Might as well park a convertible in it. Needless to say, a bathroom should not be used as a garage. Tire marks and oil leaks will ruin the tile. Also, the first time you turn the key in the ignition, everyone in the house will die from carbon monoxide poisoning. That’s what would happen in a normal house, anyway, if my kids tried to imitate what they learned from Barbie. Barbie’s house, however, is well ventilated because it only has three walls. I’d hate to think of what she had to do to the building inspector to get him to sign off on that. Check out Barbie’s Secret Backyard Cemetery, now with pink shovel accessory. Her rule breaking is my loss. I’m worried that kids will grow up and ask their perplexed realtors how they’re supposed to fit a full-sized sedan through a thirty-six inch doorway. Barbie’s unrealistic standards strike again.

Kitchen