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!

I agree we often underestimate small children's appetite for facts, especially when we have girls.

Under "Bizarre bedtime books that your children enjoy" I could put my dd1 and dd2's favourite, aged 3 and 2, was "How are lego bricks made?" A 70's school information book. Over and over, we read this archaic little book. North sea oil production, chemical processing plant, etc.

dd2 is just 6 now and her favourite book for her birthday was an internet-linked encyclopedia. The poor child doesn't get to go on the computer much cos we guard our computers jealously but she takes this book to bed with her regularly and reads about electricity and so on.

Um, am I the only killjoy to not like the domesticated female role models in Richard Scarry?
I threw one of his books out which we were given, Nursery Rhymes. It included several about wife-beating.

Bizarre bedtime books ... boy do we do those.

Ds has each Economist Yearbook for the last 4 years & does poring late at night. That logically must be the fertile source of all those graphs about flying-whale population growth/Dreamland Rain [currency unit]-vs-Sterling FX tables. Etc.

sleighs, are you normally (as in, non-Yuletide) someone else? I am finding a whole heap of kindred spirits on this thread that I hadn't spotted before (as well as a whole heap I already have, who know who they are ...)

I have a four-year old dd and I share a lot of the concerns expressed here of how commercialised these things are and how very young children are turned into voracious consumers, and that there is such a simplistic and polarised gendered subtext to it all. Toys, stories, and role models aimed at boys seem equally narrow.

Bink I am normally toomanydaves. I don't post regularly. I lurk, form vehement opinions, and then forget to post. I have spotted you before but that post was spooky.

Oh, and all of you, for an antidote to Disney, check this out. They are friends of mine, and it is an amazing show.

www.southbankcentre.co.uk/festivals-series/campaign/christmas/events-and-exhibitions/rapunzel

Fennel, your "How are lego bricks made" bedtime story is giving me warm fuzzies.

Isn't it lovely what they can be interested in when they don't know that some things are boring.

(Agree with you about the housewifey bits of RS by the way, but we've managed to gloss over this. And yes, I think so too, Franca, the new illustrations are different sometimes )

I'm going to stalk you now Daves/Sleighs & see where else we coincide - because WE LOVE KNEEHIGH (my kids' older cousins are regulars every summer in Cornwall) and we love the South Bank Centre (dh is doing something at the moment to become their guinea pig consumer patron person) & I hadn't spotted that was on & can't think of anything better to take ds & dd to.

Now, have you seen the Punchdrunk Masque of the Red Death at Battersea Arts Centre? Has nothing whatsoever to do with children or fairy tales, but if you like theatre of the Kneehigh sort I think you might like them. (See thread of mine elsewhere.)

yes of course I have Bink.....
in fact I have friends in it.
I probably know you in RL, right?
hope you enjoy Rapunzel.

I spent the whole evening thinking whether my childhood passion for fairy tales (not Disney Princesses though, they weren't so popular in the 70s, though I really enjoyed Cinderella) had somehow shaped my descent towards domesticity and now I discover that it was RS . It must have been that whole page dedicated to breakfast.

richard scarry's galore

franca and other RS fans- have you noticed Lowly Worm doesnt appear in some of the later books but a bug called Goldbug does? What do you make of this?

ooo someone mentioned pinny porn further down. Such a good phrase!

Anna's quite right, we are not looking at a lapse of ubermum domesticity followed by resurgence but rather a big expansion of it. I think the dividing line between Cath Kidston (and possibly Boden) pink flowery pinafore chic and Jordan style pinkness is very clear and classed as well.

What i find fascinating as well is the way little girls both accept and subvert standard 'girl culture'. I do remember as a girl in the early 80s being obsessed with Girl's World (that bizarre disembodied head thing). I hacked all its hair off. Also my Sindy ended up shorn and without hands. God it's disturbing in retrospect heh heh

I really can't stand the old Disney films, apart from Mary Poppins (a great way to introduce women's suffrage to DDs). My DDs love dressing up as princesses but they defintely prefer the newer films.

I would also recommend Mulan and Beauty and the Beast. We also like Peter Pan, Return to Neverland which features Jane, Wendy's daughter, who is a thoroughly modern girl. There are no simpering mermaids in this Neverland.

patsycline, you have got a wholesome Cath Kidston style name going there....

Domesticgodless - FYI, the whole consumerist übermum cult doesn't exist in France at all. No equivalent to Cath Kidston / Nigella / Waitrose / Boden... upper middle class French women outsource the domestic sphere (who'd spend money on a Cath Kidston ironing board cover when you have a slave to do the ironing?).

that is interesting Anna- I could do with a European perspective...

Am I right in thinking that in France there is far less of a 'Mommy Wars' media debate?

What do you mean by the Mommy Wars media debate ?

My sis is in Amsterdam if you want a Dutch perspective... and before that in Spain... We talk about this stuff endlessly

talk about over think something.

that's what academics do sadly custardo

its so not about donning pretty dresses or anything simple like that is it.

i hardly think i am a disgrace to my lefty principles becasue i wanted Annas dress in "The Kind and I" as a child.

feminism doesn't mean discasrding femininity.

Urrgh, those Disney story books somebody mentioned earlier are just awful. PIL gave DS one, and it went straight to the charity shop. It was a Pooh one, and a poor retelling of a poor movie. We have a beautiful copy of the original Pooh stories - there is just no comparison in terms or language, detail, story depth, illistrations...

I'm not generally on for getting rid of toys that people give the dc - censorship is not really the way forward I don't think, its better to use inappropriate role modes/products/tv as a starting point for discussion with our DC about real people, real life, what women do they know and what are they like? etc.

My DD (3 1/2) does adore pink, and fairies nd the like, and thats fine - I don't want to take those interests away from her. She has a pink fairy costume, lots of pink clothes, a dolly and a pink buggy for it - fine with me.

What I don't like is the assumption that these are the only things that little girls should/do like, and I think by buying them all the pink, sparkly, DP, fairy, high heels etc kit, we - the parents - are actually the source of the obsession, rather than the girls interestes. By indulging childrens whims to the limit, we are actually pushing them into a role.

Think about this - if your DD saw a train, an was interested in it, and asked some questions about it, would you buy her a book about trains? Would you buy her pyjamas with trains on? Wellies? A train set? a pencil case...?, and unbrella? a backpack?

Children's interests, whatever they may be, should be valued and explored, but not to the point where we are pushing them to be more interested than they actually are!

My DD has some wonderful usborn books which are non-fiction. Books about caterpillars, the body, recycling etc etc, which I really reccomend. I think we are ripping off when our over exposing them to DP and the like means they have less exposure to the wonderful fiction and non fiction book that are around, and to a host of other wonderful, exciting play and role play opportunities.

custardo - yes, you are absolutely right about that.

A woman can be a hot-shot lawyer or banker and still look feminine and attractive. And it is really important not to tell our daughters that they have to choose between "serious career" and "femininity".

anna by Mommy Wars I mean the whole tiring SAHM/WOHM thing (shudder to mention it in case I am accused of Bringing it Up)

Astrophe - I have no problems with censorship of toys or books I deem inappropriate/unsuitable/crap.

I censor what my daughter eats. Why shouldn't I censor the brain food too?