I hadn’t planned on seeing Barbie. I didn’t play much with dolls as a child, and my 90s self saw Barbie as perpetuating a narrow and shallow view of womanhood and causing my peers body image issues because of an unattainable ideal. Then, when the movie came out, my feminist friends loved it, and my non-feminist friends either hated it or ignored it. I had to see it to see what all the fuss was about.

Spoilers ahead!

One part of the movie that really resonated with me was when Barbie was preparing to go to the Real World. She expected to be greeted like a hero because all feminist problems had been solved and perfect equality had been achieved. When I was in college, I didn’t consider myself a feminist. I believed in the equality of the sexes, but I thought all the work had been done. Women could have careers, own property, vote, wear pants, etc. I was taught by my parents and by my surrounding culture that I could do whatever a man could do if I put my mind to it, and I did. I viewed feminists as whiners with victim complexes who just didn’t work hard enough and were looking for someone external to blame for their problems.

Then I went on my mission. The scene where Barbie is rollerblading along the beach and is getting harassed and disrespected by the men around her felt so much like my mission. I had been blissfully unaware of modern sexism, so when I was confronted with it right in my face, I was shocked by it. Barbie was introduced to patriarchy in the Real World. I was introduced to it in North Carolina.

In the end, Barbie chose the Real World, flaws and all, over the plastic ignorance of Barbieland. Once seen, reality cannot be unseen. While I have never returned to the literal land of my mission, I, too, chose the real world – the world where there’s still work to be done and where feminism isn’t the other f-word. We’ve come a long way, but we’re not there yet.