Online Participation Review

When assigned in class that we needed to join a virtual world, and on top of that create a blog, I thought, oh great, I have never had any desire to do either of theses activities in my life. At first I was still pretty skeptical when opening my blog and Barbie girl account, but after getting the hang of it, my perspective started to change.

Barbie girl world was nothing I ever experienced before and at first I was pretty uncertain of what to do in a virtual world. After exploring it I was able to see different activities and started to see the appeal it would provide for young girls. There were a lot of games to play, with little educational value, and the over all atmosphere of a girly world, where girls can be girls. This was my over all first impression and had I not had to dig deeper for my blog posts I probably would not have given it much more thought. Looking at identity, gender, race and sexuality I was able to see how these thoughts and attitudes were seen through my interactions.

After truly analyzing theses topics, I was very surprised at the results I found. My over all conclusion is that Barbie girls is not the most appropriate place for girls to interact in. The ideas and values this virtual world are representing are not positive for young girls to be seeing. The complete one sided identity, where all the characters look the same, along with very limited race identifications to choose from and the overly sexed avatars are not good values to be teaching our youth.

When assessing other people's experience in their virtual worlds, which were quite different from mine, I feel my experience was very sheltered and limited in comparison. Since my virtual world was geared mostly for younger girls, while the others were mostly for anyone from teenagers to adults. It seemed that my classmates were able to have a lot more interaction with other avatars than I was able to. This also allowed them to further develop their experience and get more out of the identity and sexuality themes that everyone addressed. Though conversation they could learn about the other people's involvement in the virtual world and and make judgments about their identities. Many people also talked about how sexuality was a major element seen in their world, with some people's intentions being very perverted. This was not as prevalent in my Barbie world, since the only gender available to pick was being a female.

Even though my experience was limited as a Barbie girl, I was still able to get a lot out of the assignment. I was able to identify many aspects I typically would have over looked or probably never considered. I think this was a very interesting and interactive assignment to address topics that are valuable to consider.

Sexy Barbies

As I stated in my last blog entry, all the Barbie avatars have the same bodies. The bodies have curvaceous hips and noticeable breast. Since the site is only for girls, there are no Ken avatars to interact with. But sexuality can still be seen, even in a room full of girls. As a non-VIP there are obviously limited options for clothing, and I believe I had about 5 options to pick from as bottoms. There were two pair of bell 'bottomish' jeans, which were the only pants, a pair of 'capris' and a knee length skirt or a mini skirts. The mini skirt being exceptionally short for a young girl to be wearing in real life, or the option of a sleeveless dress, which ended up being about the same length as the mini skirt. When picking a top to pair with the pants there is only one way not to have your mid drift showing and the is if you pick the dress, which is extremely short. This was not something I noticed right away, but after changing my outfit a couple times and looking for areas where sexuality can be noticed I realized you had to show some skin. This is teaching young girls it is alright to have your stomach or some skin showing, which is a negative because it is really not okay to do that, especially as a young girl and is pretty much promoting looking 'sexy' or 'hot'.
When picking out your facial features I was a little surprised/disturbed. The options for eyes all have pretty heavy make up on and the default color given is blue. The lips you had to choose from were all pretty seductive, with one of them appearing to be in a 'ring' or making a 'kissy' face or god knows what. There were 4 color options for lip stick, one of them being nude, the others dark red or dark purple, or a slightly lighter shade of purple. Showing facial features only which were decked out in make up is showing young girls that it is okay to wear drag make up to enhance yourself.
One of the last themes containing sexuality were the girls being able to go in each other's bed rooms. I thought it was pretty strange that I could walk up to a virtual girl I just friend requested and we could go off and hang out in her bed room. If I had VIP status I would have been able to be in a fashion show, which is judged by the other girls. I thought this tied in with sexuality because the winners of the fashion shows were mostly the ones with the least amount of clothing on. I think if i had been in another Virtual World, besides Barbie girls, which is geared towards younger girls, I would have seen much worse stunts dealing with sexuality, than an overly glammed out Barbie doll.

Class Question: How prevalent was sexuality in your virtual world? If it was prevalent and pervasive, Why do you think people feel the need to create avatars and act sexually inappropriate online?

Barbie Girl Identity

Identity as a Barbie girl is clearly female. The age rang for girls to join virtual Barbie I believe started at 6 and had a couple age ranges to choose from, such as 6-8, 9-12, etc, ending with 16+. I thought that stating your age might affect what age your avatar would look like, but I found this not to be true. My avatar is the age range 16+ and all the other avatars look to be the same age of mine. There are no distinct 6-year-old avatars running around, and with one of the girl's user name being "Dora lover" (I'm assuming that means Dora the explorer) most of the girls are probably younger, with avatars not resembling their actual identity. I would estimate the age of all the avatars to be around 17, based off of their bodies, which have hips and boobs. This one body type being presented to the girls playing Virtual Barbie is showing them a distorted identification with reality. It is pretty obvious that bodies come in all shapes and sizes, so this is not a good message to be teaching today's girls. The only people I noticed as looking older than the Barbie avatars are the 'employees' in the shops at shop-a-mallic shopping mall. The girl behind the desk appeared to be older, I’m guessing maybe in her 20s, but no social interactions was available to partake in with the mall employees, which was disappointing.

The identity created for the Barbie avatars is very feminine, almost to a point where it is exaggerated. The main activities you are able to do as a Barbie girl are: shop, play games, shop, decorate your room, and shop. These activities are also geared toward Barbie girl VIPs, because I cannot buy clothes and accessories as just a normal member. You can see a very huge distinction between the girls who have VIP access and the girls who do not. If I see a girl walking around with a purse, earring, or any accessory I know that she has VIP access, because I am not able to get any of those items. On top of the accessories, the over all appearance of VIPs is more unique and detailed than the few options given to regular members. When interacting with other avatars, you can click on them and it brings up a new screen with their picture, user name, and friend request button. You can also tell the VIP identity from their background of this screen, because they have options such as crowns, or other colorful designs, where as my background is just light pink and I have no choice in that.
The identity being created for the girls in Barbie girl world, is that of an 'ultimate' girly-girl. It is showing the girls who play this that they need to go shopping constantly and be up on the latest trends and fashions, and even try to out do those around you (VIP vs. non-VIPs). I found the activities to be pretty shallow and view the Virtual Barbie world as being pretty behind the times. When I think about the Barbie World it really does not provide much value in learning or doing anything unique. It makes me feel like all theses girls are destined to believe in the idea of finding a rich man to marry so you can shop and be a house wife through playing in Barbie World. I feel that the actual Barbie dolls have had a societal development closer to that of a modern day view, over the virtual site, which is ironic. When I think of some of the Barbies I had, their identities were made up of many more options than there are available for my Virtual Barbie. I had a: rollerblading Barbie, veterinarian Barbie, and a doctor Barbie. These roles of being athletic or a working doctor go much more in depth than virtual Barbie, which I find to be very strange since it is the 'new' thing for Barbie girls to do.

Class Question: How closely do you feel your virtual world resembles the real world? (State your virtual world, and some information about it) What messages does your virtual world give to the people involved with it?

Gender as a Virtual Barbie

Gender as a virtual Barbie consist of one option. Everything is for Barbie GIRLS, as the web address states and as you are greeted by Barbie when entering the site as she says "Hey Girl!". The log in for the virtual world is everything pink, and feminine. When creating a virtual Barbie account it asks for a parental email address to confirm with the child's parents that they are allowed to make an account. I put in my email, because you have to go in and confirm before you can set up your account. The email sent to the parents states how their "daughter" just made an account. I remember when signing up I did a double take and felt some what sad that a boy could not make an account with out being forced to 'gender bend'. I don't really think it is that unusual that young boys will pick up their sisters Barbie dolls at some point in their childhood and maybe feel a little curious, which should not automatically classify them as females.

The boy to girl ratio is about 1:99 in Barbie world. I have only come across one male who was the genie in the "purple palace" and would do a daily horoscope type of reading. I realize that the website is supposed to be geared as a "safe" fun zone for young girls to go and just be a girl. There are four different areas to go on the map such as: Total Girlhood, Extreme Dreampark, Shop-a-mallics, and Paw Pawlooza. There are different activities and games there for girls to do, with the focus being on getting points so you can go to the mall and shop. Can Virtual Barbie really be seen as an innocent fun place for girls to play, or are there poor underlying messages being taught? What is the message this type of virtual world is really sending to girls?

Race on Virtual Barbie

When creating avatars on virtual Barbie there is a choice of about 6 skin tones to choose from, and the range of colors is rather lacking. For my avatar, which I wanted to be pretty similar to what I actually look like in real life, and choose one or two shade up from the palest, since it's summer and I have a tan. Had I wanted to choose a different race I would have pretty much ended up looking very similar to my avatar now, because the darkest shade they have to offer could pass as being very tan, or light skinned African American, with this color being the extreme opposite from pale as pale, practically white skinned.

I am registered for the free version of the virtual world, but if you pay the monthly fee you can become a Barbie VIP, which has a lot more to offer than the generic registration. I don't plan on paying to become the VIP, but I am curious as to if there are more skin tones to choose from when creating an avatar as a VIP. There are certainty a lot more outfits, accessories, and over all options to pick as a VIP, which can be seen by the generic members, but cannot be accessed. When making my avatar they showed me many options of shirts, pants, purses, etc. which could further customize my look, but made it clear those options were only for VIP access. I do not remember seeing extra skin tones to customize your avatar in VIP world, just the necessities like lip gloss and extra shoes is all you need to really set yourself apart as a Barbie.

After I got a better grasp of what I was supposed to do in Barbie land, I left my bedroom and went into the real world. At the 'shop-a-mallics' mall I was able to see some other avatars in action. I friend requested everyone I ran into, with most request being approved. I found it hard to talk to people because there are only set phrases you can send, such as: "I love your outfit!" or "Cool room!" or "U R such a style queen!" etc. Since I can't actually talk to my friends about anything besides our outfits, I know very little about them. The only information I could grasp about their race was from their skin tone. Of my 7 friends most are pretty similar to my Caucasian skin tone, with one of them having the darkest option, assuming they were trying to look African American. Outside of one of the shopping areas there is an clearly an African American Barbie on a billboard who is very dark skinned and has dark brown hair, which is very different from anyone I have yet to run into as an avatar. This caused me to think about what an actual African American Barbie looks like, so I found an image of one online and they appear to be rather dark skinned and distinctively African American.

Class Question(s): Why would an African American Barbie be produced in real life, yet Barbie avatars are limited to mostly looking Caucasian? Does the production of only two races of dolls instill the idea in kids head's that only two races exist. What is this teaching young children?