Patriarchy According to The Barbie Movie

it's hard to overstate the massive

cultural impact of the Barbie movie

Hi Barbie

Hi Ken

the film Enchanted audiences wowed critics

sparked heated debates

and made a truly obscene amount of money

at the box office

Barbie continues breaking records

with over 1 billion dollars

at the global box office

it's an impressive cultural achievement

especially considering that the film

doubles as a feature-length commercial

for a line of plastic dolls

there was however one group

who were decidedly unenthusiastic

Despite all the bubbly pink fun

the movie's become a target

of some right-wing personalities

they are preaching empowerment

by making men look weak and dumb

feminist diet tribe about the evils of

the modern patriarchy

It's a trojan horse to to teach girls

daddy is really a dummy or

domineering idiots

It's feminist garbage and

it's really about hating men

And Ken is like stupid and unlikable

This is an assault on not just Ken

but all men

If you've seen the movie

you might be confused

Because the Barbie script goes out of

it's way to show Ken

in a sympathetic light

If anything the movie might be

a little too sympathetic to Ken

"I think I owe you an apology"

"Huh?"
Now it's tempting to dismiss this

clearly performative outrage

as just another attempt to fan the flame

of the culture war

But there is something really poisonous

under-pinning this backlash

that I do think is worth taking seriously

One word in particular

seem to touch a nerve

"Well I haven't seen Barbie yet,

but I've seen people talking about

the number of times they use

the word patriarchy in it"

"Feminism and the patriarchy

and fighting it, and all that"

"And actually to call it the patriarchy

in the film that phrase is used many times"

"If you take a shot every time

Barbie says the word 'patriarchy',

you will pass out before the movie ends"

"As we learned that the use of word

'patriarchy' no less than ten times

in this film"

"The patriarchy is a big part of this

Barbie film"

"The word is used endlessly in the movie

even though most people

even me actually has no idea that

what 'patriarchy' really means"

That is a truly staggering

level of defensiveness especially

coming from people who don't really

seem to understand what the word

even means

while there are many legitimate criticisms

of the Barbie movie's feminism

or lack thereof

this video essay is not going to

address those questions

instead we're going to use the movie

as a sort of primary to help explain

what patriarchy actually is

what it isn't and how it ends up

harming everyone including men

"Watch your flank"

to have any kind of

productive conversation

we have to get over that defensiveness

that so many men feel whenever

they they come across

the word patriarchy

"this is a real hornets nest in here"

contrary to popular belief

patriarchy is not a synonym for men

nor is it a code word for masculinity

and it certainly has nothing to do with

hating men

"yeah I am confused about that"

General confusion about

what patriarchy means is perhaps

not surprising given that the word

very rarely appears in popular media

when the term has been used

it's traditionally been as a joke

to mock feminists or feminism

"let's take off our brows and burn them

in defiance of the misogynistic patriarchy"

"you know what I think

I have to meet Harvey

but um maybe we can burn

our underwear together later"

"when the last time we had a conversation

over 3 minutes it was about

the patriarchal bias of

the Mr Rogers show

well with King Friday lording it

over all the Lesser puppets

what did I miss

the oppressive patriarchal values

that dictate our education" "good"

It's only after the rise of the me too

movement that we begin to see

a shift in this pattern

"stay out of it Courtney

you stay out of it

I'm dismantling the patriarchy this year

and I'm not afraid to start with you"

These days the word is most often

written for snarky teenage characters

"So you were Guided by Lon chivalry

a tool of the patriarchy to extract

my undying gratitude?"

"mhm, you know

most people just say thank you"

it's meant to identify them as brash

rebellious or naively idealistic

though not necessarily wrong

in their observations

"I think marriage is

just a patriarchal system designed to

make women less autonomous

you become your husband's property

you have to bear his children

you even have to take his name"

hey didn't you say that prom was a

a postcolonial patriarchal construct

it is

but we would go as a group

as a form of protest

hey hey ho ho

patriarchy has got to go

hey hey ho ho

patriarchy has got to go"

even in this new limited context

the word is still delivered as a punch

"I'm jus... I mean is that it?"

and its meaning is left

intentionally vague

"it's called Little Women

and it's about four sisters

who overcome poverty and the patriarchy"

"Nope, dolls"

the lack of specificity guarantees that

only those who are already in the know

will get the joke

"Down with the patriarchy"

"Idiots ah"

everyone else is left

either bewildered or extremely threatened

"why didn't Barbie tell

me about patriarchy?"

"Which to my understanding

is where men and horses

run everything"

"I silver away"

Sorry Ken but there are no horses involved

although it does kind of make sense

why he might think that.

"that's not fair is it?"

"It's the fault of the patriarchy"

"also what is a patriarchy?"

In its modern usage

patriarchy refers to a type of society

that's constructed to promote

male power and authority

in sociological terms it's what's called

a social system rooted in

four distinct principles

a society is patriarchal to the degree

that it's male-dominated male centered

male identified and organized

around an obsession with control

we're going to go over

what all of that means in detail

but the important thing to remember

about social systems is that

we are not those systems

and those systems are not us

"Because Barbie land, is now Kenland"

So in the Barbie movie

The Kens have a coup

and Implement patriarchy

but the Kens as a group

are not patriarchy itself

"Here I'm just a dude"

The Kens make patriarchy happen

by doing it

When they stop participating

the social system effectively

ceases to exist

In the same way that we can describe

a board game and its rules

Without saying anything about the

personality of the individual players

so too can we talk about

the system of patriarchy

and how it works without condemning

every individual man

Now keep in mind that the Barbie movie

focuses mostly on Straight White characters

but patriarchy impacts people in

different ways based on their sexuality

race, class or geographical location

"Is there a problem offices?"

Moving forward in this video

I'm going to be heavily borrowing

from a book called the gender knot

by sociologist Alan G Johnson

Since the devil is in the details

let's use Kenland

"Kendom"

"Kendom"

"Kendomland"

"Land of the"
"Land of the free of the men"

"Right. Well, this place"

Let's use Kendomland to help illustrate

how patriarchy works

"I shall seek my fortune there"
"Alright"

The first characteristic of a patriarchal

society is that it's male dominated

this is relatively straightforward

all it means is that positions of authority

are generally reserved for men

Basically when you look up in

the various hierarchies of society

you'll tend to see more and more men

the Barbie movie gives us a vivid illustration

of what male dominance looks like

We are presented with a montage of images

featuring powerful and important men

It's notable that up until recently

women have largely been

excluded from these fields

"I'll take a highlight level"

"high paying job with influence, please"

"Okay you'll need at least an NBA"

Ken also learns an important lesson

when he demands to be

given a powerful position

he has unceremoniously rejected

"No I won't let you do"

"just one appendectomy"

"But I'm a man"

"But not a doctor"

"Please" "No"

This is because male dominance

does not mean that

every individual man is powerful

"I'm a man with no power"

"does that make me a woman?"

In fact most men living in patriarchy

will never acquire

a formal position of power

"This is bad this is really bad"

"What?"

Instead they'll spend their entire lives

laboring under the boot of

other more powerful men

"Are any women in charge?"

Despite what this

Mattel boardroom scene implies

It's not impossible for a woman to

ascend to the top in patriarchy

It just means it'll be much much harder

for women to gain and maintain power

and she will be tokenized and regarded as

a special exception to the rule

"I love you guys"

Unlike in the fantasy world of Barbie land

there has never been

a female president of the United States

"How come you're so amazing?"
"No comment"

"Ah ha ha ha"

But even when a woman eventually

does win that position

it will not mean that patriarchy is over

because patriarchy is a dynamic

and resilient system

It has evolved and changed

over the decades and indeed centuries

Thanks to countless women who

have fought hard for a few seats

at the table but the table

is still male-dominated

"You guys are clearly"

"not doing patriarchy very well"

"Ha ha, no, we're uh"

"We're doing it well yeah"

"We're just uh hide it better now"

The second aspect of a patriarchal society

is that it's male centered

This simply means

that the focus of attention

is primarily on men and boys

and what they do

one of the reasons Barbie land

is so visually startling is because

it's a rare vision of

a female centered world

It's something we almost never see

in Hollywood outside of

cheesy Sci-Fi movies from the 1950s

"Landing on an unknown planet"

"they are captured by long limb beauties"

"When they say take me to your leader"

"and they take them to a creature like this"

"you know they're on planet Venus"

"Hi Barbie" "Yay space"

In Barbie land the focus of attention

is naturally placed on the Barbies

and what they do

But after the coup the Kens immediately

push the Barbies aside

and put themselves and masculinity

at the center of absolutely everything

"Everything basically everything"

"Exists to expand and elevate"

"the presence of men"

This is an exaggerated reflection of

our own male centered world

All you have to do is turn on the news or

or go to the movies and you'll be inundated

with endless stories centering men

"A symbol to the nation"

"a hero to the world"

"The Beacon of Hope shining up"

Obviously this doesn't mean that

women are never centered under patriarchy

But when they are

it's often framed as a woman's story

rather than a human story

The Barbie movie for example is

very specifically a story about the

gendered experience of being
a woman in society

"Anxiety, panic attacks
and OCD sold separately"

We can contrast that

with a movie like Oppenheimer

which is a story about becoming death

the destroyer of worlds

Yes this destroyer of worlds

happens to be a man

But notice the story isn't focused on

the gendered experience of

being a man in society

In fact all of Christopher Nolan's film

center very important men

but none are about their gender

They are built as stories

representative of the

human experience (rit?) large

Greta Gerwig's movies on the other hand

all Center women and are

very explicitly about being a woman

trying to navigate a man's world

"Very well" [Inaudible]

That's not a criticism of

either director by the way

It's just a stark illustration of

what male centered means

In patriarchy men are viewed as

the default for human and

Therefore experiences are framed as

an exploration of the human condition

While women's experiences are

first and foremost framed as
being about womanhood

"Okay"

Incidentally this deep-seated
cultural expectation of male centrality

helps explain the waves of
backlash against any entertainment

that's made for a general audience
but doesn't center men or masculinity

Male identification
is a little more complicated

But it is a critical piece
of the patriarchal puzzle

It means that core cultural ideas
about what is considered

good, desirable, preferable or normal
are culturally associated with how

we think about men, manhood and masculinity

this is why professions that elevate
qualities like toughness, competitiveness

strength, control, rationality
and invulnerability are so highly valued

and highly paid in our society

"Monsters"

While occupations that revolve around
qualities thought of as feminine

like compassion,
sharing or caregiving tend to be

systematically devalued and underfunded

"You know Greg's in medicine too Larry"

"Oh really what field?"

"Uh nursing"
[Laughter]

In the Barbie movie The Ken establish
an aggressively male identified society

They do this by stripping
Barbie land of its feminine identity

and superimposing a version of hyper
masculinity that seems to have been

lifted from 1980s action movies

They replace all the pink furniture with
black leather recliners

drape everything in obnoxious
cowboy motifs and litter the landscape

with gym equipment and sporting gear

"Don't question it
just roll with, tiny baby"

"He call me baby?"

But male identification goes
much deeper than Aesthetics

when Ken decides to embrace patriarchy
his behavior shifts accordingly

as he tries to project
male identified values

"You can stay if you want
as my bride wife or my long-term"

"low commitment distance girlfriend"

He buries self-doubt and hides
his hurt feelings behind

a layer of false bravado

"Bruski beer me?"

"I will not Bruski beer you"

"Ha ha ha, that's fine"

Under patriarchy the concept of leadership
and indeed power itself

is closely identified with masculinity

It follows then that all men are
socially elevated by default

while women and feminine things
are devalued and seen as inferior

"Oh you got fries with that?"

"If I said you had a hot body
would you hold it?"

Against this means that even men
who don't hold any institutional power

can still see themselves
as superior to women

That point is underscored
when we seethat the Kens

are generally inept at running Society

"Go face day drunk right now"
[Laughter]

"(?)"

They spend their time day drinking,
playing games, and goofing off

"Every night is boy's night"

And yet they still see themselves
as superior

simply by virtue of being men
living in a patriarchy

"You're like I can't believe how great
this place is"

In Kendom land all the Barbies
are reduced to servants

"Where are my hungry boys who want snacks"

But in the real world a small number of
women can gain power

even inside of male identified systems

However in order to do so they
must prove themselves worthy

by appearing to be just as aggressive
competitive and even less emotional

Than any man in that same position

In other words even though they are women
they must adopt and perform

male identified patriarchal values

The fourth and final feature of patriarchy
is an obsession with control

as a core value around which social and
personal life are organized

Men maintain their privilege by
controlling both women and other men

who might threaten it

The Barbie movie downplays it
but men's violence against women

and the everpresent threat thereof

"Give us a smile Blondie"

is a critical element in maintaining
patriarchal control

"I'm not getting any of that I feel
that can only be described as admired"

"but not (?) and there's no
undertone of violence"

"Mine very much has an
undertone of violence"

Control can also be achieved in other ways

and since the Kens don't really
understand violence

they use coercion and manipulation
to control daily life in Barbie land

"What is wrong with them?"

"We just explain to them the immaculate
impeccable seamless gaunlet of logic"

"that is patriarchy and they crumbled"

Not the Kens take over
for every institution

they also take control of the dream houses

"This shall henceforth be known as
Ken's Mojo Dojo Kasa house"

and they manipulate the Barbies into
embracing their new status

as objectified servants

"Anyone need a Bruski beer?"

"What are you doing? You're a doctor"

I like being a helpful decoration

The illusion of intellectual
and rational superiority

is critical to enforcing the myth
that men are in control of every situation

"Let me show you"
"Here let me show you"

"Here let us show you"

and therefore deserve their
privilege status

"Now you listen to me"

This is emblematic of how men
in the real world

will often compensate for feelings of
personal inadequacy

by exercising extreme control
over those closest to them

"You are going to be home at 6:00
every night"

"and you are going to have dinner
ready on this table"

Especially women and children

"No"

"[Singing] I don't want to push you around"

Returning to the gender knot
men are assumed and expected

to be in control at all times
to be unemotional except for anger and rage

to present themselves as invulnerable,
autonomous, independent

logical, dispassionate,
knowledgeable, always right

and in command of every situation
especially those involving women

[Laughter]
"Who are you texting?"

"Huh?"
"Who are you texting?"

"No one"
"hmm let me just"

"Ken"

This obsession with control is
so strong in our culture that any man

who is perceived as not exerting enough
control over women

is likely to be ridiculed as
pussy whipped packed

or tethered to the old balling chain

Notice that there are no equivalent
derogatory terms for men

Who do control women
only for men who don't

The obsession with control manifests
in countless ways, big and small.

"We would love it, if you could just
get into that giant box."

But, control over women, their bodies
and their sexuality

is a core tenant under patriarchy

"Get in the box! you Jezebel"

Recall that the Kens take control
of the government

and use its power to actively exclude
the Barbies from civic life

"That's right. In just 48 hours
all the Kens will head to the polls"

"and vote to change the Constitution to
a government for the Kens of the Kens,"

"and by the Kens!"

Since these are children's toys
the Barbies can't reproduce

Well, aside from Midge that one time

But, the rest of the Barbies
can't have babies

but if they could the Kens
would have no doubt

curtailed their reproductive rights
just like in the real world

The social system I've just described
is very obviously oppressive to women

But while patriarchy definitely benefits men
it's paradoxically a poison chalice

because it robs men of their full humanity

"Okay here's the deal:
it's not just about how they see us"

"it's about how they see themselves"

We only have time to scratch the surface
on this topic

But embedded in Ken's story,
we can find a few hints

as to how patriarchy ends up harming men

Even though Hollywood loves to play on
themes of a war between the genders

that framing misses a critical point

because patriarchy is not
a competition between men and women

Rather, it's an endless competition
for dominance

wherein men are pitted against each other
for a place in what RW Connell calls:

the hierarchy of masculinities

The white heterosexual hyper
masculine ideal

is at the top of the hierarchy

All other forms of manhood especially
those in any way associated with

homosexuality or femininity
are pushed further down on the hierarchy

"When you're slapped you'll
take it and like it"

Recall that when the Kens go to war
it isn't against the Barbies

it's against the other Kens

"We go to war"
"Against the Barbies?"

"No, against the Kens"
"But we are the Kens"

"The other Kens"

Up until this point, I've been mining
the Barbies movie to illustrate

how patriarchy works

But the usefulness of the film's narrative
is limited

especially when it comes to
male competition

"Oh ha ha ha, looks this beach is a little
too much beach for you, Ken"

"If I wasn't severely injured,
I would beat you off right now, Ken"

" I'll beat you up with you any day, Ken"

You may remember for example,
that long before they ever discover

what patriarchy even is, Ken and Ken are
engaged in a bitter competition

over control of Barbie's
time and attention

"You can't do a flip like that' Ken"

This is where the Barbies script
is perhaps

a little too clever for its own good

Because it's many overlapping
metaphors and allegories

leave us with some mixed messages
about the Kens

the rivalry between the Kens
may work as a sort of gender flipped

commentary on how women are taught
to seek validation through male attention

"