47-year-old music sensation Shakira recently appeared in the cover story for the April issue of Allure. In it, she discussed women’s empowerment, her music career, and even 2023’s Barbie. Shakira has values she wants her sons Sasha and Milan to uphold, especially regarding respecting women, but she feels Barbie leaned too far in the other direction and was “emasculating” for them.
Shakira grew up in a time and place where women were background ornamentation. As a result, she shared in the Allure interview, “My idol was Wonder Woman. I think I was drawn to her because she had black hair like mine, but also because she was a symbol of empowerment and strength in a decade where women were not playing the most important roles.” But she believes there are still lines to be drawn in the sand that Barbie decidedly crossed.
Shakira addresses her family’s thoughts on the ‘Barbie’ movie as an emasculating film for male viewers
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When asked, Shakira confirmed she had seen Barbie, which released last summer alongside the historical drama Oppeheimer to create the gritty pastel pink and dusty explosion of Barbenheimer. When pressed for her opinion on Barbie, Shakira shared, “My sons absolutely hated it. They felt that it was emasculating. And I agree, to a certain extent.”
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She elaborated, “I’m raising two boys. I want ’em to feel powerful too [while] respecting women. I like pop culture when it attempts to empower women without robbing men of their possibility to be men, to also protect and provide. I believe in giving women all the tools and the trust that we can do it all without losing our essence, without losing our femininity. I think that men have a purpose in society and women have another purpose as well. We complement each other, and that complement should not be lost.”
Shakira believes in empowerment and has distinct expectations
After her explanation, Shakira was asked, “Just because a woman can do it all doesn’t mean she should?” To this, she fired back with, “Why not share the load with people who deserve to carry it, who have a duty to carry it as well?”
The duality of Shakira’s beliefs is given further nuance when she says later, “Eve was a story created by misogynists to put women in the little box where we have to remain silent, not speak our minds, and not be a catalyst for change. To keep things as they are. I think there’s something refreshing about women when they get to be themselves and be unapologetic. Because we’ve had to apologize so many damn times in the past.” However, it seems, she wants men to take their cues from masculine sources of inspiration, while always making respect for women a top priority.
What did you think about the fate of the Kens in Barbie?
