Cutting off noses of dolls Spinoff Yeshivishe girls/dolls

debsey

Thu, Nov 27 2014, 6:39 pm

Just to clarify the practice
The idea is to show that the doll is not a pessel, an idol. Therefore, we disfigure it slightly to show it has no sanctity for us.
We are yeshivish. My daughters are well supplied with dolls of all sorts. We do not cut off noses (I was horrified as a kid when my aunts described cutting off THEIR doll's noses)
We do something like write our name on the back of the neck or the foot, pull out some hair, or use a pushpin to scratch a small mark into the bottom of the foot.
The idea is to show - this is not holy - it's just a doll.
The issue of BARBIE dolls is not one of her being an idol (unless you "idolize" that unrealistic female figure) it's that she is not tznius. Personally, I have a problem with Barbie from a feminist perspective. Read this. The author writes about her own ambivalence about Barbies or lack thereof in her own history and daughter's lives.

http://www.aish.com/ci/w/Banis......html

dancingqueen

Thu, Nov 27 2014, 8:38 pm

Debsey I think the author of the article is from a totally different era from me. First of all I didn't know Barbie was all about shopping. Growing up Barbie had all kinds of different jobs- dr, lawyer, pilot etc. And to me it's antifeminist to say that because she is pretty she is superficial with no substance. There also are brunette and black barbies as well.

I can't say I found that barbies proportions gave me or my friends anything to worry about as a child. She was just a doll and we weren't thinking about figures yet. My dd is too young for barbies right now do when the time comes I could reassess but right now I don't see a problem.

I never heard of purposely making a doll imperfect, ime kids often manage to muss up a doll on their own pretty quick!

debsey

Thu, Nov 27 2014, 11:53 pm

dancingqueen wrote:

dancingqueen - I hear you. I guess I come from the generation of that writer. I also don't love her extremely exaggerated figure, which does seem that the intention is to say - the ideal woman is this extremely unrealistic being.

In terms of mildly disfiguring the doll, I think the idea is to pass on a mesorah - we are careful to distance ourselves from idol worship, so let's make sure that we follow that minhag and show - this is not an idol. This is a DOLL. When my daughter was 4, and I took a pushpin to prick the heel of her doll she told the doll very seriously "It's OK. You do not have a neshama. You are not really real. So it won't even hurt you, and we don't have to smash you like Avraham did......." So she got the concept and wasn't upset by it. But I never got the point of ruining the nose. Why make the doll ugly?