Hayley Caronia

The Barbie doll features elbow and wrist articulation, enabling stimming, hand flapping, and other hand gestures that some members of the autistic community use to process sensory information or express excitement.

I would also like to point out, you know, maybe an uncomfortable truth about

that I don't think that children who are that autistic are going to be playing with a Barbie doll and making their hands do certain hand motions to match their own autistic hand motions.

I think this is maybe a little complex,

Is that a crazy thing to say?

I just don't think that these kids are going to be using these dolls or even really understand in some... Depending on how autistic they are, how severe they are on the spectrum, some of these kids aren't going to understand it.

And Barbie put out a video promoting this Barbie, this autistic Barbie.

And a lot of the...

like spokespeople that they had were adults.

They were adults talking about Barbie and what this representation means to them.

They also say that the doll has a different eye gaze that is shifted slightly to the side, which reflects how some members of the autistic community may avoid direct eye contact.

The autistic Barbie doll also comes with a pink finger clip fidget spinner that

noise-canceling headphones, and a tablet.

The fidget spinner is supposed to be a sensory outlet that can help reduce stress and improve focus.

Then the headphones are a fashionable accessory that reduces sensory overload by blocking out background noise.

And then the tablet is a screen that serves as a tool to help with everyday communication.

And then apparently this dress is autistic,

person friendly, it's loose fitting, and it has short sleeves and a flowy skirt that provides less fabric to skin contact.

So these are all of the ways that Mattel thinks that this Barbie is appealing to the autistic community.

And it's all make-believe.