My Weekend Crush

Look, I was never a Barbie girl. Growing up I had exactly two – Malibu Barbie and Malibu Ken. How I ended up with the least clothed of all the Barbies is beyond me. So half of my playtime with them was spent fashioning clothing out of Kleenex and Scotch tape. Also, Jesus Christ, what the fuck was wrong with her feet? To be perfectly honest, I was a Star Wars action figure girl. And since Barbie towered over those guys, she only came in handy when they were under hostile attack from an Amazonian race.

Still none of my contrarian childhood playtime nostalgia in any way dampens my excitement about what’s happening right now with the plastic toymaker. Because right now there’s an Abby Wambach Barbie. Obviously, none of this negates the unrealistic expectations that decades of physically impossible body proportions have wreaked on girls and women as a whole. But for one of the most popular toy brands in the world to create a doll in the likeness of an out lesbian athlete with an obvious alternative lifestyle haircut? Come on, that’s a Big Fucking Deal, Joe Biden. So huzzah for the first out lesbian Barbie (I mean, we all had our suspicious about Skipper, but still).



Sadly, you probably won’t find Abby Wambach Barbie on store shelves near you soon. She appears to be part of the “Shero Collection,” which was first released last year and included Ava Duvernay, Emmy Rossum and Kristin Chenoweth dolls. While those dolls were sold commercially, it appears it was in rather limited number as part of their adult collectibles line. So whenever Abby does go on sale, you’d better get your gaymo Barbie quick.

As Abby helped introduce the doll earlier this week at the Makers conference, it was an unmistakably awesome moment for little girls who maybe didn’t quite fit into the standard Barbie mold. Like Abby said herself at the unveiling, “Maybe if our doll doesn’t look exactly as you feel, here is another option.” Another option, indeed. Happy weekend, all.

EDIT: Fuck, shit, damn. It looks like Mattel is NOT making the Abby Wambach Barbie available for purchase. It was a "one-of-a-kind" doll created just for Abby herself. Wow, so basically they just wanted the publicity of being gay-inclusive without actually being gay inclusive. NOT COOL.