What's Wrong With Cinderella Summary

709 Words2 Pages

"What's Wrong with Cinderella", an article in the 2006 New York Times, discusses the toxicity of the Disney Princess era and all the princess products, and how it largely contributes to forcing gender roles on young girls and pushes young girls to heighten their sense of being feminine. Peggy Orenstein, the author of the article and a mother to a young girl herself, doesn't like the concept of princesses and explains how everyone associates girls with princesses. Several issues and concerns are raised regarding the physical and mental impact that the younger generation might have from the excessiveness of the princess theme toys, clothing and animation. The writer believes that young girls are being influenced to think that beauty is determined …show more content…

Whereas Peggy Orenstein believes that girls should be more like boys more focus on real career choices, and grow up to be successful businesswomen rather than desiring to be life fairytale princesses. She believes little girls have been brainwashed into wanting to be perfect little girls and not participate in average children activities, such as sports because they feel it's unfeminine. It seems that Orenstein feels her daughter does not consider herself a girl if she doesn't follow the princess role. However, pushing back toward that argument, are there issues raising a daughter unisex and not reinforcing the female gender role at all? There are a few drawbacks to raising a daughter unisex. For one, it may come off to a child that being feminine is bad. Relationships can also become a conflict in the society we live in today. If a daughter is raised unisex, she may tend to also have traits that are more masculine, such as having the tendency to be more dominant. This can become a problem in a relationship because in our society today, men are dominant and lead relationships and a woman raised unisex may clash with a man raised as their typical gender …show more content…

By raising a daughter unisex and telling them they can "have it all" and do it all, more pressure is put on the child to be it all, and by telling a girl that they can be anything, the message unintentionally is received as they need to be everything. A big problem is that in order for raising daughters unisex to achieve something and for the girls to not become outcasts in society, many families would have to raise their daughters unisex. Raising one girl unisex will lead her to not fit into our society that has created distinct gender categories, rather, a large group of people, or rather a movement, would need to take place for such a thing to work and create a society that doesn't push children raised this way out of their gender box. I have three girls and agree with Peggy Orenstein, but also think that girls should have their time to be kids and love princesses. Every little girl loves princesses at first but anyone who has kids knows that as they grow up and become teenagers the princess effect begins to fade off and they begin to think that things princess related are childish. Teen girls like my 13-year-old daughter then have their own

Show More
Related

  • Summary Of Crystal Liechty In Defense Of Princess Culture

    1131 Words  | 3 Pages

    Quenzer is a mother and also a blogger for The Everyday Mom Life. On August 2016, she posted an article called “Be The Princess If That’s What You Want to Be.” She argues that parents should not steer their children away from what feels normal to them. She explains that most people associate princesses and pink with girl activities and applaud those who love blue and orange. The girls who love princesses and pink should not be ignored. She states, “If I don’t believe she can [be kind, generous, and polite] while being a princess and liking the color pink, then I am part of the problem. If I don’t believe that she can enjoy things that are still traditionally stereotyped as girl things and still be strong, brave, and fearless, then what am I teaching her” (Quenzer). Quenzer claims that she should not depict what her daughter can be, but she wants her daughter to find her own passion. Quenzer adds to Liechty’s argument because she adds that even though the princess culture can teach a child values, it can also allow children to discover who they are. Quenzer also furthers Bartyzel’s claim because she argues that parents should not narrow what it means to be feminine. The author’s purpose is to inform parents that they should not limit their children in order to persuade the audience to let their child find their passions. The author writes in a suggestive tone for parents. I agree with this claim because I believe

    Read More

  • Stephanie Hanes Little Girls Or Little Women? The Disney Princess Effect

    1729 Words  | 4 Pages

    Finucane’s daughter had seemingly been robbed of her creative imagination after trying to live up to the expectations of a Disney princess. Her daughter “seemed less imaginative, less spunky, and less interested in the world” (Hanes 1) after being introduced to the Disney princess line, willing herself to be just like the princesses. Young children know no better and are very susceptible to the world around them, and are very likely to imitate what they are shown or what intrigues them. Hanes was outraged at how Disney had stripped the child of believing in other imaginative creatures and activities, and was stuck on behaving as a princess. Hanes provides research in the article that supports that Finucane’s daughter is not the only one to catch the Disney princess symptoms. There is a whole book about this “diseases” as well as much research conducted on educators that seemingly all agrees that “[teachers] are unable to control the growing onslaught of social messages shaping their…students” (Hanes 1). Through her research Hanes discovered that the Disney Princess empire is a $4 billion dollar industry that leads to “self-objectification, cyber bullying, and unhealthy body image…” (1) causing problems for young girls. These “ideals” will stay with them throughout the remainder of their life, based on decisions that were made for them, to introduce such “ideals” into their minds. Hanes’ readers are most likely to be parents or adults who will likely become parents in the near future, and this article is a great introduction to the long road of making decisions that will impact the way their children think

    Read More

  • Gender Stereotypes In When I Was A Boy By Dar Williams

    2530 Words  | 6 Pages

    Why it is like that? Children don’t have social roles, they are just being who they are. And the most awful part is that they must lost the very important part of their individuality. It happens during the process of growing up, when they are being forced and compelled to adopt social norms. It might go smooth or becomes a struggle, but it’s inevitable. Our essence is uncomplete, it’s stocked up with numerous gender stereotypes and gender scripts. But if we strip off all the build-up of these stereotypes, we left to be miserable and lonely human being. Dar Williams song is a nice illustration hoe society slowly but surely imposed its gender rules in our lives. We receive feedbacks and instructions from literally everything. But we not just the receivers. We are active learners and teachers in gender school. We ourselves constantly give feedback and instructions to others. Thus, gender becomes interactive process. It emphasise West and Zimmerman, when they speak about gender accountability, “If sex category is omnirelevant (or even approaches being so), then a person engaged in virtually any activity may be held accountable for performance of that activity as a woman or a man” (West, Zimmerman “Doing Gender”, 1987, p. 136). It seems that every our move becomes gender accountable, and all of us are sharing this duty to maintain each other gender. To the certain extend, it becomes obligation for every individual to keep gender binary active, and we all doing so by

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Girl By Jamaica Kincaid Girl

    1705 Words  | 4 Pages

    She is responsible for training her daughter to gain abilities to discover her roles herself through knowledge, and also responsible to provide her daughter with inner and social safety. In addition, in the society, it is necessary for a mother to be fully aware of the significance of her daughter’s adolescent stage; she has to direct her daughter’s potentials by useful activities while she maintains a healthy, relationship with her daughter. Social norms and traditional conduct if care isn’t taken might affect a child. One should be able to express one’s self, by not been judge by the society. Whether a one acts a certain way the society doesn’t except one to act, one should have a freedom to express his or her gender roles in the way one wants it to

    Read More

  • Disney and Traditional Stereotypes

    1067 Words  | 3 Pages

    A little girl sits on the floor with her gaze fixed on the television screen in front of her, watching magical images dance before her eyes and catchy songs flow through her ears. Even though she had seen it at least twenty times before, she still loved The Little Mermaid just as much as she did the first time she watched it. As she watched it, she longed to be a beautiful mermaid with a curvy body and wonderful singing voice like Ariel. She longed to be saved by the handsome Prince Eric, and fall in love and live happily ever-after like Ariel did. In today’s society, women strive to achieve equality between the sexes. Despite the tremendous steps that have been taken towards reaching gender equality, mainstream media contradicts these accomplishments with stereotypes of women present in Walt Disney movies. These unrealistic stereotypes may be detrimental to children because they grow up with a distorted view of how men and women interact. Disney animated films assign gender roles to characters, and young children should not be exposed to inequality between genders because its effect on their view of what is right and wrong in society is harmful to their future.

    Read More

  • Gender Roles in Disney

    2315 Words  | 5 Pages

    Media is a powerful agent in entertaining children. It also influences and teaches the youth of society the suitable and appropriate gender roles that they inevitably try to make sense of. The power of media is very influential especially in the minds of the youth. Disney movies target the youth and plant certain ideas and concepts about social culture into the vulnerable minds of children. Media uses gender to its advantage, just like Disney productions. Humorous caricatures reveal some harsh realities about the portrayal of Disney Princesses in many movies made by the Walt Disney Company. Disney mixes innocence with the ultimate form of fantasy to capture an audience. Predominantly, Disney helps highlight the gender roles by showing the audience simply what they want to see. In the attempt to stick to the norm and portray stereotypical female characters, Disney created Princesses. Presented as damsels in distress and inferior beings to men, Disney Princesses give children an inaccurate portrayal of gender roles at a young age. Through Disney’s social success and intriguing films, such as The Little Mermaid, Snow White, Aladdin, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, and Beauty and the Beast, Disney Princess movies portray stereotypical representation of gender roles through the denigration of the female image, targeting and ruining the perception of youth today.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of What's Wrong With Cinderella

    1024 Words  | 3 Pages

    Throughout many fairytales, Cinderella more evidently, there is the stigma of male roles and female roles. The man is the prince, the knight in shining armor, the strong protector and able provider, and the woman is the princess. Dainty and innocent, weak and capable only of looking pretty, fostering children and maintaining appearances of house and home. These roles of placement have been around long before fairy tales, and they’ll be around long after fairy tales, but the inclusion of these roles through characters in fairy tales does nothing but enforce the idea that this is the way things are meant to be, and women who do not assume these roles are wrong and unworthy. In her article, Orenstein refers to Cinderella as “the patriarchal oppression of all women”, and she is exactly right (Orenstein “What’s wrong with Cinderella?”). The impression left of these gender stereotypes travels off the pages of the fairy tale and into the real world when studies show that there is a “23% decline in girls’ participation in sports and other rigorous activity … has been linked to their sense that athletics is unfeminine” (Orenstein “What’s wrong with Cinderella?”). The blatant disregard for equality in these stories can be summed up with a term Orenstein coined, “relentless resegregation of childhood”, which ultimately defines what it means to be a boy or a girl in the terms of set behaviors and life duties (Orenstein “What’s wrong with Cinderella?”). Whether it be Cinderella or any other princess, the fairy tale business makes it a point to create a place for women with their stories, and unfortunately that “place” is demeaning and still practiced

    Read More

  • Analysis Of The Article 'Learning To Be Gendered'

    708 Words  | 2 Pages

    In today’s society, it can be argued that the choice of being male or female is up to others more than you. A child’s appearance, beliefs and emotions are controlled until they have completely understood what they were “born to be.” In the article Learning to Be Gendered, Penelope Eckert and Sally McConnell- Ginet speaks out on how we are influenced to differentiate ourselves through gender. It starts with our parents, creating our appearances, names and behaviors and distinguishing them into a male or female thing. Eventually, we grow to continue this action on our own by watching our peers. From personal experience, a child cannot freely choose the gender that suits them best unless our society approves.

    Read More

  • Essay On Gender Socialization

    1985 Words  | 4 Pages

    In our current culture, there is a huge difference between what is considered to be for girls or boys. From birth, children are told what colors and styles of clothing they wear, what toys they should play with, and how they should act. Often, girls are told they cannot play with toys considered to be for boys and boys are told they are not allowed to play with toys considered to be for girls. Children who do decide they want to play with the toys not traditionally for their gender are often scolded by family members, pushing the children back to their gender-specific toys. Gender socialization starts at birth and continues from adolescence, to adulthood, causing specific and detrimental differences

    Read More

  • Disney Princesses' Influence on Young Children

    1103 Words  | 3 Pages

    Princess films are centered around a female character who meets the love of her life and, like in other fairy tales, ends with their wedding (Ross 4). Initially, the Disney princesses’ have portrayed a typical female role in the film, showing the expected gender roles in American society (England Descartes Collier-Meek 563). These gender-based stereotypes are influenced by the time period they were made in, but also originating from old fairytales made centuries ago. “Society’s increasing reliance on the use of television and videos to occupy children warrants continued investigation of how exposure to media may affect children. Given that media portrayals like those in the animated movies of Walt Disney often reinforce societal stereotypes related to gender, ethnicity, and culture, parents may consider a more thoughtful approach to the use of television and videos” (Disney Movies 1).

    Read More

  • Gender Stereotypes in Fairy Tales

    1317 Words  | 3 Pages

    "Disney Princesses: Classic Fairy Tales Or Gender Stereotypes?" Hartford Courant, 27 Aug. 2012. Web. 09 Dec. 2013.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Cinderella

    1162 Words  | 3 Pages

    The classic tale of Cinderella is well known for the fight of overcoming great obstacles despite great odds. However, there are always a few ill-hearted people who go out of their way to cease any competition that they might face, as seen with Cinderella’s step-sisters. Samuel Jackson says is his distinguished quote, “The hunger of imagination…lures us to…the phantoms of hope,” to help develop a more defined view of a fairytale. The story of Cinderella fully embodies the ideals of a true fairytale by encompassing magic, hope, and struggle between good and evil throughout the duration of the plot.

    Read More

  • Gender Neutral Parenting Essay

    2034 Words  | 5 Pages

    Over the decades, a significant mark of the evolution of gender is the increasing social phenomenon in how society conceptualizes gender. Gender is a system of social practices for characterizing people as two different categories, femininity and masculinity and arranging social relations of inequality on the basis of that difference (Ridgeway & Correll 2004). Gender-neutral parenting (GNP) refers to raising children outside of the traditional stereotypes of girls and boys. It involves allowing children to explore their innate personalities and abilities rather than confining them into rigid gender roles that society has shaped. It can be argued that it is through socialization children discover how to operate in gendered structures, learn

    Read More

  • Feminism In Disney Movies

    1213 Words  | 3 Pages

    In society today, there is pressure from all sides to conform to a certain ideal of beauty. People are overwhelmed with the different types of images and media forms that are telling people how to act and what to look like. Media is one of the most powerful tools at our disposal. It has the power to educate, affect social change, and much more, but if taken incorrectly people will take drastic lengths to change something about themselves. There have been many attempts to empower women through different types of media, but many have failed miserably. Over the last couple of years, Disney has struggled greatly with the representation of women throughout Princess movies because young girls are hounded with images of princesses,

    Read More

  • Cinderella Character Analysis

    1002 Words  | 3 Pages

    Disney and old fairytales threaten gender politics and ideal women roles by giving certain stereotypes for domestic and personality traits. Fairytales that have turned into Disney productions have sculpted domestic roles for women that consist of cooking, cleaning and caring for the children. Disney has also created these princesses with personalities that are shy, passive, and vulnerable. The cause of these stereotypes are making individuals obliterate their own identities and becoming clones from the mold that was prepared for

    Read More

More about What's Wrong With Cinderella Summary

Open Document