Barbie's Sordid Sexual History

Editor's Note: This item was moved up from our blog.

Before Barbie was an astronaut, a businesswoman and Sarah Palin, the busty, blank-eyed doll was a glimmer in the eye of toy designer Jack Ryan, a compulsive swinger who openly patronized prositutes, staged orgies, and strangest of all, was once married to Zsa Zsa Gabor.

According to Toy Monster: The Big, Bad World of Mattel (a new book about the toy company highlighted in the New York Post) Ryan spent much of his time surrounded by Barbie lookalikes (although presumably the real-life versions had genitals) and generally creeping people out. Gwen Florea, who did the voice of talking Barbie says, "He once said to me he loved me being tall so he could stick his nose in my boobs when he hugged me.”

The book (via the Post) quotes one of Ryan’s friends on the genesis of Barbie:

"When Jack talked about creating Barbie ... it was like listening to somebody talk about a sexual episode, almost like listening to a sexual pervert ... "

Our blog editor Isaac Fitzgerald said:

" ... sad when you think of all the girls who grew up aspiring to look like, what was in the end, just  a horndog's limited vision of beauty."