Tags: fighting back
Posted May 15th, 2013, in Princesses, Recommendations, Recommendations Girls, Recommendations Grown-ups, Why I Wrote CAMD | 1 Comment
So many people have sent me links to Jamie Moore’s work. Moore is a photographer and mom to a 5-year-old girl, Emma. In response to the cultural omnivorousness of Disney Princess, she she began to think about: …all the REAL women for my daughter to know about and look up too, REAL women who without ever meeting Emma have changed her life for the better. My daughter wasn’t born into royalty, but she was born into a country where she can now vote, become a doctor, a pilot, an astronaut, or even President if she wants and that’s what REALLY matters. I wanted her to know the value of these amazing women who had gone against everything so she can now have everything. Gosh, that is so beautifully written, isn’t it? Anyway, she and Emma chose five of those women for Emma to dress up as to honor for her [...]
Tags: Disney, girlie girl culture, pink princess culture camd, premature sexualization, princess culture
Posted May 3rd, 2013, in Asian American Me, Creepy Marketing, Princesses, Why I Wrote CAMD | 167 Comments
Update: The fabulous A Mighty Girl has put a petition up on Change.org asking Disney to keep Merida BRAVE. You can sign it here. So, I was about to commend Disney for doing something right. Yes, I was. The front page story in today’s New York Times reported that the company stopped production of branded merchandise in Bangladesh in March, after the last disaster there: a fire that killed 112 people. To wit: A Disney official told The New York Times on Wednesday that the company had sent a letter to thousands of licensees and vendors on March 4 setting out new rules for overseas production. Less than 1 percent of the factories used by Disney’s contractors are in Bangladesh, according to the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The company’s efforts had accelerated because of the November fire at a factory that labor advocates asserted had made Disney apparel. [...]
Tags: pink princess culture camd, premature sexualization
Posted April 23rd, 2013, in Creepy Marketing, Princesses, Why I Wrote CAMD | 27 Comments
A note on this blog post: I have been discussing Candyland for years–since I got it for my own daughter. I also mention it in my talks. It is one of the best examples, along with the other toys linked below, of sexualization of toy culture. This particular post was inspired by a post on my facebook page from reader Lisa Marie Norton, whom I don’t personally know. In trying to write a quick post, I pulled photos from Google that were from Rachel Marie Stone’s blog. She and her followers have been unhappy with that and I apologize. I was sloppy. I don’t think of blogging the way I do my articles and books in terms of journalistic standards, mostly because it seems bloggers themselves don’t; it is a new world to me. At any rate, I hope the changes below will make amends. That said, please understand that my ideas are my [...]
Posted March 4th, 2013, in Creepy Marketing, Princesses, Why I Wrote CAMD | 12 Comments
When I first started writing about the Disney Princesses, people assumed my beef was with the girl waiting around to be rescued by the handsome prince. But honestly? I don’t get that passive vibe from little girls playing princess or from the merchandise sold them. For instance: how often do you see a prince doll at Toys’R’Us? (Though, personally, I think Prince himself is a doll…). No, today’s princess is not about romance: it’s more about entitlement. I call it “girlz power” because when you see that “z” (as in Bratz, Moxie Girlz, Ty Girlz, Disney Girlz) you know you’ve got trouble. Girlz power sells self-absorption as the equivalent of self confidence and tells girls that female empowerment, identity, independence should be expressed through narcissism and commercialism. Think of it as the Kardashinization of girlhood (or maybe just the apocalypse): whether it’s craft kits, science kits, summer camps, birthday parties, dolls, games [...]
Tags: Disney, pink princess culture camd, princess culture
Posted October 3rd, 2012, in Princesses | 39 Comments
Just saw this latest video posted by Disney. They’re trying to rebrand the Princesses as being about strength of character and self-efficacy. What do you think? Can they do this: while also peddling tens of thousands of products to our daughters that emphasize beauty and consumerism? Does the brave Rapunzel in the movie offset the one who is on the Escape From the Tower Lip & Nail Set? Or the Pretty Pretty Princess board game? Or the zillions of other products out there? You tell me. Meanwhile, this video put me in mind of one from years ago, back in the days of Girl Power, that Nike did: And finally just for fun and to illustrate how deeply the Princess phenom has gripped our collective imagination, (see it before it goes viral and loses its cool) I give you “Hipster Disney Princess the Musical!” Kind of the opposite of age [...]
Tags: age compression, CAMD, girlie girl culture, pink princess culture camd, premature sexualization
Posted August 2nd, 2012, in Princesses, Why I Wrote CAMD | 31 Comments
So, while we’re on the topic of how the Disney Princesses–the brand that parents go to to stave off premature sexualization of their innocent girls–are changing, let’s take a look at Belle. Recall that the message of “Beauty and the Beast” is that true beauty comes from within (though you could also argue it teaches that if you hang out with an abusive guy long enough he turns into a prince…). Now let’s look at how Belle has changed since her debut in 1991. Here she is in the movie, just a girl and her book, singing, as one does: Here she is, also in the movie, in her iconic yellow gown, the one that has made countless preschool girls rip the necks of their t-shirts because “princesses don’t show their shoulders” (people tell me that all the time): Now here is the BRAND NEW BELLE circa 2012 from [...]
Tags: age compression, Disney, girlie girl culture, pink princess culture camd, premature sexualization
Posted August 1st, 2012, in Princesses, Why I Wrote CAMD | 43 Comments
I’ve been writing and talking about how the princess culture morphs into the diva culture as girls get older, but the transformation works both ways. Over time, the Disney Princesses not only have become more focused on cosmetics than character, but their actual faces are increasingly influenced by pop culture divas. Take Cinderella. Here is what she looked like in 1950, in the original Disney film.: This is as a servant girl (a part of her character that has disappeared ENTIRELY, but which is the basis for her strength of character and the real reason we’re supposed to root for her…) And at the ball: Among the interesting things to note: her hair is not that blonde and her face is sort of regular-looking. Here she is in the post-2001 official Disney Princess era: blonder, blander, coyer, flirtier, more like a parody of the princess perhaps? Note how different [...]
Tags: fight fun with fun, fighting back, Let kids be kids
Posted May 9th, 2012, in Princesses, Recommendations, Recommendations Girls, Recommendations Grown-ups | 3 Comments
Looking for a new “fight fun with fun” book for your middle grade daughter (or son….)? Honey, have I got two for you. Kepler’s Dream, the debut YA novel by Juliet Bell, is about 11-year-old Ella, a clever, compassionate girl whose mother’s cancer treatment and father’s disengagement exile her to “Broken Family Camp” for the summer: staying with her severe-natured grandmother in her peacock-ridden hacienda in Albuquerque. Neither of them is happy about the arrangement. Ella is afraid her mother may die, but all her grandmother seems to care about is her crazy library full of books When a rare and much-loved volume, Kepler’s Dream of the Moon, is stolen, however, Ella decides it’s up to her to find it. The result could be the key to healing her broken family. This is the kind of book I used to love as a girl, back in the days before the [...]
Tags: CAMD, Disney, girlie girl culture, pink princess culture camd, princess culture
Posted April 24th, 2012, in Creepy Marketing, Princesses, Why I Wrote CAMD | 27 Comments
The garden used to be a wholesome place where you could wrest your child away from the tentacles of licensed products, right? No more. the ever-brilliant Rebecca Hains has made me aware of Burpee’s new Disney Princess seeds (oh yes, that’s what I wrote). Needless to say, the ladies only grace flower packets—Mickey, Donald and the rest get vegetables because, as Rebecca notes, “princesses are meant to be gazed on; they are delicate beauties…” Too bad for boys who will now doubtless be expected to reject the flower patch. Meanwhile, Rebecca points out that while regular seeds cost about a buck a pack, The DP ones weigh in at $1.99. That’s quite the royalty tax Disney’s levying ! Then there’s the mark-up accompanying Disney Princess plant labels which cost a whopping $2.97 for 6 while the regular labels are a mere $1.99 for twenty. Rebecca concludes so beautifully [...]
Tags: fight fun with fun, fighting back, girlie girl culture, pink princess culture camd, premature sexualization, princess culture
Posted April 5th, 2012, in Boys and Girls, Creepy Marketing, Equal Parenting, Princesses, Why I Wrote CAMD | 39 Comments
I can’t get this new study on preschoolers and outdoor play out of my mind. Initially brought to my attention by KJ Dell’Antonia at Motherlode, it found that roughly half of parents of preschoolers did not take their children outside to play regularly–suggesting that those children are not getting the level of physical activity they need (see KJ’s post for important caveats). But here’s the kicker: parents were 16% more likely to take preschool boys outside than preschool girls. Why? Researchers theorized it was ingrained (and probably unconscious) stereotypes about how much exercise girls need. This sets the stage for sedentariness in adolescence and beyond. Which, I’m guessing, plays into distorted body image and unhealthy dieting. Great for the 60.9 billion dollar diet industry (with its 95% failure rate); not so great for girls. So you know I’m going to loop this back to the Princess Industrial Complex, right? Girls don’t seem to [...]
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