Princess culture

Ever since the day i got the call telling me i would be the father of a baby girl I immediately began thinking about how i would raise her. I thought about how i would go about instilling our values effectively, and how i would avoid the mistakes the adults in my life had made when i was a child.

I also began looking at every little girl and even the women i saw on the street, or on television, to deconstruct exactly how this little person grew up to become a girl. Since I've never been a little girl its hard to know exactly what things a little girl likes but i certainly do my best to be supportive, and at this age (15 months) theres not much difference between the two genders. Soon however, it will be time for toys from one of two sections in the Toys R Us store, the boys side or the girls side. 

When you walk into the girls side you're immediately overcome by all the PINK and the princess dolls, princess costumes, princess balls, princess shoes, princess chairs, in short: princess themed EVERYTHING. I'm sure most people are asking, what exactly is wrong with a princess themed toilet seat? The short answer is: nothing. The longer answer is, everything, and heres why. 

I consider myself a feminist and to me that means a woman has carte blanche over her life decisions from the menial ones, to the major ones, so i fully support my daughter (and any girl) who wants to play with princess dolls, or pretend they are a princess and that one day their prince will come to rescue them, but i don't support pushing said interest in princess culture on my daughter.  Especially considering that, from the ground up, its about as anti-feminist as it gets. Waiting to be rescued by a man? just, no. 

So what is a feminist dad to do? Well, i haven't gotten that far yet, for now i'll supply her with all types of toys but in time i'm sure she will begin to develop a preference for one thing over another. As of now she loves Mickey mouse and Doc Mcstuffins, so we're all good....but i can already see it...Madison comes home from school with a princess doll hidden in her bag, it falls out, and i scream in horror....THE HORROR! 

For the shorter version of why im not fond of princess culture, this image has made its way  around the internet, for quite some time actually. I wouldn't take it too seriously, however it does make some good points.