With body image and ‘body shaming’ being such a big topic of discussion, Mattel, the makers of Barbie have decided to come out with a new line of Barbie dolls on Thursday, January 28.

According to Mattel, Barbie will now come in four body types and seven skin tones with 22 eye colors and 24 hairstyles. In all, 33 dolls will roll out in stages, spokeswoman Michelle Chidoni said.

Girls and women do not come in one shape or size, everything about each woman or girl is different. Now after many years, Barbie would like to support each girl to be true to herself. The move comes a year after Mattel introduced Barbies with moveable ankles that would allow the dolls to wear flat shoes for the first time.

Personally, I find this important to our future generations. Barbie dolls are not made to be played with by just young girls, but young boys as well. Not only do girls have unrealistic perceptions of body image, boys do to. Body image issues do not have genders. Mattel has been denounced for the way Barbie looks and is represented for years due to the highly unrealistic expectations of looks. These new Barbie dolls are finally receiving a positive wave of attention. Postive Tweets, Facebook posts and other posts have been positively supporting the new Barbie dolls.

“Thank you @Barbie. I’m officially excited & proud to buy my daughter a barbie one day!” tweeted Johnalyn Peluso (@Johnalyn_Lee).

In June, Mattel broadened the number of skin tones, eye colors and hair styles available for the dolls, which first appeared on store shelves in 1959. The latest changes, however, “Are by far the most dramatic we’ve ever made,” Chidoni said.

A few years before the release of these new Barbie dolls, Mattel released the “You Can Be Anything” Barbie. The Barbie dolls became so popular, even the Barbie doll hashtag #YouCanBeAnything was trending on Twitter. Ranging from a dentist to a rock star, Barbie is teaching little girls to dream big and do what they love and not to be placed under any stereotypes a woman may have. Barbie creator, Ruth Handler said, “My whole philosophy of Barbie was that, through the doll, the girl could be anything she wanted to be. Barbie always represented the fact that a woman has choices.”

As females, we have all received some degrading comment about our appearance resulting in several more severe issues-depression, eating disorders, plastic and enhancement surgeries, and a lack of confidence. Now, I’m not going to go all ‘crazy feminist’ on you, but from personal experiences, I know just how important being confident in yourself is.

As a middle schooler leading up to the end of my sophomore year of high school, I struggled with self-image and acceptance as many girls do. As a child, I viewed Barbie as an image of perfection, but because I didn’t have blonde hair and blue eyes, I found myself lacking confidence because I knew I was never going to be able to attain this look of “perfection” that every girl wanted. As I grew older, I even started becoming embarrassed with myself for even playing with Barbie dolls as a child, because I felt they were trying to put an image in a young girls mind of something that isn’t even naturally attainable. The older I grew, the more accepting I became because as a child, you didn’t know that the image of perfection was this blonde haired, blue eyed Barbie doll, you were just playing Barbies with your friends. The older I got the more I accepted myself for who I was. I learned to fall in love with the green eyes and a freckled face, outgoing person that I was. I think that is what Mattel is trying to do now. Instead of showcasing a beautiful, yet unrealistic representation of women and girls, Mattel is using Barbie dolls to teach girls to love themselves who they are.