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As someone with a three-story pink Barbie Dream House in the middle of her living room, I can tell you that I pay closer attention to gendered children’s toys these days than is normal for a woman my age.
I have noticed, for instance, that the profusion of Barbies sprawled across my floor are not always light-complexioned and blond, with impossibly attenuated torsos, as they were when I was little. My 10-year-old niece’s dolls have a range of skin colors and body sizes; some Barbies, you might even say, are
thicc, current slang for a full-figured curvy body. This is a fantastic development, and if I need to explain why, you have not been paying attention.