The Barbie Movie and My Identity Crisis

 I just finished watching the Barbie movie for the second time. This is not a review as there have been many others who have done fantastic jobs of it and I don’t feel the need to add my voice into the discussion. However, there were many scenes and themes that I related to very deeply in the movie. I genuinely loved the movie and while it is meant to be satirical, it is very poignant and deep with many scenes that hit you between the eyes with truths that are just beginning to be said aloud, such as the famous “Gloria’s speech” scene. But one scene that I deeply relate to is near the end when Barbie and Ken are in Barbie’s dream house discussing Ken’s identity apart from Barbie.

 Ken says to Barbie, “I just don’t know who I am without you.” 

Barbie responds “You’re Ken!” 

“But it’s Barbie and Ken”, he replies. “There is no just Ken. That’s why I was created. I only exist within the warmth of your gaze. Without it, I’m just a little blonde guy who can’t do flips.” 

 Barbie replies, “Okay. Ken, you have to figure out who you are without me.”

 “Why?” asks Ken. 

“You’re not your girlfriend. You’re not your house. You’re not your mink.” 

“Beach?” (his ‘job’) asks Ken. 

“Nope. Not even beach. Maybe all the things that you thought made you you aren’t…really you. Maybe it’s Barbie, and… it’s Ken.”

This struck a chord with me. Over the last few years as my husband and I have been untangling ourselves from patriarchy and its softer form, complementarianism, I had a sort of identity crisis. As Christians, we are often told that our identity is in Christ. This is true and good! However, we are told that and then also told that our identity is in other things as well… It is a sort of whiplash. ‘Your identity is in Christ alone…….and in __________”. I believe this is especially true for women. 

Women are quite literally told that we only truly exist in the warmth of the gaze of men…that our entire reason for existence is for men—for their pleasure and to be their helpers. If we want to have an identity apart from them we are called many names, Jezebel being one of them (which Barbie is called in the movie and blatantly told to “get back in the box, you Jezebel”). But not only are we told we were created for men, for their pleasure and to be their helpers, but we must do these things in a particular way to make sure the men always feel in charge and “masculine”. If we don’t exist correctly then we will keep men from existing correctly which will not glorify God. 

Women especially are given so many resources on how to glorify God in our marriages and in the mundane of housework and child rearing. I don’t mean to belittle these things because the Bible says that in whatever we do we should do all to the glory of God (1 Cor. 10:31). Yet in these resources it still seems to point to our identities as wives and mothers- to the things we do. You aren’t just a wife, you must be (fill in the blank) kind of wife. You aren’t just a mom, you have to parent like (fill in the blank). 

For my entire life I have found my identity in external things. It was in being an obedient child; a virgin; wearing skirts; listening to only a certain style of music; being KJV only; being Baptist; being a wife; not just a wife but a submissive wife; a mother; a homeschool mom. I was always told that my identity should be in Christ alone but I wasn’t pointed to Christ, I was pointed to things I did and ways to do them. So many resources are dedicated to being not just a Christian but a certain kind of Christian who does X and doesn’t do Y; not just being a Christian who is a wife, but being a submissive wife who knows how to properly respect and conform to her husband and provide him with the sex he needs; not just in being a Christian who is a woman, but being a woman who dresses like X and doesn’t dress like Y and who acts this way and not that way. Not just being a Christian who is a mother but a mother who parents a certain way. Social media is full of people telling us how to be wives, mothers, and women while saying we should find our identity in Christ yet pointing us anywhere but Him. 

This is true for messages we hear on Sunday, podcasts, books, articles, and other related outlets where we are told we are Christians yet we are pointed to things we do or don’t do as sources of our identity rather to to Christ Himself. How are we to know what it means to be a Christian (little Christ’s) if we aren’t pointed to the Source Himself? 

And so as I began untangling from my identity being wrapped up in being Brad’s wife and mother to his children who also happened to be a Christian, it was hard. So hard. I didn’t know who I was. I didn’t know what I liked— what clothes do I like that my husband didn’t pick out for me, what hobbies do I have that don’t involve him or the kids; what style would I like to decorate my house; what do I like to do for fun; what makes me happy and brings me joy and peace? I had no idea! And apart from that, who was God apart from what I was told He wanted me to do? Because it matters. In order to fully love someone, you have to know them. You have to be familiar with them and they you. And I felt like I was intimately familiar with what God expected of me, but I didn’t know who He was… I wasn’t intimately familiar with God, with Christ for me, with the gospel, only with His commands. We are all familiar with “Christianity is not a religion, it’s a relationship”, yet all we are given are commands, not a Person to have a relationship with. 

The more I sought to know who Christ was and understood the Gospel of Christ for you, the more I wanted to obey His commands and didn’t need humans telling me what to or not to do. My identity isn’t in my “fruit”, but in the Vine. I am not a Christian because I read my Bible every day, or I wear a certain style of clothing, or because I don’t watch certain things or listen to certain styles of music, or because I am feminine or submit properly to my husband. I am a Christian because although I was a sinner, Jesus came to earth as a baby, lived a perfect life in my place, keeping the law for me, then died the death I deserved, and rose again defeating death. I am a Christian because God granted me faith, repentance, justification, sanctification, and some day glorification. “Not of works, lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2:9 KJV). My identity, even now after salvation, is not in things I do or don’t do. 

And this includes being a certain kind of wife, or parenting a certain way. Because I cannot be on social media long before the reels on homemaking and parenting and marriage or big name Eva materials are in my face. Churches have women’s studies and conferences on how to be a godly wife/woman but don’t as often show us how to study our Bible (in a non gendered sort of way….everything seems to have to be made pink for us), or studying the attributes of God, or digging deep into theology. Everything is given through the lens of our gender and stage of life. Many Christians mock the LGBTQ community for saying their gender or sexuality is their identity because it should be in Christ, while simultaneously affirming that our identity is in fact in things other than Christ. 

All this to say, watching Ken trying to find his identity apart from Barbie (which is a satirical flip of the stereotype of women always trying to find their identity in a man), I cried, because I have finally found my identity in Christ alone, apart from my husband and children or anything else. And in Christ I am free to be me. Just me. He knows me and I don’t need to put up a front. I am free to enjoy painting, photography, cooking, homemaking, homeschooling, gardening, etc. In Christ I am free from the bondage of  “you must____ and you must do it this way”. It isn’t “Christ and…..” just like it isn’t Barbie and Ken. It is Christ. And in Christ I am free to obey without fear; I am free to obey as the Spirit who indwells me leads me, rather than how others try to tell me I must obey. I don’t have to conform to culture—including church culture. 

It isn’t ever “Christ and…” 

It is “Because Christ is for you, you are free to know Him and obey Him out of love. You are free to be the wife your husband needs not the wife others tell you you have to be. You are free to be the mother each of your children need, not the parent others tell you you must be. You are free to be the Christian the Holy Spirit conforms you into, not what others dictate. In Christ, you are….you.”