SP

"Do you want to get together and play with our American Girl Dolls?" 

The dolls. If you had an American Girl Doll, you knew the excitement you felt when a childhood friend of yours had one too. You knew weekends would be spent dressing your dolls up in their overly-expensive dresses, or brushing their hair with a built-to-break $30.00 hairbrush (which is now 8 dollars, by the way). And you loved your American Girl Doll like the promising little girl you were, observed by the patriarchy and left to domestic chores at the age of 5. 

Every season you'd wait for the catalogue to come in the mail. Pen in hand, you would circle all of the overly priced items you wanted: a yellow raincoat for when Molly *walks* through the rain, a traveling suitcase for all of Josefina's clothes that just doesn't have the same durability as a plastic bag that you will inevitably carry from your house to a friend's, or the IttyBitty twin dolls, creepily staring at you while you peruse the magazine, wondering if you also want the smaller children. Will they be your AG Doll's kids? Sister? Brother?! 

Here's the list of the original American Girl Dolls:
1. Molly McIntyre
2. Felicity Merriman
3. Addy Walker
4. Kaya
5. Josefina Montoya
6. Kit Kitterage
7. Kirsten Larson
8. Samantha Fucking Parkington 

Speaking for myself and anyone with any sort of intuition, all dolls numbered 1 through 7 were kind, spunky, and fun to play with. Number 8, and let me just abbreviate her name as SP because it hurts to type all the way out without some form of PTSD, ruined the friendship all of these dolls could have had. Allow me to explain myself. I only ever read Molly's story and SP's story. I immediately decided that SP would be Molly's enemy. Each time I knew someone with an SP, I judged them and wished to abuse SP. She was the equivalent of the girl your significant other tells you not to worry about. The girl who backhand compliments you in the bathroom at the bar: "Wow, I could like nevevevever wear that." The one who never tells you where she buys her clothes. In her perfectly half-up half-down straight black hair that flows onto her ironed-AF checkered dress, I feel nothing but violence when I look at Samantha. Her beady eyes pissed me off because they stared whenever you did something stupid. And then her stupid blush-colored clutch--UGH. 

I hope I can find some readers traumatized from SP at an early age and who began to see SP's in everyday life. At the middle school dance swaying to Nickelback with your crush, the name on every boy's prepubescent lips. I keep seeing articles and memes about the American Girl Dolls, but no one has formed a powerful militia against this doll. We need to be different in 2020. We must be vigilant, yet powerful. We must continue to fight the Samantha Parkingtons (OW) of the world.