Watching last night’s episode of ‘Mad Men’, I had to admit that Christina Hendricks, playing Joan Harris, is ‘all woman’.

It was great looking at this voluptuous, curvacous deeply sensual woman on-screen, on the same day that I received a love note about my own body from a very sexy man, one intimately involved in my own battles with body image.

Reviewing his comments, I cannot print them. He knows that I have been dieting again, insuring that I look my best size-8 self, hardly making me a skinny girl. I did express to him my desire to perhaps become a size 6, and this is what raised flags in his mind about our future.

My friend (who can buy and sell us all; I must add that fact) said that when a high libido-guy looks at a woman like Christina Hendricks, he sees her own sensual appetite and lust for him. Her frailty or lack of it impacts his own ardor in lovemaking.

My friend assured me that my health and wellbeing are his primary concerns, but so is my sexual vitality. Curves like the ones worn by Christina Hendricks say ‘let’s be sexual’ and ‘you don’t need to worry about breaking me.’

My friend spoke of the sensual power in a body like the one owned by Christina Hendricks. She is sexual and her curves communicate a positive message to him about her ability to enjoy life. Please forgive TMI, but we so rarely get positive messages about female sexuality today.

Why then, must Mattel take away Christina’s curves, reducing her to Barbie nothingness? What is wrong with selling a Barbie doll that actually looks like Christina Hendricks? Is the Vatican now approving Barbie Dolls, stamping out any ounce of sexual vitlaity?

It’s my strong belief that post-80s supermodel fashion, led by men like Karl Lagerfeld and Ralph Lauren, seeks to eliminate sexuality from a woman’s body. Woman is reduced to a boy-body, while Lagerfeld celebrates the curves of his feminine muse Baptiste Giabiconi.

As women theoretically and functionally gain ascendency in the 21st century, the patriachy is hardly playing dead.

Especially American women have been trained by big business to evoke sexuality through the things we buy, and not with our bodies. In rendering us thin as boat racks, taking away our breasts and hips, we rely on possessions and artifice — not our innate sensuality — to communicate our womanliness.

There are moments when I wonder if perhaps I am too harsh on this topic. I have no problem being a raging feminist who loves men. The dichotomy suits me.

Looking at these photos of Mattel’s Barbie Christina Hendricks, it reminds me that I’m not off-base. The over-zealous photoshopping at Ann Taylor last week, Ralph Lauren’s 2009 firing of Filippa Hamilton for being too fat — these trends and countless more reflect a subliminal misogyny towards women.

This patriarchal misogyny manisfests itself today in a determination to control female sensuality physically and psychologically. My benchmark is the 80s supermodels who were thin but also full of vitlaity. When you looked at their bodies, they radiated ‘sexual female’.

The need for Mattel to render Christina Hendricks in a dramatically-different version of her real-deal self is a sick, distorted business practice. The question is whether women will continue to buy into this patriarchal nonsense or revolt, once and for all.

It’s women who will buy this Mattel doll for their daughters. For once in our lives, could millions of mothers ask what we are doing to female identity with these acts? Healthy curves should be celebrated. If the only way business gets the message is with a refusal to buy, then I say “Just Do It!” Anne

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