Let’s be honest — Barbie has never been a shining beacon of progressive thought. Her figure looks more like Jessica Rabbit than Jane Doe, and her physics-defying measurements would kill an ordinary girl. That said, her latest fictional adventure, Barbie: I Can Be a Computer Engineer, hits a new low.

Back in 2010, Mattel released Computer Engineer Barbie and shortly thereafter, the fictional storybook accompaniment, “Barbie: I Can Be a Computer Engineer.” Sounds promising, right? Almost like Goldieblox, the highly successful toy promoting girls in STEM. But the book was less Goldieblox and more Father Knows Best.

Throughout the story, Barbie wants to design a game that shows kids how computers work. That’s great. Unfortunately, she can’t code and relies entirely on her guy friends to do all the heavy lifting. As for Barbie? She’s just the designer. With a girlish giggle.

Barbie proceeds to catch a computer virus, accidentally transfer the virus to her sister’s laptop (wiping out all her music), and foul up the entire situation. For a budding “computer engineer,” she seems to know surprisingly little about antivirus software and basic PC security.

Barbie’s computer sci teacher, a female no less, explains in insultingly simple terms how to fix her problem, but even that’s too complex for her delicate lady brain. So what does Barbie do? She gets her guy friends, Steven and Brian, to save the day.

Gizmodo has a good blog post breaking down the book — with screencaps — and they explain Steven and Brian thusly:

“Steven and Brian are nice guys, I’m sure. But Steven and Brian are also everything frustrating about the tech industry. Steven and Brian represent the tech industry assumption that only men make meaningful contributions. Men fix this, men drive this and men take control to finish this. Steven and Brian don’t value design as much as code.”

In other words, women are only good for creative endeavors, and men — who care little for artistry — take care of all the technical mumbo jumbo.

Oh, but it gets better. Barbie takes credit for fixing her sister’s laptop and receives all the accolades due her guy friends.

At school, Skipper presents her assignment to the class. “Hi, everybody,” she says. “The person I admire most is Barbie — a great sister and a great computer engineer!”

Nice.

Needless to say, this book not only didn’t inspire young girls to pursue STEM careers — or present a realistic version of a budding computer engineer — but it’s extremely silly and patronizing — even for someone like me who doesn’t normally involve himself in issues like this.

As you might imagine, the book provoked a huge backlash, and Mattel eventually pulled the book from Amazon and issued an apology on Barbie’s Facebook page just last week:

“The Barbie I Can Be A Computer Engineer book was published in 2010. Since that time we have reworked our Barbie books. The portrayal of Barbie in this specific story doesn’t reflect the Brand’s vision for what Barbie stands for. We believe girls should be empowered to understand that anything is possible and believe they live in a world without limits. We apologize that this book didn’t reflect that belief. All Barbie titles moving forward will be written to inspire girl’s imaginations and portray an empowered Barbie character.”

I don’t buy it. This wasn’t some wayward reference or miniscule detail that Mattel skipped over. Whoever wrote this book made the conscious decision to portray Barbie as a helpless dunce who fouls up the simplest computer tasks, gets her guy friends to fix her mistakes, and takes all the credit. This was fully premeditated.

I don’t pretend to know how to get girls more interested in STEM, but this ain’t it.