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Original poster

Women on CBeebies

30 replies

purpleaura · 03/02/2015 13:21

Hi all, this is something that's been bothering me for a while and I'd love to explore it more with you lovely ladies... I'm not sure if this is quite the right place, but I'd love to hear some feminist perspectives on this issue. Please redirect me elsewhere if you think that's more appropriate.

I find that I get quite irritated by the female presenters and female characters on Cbeebies programmes. I feel that they are almost always extremely smiley, very 'nice' and with no other discernible character attributes. The number of enormous female toothy smiles is overwhelming- Nina and her neurons, Miss Hoolie and the other Balamory ladies, the woman who presents Swashbuckle, all the female presenters... I'm startign to see their enormous grins as sinister! The only woman I can think of with a bit of personality is the presenter, Katie, who's allowed to be a bit quirky. Male characters and presenters seem to be afforded a bit more room to display other character traits.

I'm interested in/concerned by this representation of women. What effect might it be having on our little boys and girls? Are we teaching girls to be nice and smiley at the cost of other things? Are we teaching boys to expect the same from women? Or have I just watched too much CBeebies?!

I'm really looking forward to discussing this a bit further and perhaps you can help me to identify more eloquently quite why this bothers me so much. Thanks for reading!

OP posts:
Original poster
purpleaura · 03/02/2015 14:12

Haha! I'll listen carefully to the parrot next time ifyoure! I hadn't actually thought about body stereotypes, but you're both absolutely right. I guess Kerri (sp?) is a step in a good direction concerning representing different bodies. But you're right that they all have long hair, wear 'respectable' amounts of make up (except Nina who is always hideously made-up in copious amounts of vivid green eyeshadow!) and conform to the same body type. Grrr. I am enjoying getting rid of some of my Cbeebies rage!

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ifyourehoppyandyouknowit · 03/02/2015 14:06

I'd just like to see some different female body types on Cbeebies (but that goes for all mainstream TV). They are all uniformly pretty and slim (to current standards of beauty) and it would be nice to see some variation. The men are all a bit different - Justin/Mr Tumble has a big tummy, Andy is super-tall, Alex is short (and older).

The Swashbuckle woman kills me, her face must hurt from grinning like that. (Side note, am I imagining it or is the voice of the parrot actually Moriarty from the recent Sherlock?!)

ChunkyPickle · 03/02/2015 14:04

I think CBeebies is much better than the disney/nickolodeon stuff - all the presenters are cheerful, and they do have more balanced cartoons (Abney and Teal for instance is a lovely, gentle, largely unbiased cartoon for instance)

However, then there are things like TreeFuTom, or Mike the Knight (good god Mike is an awful character and it's full of stereotypes) which feed into the idea that boys only want to watch cartoons with boys in. Just not true for any of the kids of my aquaintance (generally under 4s) - who all love Doc McStuffins as much as each other (I blame the catchy tune)

They also fall prey to the pink/eyelashes for the female characters (numberjacks, numtums) - all of the young children who I've questioned on the difference between boys and girls mention eyelashes!

Original poster
purpleaura · 03/02/2015 13:53

Thanks for your reply BuffyBot- interesting questions... you've really made me think! I guess the characters are often quite simple, so each character has a 'thing' that they do/are. I can think of male characters who are creative, silly, stupid, wise, slow to catch on, have a specific interest in something or a magical ability. Though there are a few females who have a specific interest in something, or a magic ability (like the magical but sexually suggestive winking mermaid in 'Old Jack's Boat'!!), I can only think of 2 or 3. I suppose I'd like to see a whole range of traits portrayed in female characters- negative ones as well as positive. I can see that the BBC work hard on being PC and trying to represent a wide section of society, and I'm sure its hard to please everyone. But the gender divide crosses cultures and is relevant to everyone. Preschoolers are so vulnerable to messages about gender, because they are just absorbing the world around them and trying to work it all out.

OP posts:
BuffyBotRebooted · 03/02/2015 13:39

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