A Princess Crisis

Katherine here.

We've been staying at Chris's house and taking care of the kids while he and Christine take a well needed break. They chose to go to Las Vegas where they've been spending their time staying up all the time seeing shows and gambling and doing Las Vegas things. I'm happy for them, but if I wanted a break I would have headed for a beach. It's been an exhausting joy to be with the kids. They are wonderful, but constant alertness wears me out.

In the midst of this happy babysitting I started having a princess crisis. Sammi (five this month) and Brooklyn (three) are princess fanatics. They watch princess movies all the time, read princess books, have princess toys--everything is princess, princess, princess. I understand the marketing and all that--I mean we just got over having everything Hello Kitty and Dora the Explorer. It's basically the same stuff, just pinker.

I'd been doing okay with all the princess pretending and singing--Brooklyn can really belt out "It's a Whole New World." I knew about most princesses already-- the traditional lovelies like Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty and some of the newer ones like Jasmine and several other ethnic beauties whose names I can't remember. I'd been raised on the need for a handsome prince to rescue me and take care of me and Mom wasn't sure what to do when I left college un-rescued and went to work. It's only one aspect of me that hasn't matched various ideals she set up that I didn't fulfill.

Anyway, yesterday a feminist rage (pretty rare for me) boiled inside when the second round of Disney's The Princess and the Frog played on while I knitted the sleeve of a sweater. I found myself paying attention and as the movie ended I was angry when Prince Nevine rescued Tiana. I'll explain.

The Disney version of this story stars its first Afro American princess who begins as a waitress working two jobs a day to fulfill a dream she shared with her father to own a great restaurant in New Orleans. She saves every penny and is ready to give the real estate bankers her down payment when they up the price. At the same time, a talking frog appears and asks to be kissed and she does so to get the last money needed for her dream.

The kiss backfires and Tiana (the princess to be) becomes a frog and wanders the Bayou with the prince frog, a trumpet playing alligator, and a firefly named Ray I liked a lot despite his bad teeth. The goal is a return to humanhood and along the way almost everyone tells Tiana that she needs to stop working so hard and she should wish more and love more. They want her to wish on the star Evangeline and mock her when she finally gives in but foolishly wishes for help with her restaurant.

I was saddened when the firefly died. I liked him and it reminded me of the death of the ant in Honey I Shrunk the Kids (I wept over that the first time). There's lot of voodoo and chasing around--usual good guy frog versus bad guy Shadow Man kind of stuff.

In the end, Tiana realizes that loving the prince frog (in frog form) is all that matters. The frogs marry and kiss and now that Tiana is a "real" princess they both become human. The prince buys her restaurant and they fix it up together. The alligator even plays the trumpet at the new place.

What an awful message to send to little girls--especially our Sammi and Brooklyn. The movie says that hard work and a dream of your own is misguided. Wishing on stars and waiting for love and having a man help you with your dream is what is needed. I wanted to puke.

I took Brooklyn aside to talk to her about this because she is the most obsessed and her current behavior has large traces of princess behavior. For example, last night, she wouldn't go to bed unless she wore a princess dress to sleep in. When Christine called to say goodnight to the girls, she told me to let B. go for it--it wasn't worth the fight she would put up and she slept in a dress that did not look comfy to me and I'm big on comfy at bedtime. The princess had won the battle.

As I tucked her in, I asked what it is she likes about princesses. B. said, "They get pampered." I countered with Cinderella and Tiana and all their hard work towards their dreams and she said, "They are only exceptions." She's three.

I rarely get upset about stuff like this, but I am upset. Franny had an amazing day at work not too long ago where she planned an event for Mrs. Obama's mentees in the DC area to visit the Supreme Court. They all spent the morning with Justice Ginsberg who told the high school women that they needed to fight to retain their rights because case after case is being presented that all whittle away at women's rights. Franny was thrilled and wept and said it was one of the five most important days of her life.

Franny works 80 hours a week for her dream to exist. When she wants pampering and needs pampering, she knows how to get that too. She does not need a male to make her life work as yesterday's princess movie suggested. I believe she's where she is because the world she grew up in and the family she grew up in believed you had to work hard and open doors to get where you want to go. She was raised to be an independent person, not a princess.

I can't wait for the princess phase to end with our grandgirls. Looking back, I wish the Dora the Explorer period was still in full swing. Dora wanting learning and knowledge. Princesses just want rescuing and that's a recipe for victimhood--just ask Tess.