First, I’d like to thank Greta Gerwig for a perfect image to use while having to write about all these men so angry that Barbie exists.
It seems as if Bill Maher has joined the long list of men who were somehow hurt by the movie Barbie. Despite Maher acting like the movie punched him in the face, the film is just a satire that poked fun at the patriarchy while giving Barbie her time to shine and Maher took that as a personal attack? Weird!
Maher, who just always seems to miss the point, took to the artist formerly known as Twitter to share his thoughts that no one wanted about the movie. It starts as follows: “OK, ‘Barbie’: I was hoping it wouldn’t be preachy, man-hating, and a #ZombieLie – alas, it was all three. What is a Zombie Lie? Something that never was true, but certain people refuse to stop saying it (tax cuts for the rich increase revenues, e.g.); OR something that USED to be true but no longer is, but certain people pretend it’s still true. ‘Barbie’ is this kind of #ZombieLie.”
His issue? The actual board at Mattel has five women to its seven men while the one in the movie is all men. It is meant to be satirical but I guess Bill Maher needed that spelled out. You can read his full novel here:
Maher seems to think that he knows exactly what it is like to be a woman because he saw the movie with a 30-year-old (which he notes) and then spells out some numbers (which still lean favorably towards men and only take into account current demographics in 2023 with no historical context). The point of his novel is simply that he misunderstood everything Barbie said and decided we all needed to hear his thoughts.
Men like Maher love to just … talk
I personally don’t understand the vitriol spewed at this movie. The final lesson is that no one benefits from a patriarchy or a matriarchy. It says we as people need to listen to each other and benefit from a world where people are all seen equally. Still, men online have decided that what it means is that all men suck and we should yell at them as so.
Actually, all these “reactions” and hate-fueled rants towards Barbie have made me want to yell at them, not the movie itself. In Barbie, I feel bad for men like Ken (Ryan Gosling) who have no power unless their Barbies give it to them. That’s why the end of the movie is so great because we get to see the Barbies and Kens working together.
Still, men like Maher saw that and thought to themselves, “Wow how ever will I convince women much too young for me to come and see movies with me when they have feminist ideals and love themselves?” I think his comment from his 30-year-old date to the movie was supposed to represent how all women feel about Barbie. Sorry, Bill. She doesn’t speak for me and I think that I have enough brain cells to know what this movie is actually saying.
(featured image: Warner Bros.)
