Wellness culture gone wrong has come for kids
LA TimesEven pre-COVID-19, health experts witnessed children struggling with their mental and physical health. “There’s a greater awareness of the tremendous pressure and challenges that kids are facing younger and younger,” says Colin Sharkey, executive director of the Assn. In 2020, Mattel released its Barbie Wellness Collection to introduce “girls to the benefits of self-care through play.” By that, it meant that Barbie focused on personal well-being with what Barbie does best: accessories. Through Barbie’s armada of feel-good “things,” health was equated with the right purchases, narrowing wellness to its consumerist and appearance-based stereotypes. “The message that parents really need is that they don’t need stuff to help their kids lead a healthy life,” says psychologist Susan Linn, a research associate at Boston Children’s Hospital and the author of “Consuming Kids.” “But the goal of marketers is to convince customers that their sense of well-being lies in some product that can be bought.” If Mattel had called it a spa collection, it would be less controversial.
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