Throw some Hijab on the Barbie!!

Barbie pushed aside in Mideast cultural shift

Barbie Dolls are hard to find in the Middle East these days. In her place is Fulla, a dark eyed doll with Muslim values.

In a classic case of if you can't beat 'em join 'em NewBoy Co out of Syria is marketing Fulla and good Muslims who would never dream of buying the infidel Barbie are shelling out for Fulla like crazy. She retails in Damascus for about 825 Syrian lira/$16 US (clothes sold separately, don't ya know) and in a place where average income per capita is $100US a month that ain't hay.

Other dolls have donned the hijab in hopes of capturing the Islamic youth market. Mattel has a Moroccan Barbie and Leila, a slave in the Ottoman empire (nyuk-nyuk). In Iran, there's a veiled doll named Sara and Michigan brings us Razanne. Fulla has left them in the sand

Barbie smacks Fulla down in the boyfriend department, though. According to NewBoy Fulla won't ever have a boyfriend.

What's the Arab street saying?

The girls love 'em and are as annoying about them as my niece is with her Barbies. Parents do complain about the expense but like the positive Islamic role model Fulla represents.

Maan Abdul Salam, bless his heart, a Syrian women's rights activist, said Fulla was

"emblematic of a trend toward Islamic conservatism sweeping the Middle East. Though statistics are hard to come by, he said, the percentage of young Arab women who wear the hijab is far higher now than it was a decade ago, and though many girls are wearing it by choice, others are being pressured to do so."

I like my Barbie to look like this: