Bonfire of the Princesses

Contrary to the rumors I have been trying to spread for some time, Disney Princess products are not contaminated with lead. More careful analysis shows that the entire product line -- books, DVD's, ball gowns, necklaces, toy cell phones, toothbrush holders, t-shirts, lunch boxes, backpacks, wallpaper, sheets, stickers, etc. -- is saturated with a particularly potent time-release form of the date rape drug.

We cannot blame China this time, because the drug is in the concept, which was spawned in the Disney studios. Before 2000, the Princesses were just the separate, disunited, heroines of Disney animated films -- Snow White, Cinderella, Ariel, Aurora, Pocahontas, Jasmine, Belle, and Mulan. Then Disney's Andy Mooney got the idea of bringing the gals together in a team. With a wave of the wand ($10.99 at Target, tiara included) they were all elevated to royal status and set loose on the world as an imperial cabal, and have since have busied themselves achieving global domination. Today, there is no little girl in the wired, industrial world who does not seek to display her allegiance to the pink- and-purple clad Disney dynasty.

Disney likes to think of the Princesses as role models, but what a sorry bunch of wusses they are. Typically, they spend much of their time in captivity or a coma, waking up only when a Prince comes along and kisses them. The most striking exception is Mulan, who dresses as a boy to fight in the army, but -- like the other Princess of color, Pocahontas -- she lacks full Princess status and does not warrant a line of tiaras and gowns. Otherwise the Princesses have no ambitions and no marketable skills, although both Snow White and Cinderella are good at housecleaning.

And what could they aspire to, beyond landing a Prince? In Princessland, the only career ladder leads from baby-faced adolescence to a position as an evil enchantress, stepmother or witch. Snow White's wicked stepmother is consumed with envy for her stepdaughter's beauty; the sea witch, Ursula, covets Ariel's lovely voice; Cinderella's stepmother exploits the girl's cheap, uncomplaining, labor. No need for complicated witch-hunting techniques -- pin-prickings and dunkings -- in Princessland. All you have to look for is wrinkles.

Feminist parents gnash their teeth. For this their little girls gave up Dora, who bounds through the jungle saving baby jaguars, whose mother is an archeologist and whose adventures don't involve smoochy rescues by Diego? There was drama in Dora's life too, and the occasional bad actor like Swiper the fox. Even Barbie looks like a suffragette compared to Disney's Belle. So what's the appeal of the pink tulle Princess cult?

Seen from the witchy end of the female life cycle, the Princesses exert their pull through a dark and undeniable eroticism. They're sexy little wenches, for one thing. Snow White has gotten slimmer and bustier over the years; Ariel wears nothing but a bikini top (though, admittedly, she is half fish.) In faithful imitation, the three-year old in my life flounces around with her tiara askew and her Princess gown sliding off her shoulder, looking for all the world like a London socialite after a hard night of cocaine and booze. Then she demands a poison apple and falls to the floor in a beautiful swoon. Pass the Rohypnol-laced margarita, please.

It may be old-fashioned to say so, but sex -- and especially some middle-aged man's twisted version thereof -- doesn't belong in the pre-K playroom. Children are going to discover it soon enough, but they're got to do so on their own.

There's a reason, after all, why we're generally more disgusted by sexual abusers than adults who inflict mere violence on children: We sense that sexual abuse more deeply messes with a child's mind. One's sexual inclinations -- straightforward or kinky, active or passive, heterosexual or homosexual -- should be free to develop without adult intervention or manipulation. Hence our harshness toward the kind of sexual predators who leer at kids and offer candy. But Disney, which also owns ABC, Lifetime, ESPN, A&E and Miramax, is rewarded with $4 billion a year for marketing the masochistic Princess cult and its endlessly proliferating paraphernalia.

Let's face it, no parent can stand up against this alone. Try to ban the Princesses from your home, and you might as well turn yourself in to Child Protective Services before the little girls get on their Princess cell phones. No, the only way to topple royalty is through a mass uprising of the long-suffering serfs. Assemble with your neighbors and make a holiday bonfire out of all that plastic and tulle! March on Disney World with pitchforks held high!

Comments

[mamacat]

Disney is contributing to the Princess phenomenon that you describe, but is not solely responsible for it. One more necessary ingredient to the phenomenon is to have parents who push that sort of value system on the little girls. Without out-of-control parents, what Disney is doing would be pretty harmless.
Should we put labels on Disney products? "Caution, overexposure to Princess products may cause a distorted world view."
Maybe we should force parents to sign a form before they can have children, "Caution, bad parenting can be harmful to children."
A little common sense goes a long way. I do not understand some parents' compulsion to turn little girls into sex symbols.

[NABNYC]

I've thought for a long time that much of the Disney empire sexualizes little girls. I remember going with a friend and her child to see a Disney cartoon - maybe Aladdin? - sometime in the mid 1990s? The little girl cartoon figure was drawn with a tiny waist and large hips and buttocks. And I kept wondering at what weirdo middle-aged male would draw a little girl to look like that. Something about it was really disturbing.

Then, of course, it was the old familiar storyline. Little girl is captured by bad guys, young man rescues her. She does not rescue herself. She does nothing but sit on her very amply-drawn buttocks and hope she is rescued.

I think we could do better than this garbage.

And I even remember the lion king. Why is the lesson to children that only violence will help save the good guys, take down the bad guys? Why couldn't the good guy and his friends "scheme and plot" (i.e. use their brains) to bring down the bad guys. Why these reinforcement of the appropriateness of violence.

And one last thing. It's not a movie. It's not a film. It's a cartoon. Everytime I hear someone say something is one of the best "movies," but it's a cartoon, I get really annoyed. You need to take away the actors, directors, setting, costumes, lighting, and most of everything else in order to get to a cartoon. They charge as much as if it was a movie, but it isn't. It's a cartoon. And a long time ago, the cartoon was free, and it came on before the movie. And everyone called it a cartoon. Which is all that it is.

[ecotopian]

"Today, there is no little girl in the wired, industrial world who does not seek to display her allegiance to the pink- and-purple clad Disney dynasty."

My girls don't have any of them. Have never wanted any of that They really aren't into that. The only princess they like is "Princess Mononoke". A wonderful anime film from Japan. Trust me, Disney it ain't.

The best way to not have these things in you house is to turn the damn TV off! If your kids don't see it, they are less likely to want it. The Disney Channel is nothing more than a merchandising tool. Avoid it.

My girls aren't big fans of "fairy tales". Way too boring. "Lord of the Rings", on the other hand, that's more their speed.

[wildflowermaven]

Most effective way to minimize effects of the 'princesses' and other media models is to minimize the kids' media exposure. All the kids I've known whose parents either banned TV altogether, or limited it to occasional specials and videos have not been obsessed with the princesses or other products promoted through TV. Take back the power, and get rid of the TV. Your kids will be better for it, and likely you will be as well.

[shsofahs]

I am the father of an eleven year-old girl. We have been going to movies together for years now, as well as watching Disney Channel and, when she was younger, playing with the princesses my daughter dubbed "the glass girls" (because she was collecting ceramic figurines of them for a few years). One thing she and I have noticed over the years, and it always makes us wince, is that Disney loves to kill off the mother in the first reel, if she's in the movie at all (the one exception is Lion King, where the Daddy bites the dust early on). Think of all those movies where there is no mother: Cinderella, Bambi, Snow White, Nemo...I'm sure the film majors out there can help me here, but that's a pretty good start. Maybe all these princess babes are so slutty because they don't have a decent female role model at home.

[BobHiggins]

In general I have loved your work from afar, but this piece knocked me for a loop.

At the same time these clowns profess their allegiance to family values, to innocence and purity, in the same breath they sell a ridiculous and fraudulent sexuality to our children, our baby girls.

Thank you.

Bob Higgins
http://worldwide-sawdust.com

[Susanholmes]

Barbara,

i not only agree with you in spirit - i'd be right there with you pitching the perky, plastic post-adolescent playboy bunnies onto the flames with you.

however, i think it's more than a little naive to think that children develop sexually without adult interference. every idea that comes into a child's head about sexuality in their first six or seven years - including how to maintain relationships, appropriate public behavior with your partner and so on - comes from observing and imitating adult behavior. gay or straight, cis or trans, bi or celibate, we all act like our parents in our relationships - at least on some levels.

once the single digit years are over, we pick up things from friends and experience, yes, but in the end i've never met a woman who hasn't suddenly raised a hand to her lips in shock at hearing her mother's voice come out of her mouth. the gods know i have.

disney is a terrible influence on many levels, yes. to counter it, though, we've got to provide out kids with examples just like all the conventional wisdom says, and also...

...really mock the heck out of this whole princess thing. i'm completely serious about that. when you see it on TV with your daughter, just laugh and laugh and laugh and go on and on about how stupid and helpless the little bitch is! "how can she run away from the bad guy in those shoes? LOOK at that dress, it must weigh three hundred pounds! AUGH look at her! with those hips? no WAY is she going to be a mommy!"

a three year old won't understand what you're talking about, but they will understand the attitude, and they will imitate it.

[eanderso]

Oh get over it. It's her parents, not Disney, that's going to have the most influence over a little girl. If mom is a closet princess, wait-for-y­our-prince kind of lady, that's what the little one will be. But most moms aren't, and I give my daughter more credit for the intelligence to differentiate between fairy tale fantasy and reality than this author apparently would.

[mommadona]

Disney was very much into archtypes and the "dark arts".

He understood "animus/anima".

And you're right - I always liked the "bad queens and witches"..­...now, THAT was power.