
Are you woman enough? Chances are that you are not, at least according to gender expectations in the 1970’s.  With the striving desire to eliminate social and opportunity barriers, women, during the second feminist movement, stressed how this social imbalance was unhealthy for society.  In Marge Piercy’s poem, “Barbie Doll”, she emphasizes how societies unbalanced gender roles plays a devastating impact on women’s everyday lives.  In her poem, Piercy tells a story of how an ordinary and healthy young girl is affected by the embedded expectations of women.  As the girl begins to grow into a bright beautiful young woman she is verbally assaulted when a classmate of hers utters out, “You have a great big nose and fat legs” (348).  Now, if this insult were to be made to any matured female, or male, it would have no significance; however, due to societies’ expectation that every woman must be beautiful, the poor young girl decides to dismember herself by cutting off her arms and legs, which results in death.  Although being the tragedy that it is, it is quite ironic how during her open casket viewing with “the undertaker’s cosmetics painted on” and her “turned-up putty nose” how “everyone” calls her pretty (349).  This scenario bashes the idealization of women, and goes to show the totality of women’s inequality.

Though some might argue that women have their own role in society, apart from men; skills such as caregiving and organized leadership are roles that women are known for doing better men along with countless others.  Due to the unevolved gender roles, that still leave traces in modern society, women across the globe have been robbed of their full potentials, for these deeply rooted social norms practically force women to redirect their priorities to things such as beauty.  When a woman’s top priority is beauty they can easy become distracted from more important issues at hand. 

In Piercy’s poem, she illustrates how even parents follow gender expectations, for she even states how while the girl in the poem was still young she was “presented dolls that did pee-pee and miniature GE stoves and irons” (348).  This goes to show how early in childhood that females are introduced to “chores” that are socially demanded by society.  In an ideal world, there would be no such thing as a specific job dominated by a single sex.  If that were to be the case, it would result in a more diversified community. 

As the physical appearance of women became an increasingly problematic situation, change was necessary to be made.  Women would even go as far as consenting to pain to achieve beauty.  The most popular way that women can transform their looks most closely to the ideal woman is by using make up.  Make up can unbelievably change the way a female looks.  Even in “Barbie Doll”, bystanders to the young girl’s funeral bravely said, “Doesn’t she look pretty” after makeup was applied to the girl (349).  This is ironic because it is “everyone” saw a fat nose and thick legs on the girl before she passed.  

While “Barbie Doll” does stress the power of words, it also proves how serious women are about achieving this ideal beauty set on by societies standards.  It is these standards that drive the ambition of the women to be “beautiful”.  “No one becomes professional without encouragement; in a world that encourages few women” (Moran and Gornick), so rather than encouraging women to list beauty as their first priority, the community should encourage each other to succeed and to live a happy life.  

As Piercy uses a girl child as the main character in her poem to bring attention to the wrong doing toward woman in society during the 1970’s, she illustrates how devastating it can be for women to live in a society as such.  “Woman has lived, almost always, as the subordinate member of the species” (Moran and Gornick), and “Barbie Doll” is an attempt to bring some light upon the unjust society was during the second feminist movement.  After reading the poem, most audience would describe it as vulgar and inhumane, however, it was the ongoing issue of women’s worthiness that had been restricted due to cultural founding sent by our ancestors that truly was inhumane.  For how could one treat another human being with lesser respect and value just because of their gender?  Things such as these are what hold our society back from its full potential.  If people would encourage women more to do well in life rather than to dress up and look pretty, society would revolutionize and become extremely productive.  

The scene in this poem where the young boy tells the little girl that she has “a great big nose and fat legs” shows how poorly males treat females in society.  The gender roles of the 20th century were the farthest thing for tolerable.  When reading the poem and the reader stumbles across this insult, one would not think anything of it but, oh that boy is a bully.  Yet that should not be the proper response.  Before the second wave of feminism “Women were generally unwelcome in professional programs; as one medical school dean declared, "Hell yes, we have a quota...We do keep women out, when we can” (Tavaana).  Piercy screams for change through this poem, begging for society to better treat women.  

Fairness is key to a successful society.  When women were being treated as the lesser and change had not been made, it soon became a serious problem.  As Piercy reveals her frustration with the sexist issues at the time through “Barbie Doll”, she also gives off a sense of how fake people will be when face with a situation of death, even if it was their fault.  For in the poem after the little girl had committed suicide in attempt to become more beautiful, during her viewing all of the bystanders were complimenting the little girl’s physical appearance saying how beautiful she looked.  Yet how symbolic is it that how after the girl’s nose is completely reconstructed and she has make up on her face to hide the sight of her soullessness is when everyone finally thinks she is “beautiful”.  It is almost a known fact how “In 1960, the world of American women was limited in almost every respect” (Tavaana).  With that being said Piercy does a great job truly showing how much society belittled women, especially when it comes to their physical appearance.

Throughout the 20th century, the way that women were being treated was an issue that desperately needed attention.  This poem does a fantastic job of luring attention to feminism, and how important it is to change the way that society is formatted.  Even today the meaning of this poem can still be used.  Still today there are women and girls being treated poorly and made fun of because of their looks.  Therefore, people should watch what they say, to men and women, because you never know how they will handle the situation. 
