** Disclaimer #2: This post is all over the place, I'm sure. It is a jumble of thoughts and perspectives that, three years into having a daughter, I am still working out, and probably will be working out until she is 30.
As I promised on Facebook last week, I have been reading Cinderella Ate My Daughter by Peggy Orenstein. It's a continuation of my decades-long discussion with myself about girl culture, aided by books like The Body Project, Survival of the Prettiest, Pink Think, Reviving Ophelia, Wasted, Dying to be Thin, Growing Up Girls, Daughters of Suburbia, Delinquents and Debutantes among others. Mostly, I've been having this discussion with myself in order to figure out where my own adolescence derailed enough to drive me to an eating disorder and other whacked out thinking. It's the journey that lead me to be interested in human services and make the decision to minor in Women's Studies in college. I wanted to help adolescent girls who were struggling with those same tough issues I dealt with. It's not where I've ended up, but it's still where my heart is. But this may be the first time I've purposefully mulled over little girl culture and what impact it is having or will have on my own daughter. Oh, of course, I've thought about it, as I've made purchasing and media viewing decisions for her. But I'm talking about analyzing those spur of the moment, gut-led decisions and the influence, good and bad, they have on her. And this is the first time I've really, really taken a hard look at little girl culture versus adolescent girl culture. Because that's where it all begins, of course, with each and every interaction she will have with society and society's expectations of her. Even as a little girl.
Even before I knew I was pregnant with a girl, I had made it known that I really wasn't down with the Disney Princesses. For reasons I couldn't even necessarily verbalize competently, they just seemed to send all the wrong types of messages to little girls. When I did find out I was going to be raising a girl, I made promises that those princesses wouldn't find their way into my house. Guess what? They sneaked in anyway. We have a DP playmat with four princesses in coy profiles. Somehow, Giuliana knows all their names. She has pink pom poms adorned with DPs on the handles. We have a few of the movies, The Princess and the Frog, Cinderella, and Snow White. The Princess and the Frog DVD broke recently, and though it's probably my favorite of the bunch given it's comparatively positive quasi-feminist messages, I'm not heartbroken to see it go. Confession: I personally ordered Cinderella on eBay and Snow White used to be mine as a kid. Since they are both VHS, they don't get much play time and I'm ok with that. But I ordered Cinderella for her because, another confession, she enjoyed the book so much.
We have other non-Disney princess paraphernalia in our house. She has a shiny silver tiara with glittering pink gems. A frothy pink tutu that, yes, I bought and coerced her into wearing one Halloween. She puts that on when she wants to be a princess. And of course, we have a pink Little People castle with a prince and a princess.
Pink. Pink, pink, pink. That's another taboo I thought I could vanquish. Nope. I purposefully decorated her bedroom in neutral colors. Green, blue, yellow. A touch of hot pink for a bold, fun statement (though my mother smirked over that choice given my aversion to anything pink for my little girl. But I was thinking, you know, cotton-candy-Barbie pink. Anyway...) But her Nana lovingly made her a cotton-candy pink blankie which is her favorite thing, and I wouldn't have it any other way. When I bought her big-girl bedding for her twin bed, I wanted polka-dots for my circle loving kid, and there was very little escaping more pink. She recently was given a play doctor set...in, you guessed it, pink.
And "girlie." Our house is stuffed with "girlie" toys. Shopping carts, kitchen sets, purses, necklaces, baby dolls in strollers. Domesticity, fashion and mothering.
So what does all this mean? Have I failed as a feminist mother? Have I compromised my principles? I don't think so. But I am learning that compromise can't be avoided. And probably shouldn't be avoided. For all those pink, girlie, princessey toys, she also has firetrucks and toy cars, a rocket ship, musical instruments of every variety, blocks, trains...typical "boy toys." This past Halloween she chose to be a "Firefighter Giuliana" and was so proud of her fire engine red hat, boots, coat, and real siren. This past weekend she had a sleepover with her cousins at Nana's house where the girls played princess dress up and put on makeup (while I sat at home reading my book! Irony...) But when I asked her what her favorite part of the weekend was, she told me it was playing with the train set.
What I worry about, of course, is not the individual toys and movies, but the messages they subliminally, and overtly, send to my daughter about her role in society. Is she a princess to be adored for her beauty? Is pink the only color she is allowed to enjoy? Is there anything wrong with enjoying playing mommy and grocery shopping, two things she may well end up spending a significant portion of her life actually doing? I don't know. I know I don't want her to spend as much time as I have (and, honestly, still do) thinking about appearances and how her body measures up to impossible standards. I made a pledge to myself before she was born to never criticize my body in front of her. So far, I've done pretty well. And I made a pledge to myself shortly after she was born not to comment on her body in anything other than a positive manner. No teasing little comments about being too skinny or her tiny little tushie. Even though I worry to myself sometimes that she needs to eat more, that she is on the skinny side. I worry about that from a health stand-point, but when I'm being honest, I can admit that I'm secretly glad that, so far, it appears that she hasn't inherited my tendency to overweight. God, I'm disgusted with myself for admitting that, but there it is. (By the way, if you read Cinderella Ate My Daughter you will find several similar comments in there. Peggy and I were sooooo on the same page.)
I want desperately for her to be proud of herself - of her talents, strength, ambition, independence, intelligence, and, yes, of her body. The whole package, not just pieces of it. And I want her to find strength in herself in ways that honor the fact that she is a woman, not distort or exploit it. I spent some time the other night on youTube watching various girl-power music videos, and I have to say, emphatically, that if this is girl-power
we have a long, loooooong way to go for our daughters' sake.
I knew these issues would crop up when she hit those weird tween years. I guess I just didn't expect to be fighting this battle on her behalf so early. Influences to be thin, demure, and hyper-sexualized seem to begin practically in the womb these days. And it's certainly not just the Disney Princesses. Take my beloved Strawberry Shortcake for instance. I loooved SS as a kid. I had a whole little set with Strawberry, Huckleberry, Blueberry Muffin, the Purple Pie Man and Sour Grapes. I was thrilled to they were staging a comeback and I could introduce them to my daughter. I knew they had changed over the years and was fine with this variation
but this one
(the version all of Giuliana's actual Strawberry Shortcake toys come in) gives me pause. Why so tall and thin all of the sudden, Strawberry? Why do you suddenly, after 30 years of being a sweet little girl, have to look all sweet-16? What was wrong with being a little girl, you know, your target audience? And it's not only SS, either. As Peggy Orenstein points out, what happened to Dora? This,
to this.
Most Dora merchandise comes in the latter form nowadays. And though they say they wanted Dora to grow up with the girls who fell in love with her, who are now tweens and teens, that's not who they're marketing her toward. They still target little girls. So why all this rush and pressure to grow up? Why can't little girls just enjoy being little instead of all these quiet, subtle messages that it would be so much cooler if they were older, prettier, thinner, and maybe even sexier? Those are NOT the messages I want my daughter to absorb, but sometimes I feel I don't have a lot of control over it.
I do my best to walk that tightrope of being a good role model, making good choices for her, and not falling off on one side or the other of hyper-femininity or banning all things pink. Some days I feel like I have to contort myself to stay in that narrow space I've tried to carve out, the space to allow her to enjoy being a girl without falling into the trap of only being a "girl."
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Edited to add: After re-reading this several times, I want to make one point clearer.It's not that I want to keep Giuliana from any and all images of femininity. I do think it's important for her to be able to integrate femininity with all the other aspects of her personality. And I don't "hate" the Princesses. I actually like most of the movies...they are fun, I enjoy the songs, the humor is cute. But I don't want that to be the over-arching representation of femininity in her life at this impressionable age. What I am afraid of is if I give into all the Princess hype and marketing, that it will make a stronger impression on her that I would like. Does that make sense?
Also, as I was re-reading this post last night, G crawled up into my lap and saw the pictures of SS and Dora. She wanted to look at them, so I scrolled over them several times. She did not recognize "new Dora" as being Dora. She said, "Whose that, Mommy?" She has definitely seen "new Dora" several times before, so I am glad that "old Dora" still has the stronger impact. (BTW, I did NOT show her the "Lady Marmalade" video :)
4 comments:
Hey, I played with Barbies and princesses and pink, pink, PINK, and I turned out ok. I went through a number of years where I was having really bad nightmares, and I found that watching Cinderella three times a day would help me fall asleep-- because, of course, my brain would be so consumed with pink princess images it wouldn't have room for anything else! I don't think these fascinations/obsessions warped my body image at all.
Ballet class did. My mom being on a diet (a very balanced, healthy diet-- but still a diet) DEFINITELY had a big impact on my body image. As in, "mommy is eating less to be happy. That means I should eat less to be happy, too."
I think the biggest thing is to constantly celebrate what her body is capable of. She'll learn to take pride in what she accomplishes, not what she looks like.
Waht did they do Dora??? I have been out of the Dora loop since my boys are not into her anymore.
Secretly I wanted a daughter so bad it hurt. But now, so many years later, I am somewhat glad I don't have to walk this particular tight rope.
On the other hand I have to teach my boys not to treat girls the way the media portrays them. Equally hard I think.
We will muddle through the best we can.
Great thought provoking post!
When I was 12 I really wanted a Barbie but they had sold out... it was the beginning of the Barbie craze. For my birthday, I got a rain check for a Barbie. But I was a fretful young girl and worried myself sick that I didn't need a Barbie and shouldn't get a Barbie so I used the gift certificate to buy "educational toys".... a puzzle map of the United States, a pencil case with all the State Capitols... some other things like that. But I really wanted a Barbie and was terribly sad with all my educational toys.
Hey! what about a toy gun?
As a little girl, I climbed trees and dug in the dirt. I did play with the Barbie dolls I inherited from an older sister, but it was a half-hearted kind of play; even at 8 I KNEW not all girls were going to be blonde, blue eyed and wear "hip" clothes all the time.
I don't really have a problem with the DP's so much that they're girly, it's more because they're EVERYWHERE. Di$ney (yes, I spell it with a dollar sign) cares less about kids and more about money nowadays, and their efforts to be "multicultural" so as not to offend anyone (It's good to include everyone, yes. But not when you're obvious about it)
I don't know if you get what I'm trying to say-- I HATED what they did to Strawberry Shortcake (she was already cute, why mess with it?) and what they did to Holly Hobbie (Hello? She's a pioneer girl, not a fashion model!!)
I'm picking up that in the mom department, you're a little smarter than the average bear--and I'm sure you'll use all these as examples of "you can be like Barbie if you want to--but no one says you have to be".
I do like the new Dora, though. I think it was time for her to grow out her hair and grow up a little. ;)
Aye,
Scratch
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