Franklin suggested that we post about some points people are making about Dora the Explorer’s makeover.  Originally drawn like this…

…Dora has been re-envisioned and now looks like this:

Wicked Anomie writes:

The producers insist that the new tween Dora will still be like the old one in personality and interests. Just more fashionable, with ballet flats, long hair, jewelry, and makeup. And she wears a dress. Not the choicest attire for galavanting in the woods going on adventures, but hey…

I asked my six-year old daughter what she thought of the new Dora. She likes her better. Why?

“Well, I like that her hair is longer, and she’s wearing a dress. And a necklace. And I like her shoes. And that other one, she’s fat in her belly and her clothes don’t fit right. I don’t like her shoes, either. And her hair’s all short and she doesn’t have a necklace.”

Gwen and I, however, are not surprised at this new feminized Dora.  About a year ago we were in Toys ‘R Us in Henderson, NV, and were so struck by the Dora the Explorer toys that we took pictures of every single one of them.  Almost all of them feature feminized activities such as cooking, taking care of babies, and fashion and accessories.  There are 15 images so I’ve put them after the jump:

Dora pink music player and cellphone to style:

Dora Jumbo Activity Floor Pad:

Dora’s Dress & Style Surfer and Birthday outfits:

Dress and Style Dora with an “aDORAble younger look!”:

Dora’s Doll Stroller so you can be “Just like a real mommy!”:

Dora’s Shopping Cart:

Dora’s Talking House:

Dora’s Adventure Dress Up Trunk:

Chef Dora’s Kitchen:

Big Sister Dora takes care of babies:

Dora’s talking cash register:

Dora’s Pet Vet Set:

Let’s Get Ready Jewelry Box:

Making Tacos Play Food Set:

Banana Split Sundae Play Food Set:

Let’s Get Ready Vanity:

A purse for Dora:

Dora and Ginger, her pony:

If the toys at Toys R’ Us are any indication, except for “Exploring New Looks,” Dora hasn’t been doing much exploring for quite a long time.

See also our post on Strawberry Shortcake’s and Holly Hobbie’s makeover.

These clothing ads from 1928, featured on Jezebel, portray an ideal female form that is wildly different than the one we have today.  Note the straight lines (no hips or boobs) and very short hair cuts:

I also like how the first image reads “Summer 1928 Apparel.”   Seasonal fashion, it appears, is nothing new.

In the Girl and Boy Scouts, merit badges represent the acquisition of skills and knowledge.  Artist Mary Yaeger tries to draw attention to the skills and knowledge that girls and women in America aquire, whether they be scouts or not, with her own set of embroidered merit badges. They feature things like tolerating menstrual cramps, shaving armpits, taking the birth control pill, suffering through gyn exams, using mascara and lipstick, learning how to walk in high heels, wearing sexy underwear, and more.

The project nicely reminds us that women have to work hard to appear properly feminine, as well as the unique things we experience as women.

Via Jezebel.

The Guardian is now making all of the data it uses in its stories available for free online. You can browse their data on subjects as wide ranging as imports and exports of plastic bags, reported amounts of exercise, and the best selling singles of 2008 at their Data Store. As one example, I’ve pasted in 20 government financial bail outs as a percentage of their GDP:

Women of color rarely grace the covers of fashion magazines like Vogue.  And yet, for the second time this year, the Vogue cover features a woman of color, Beyonce.  Unfortunately, in line with cultural stereotypes, the issue is the “Shape Issue,” contributing to the stereotype of Black women, and Latina women too, as especially “curvy.”  We document the fetishization of black women’s behinds here.

This month, Beyonce’s cover includes stories entitled:

Fashion for Every Figure: Size 0 to Size 20

Real Women Have Curves: Beyonce at Her Best

NIP/TUCK: Designing a Perfect Body

WORK IT! Longer Legs, Leaner Lines, Sexier Silhouette

THE RIGHT SWIMSUIT FOR YOUR BODY TYPE

WEIGHT OBSESSION: One Woman Conquers Her Diet Demons

The magazine sets up, essentially, an impossibility:  “Have curves, but by curves we mean something very specific: boobs and an ass.  You know, like Black women’ve got.  See Beyonce? She’s Black. So she’s got curves.  No matter that she’s extremely thin.  You should be extremely thin, too (‘WORK IT!’); eh em, we mean, ‘conquer your demons,’ we love you ‘from size zero to size 20.’  Just kidding!  We totally don’t.  Design ‘your perfect body’ with cosmetic surgery!  Then you’ll really love yourself… and we will find you acceptable… it’s win win!!!!”

Racism and sexism.  Nice work, Vogue.

(Via Jezebel.)

Will M. sent us this fascinating clip of Lil’ Wayne on Jimmy Kimmel Live. In the clip, Kimmel asks Wayne about losing his virginity at age 11. Wayne reveals that he did, indeed, lose his virginity at 11. He lost it to a 14-year-old girl who turned out the lights and surprised Wayne into participating, even as he had not intended doing so. What is fascinating is, were Wayne a white female, this narrative would have been considered molestation or rape. As a black male, doubly hypersexualized as a man (who always wants sex) and a black man (who really always wants sex), it’s just considered a joke. This is really nice evidence of the social construction of men, especially Black and Latino men, as hypersexual and, therefore, incapable of being sexually assaulted.

The discussion of his virginity loss begins at about 2:40.

Just one excerpt:

White guy: I didn’t know you could lose your viriginity at 11-years-old.

Other white guy: Well, we can’t, but he did.

Crazy Vet offers us this rather amazing commercial for BP as an example of “green-washing” or an effort to make a company appear environmentally friendly:

What I think is especially remarkable about this example is how entirely free of any content it manages to be.  The commercial combines pretty colors, animation, babies, cute music, and whistling gas pumps.  That alone, apparently, is effective in convincing us that BP is environmentally benign.  It is pure emotion, completely devoid of an argument.

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Lisa Wade is a professor of sociology at Occidental College. You can follow her on Twitter and Facebook.

People in Muslim countries don’t think so:

(worldpublicopinion.org, via Kevin Drum at Mother Jones and Alas a Blog).