"Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds...
I’m writing this on July 4, 2023, the 247th birthday of the United States. In the overall scheme and vastness of world history, that’s still pretty young. We are but mere adolescents on the world stage, at least when compared to more established nations like, well… pretty much every other country except for South Sudan.
As I scroll the headlines, it occurs to me that we are indeed acting our childish age. A feeling of dread starts to overcome me as I see the same story over and over and over, ad nauseum. It is prima facie evidence of how divided we are in this nation and how if headlines like these keep piling up, we are doomed.
I am, of course, talking about the unceasing, every-day, every-hour, every-minute mind-numbing, soul-crushing drumbeat of…
…the Barbie movie.
Regardless of how little you care about this coming cinematic travesty, you are exposed to its toxic fallout. If all you read is foreign policy white papers from obscure think-tanks and “Beowulf” in its original Old English, you’ll find something about “Barbie” somewhere:
- “Putin invaded Ukraine because he was desperate to keep ‘Barbie’ from infiltrating Russia through the Ukraine border.”
- “Beowulf comes to aid Hrothgar not to protect the Danes from Grendel, but to keep the mother-f-ing Barbie movie out of Denmark.”
You think I jest?
I do not subscribe to, frequent, seek-out, curiously gaze at or in any way engage with any news source that deals in pop culture or entertainment or celebrity news. It’s not that I am above it all, but rather my brain is finite and there are a finite number of hours in each day, and I have to triage the type of content I choose to absorb. (Cat videos still, after about two decades, occupy most of my brain and time.)
Despite my concerted efforts to avoid any news source that might consider writing about “Barbie: The Movie”, it is unavoidable, like Harry and Meghan but far more pernicious (but, possibly, more interesting.)
Take this story, for example: “Barbie” has been banned in Vietnam due to some kind of kerfuffle between Vietnam and China over territorial claims in the South China Sea. Apparently, the movie has a scene with a map to which Vietnam objects. Not kidding.
The sheer volume of news stories about “Barbie” is confirmation that this country is divided along pro-Barbie/anti-Barbie fault lines.
But when you pull the lens back a bit, the picture becomes even more dire. To wit: If World War III breaks out between China and Vietnam, whose side are we (the U.S.A.) on? I mean, we have some serious beefs with China right now, but Vietnam is dissing Barbie – third only to McDonald’s and the U.S. dollar as symbols of our mighty awesomeness.
As a result, the U.S. is forced to throw in with China to defend Barbie’s honor. Well, Russia is not going to like that much, so Putin installs missile silos in Hanoi, which gets India riled up enough to join the U.S./Sino Alliance, which immediately forces Pakistan, longtime India disliker, to join the Russo/Viet Axis.
Germany, never one to miss an opportunity (they started I & II, so they’re not sitting out number III!) invades France, which immediately surrenders but at least they (the French) get to see a dubbed version of “Barbie” in French sometime during their 22-week annual holiday, at least until the Germans ban it.
This is just one scenario that plays out in which Barbie destroys the world and looks great doing it. I am sure the military and policy wonks at DoD and State are right now huddling with the CIA to game out other scenarios in which the world ends in a pink polka dot mushroom cloud. Let’s hope the Barbie dream house has a fallout shelter and enough freeze-dried MREs and condoms for Barbie and Ken to wait out Armageddon. (Actually, as I recall from my sisters’ dolls, condoms are optional and tragically superfluous given Ken’s anatomy.)
So, America: I implore all of us to take stock in what we have wrought. In our never-ending effort to spread our adolescent culture throughout the globe, we may very well have lit the fuse that not only ends American cultural hegemony but leaves us all foraging for berries and small rodents in a post-nuclear Barbie hellscape.
Maybe skip the movie and head to a bookstore or a library.
Or YouTube. Because after the end of it all, there will be cats.