Doll has no curves, fans are clearly not happy about it

Aug 9, 2010 19:11 GMT  ·  By

Christina Hendricks is a gorgeous woman now being hailed as an ideal for all ladies out there. A size 14, the star eats healthy, works out but obstinately refuses to diet, for which reason she can boast stunning curves, unlike other actresses who choose to starve themselves into a size 0. Mattel has clearly missed the point on this one, releasing a doll that looks nothing like Joan on “Mad Men,” as the Daily Mail points out.

The red-haired actress has often spoken against the Hollywood trend that tells women they can only be deemed good looking if they’re a size 0 – or a 2, at the most. Though she too was once a model, Christina says she has recently discovered there’s beauty in curves and she has come to be held as a role model for all women ever since. The British minister of equality, for instance, was just recently saying that ladies should aspire to an hourglass, size 14 figure like Christina’s.

Mattel either didn’t get this or it’s deliberately not paying attention to what is being said right now, the Mail says. To customers and dieticians’ outrage, the Barbie maker has come out with a doll that looks nothing like Christina’s character on the television series, except for the fact that it has red hair and a superb taste in fashion. All the curves are gone, the breasts are small and the hips are rather boyish, which means the doll is very close to a size 0 – precisely the opposite of Joan.

“[Equality minister] Lynne Featherstone is absolutely right to highlight Miss Hendricks as an example of a perfectly healthy body shape and weight, and she looks stunning. There is no reason a size 14 can’t be healthy and attractive, so it’s sad and alarming that toy manufacturers can’t represent this. When young girls aspire to look like magazine photographs, or in this case toys, they are trying to achieve the impossible because the images have been heavily airbrushed,” dietician Sion Porter, an expert in healthy eating at the British Dietetic Association, says for the Mail.

Porter is not the only one to express disappointment in the new Mattel doll, as countless voices are saying online that the company should stay true to Joan and Christina Hendricks, and make the doll with curves. Yet Mattel does have a good excuse: “The Mad Men dolls are styled to capture the aesthetics of the show,” a spokesperson says. That is to say, this is fashion we’re talking about, and not curves.

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