Barbie Comes to Life!!!

An African woman, is a beautiful woman, a quality woman, not a quantity woman …these are part of the lyrics to the song ‘African Woman’ by Jommenes in praise of the attributes of African women. I love this song; so don’t misunderstand me, but I find it ironical because in today’s world, the beauty of a woman is precisely determined by her quantity – the quantity of breasts, hips, posterior, tummy, the list is endless - and not any other inner attributes that she may possess.

The various body parts of a woman are considered excellent, very good, good, fair, average or lacking, depending on their sizes. It is how big or small is her posterior? How about her hips? How thick and long is her hair? What size are her breasts? Are her toes small and shapely or are they huge and blotchy? Everywhere, size and quantity are being used to appraise women and their beauty.

But of course no one admits to this. People will always give you this line, ‘For me, what matters first and foremost is the inner beauty and the inner person; you know, someone can be beautiful on the outside but inside they are nothing.’ My response to this – absolute and utter nonsense. If we actually judged people by their inner beauty, so many people would not be where they are today. It is their looks that have got them there.

While men do get judged by their looks, it is women who are the main victims. So, what is a beautiful woman and especially in our context, a beautiful African woman? Okot p’Bitek in his much acclaimed Poem, ‘The song of Lawino’ addresses this issue among the many other issues raised in this epic. The book discusses the issues facing a liberated Africa which vary from religion to culture and traditions.

Lawino’s husband, Ocol, takes on a second wife, a white woman, and seems to prefer her and her ways to Lawino, who laments her husband’s neglect and changed ways in the poem. In one part of the poem, she compares the beauty of the African woman to that of the European describing the African woman as voluptuous with thick lips so that when she kisses her beloved, he will not forget her kiss. She hits out at her rival, the European co-wife as being unhealthily thin and with thin pale lips.

While in many parts of the world, thin women with just the right amount of flesh in certain key parts are considered beautiful; this is not the case in Jamaica. In Jamaica, big is beautiful, and western ideologies of beauty do not apply there. In fact, it is claimed that some women eat chicken feed to gain weight.

However, the catch here is that you need to be light which has led to many Jamaican women getting all manner of skin conditions due to the usage of dangerous chemicals to bleach their faces. This has become such a serious issue that the Jamaican government has actually instituted a campaign against use of facial lighteners which also aims at encouraging Jamaicans to accept themselves just as they are.

Now, I understand that there is a limit to how much we can say size does not matter. Obesity is on the rise especially in the developed world; even among children. But for the majority of people, there size does not pose a health risk, maybe a fashion one.

It is unfortunate that young women are suffering from diseases such as anorexia and bulimia just to be considered beautiful when in reality there is nothing wrong with them and these are beautiful women in every sense of the word. Others are going for elective surgeries, having silicon implanted into their breasts, their hips and behinds sliced up to be reduced and liposuction on their stomachs and thighs all in the name of attaining the desired image.

As women, we need to realize that no matter how much we try, we will never look perfect to everyone. Someone will always want us to have a little bit more or a little bit less in certain areas. We must define what is beautiful to us and refuse to be forced into the box; after all, what makes the world an interesting place to live in is its diversity.

Imagine what kind of world it would be if all the women were tall and the famed shape of 36-24-36 and all the men were 6 ft tall, handsome and with a firm six pack? Where would the fun and uniqueness be? More importantly, I am genuinely worried that the Barbie doll is becoming personified by women all over the world and we may soon have a world of Barbies!