The Barbie Liberation Organization or BLO, sponsored by RTMark, are a group of artists and activists involved in culture jamming. They gained notoriety in 1993 by switching the voice boxes on talking G.I. Joes and Barbie dolls. The BLO performed "surgery" on a reported 300–500 dolls and then returned them to the shelves of stores, an action they refer to as shopgiving. This action resulted in girls opening their new Teen Talk Barbie to hear it say phrases such as "vengeance is mine" and boys hearing their G.I. Joe say "The beach is the place for summer."
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Motivation and context
The BLO was originally conceived in an effort to question and ultimately change the gender stereotypes American culture is known for after Mattel released a speaking Barbie that said "Math class is tough." It took place in the middle of the culture wars of the 1990s when creative dissent was once again gaining popularity and artists and activists were often trying to conceive of new ways to rebel against cultural stereotypes and powerful forms like network TV. By 1993, criticism for Barbie as a negative gender stereotype for women was commonplace both in academia and popular culture. This may have been partially responsible for the generally positive response of the public to the project, the criticism they were making was familiar and not a controversial point to make during the 1990s. Although their criticism was not new, the creative form of hacking used by the BLO was noteworthy.
Methods
There is a detailed description of the complex "surgery" they performed available on their website, encouraging others to take part in the surgeries themselves. The surgery required some technical skills, tools and precision, but the voice boxes in the dolls were similar enough that the surgery could be reproduced fairly easily in other parts of the country. They outlined the surgery in easy to understand images. After the surgery they would secretly return the toys to shelves, what they call reverse shoplifting. Therefore, the store makes money twice and everything they did was perfectly legal.
They also produced a video to explain their point. They used the familiar form of the nightly news message, collaged with cutting edge video art techniques to get their point across. Viewers would be unable to tell exactly what was news and what was made up, they made some points through exaggerations and some through the use of actual news footage.
The media responded with coverage, but no legal issues were ever seriously raised. Hasbro and Mattel, the makers of the dolls brushed off the "attacks" with little fuss, although some people were outraged with the "terrorist attacks" directed at children.
Controversy
Because of the nature of culture jamming, it is hard to tell how many Barbies and G.I. Joes were actually switched, and how much of the media attention was orchestrated by the "artists". The "artist" Igor Vamos, famous for acts of media intervention intentionally hyped up the media to report more cases of the switched identities than may have been the fact. Although most sources suggest from 300–500 toys were hacked, other reports up to 3,000 across the country and in other countries like Canada, France and England. Others assert that only 12 toys were actually switched and the rest was cleverly arranged media hype by Vamos and his associates. This slant renders the project less about cultural stereotypes and more a critique of the nature of the television and media culture of the 1990s as well as opening a door for other media interventions in the coming years.