Comedian Bill Maher is calling out the feminist box office smash Barbie for pushing what he calls a “preachy, man-hating zombie lie” pertaining to the movie’s incessant references to “the patriarchy.”
Bill Maher posted a lengthy social media screed against Barbie, focusing on the plot line that finds Barbie (Margot Robbie) confronting Mattel’s board of directors, which is portrayed as all-male. In reality, however, Mattel’s board is comprised of 11 people — five of whom are women.
Maher said the movie creates a “zombie lie” by knowingly perpetuating a long-dead falsehood.
“Barbie is this kind of #ZombieLie,” he tweeted. “Spoiler alert, Barbie fights the Patriarchy. Right up to the Mattel board who created her, consisting of 12 white men! The Patriarchy! Except there’s a Mattel board in real life, and it’s 7 men [6 in actuality] and 5 women. OK, not perfect even-steven, but not the way the board IN THE MOVIE – which takes place in 2023 – is portrayed. And not really any longer deserving of the word ‘patriarchy.’”
He added: “Yes, there was one, and remnants of it remain – but this movie is so 2000-LATE.”
OK, "Barbie": I was hoping it wouldn't be preachy, man-hating, and a #ZombieLie - alas, it was all three. What is a Zombie Lie? Something that never was true, but certain people refuse to stop saying it (tax cuts for the rich increase revenues, e.g.); OR something that USED to be…
— Bill Maher (@billmaher) August 7, 2023
Maher went on to say that Barbie’s portrayal of stereotypical male and female behavior feels bizarrely dated for a movie set in 2023.
“I saw Barbie with a woman in her 30s who said, ‘I don’t know a single woman of any age who would act like that today,'” he wrote.
Barbie, which was released by Warner Bros., recently passed the $1 billion mark at the global box office.
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