American Girl

The logo for American Girl.

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American Girl is an American line of 18 inch (46 cm) dolls initially released in 1986 by the Pleasant Company and later acquired by Mattel in 1998. As the name implies, the doll line revolves around children of various walks of life throughout American history, with dolls which come with books telling of their backstory and the era the dolls' stories take place in. Although the books are written for girls who are at least eight years old, they endeavor to cover significant topics such as child labor, child abuse, poverty, racism, slavery, animal cruelty and war in manners appropriate for the understanding and sensibilities of their young audience. Besides the line of dolls, playsets and associated literature, they also used to run a children's magazine from 1992 to 2019, also named American Girl.^{[note 1]}

Considering the above mentioned topics portrayed by the doll line as well as America's colorful sociopolitical history, the toy line garnered both criticism and controversy from various political and social commentators.

Doll of a kind[edit]

Totally not Chucky's minions.

The American Girl line started in 1986 as the brainchild of Pleasant Rowland, a former news reporter and educator who sought to come up with a more educational alternative to the wildly popular Barbie fashion dolls by way of characters who are around the same (canonical) age as their owners.^{[note 2]} Rowland enlisted her book author friend Valerie Tripp and German toymaker Götz, who supplied them with the face sculpt and body design used by the dolls to this day.^[2]

The upscale marketing of the dolls, which cost $115 as of 2022 without extras,^[3] drew scrutiny^[4] which led to budget-price alternatives and questions about the doll line's backstories being hypocritical in the face of commercialism, e.g. the character of Kit Kittredge having her family endure the hardships of the Great Depression, on top of Kit's doll line and associated collection selling for a price that flies in the face of those who suffered the Depression, not to mention that the movie starring Abigail Breslin as Kit is effectively a toyetic feature film plugging the toy line.^[5]

Unsurprisingly, the doll line's popularity and subsequent controversies stemming from its (perceived) progressive messages led to a number of conservative and/or religiously-inclined companies to come up with alternatives which seek to adapt the appeal of an educational line of dolls to their ideological tastes, i.e. indoctrination in doll form. Some of these conservative Christian American Girl imitators include Dolls from Heaven (whose roster is comprised of real-world saints such as Thérèse of Lisieux, John Paul II and Joan of Arc among others)^[6] the now-defunct Beautiful Girlhood^{[note 3][8]} and Life of Faith dolls,^[9] not to be confused with the similarly named Girls of Faith line, created by a conservative Christian mother named Sara McCord,^[10] and the Faith Friends dolls, whose tagline "Christian Alternative to 18-inch Dolls" is a not-so-subtle dig at American Girl.^[11] Even Muslims have joined in on the fun as well with the Salam Sisters dolls,^[12] though there have been earlier examples of a Muslim-friendly alternative to Western-made dolls such as the Fulla Barbie knockoff doll.^[13] One patently bullshit claim by conservatives is that American Girl has gone woke in recent years due to their promotion of LGBTQ+ and feminist ideologies, never mind the fact that the line has already been progressive from the get-go, one instance being the character of Samantha Parkington standing up to women's suffrage and denouncing the horrors of child labor during her era.^[14]

Will make a toothy grin for food[edit]

A popular line in American Girl's catalogue is the Girl of the Year doll, where they release a limited-edition character each year with a backstory based on contemporary American life, usually revolving around subject matters and hobbies (stereotypically) associated with little girls such as gymnastics, painting and the like. One of these characters was Gwen Thompson, who is marketed as a companion to the actual 2009 girl of the year Chrissa Maxwell. The doll itself is fine and all, but what drew controversy was Gwen's story as a victim of homelessness, not helping matters was when the doll, like others in the line, was marketed at a premium of about a hundred dollars.^[15] Gwen's reception took a turn for the worse when media outlets and political pundits spun exaggerated and out-of-context tales about the tastefulness of making an upscale toy out of a serious social issue; an unnamed representative of American Girl later responded: "The doll is meant to teach tolerance and is part of an outreach program teaching young girls how to spot bullying and stand up and speak out against it," stating that the characters "offer valuable lessons about life" and they were disheartened that there had been any confusion over their fictional characters.^[16]

Nine years a slave?[edit]

The choice of story for Addy Walker, an African-American doll whose story is set in the Civil War era, was seen as questionable as she was initially depicted as a slave;^[17] she later gained her freedom along with her family later in the storyline.^[18] Some have also expressed concerns about American Girl's other characters of color, like Kaya'aton'my, a Nez Perce character whose story takes place in 1764, and Josefina, a Latina girl from New Mexico in 1824, are both set before colonization and have been criticized for avoiding the topic of genocide through these pre-Western contact settings. The character of Kaya, for one, was seen by critics as perpetuating the myth that native people are set in the past and ignores modern-day natives.^[19] Setting Kaya'aton'my in the past also perpetuates the “memory of the Indian” as a fixture of the past and being necessary to the American manifest destiny belief that resulted in the genocide of native people across north America.^[20] Hawaiian Nanea Mitchell, whose story took place in Pearl Harbor during World War II, was also seen as ignoring the prior issues native Hawaiians faced when their (former) kingdom was subsumed under U.S. control by way of fiendish fruit companies,^[21] instead depicting Hawaiians to be happy to be a part of the United States as per United States military pamphlets portray of the same time period.^[22] And while consultants from ethnic groups were hired to maintain veritas within the context of the books and their target audience, the dolls' expense posed a barrier to entry for those represented, making them more of a luxury for affluent families than an educational tool for children.

Gays, gays everywhere[edit]

That's it, I'm Bailey-ing out![edit]

"They're turning the freakin' dolls and koalas gay!"

Kira Bailey, 2021 girl of the year and tourist in the glorious country of 'Straya, also became victim to the cultural zeitgeist when One Million Moms (OMM), a front group for the reactionary Christian cesspool American Family Association, took umbrage at what they saw as the homosexual agenda infiltrating children's media by way of Kira's backstory where one of her aunts who lives down under has a lesbian relationship.^[23] They whined:

Why can’t the toy manufacturer let kids be kids instead of glamorizing a sinful lifestyle? […] American Girl is confusing our innocent children by attempting to normalize same-sex marriage. The doll company did not even include a warning so parents would have a heads-up.^[24]

The Ballad of the Black Girl with Two Dads[edit]

Prior to Kira's release, an article in the doll line's official magazine also came into OMM's crosshairs, when the magazine featured an African-American girl named Amaya Scheer who was adopted by a white gay couple; the latter having been heartbroken by the negative response towards the article and the hate mail ensuing from it.^[25] OMM's threatened boycott spectacularly backfired; an outpouring of support from many prominent national media organizations resulted in a dramatic increase in financial support for a nonprofit charity organized by one of Scheer's fathers.^[26]

Puberty hit them like a truck[edit]

In 2022, an advice book entitled A Smart Girl's Guide to Body Image earned significant backlash from the garden-variety reactionaries, accusing American Girl of advocating child abuse through what is seen as unsound advice over a prepubescent transgender child's gender identity by way of puberty blockers and hormonal therapy.^[27] As usual, a number of conservative parents took to social media to express their outrage and disgust over perceived sexual deviancy or trans recruitment^[28] and called for a boycott of the doll line whom they see is corrupting their children.^[29]

This ignores the fact that puberty blockers are reversible; while they may have adverse effects on some patients, it has been successfully used on those with precocious puberty and has been extensively studied and tested since the 1990s.^{[note 4][30][31][32]} The outrage over the book could also be seen as yet another manufactroversy by (conservative) media outlets to stir reactionary sentiment not unlike similar controversies involving children's media. And if you conservatives are going batty about a book you allege is condoning child abuse, then explain why the fuck does this book about promoting child corporal punishment exist and how the fuck is it still being sold on sites like Amazon.^[33]

You're a TERF, Harry.[edit]

Things got a little complicated with American Girl when they partnered with Warner Bros.' Wizarding World franchise for a series of licensed accessories and play sets for the dolls, especially considering the doll line's (as well as Mattel's in general) progressive stance clashing with the transphobic views of Harry Potter series creator J.K. Rowling. A number of fan sites, such as the American Girl Fandom wiki, have taken the effort of distancing themselves from Rowling's crankery (especially as the site's owner is from the LGBTQ+ community no less) and put up disclaimers on every Potter-related article, while at the same time acknowledging that while it is their duty to document the American Girl franchise as a whole, they take at least some responsibility for possibly encouraging people to purchase the items in question considering the views of the series creator.^[34]

A politician named Hillary[edit]

Where's the purged emails^[35] subplot?

In 2018 American Girl (by way of book publisher Scholastic) released a biographical book about Hillary Clinton entitled A Girl Named Hillary: The True Story of Hillary Clinton. While some may call into question American Girl's choice of subject matter considering Mrs. Clinton's polarising reputation,^[36] other reviews of the book noted the non-partisan approach the author took when treading her life story.^[37] Still, considering how it was released one year into the regime of Clinton's fiercest rival during the 2016 election, Donald Trump, a biography about a contentious subject matter for children (and further marketing as a feminist girl power tale) can and will raise some eyebrows, with some threatening to boycott American Girl and cease buying toys from the company for allegedly indoctrinating young children into a particular political agenda.

All hail Sombrita![edit]

What a mighty specimen is the goat! What strength! What endurance! What capriciousness!

If there's one saving grace to all the craziness the doll line has been in for the past few decades, it isn't the introduction of Mexican-American character Josefina Montoya, but her pet goat Sombrita, who was introduced in the book Happy Birthday, Josefina! and with a plush goat toy to tie in with said book.^[38]

Us here at RationalWiki commend the fine people at American Girl for putting us in consideration when they made the Josefina Montoya doll collection and associated playsets.

Not-so-pleasant Rowland[edit]

Pleasant Rowland herself also became subject to scrutiny with her business decisions, most notably when she attempted to buy a New York town to tie in with the doll line, something which the residents were none too pleased about. The incident was satirized in the novel Happyland by J. Robert Lennon.^[39][40]

See also[edit]

• Barbie: The Movie - based on another toy franchise from Mattel
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic - based on a toy franchise from rival company Hasbro whose fandom is also composed of adult collectors

External links[edit]

• Official website
• American Girl Wiki
• Know Your Meme article, a high-level (albeit outdated) look at the fandom.

Notes[edit]

References[edit]