Talk about Parents Behaving Badly, I was watching The Girl’s Next Door, the reality show about Hugh Hephner’s harem. and I saw a very bad mother.
The girls were signing autographs and this woman had brought her two daughters, one about six-years-old and the other maybe 11 or 12. The three of them were so excited to meet their favorite TV personalities. The six-year-old was like, “Kendra is my favorite!” The nine-year-old was totally into Bridget and the mother enjoyed Holly.
What the hell is wrong with that mother? Does she not understand that these are PORNO reality stars she’s holding up as role models to her little girls? Playboy is still considered pornography right? If Playboy is the ambition of these young girls, is it such a far leap to full blown porn movies?
I also watched this stupid show called Sunset Tan briefly. (Nothing I really want to watch on Wednesday nights.) It’s another profession reality series about a tanning salon in LA.
This ridiculously superficial mother brought her 3rd-grade daughter in to get the best tan in the class. She literally spent $1,300 to have her daughter fry in a cancer-causing tanning bed and then get a spray tan. She bought every oil they sold because the sales guy told her This is the package Lindsay Lohan comes in for.
Do you want to look just like Lindsay Lohan, Mom kept saying. Make sure you get her cheeks really good, we want her to look as pretty as Lindsay Lohan. We need for her to be the prettiest girl in the class for her school pictures.
At the last minute the eight-year-old is standing in her bikini in front of some 30ish dude with a spray gun and she says, Mommy, I don’t think I want to do this.
Well, you have to. You have to be the prettiest girl in the class, Mom said, as she pushed her towards the gun.
That poor kid looked like a burned pumpkin when she was finished.
These are NOT empowering messages for our daughters. Young girls should not be so competitive about their prettiness in elementary school. Porn stars/Hugh Hephner’s kept women shouldn’t be held up as role models. DUH!
Get some perspective ladies.
P.S. I’m watching this trash – but my daughter is in bed.
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Domestic Labor Balance
May 29th, 2007 — Family Life
By Tracee Sioux
We had a fabulous time over Memorial Day weekend when a very generous friend offered to let us stay at her bed and breakfast for three days. It was super-glorious. We were so grateful we couldn’t help inviting a few friends over to share it and made it a lovely party. It got me to thinking about who does the domestic or social labor, men or women?
When my extended family socializes or have parties it is literally exhausting hard labor for the women. My grandmother, aunts and mom will cook for days. They are the last to sit down and when the eating is over the women are the ones to clean up. As a child I just accepted this as a matter of course. The women did the work in the home.
As an adult, however, I am one of the women expected to work my butt off. As an adult I’ve come to realize how exhausting putting on Sunday dinner is. It’s a day of rest for the men, but a day of hard labor for the women. As a little girl everyone in our family had to clear their own plates from the table, except my father, he was treated as a pampered prince because he was the man and “brought home the money,” my mother would explain. Well, women are bringing home much of the money in today’s society, but we’re still doing more than our share of the domestic labor.
I don’t resent the work to create a hospitable party. I resent the men sitting there taking it for granted that it’s the woman’s job. I can’t change my extended family, but I’m straight up with my daughter that it’s the wrong attitude and it’s unfair.
When I throw a party or get ready for company my husband pitches in. He is expected to help me clean for company, prepare the food and to clean up after the party. Why shouldn’t he really?
I think we’re in a a girl revolution and we, their parents, are the transition generation. It’s not too easy to convince my 50-year-old uncle that it’s his job to clean up after dinner as much as it is mine. However, my daughter can see that I expect my husband to help in the same social situations. This way, by the time she’s grown up she’ll know that it’s within her rights to expect her husband to help with the domestic chores.
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False Eyelashes
May 26th, 2007 — Body Image & Self Esteem, Media, Marketing and Advertising
by Tracee Sioux
I was attempting to teach my five-year-old daughter to critically deconstruct advertising while watching television one day.
Oh, mommy look how pretty her eyes are! You gotta try that. Ainsley exclaimed when she saw a commercial about Loreal’s Volume Shocking Mascara.
Those are fake eyelashes Ainsley. No mascara can make your eye lashes look like that. You shouldn’t believe everything you see on commercials. They tell us that so we will buy their mascara. But, it doesn’t mean it’s true.
Good lesson, I congratulated myself.
When I went to buy new mascara I thought I’d spend a bit more as my lashes were falling out, so picked up the Loreal Volume Shocking Mascara.
You’re wearing fake eyelashes, Ainsley screamed as I was applying my make up one morning. Mommy’s wearing fake eyelashes!
It’s not fake eyelashes, it’s mascara. I just wanted to see if it worked.
Damn, it does. You should try it. I use it every day now. While the woman in the commercial IS actually wearing false eyelashes, as I told Ainsley. This stuff really does fatten and lengthen the lash using a wand of white goop. Then the color goes on with a comb and your eyelashes really will look thicker and longer. It’s totally worth the $10.
It’s hard to teach girls to deconstruct advertising and downplay the “beauty is all important” message, when as women, we too want to be beautiful and find a product that helps us look better.
When we tell girls that beauty is not important, they know we are lying. Mainly, because we spend time and money on looking beautiful. Beauty is important. We may as well start telling them the truth. Then perhaps we can teach them to put the importance of beauty in balance with inner beauty, compassion, brains, strength, courage, personality and all the other things we want them to know are more important.
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Girls Can Be Soldiers Too
May 25th, 2007 — Other stuff
I hope everyone is out frolicking with their kids this Memorial Day.
We are supposed to be remembering our lost veterans on this day.
We have a war going on right now, so it’s good to talk to our kids about that.
Lots of not-so-noticed veterans are women.
Do our daughters know that soldier is a career option for them?
I wasn’t sure Ainsley knew she could be in the military or be a soldier and so I asked her.
She was not aware of this option. Nor did she realize that her aunt Janet served five years in the Army. (I love the picture of her in her camo with a machine gun that makes her look like she could cream my little brother.)
I don’t want her to become a soldier particularly, however I do want her to view previously no-girls-allowed professions as within her reach.
Thank you to the soldiers in my life – my dad, retired from the Air Force and Utah Air National Guard after 30 years, and my sister-in-law Janet, who is subject to being called back up (end the war, she just had a baby!) after serving in the Army for five years. And my Grandpa, Don, a World War II veteran. Thankfully, all my veterans are still living. Also a cousin currently serving active-duty with a nuclear submarine in the Navy.
Happy Memorial Day!
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Growing A Girl
May 25th, 2007 — Body Image & Self Esteem, Reviews & Giveaways
By Tracee Sioux
I highly recommend Growing a Girl: Seven Strategies for Raising a Strong, Spirited Daughter
First, isn’t the title just delightful? I am so jealous that I didn’t come up with it myself.
It’s such a great book I lent it to my friend and she didn’t want to give it back. I ordered another one.
The very best time to read this book is when you are pregnant with a daughter. By the time I read it my daughter was already 3 or 4 and I realized I had already done some things I could’ve done differently. Better late than never though.
For instance, I had spent a great deal of time with her working on letters but never any numbers. I also realized that my aversion to math, like frequently calling myself “math retarded,” was going to have negative consequences on her ability to think linearly and be an achiever in the sciences (jobs that pay tons more than the arts).
Other mistakes I wish I wouldn’t have made is letting the Princess obsession go unchecked, even though my gut was telling me to enforce some limits. I was not giving her ready access to blocks and video games that help kids learn spacial skills and to think strategically. After reading the book I asked my mother to give her math puzzles, block and legos – of which, sadly, she had none. For Christmas she got video games to encourage hand-eye coordination. I also sent the next birthday invitation with instructions, “No Princess or Bratz toys please.”
Prior to reading Growing A Girl I had complacently accepted that her grandmothers would genderize her through their gifts. I am no longer so passive about the ongoing gifts of dolls, dress up clothes. After all, they give science projects and tool belts to the boys.
It’s also got some fantastic stuff about complimenting daughter on beauty versus brains and where we put their value.
Another fantastic aspect of this book is that my daughter really enjoys the focus on her girlness. She begs for me to read to her from it. When I lent it to a friend, Ainsley repeatedly reminded me to ask for it back.
It makes her feel good to know that she’s the girl I’m growing and that I think it’s such an important job that I’m going to read up on it.
