Is too much exposure to Disney princesses bad for a lttle girl?

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Trivial compared to some of the other threads in this topic, I know, but need to know if I should just indulge 4 yo DD1's princess phase or if I'm setting her up for a lifetime of waiting for her 'true love' to arrive on a white charger and whisk her off to 'happily ever after' (yeah, right).
Going to bed now but am genuinely interested in your replies!

There are whole modern industries devoted to making women into princesses, and women who enjoy that.

Lots of career-focused women dream of working at companies like L'Oréal and Estée Lauder.

I think if we are being serious now, that you are the most importanr and influencial role model in your daughters life. As long as you are not simperingly wet and down trodden then she will not turn out that way. For the record my prince charming swept me off my feet.

I'm actually scared at the thought of being dd's role model... at least Cindarella enjoys the housework and talks to mice.
madame d'aulnoy fairy tales, get this. It's great. Anna you'll find it in french as well.

[resolves to talk to mice]

Hi Bink.

I'm liking the cut of your jib, Domesticgodless... Very interesting post re the domestic adornment thing being a symbol of high economic status rather than drudgery.

Franca - that looks great, thanks

Anchovy, I am researching the whole nanny/sahm/working mother thing at the moment for an article so it's close to my heart.

The domestic adornment thing is kind of anecdotal, although I am looking for evidence at the moment! I am noticing a big resurgence in the ubermum thing for upper middle class women, and simultaneously there has been an upsurge in this rather hysterical excess of feminine frippery for girls which I now seem to see everywhere.

Domesticgodless - don't you think the upper middle class übermum has always been around?

Of course, she has more money and more opportunities than ever. But I don't think she ever went away (the word resurgence would suggest that).

I think she has now become an aspiration though, and one that marketing depts have capitalised on (Kidston et al), so she is getting more exposure than she used to.

MrsBadger - that's basically true of all segments of society that have any $$$ worth to business .

Anna the blue bird was my favourite, featuring princess Florine.

Franca - thank you, I'll print it out and read it in bed (in comfort and peace) later.

Now for a serious hijack - Franca, where can I go on holiday in Italy in August where there aren't going to be millions of people?

come on the little italy thread and we'll give it a good thought... it is not easy....

Good posts Anchovy and Bink.

LisaLisa, to answer your question about Poppy, in the Poppy book I read to dd the other night she sounded like a spolt brat. The plot was

Poppy and Honey went to the fair
They each saw a dress they liked, they couldn't afford it
Their mum said no
They whined a bit
She said ok, do a couple of hours pretend work and you can have them!
They found them in 'princess baskets' (wtf are they?) hanging on a tree the night of the fair ball
David Sage the vet proposed to Saffron whose dress was even more amazing
Poppy and Honey were asked to be briddesmaids as they had such lovely dresses

Moral: whine and get what you want and if you look nice enough you might get asked to be an adornment at a wedding I also think the writing style's stilted plus, they bore me. (I know, they're not aimed at me! This one was a birthday present)

it's this one

gosh this princess poppy sounds hideous www

Yes I used to worry about this at the same age. Now my dd is 9 and I remember the innocence and sweetness of the Disney Princess days with great fondness.

Heehee at your name, love it!
I went through a fairytales phase, but I was a bit older. Loved Russian Fairytales and Brothers Grimm princesses. They were still princesses, but a bit more feisty.
It will probably seem really babyish to her in about three or four years, so I don't think there is a lot of harm in indulging her, as long as you don't go bankrupt in the process.

I'd quite like a bit of princessy stuff.

Four boys = Little ones - Cars, tractors, and feckin' Thomas. Older boys - Helicopters and making weapons out of anything.

DS3 and 4 do play with my old dollies. But it won't last. The ninja element is already creeping in.

Yes, we have a Russian fairytale book which is absolutely beautifully illustrated and textually much richer than the DP ones (go ahead and call me snobbish - something I haven't been called since my days in a state school for being bright, LOL).

Domesticgodless - interested in your article - am a working mother with a fantastic nanny and a feisty 4 year old DD and a rationed approach to empty frippery: CAT me is you need any quotes for your article!

oo, don't start me on textual richness (hi there 'chovy) - all them reading Disney princess stuff need to have it smartly sleight-of-handedly substituted with a Joan Aitken-told, Jan Pienkowski-illustrated book of tales from the Steppe.

Baba Yaga; Chicken-Footed Hut; etc.; fabulous.

DD loves things with her 'favourite princess' on (Aurora/Sleeping Beauty, who with reference to the early comment on this thread IS the one she most closely resembles, hm, interesting). She is getting a soft Aurora doll from my brother and SiL for Christmas which may finally make her like them (she is scared of them). She also likes listening to proper fairy stories (now she has got over the terror of witches) and I enjoy reading them, provided they're well-written versions. Where I have a problem is where Disney Princesses meet books - I once had to read my friend's daughter the Disney book of Sleeping Beauty. Shudder. It was a pedestrian transcript of what is a rather lovely film, and it just about made me lose the will to live. Not a PC judgement, purely aesthetic/literary - but I'm very glad that said friend has just had another baby girl so there is no chance of the book getting passed on to us!

Domesticgodless - I like the new phrase 'pinny porn' to describe this sort of fantasy domesticity.
I absolutely think it needs examining in a cultural/political context.

I think we do our girls a big disservice these days. They're all such pink-obsessed fashion victims, brought up to think that:
a) their appearance is the most important thing about them
b) they are defined more by the fact that they're female and feminine than by the fact that they're strong, intelligent, resourceful
c) Cheap, pink, plastic tat is desirable
d) Being liked by men is absolutely vital.

Our dd is only 3 months, but I'm dead set against pink, fashion victim dolls, domestic drudgery toys, anything that encourages her to be a feeble little princess. She's bright, dammit - I want her to have the strength of character to go with that.

It's the merchandise aspect that bothers me more than the message, because I think my dds have a lot of strong role models to offset any limp princess ideas.

What makes me sad is the cloning of little children. You can go anywhere in the world now where people have money to spend, and you'll see little girls in the SAME dresses, SAME bags, SAME lunchboxes, and they all watch the SAME movies and like the SAME sicky shade of pink.

dd1, age 3, has been reasonably well shielded from this and she still gets excited about pink sparkly nylon.

But (just a few examples at random) she has a great interest in skeletons (I'm not really sure how this started), also in the last couple of days has asked over and over for readings of the Richard Scarry diagram of the paper factory. She's very interested in the various roses we have (it's summer in NZ) and watches them like a hawk for new flowers. Her favourite bedtime story is the one about her being a pilot and flying over our valley and waving at all the neighbours in their gardens.

ie totally weird random stuff and no other little girls her age would be interested in exactly the same set of things.

IMO, that's how it should be. How are they ever going to get a grip on life and find out who they really are if they're all little clones invented by the marketing dept of Disney Inc.