Coming off the heels of the big royal wedding recently, many of us got a glimpse at the princess that may live within each of us: The giddiness at the sight of the stunning gown, the jewels, the horse-drawn carriage, and of course, Prince Charming waiting at the end of the aisle. Every girl’s dream, right?
Except now that I have a little girl, that dream kind of freaks me out. Of course I want her to find love and romance and happiness, and live her happily-ever-after, but on her own terms as a strong, independent woman. So I dodge the deluge of perfect princess characters that abound at every turn. With their coiffed ‘dos, made-up faces, and tiny little waists, they dream of their man coming to rescue them as they bat their inhumanly long eyelashes and leave a trail of glitter wherever they flit off to. In the subtext of the figurines and the branded t-shirts, lunchboxes, backpacks and whatever else, is, of course, that beauty is all-important, and all-powerful.
In her new book Cinderella Ate My Daughter: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the New Girlie-Girl Culture, Peggy Orenstein sites recent research from the American Psychological Association that reveals that these images are not as innocent as those eyelashes suggest. Their findings state that the emphasis on beauty and sexiness at early ages, promoted by these images, is increasing girls’ susceptibility to the dangerous worrisome issues later on, like eating disorders, negative body image, depression, and risky sexual behavior.
Yikes. It’s enough to want to make you ban the “p” word from the playroom.