Women on CBeebies

[purpleaura]

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!

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.

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!

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?!)

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!

Quick answer is yes, being smiley, nice and accommodating is what girls have long been trained to do and boys to expect.

It really discombobulates adults when a woman does not behave this way, especially in everyday casual social encounters, whereas men being grumpy, demanding, selfish or opinionated is not considered surprising, even if it isn't seen as desirable or pleasant.

So, in as far as CBeebies is part of everyday life and society, it's no surprise they perpetuate these norms. It is reasonable though to expect them, and all people paid to influence or look after children, to think about what assumptions, expectations and behaviours they are passing on.

CBeebies though, everyone is quite smiley. I wouldn't say Alex or Andy display strong personality traits, other than cheeriness. (I'm afraid Katie is the one presenter who grates on me - she seems somehow insincere to me, though also smug - which could well be a pejorative synonym for confident. Hmm).

Rosie of 'everything's Rosie' personifies your point. She is an archetypal 'nice big sister', always sensible, helpful and actively thinking about everyone else's needs - in a 'capable head girl' way. Will, the boy in that, is nice but thoughtless and a bit selfish. He often has to be prompted into niceness by Rosie. I think that is many people's idea / experience of normal M / F relations.

Some of it is really good, and I think they do a good job of representing a huge range of children, but I am a bit hmmm at some of the adults and the presenters.

I have noticed and been a bit irked by the quiet, passive characters of Topsy and Zebby on Raa Raa, whereas the boy animals are bolder, louder, more confident.

We love Sarah and Duck. She is something of a 'quiet, thoughtful girl' but the gender relations are mostly pretty good (except for the episode 'Stargazing' which I hate!) and it's a bit too odd to relate strongly to everyday life.

Btw, tangent but Alex is not short! I though he and Cat were tiny, then saw him standing next to Mr Bloom, who is tall and Alex was almost the same height. It's just that Andy is really very tall.

I like Rebecca in 'Let's Play' though. I think they are very consciously un-sexist there and it is great - especially because it's sometimes a tiny bit surprising to me - to see a slender young woman doing a lot of the adventurous and physical jobs she takes on, with huge enthusiasm and confidence (within the bounds of the programme set up, that the main character never really knows what they're doing). It's a great advert for giving things a go.

ifyourhoppy I was convinced the parrot was Moriarty for a long time, even Google it. Imbd and Wikipedia insist they are not the same actor. I remain unconvinced!

spectacularly misses the point of this thread

Being honest and being subjected to fucking obscene amounts a lot of Ceebeebes it's not something I have noticed. I agree they are all slim and pretty and that's not totally the case for the male hosts..all though mostly they are also nice looking.

I actually think the hosts are quite good at breaking gender roles, Nina and the Neurons (female scientist) Mr Maker (man doing crafts). I'm not so keen on Justin's house for the occasional drag performances... Female pirates, and what's the one where the two hosts take turns "play acting" something? So one week she might be a footballer and he'll be something else the next week?

All that said... the actual cartoons and children's programming is shocking. Full of lazy stereotypes, and basically zero educational value and you can tell they have put zero thought in to the scripts or the filming. It's pretty disappointing actually as It's the only thing I can turn on with out chromecasting where they aren't subjected to loads of evern worse advertising

Ah "let's play" that's right garbanzo. Missed the last 2 posts for some reason

Presenters - no. I agree as above- all the presents are smiley nicey types, male or female. The one that always got me was Wayballoo - the girls are both so insipid and pathetic! Drove me bonkers.

Yy to let's play. Melody is good for displaying a fairly realistic daughter (even if mum is patient to the point of saintliness!)

I agree that Melody is good...I also have a soft spot for Woolly and Tig as I think it too does a good job of showing an ordinary girl with all her fears and worries and how she overcomes them. I detest Zingzillas. I wouldn't let my children watch it as the girls are either pink and fluffy or mute!! Whereas the boys are cool and take the lead. I was also disappointed that they chose to have a male doctor and female nurse in Get Well Soon....what an opportunity that was to challenge stereotypes but nope!

Granny Island, Katie Morag and her Mum are all fab characters. I like Jess from Minibeast Adventure too.

Granny Island is a fab character but she was going to be a man originally! Mhari Hedderwick was asked to change the grandparent's gender because the publisher didn't want picture of a young girl sitting on an old man's knee , she'd already done most of the illustrations by this point so changed the hair a bit and the name.

I may be a few years behind the times here but me too had a female doctor
One of the few who didn't make me swear at the screen

That's really interesting about Granny Island. She is very similar to my mum and her friends!

Bring back Grotbags.

Grotbags was on ITV.

HTH.

I don't know if anyone's told you this but you can usually change the channel.

I thought you preferred to talk about the topic at hand, which in this case is CBeebies.

Or do you think Grotbags should hop channels? Anything you think should change about her show for today's watchers?

Talking about the topic at hand does not prohibit conversational flexibility.

Grotbags was compulsive viewing. She embodied many of the aspects that the OP complains are lacking in Cbeeb's female characters. To be blunt she was fat, ugly and generally vile. However, I eagerly awaited the next episode in the hopes that tomorrow would be the day when she managed to kill Rod Hull and drown his stupid Emu in a cauldron of molten lead. Perhaps not the most healthy of preoccupations for a young TV viewer, but I expect much more satisfying to watch than the bland tripe that the OP refers to.

Unfortunately I suspect that a great chorus of angst and reactionary rage would follow any rehash of the format. Women = witch, women = evil, fat = evil, and so on... regardless of how much kids might look forward to watching Emu being beaten to death with a broomstick.

Maybe a re-worked format involving a clever woman (minus the witch outfit), but otherwise embodying most of Grotbag's characteristics being pitted against a man so annoying that watching him suffer is a pleasure might be possible.