Women have been continuously expected to look, act, and even behave in a certain feminine way in order to present themselves as, "ladies." But besides the issue of women having basic rights and ideas, they also haven't all won the genetic gene pool lottery in order to present themselves to the social standards of their society. Instead, they have to cover themselves with makeup, and materialistic objects in order to feel compelled to present themselves to the outside world. This type of self-obfuscation has been occurring in almost every culture in our world. Recently, in the 1960's, a new plastic toy came out to increase the chances of young girls to grow up and act in way to promote the social norms of the ideal woman body. Comparing the history of second wave feminism to Barbie Doll, by Marge Piercy, and by looking at Socialist Feminism by Linda Gordon, one can see that our society as a whole has changed the view of our "ideal" woman to nothing more than a plastic doll by applying the ideas reached from second wave feminism and the outcome of this movement.

The poem, Barbie Doll, by Marge Piercy puts this idea of plastic beauty into retrospect. She explains that a "girl child," was born just like any other American child, and is presented with the usual toys and extracurricular opportunities as any other, but when the girl hits puberty, another growing pre-pubescent girl tells her that she has, "a great big nose and fat legs" (line 6, Piercy). From that point on, the girl only sees her imperfections and nothing else, and continues to apologize and attempt to change something that she has no control over. People in today's society perceive Barbie as the ideal woman body at a very young age because the toy is marketed towards children, so when growing girls see their imperfections compared to the unrealistic plastic doll they begin to doubt their body image, and the other growing children surrounding them. Our unrealistic body expectations is continuing to be a growing concern with young adults, as they decide to do everything they can to look and behave as if they were a plastic doll. Even at the end of the poem, Piercy points out that the only way for a woman to have a happy ending is to warp their appearance with makeup, until the day comes when one is on her death bed and people recognize her for who she truly is. In our society, this is the norm. This type of societal stereotype is how women are expected to behave; trapped in a continuous cycle of transforming their natural form into manufactured plastic. 

In Linda Gordon's essay, "Socialist Feminism: The Legacy of the 'Second Wave,'" she reinvents the idea of women having the right to their own body. Meaning, that you are your own person and nobody can change that, only your own personal vendettas. Gordon explains that socialist feminists believe that socialist regimes were corrupt and undemocratic. Everything that has been developed because of masculine ideals are corrupt; such as militarism and environmental annihilation. But, she also breaks away and reevaluates how socialism vs. capitalism are also involved with the ultimate idea of feminism. She says, "The distinctive mark of socialist feminism was its view that autonomous structures of gender, race, and class all participated in constructing inequality and exploitation" (Gordon, 22). By that she means that everybody including all races, genders, and whether you are middle, lower, or upper class, have developed this reinforced idea of how women should behave and act. From that stand point second wave feminism was born. 

The movement referred to as second wave feminism ignited the poem, Barbie Doll, by contributing greatly to the previously mentioned idea of the perfect body. Second wave feminism, as described by Martha Rampton from The Three Waves of Feminism, was a, "concentrated effort to rid society top-to-bottom of sexism, from children's cartoons to the highest levels of government" (Rampton). The second wave feminism movement all started by the protests against the Miss American Pageant in 1968 and 1969, where a group called, "the Redstockings staged a counter pageant in which they crowned a sheep as Miss America and threw 'oppressive' feminine artifacts such as bras, girdles, high-heels, makeup and false eyelashes into the trashcan"(Rampton). The Redstockings performed the counter pageant to get the public's attention in order to become aware of this new movement and to make people aware of the perfect body image compared to the average human. This movement coincides perfectly with the Barbie toy because of its stance on natural beauty vs. society's social construct of beauty, and on reproductive and social rights. The women involved with second wave feminism saw the ideal social standards of beauty as degrading, and saw that the influence of children's toys like Barbie continued to reduce women as mere objects.

Women are human beings, and should not be idealized as having these wild expectations of beauty. The Barbie Doll toy has only inhibited this break away from the ideal woman, especially because the doll is marketed towards moldable children. By comparing the history and logistics of second wave feminism and socialist feminism to Barbie Doll by Marge Piercy, one can see that by looking from the eyes of a stereotypical white upper-class human, that women are expected to look and behave in a way to present themselves as ladies.

