Once upon a time, little girls are made of sugar and spice and all things nice and little boys are made of frogs and snails and puppy-dog tails ... but no more!
Enter the feminist book for children:
Bring on Jacinta Bunnell's colouring book Girls Are Not Chicks, published in the UK this week. The New York-based author first had the idea for feminist books for children when reading bedtime stories as a nanny. "I found myself editing the words so as not to pass on a sexist message," she says. "In most children's books the girls have pretty frocks and bows in their hair, so I would turn it around – call the boys by girls' names and vice versa."
In the US "anti-princess reading lists" have appeared, pioneered by the websites Mommytracked.com and Bitchmagazine.org. There are now books for three- to eight-year-olds with a specifically feminist agenda: Call me Madame President, Girls Think of Everything, Girls Will Be Boys Will Be Girls.
Viv Groskop of The Guardian has the run down of books that'll turn your little princesses into Betty Friedans in no time flat: Link
I don't see why the idea that there are multiple ways to be a girl, and that they don't all involve tiaras and pink frilly dresses is so threatening to people? I can't understand why the idea of wanting to challenge very limiting notions of femininity provokes quite so much, frankly ill informed, anti-feminist ire.
- this statement proves the need for an alternative message. "What little boy doesn't want to be a prince?" doesn't have quite the same ring, does it - because you can immediately picture some boys wanting to be firefighters or action heroes or whatever else.
Because we show boys from birth that they have many options.
Funny if all you offer - and all you approve of - is princesses and pink, that many girls will "want" that. I'm interested in the fear underlying those who want to insist that it's 'natural' for girls to only want those things. What do YOU lose if girls are taught that blue's a girl's colour too?
If you offer alternatives like in these books, as well as Disney, all kids will have a real choice. Not until then though.
Originally a poem from 1820 England... not a dirty limerick... Get educated?
Alot of women grew up reading these stories, and turned out just fine...
If I ever have kids in the future, or am around kids of that age I will be sure never to get a feminists' children's book. I just hope I have all my children books from the past, then no worries. Heh, can't wait for them to butch up dora the explorer or barbie.
And as for the lil beauty queens and whatnot, it isn't because you read them books, it is because of how the parents raise them.
You who claim that your daughters would rather dress in pink and play with dolls, and sons that would rather play cowboys and indians, well why do you think this is? It's not because of a congenital need to do so, but rather a mirror image of our society.
Unfortunately (I wish it weren't true) I think that these patterns will never disappear completely. It's too ingrained in our daily lives and because of that simple fact it will continue onwards.