1 00:00:14,13 --> 00:00:15,25 I want to talk tonight 2 00:00:15,26 --> 00:00:19,87 a little bit about the work that I did in Cinderella Ate My Daughter and then some 3 00:00:19,88 --> 00:00:23,59 of the ways that we can push back and sort of just go through the ways that the 4 00:00:23,60 --> 00:00:29,10 culture of little girls the media and marketing and consumer landscape that they 5 00:00:29,11 --> 00:00:34,97 inhabit has changed primarily in the last decade or so I've been writing about 6 00:00:34,98 --> 00:00:35,77 teenage girls for 7 00:00:35,78 --> 00:00:42,34 a long time and I started writing about little girls because. I had 8 00:00:42,35 --> 00:00:43,45 a daughter I became 9 00:00:43,46 --> 00:00:49,81 a mom and I think for most of us with little girls you know 10 00:00:51,20 --> 00:00:55,21 the first time that you hold that little girl in your arms you just think you want 11 00:00:55,22 --> 00:00:59,16 her to have you know all the potential all the possibilities and you don't want 12 00:00:59,17 --> 00:01:03,03 there to be anything that she feels like she can't do because she's 13 00:01:03,04 --> 00:01:06,10 a girl and you don't want you to be anything that she feels like she has to do 14 00:01:06,11 --> 00:01:06,56 because she's 15 00:01:06,57 --> 00:01:12,54 a girl and my husband and I were going along raising our daughter that way and then 16 00:01:12,55 --> 00:01:19,15 she went to preschool Oh how the mighty fall and we were walking around town 17 00:01:19,16 --> 00:01:22,65 and I live in Berkeley so I sing I can just imagine what's going on where women 18 00:01:22,66 --> 00:01:29,60 actually shave their legs. And. And we would go to 19 00:01:29,61 --> 00:01:33,51 the local grocery store and the guy behind the checkout counter would greet her and 20 00:01:33,52 --> 00:01:37,76 say you know hi princess and then we go to the drugstore and the late nice lady 21 00:01:37,77 --> 00:01:40,00 behind the checkout counter would offer her 22 00:01:40,01 --> 00:01:42,63 a balloon and say I know what color you want and give her 23 00:01:42,64 --> 00:01:47,88 a pink one without asking and you know the tattooed peers waitress at the breakfast 24 00:01:47,89 --> 00:01:53,13 place owned by Green Day would give her her princess pancakes and finally we went 25 00:01:53,14 --> 00:01:57,25 to the dentist you know those tricked out pediatric dentist that charged because 26 00:01:57,26 --> 00:02:03,67 they have Pac Man in the office. You do and. The dentist said to me 27 00:02:04,43 --> 00:02:08,78 my daughter sees me you want to get my princess throne and I'll sparkle your teeth 28 00:02:09,34 --> 00:02:11,09 and I just want my gosh to have 29 00:02:11,10 --> 00:02:18,02 a princess drill too I mean seriously I remembered availing myself of my mom's cast 30 00:02:18,03 --> 00:02:19,53 off tiara now and again when I was 31 00:02:19,54 --> 00:02:24,69 a kid you know royal play is as old as King Arthur's court but I didn't remember 32 00:02:24,70 --> 00:02:30,39 this idea that for three solid years of my life twenty four seven three hundred 33 00:02:30,40 --> 00:02:31,34 sixty five days 34 00:02:31,35 --> 00:02:35,53 a year I was not supposed to just like play princess in my room but actually be 35 00:02:35,57 --> 00:02:41,51 a princess out in the world and I really didn't know if this was an issue or not 36 00:02:41,55 --> 00:02:45,60 you know I mean on one hand girls were doing really well they were flooding the 37 00:02:45,61 --> 00:02:51,33 playing fields they were going to college in greater numbers than boys and yet the 38 00:02:51,34 --> 00:02:57,14 pressure to find themselves through appearance to believe that how they looked very 39 00:02:57,15 --> 00:03:03,65 narrowly defined is who they are had not abated one whit and if anything it had 40 00:03:03,66 --> 00:03:07,98 grown that message of growing more intense and it was skewing younger so that when 41 00:03:07,99 --> 00:03:10,47 I kind of delved into the research I looked at 42 00:03:10,48 --> 00:03:17,28 a study of two thousand. Kids and it found that between two thousand and two 43 00:03:17,29 --> 00:03:22,40 thousand and seven the percentage of elementary school aged girls who expressed. 44 00:03:23,55 --> 00:03:29,84 Intense concern about weight and appearance went up. And 45 00:03:30,22 --> 00:03:33,36 thinking about that and then thinking about sort of at the other end of the 46 00:03:33,37 --> 00:03:38,80 spectrum I was looking at research on college age women and I was looking at print 47 00:03:38,84 --> 00:03:43,88 at Princeton University they become alarmed because the percentage of young women 48 00:03:43,89 --> 00:03:50,10 in leadership positions elected and appointed leadership positions had also dropped 49 00:03:50,30 --> 00:03:55,24 during the same period precipitously and when they surveyed the young women about 50 00:03:55,25 --> 00:03:59,77 why they weren't willing to put themselves forward they also got the response that 51 00:03:59,86 --> 00:04:04,02 the girls felt the young women felt that they had to do everything do everything 52 00:04:04,03 --> 00:04:10,72 well and look hot while doing it so thinking about all of that I began this journey 53 00:04:10,73 --> 00:04:16,68 through Girl Culture and it took me from Disneyland to American Girl place I went 54 00:04:16,69 --> 00:04:23,59 to a Toddlers and Tiaras beauty pageant so you don't have to. I went to 55 00:04:23,60 --> 00:04:30,29 a Miley Cyrus concert so you don't have to. And I 56 00:04:30,33 --> 00:04:34,13 delved into twilight and I and I looked and I hung out on Facebook and all of it I 57 00:04:34,14 --> 00:04:38,41 was looking at this continuum of what girls were seeing and hearing and playing 58 00:04:38,42 --> 00:04:43,74 with from toddler to tween and how that was affecting their sense of self their 59 00:04:43,75 --> 00:04:47,97 development of their sexuality their body image their ideas about their future 60 00:04:47,98 --> 00:04:53,02 relationships and their sense of their academic and professional potential and I 61 00:04:53,03 --> 00:04:57,47 started with the princess's with the question of whether the very thing that claim 62 00:04:57,48 --> 00:05:02,03 to be protective of girls to protect them against premature sexualization was 63 00:05:02,04 --> 00:05:05,92 actually priming them for it I'm only going to give you one slide that has text and 64 00:05:05,93 --> 00:05:09,20 then read it because I know you can read and I hate when people do this but this is 65 00:05:09,21 --> 00:05:13,93 important so sexualization because we bandy that term around a lot it's when 66 00:05:14,25 --> 00:05:18,80 a girl learns that her value comes primarily from her appearance especially looking 67 00:05:18,81 --> 00:05:23,21 hot or this can be any of these can be true or any combination of them can be true 68 00:05:23,50 --> 00:05:24,12 she's held to 69 00:05:24,13 --> 00:05:29,32 a narrow standard equating physical attractiveness with being sexy or she sexually 70 00:05:29,33 --> 00:05:35,19 objectifies herself or as objectified she judges her body by how she thinks it 71 00:05:35,20 --> 00:05:39,57 looks to others rather than how it feels to her or adult sexuality is 72 00:05:39,58 --> 00:05:43,35 inappropriately imposed on her so let that marinate for 73 00:05:43,36 --> 00:05:48,35 a second because you're going to need to remember it and you will be quizzed. The 74 00:05:48,36 --> 00:05:50,25 American Psychological Association issued 75 00:05:50,26 --> 00:05:55,67 a report on the sexualization of girlhood that showed them in that that as this has 76 00:05:55,68 --> 00:06:00,43 become so and as girls excessively focus on their appearance especially 77 00:06:00,44 --> 00:06:05,83 a narrow defined ideal of appearance they become at risk for the vulnerabilities 78 00:06:05,84 --> 00:06:09,22 that we worry about with girls obviously it's not a plus because see but there's 79 00:06:09,26 --> 00:06:16,07 a vulnerability there for distorted body image eating disorders depression 80 00:06:16,19 --> 00:06:20,70 low self-esteem poor sexual choices all the things that we worry about so cute so 81 00:06:20,71 --> 00:06:25,14 keep that in mind and now I'm going to go back to the princess 82 00:06:25,15 --> 00:06:31,73 a. So when my daughter came home and said that she there were these Disney 83 00:06:31,74 --> 00:06:35,38 princesses I don't know what she was talking about and it turned out that there was 84 00:06:35,39 --> 00:06:40,09 a reason for that the Disney princesses did not exist until two thousand and I know 85 00:06:40,10 --> 00:06:43,90 you're all thinking yeah they did but they didn't there were those movies right 86 00:06:43,91 --> 00:06:45,84 there was Cinderella snow white maybe if you're 87 00:06:45,85 --> 00:06:51,38 a little younger there was beauty and the Beast. And they would come out and they 88 00:06:51,39 --> 00:06:55,09 would be in theaters for maybe two weeks and they'd be available on V.H.S. 89 00:06:55,10 --> 00:06:56,22 Later on and there would be 90 00:06:56,23 --> 00:07:00,25 a little bit of merchandise around that but then what would happen is they would 91 00:07:00,26 --> 00:07:03,42 come out of the theaters and Disney would say they go back in the vault that's what 92 00:07:03,43 --> 00:07:08,16 they talk about with their languages and they all the merchandise would disappear 93 00:07:08,52 --> 00:07:12,66 and you wouldn't see those characters again for seven years until 94 00:07:12,67 --> 00:07:17,73 a new generation of children came along so what changed was that around about two 95 00:07:17,74 --> 00:07:18,31 thousand there was 96 00:07:18,32 --> 00:07:21,65 a guy who became the new head of consumer licensing and he went down to Phoenix 97 00:07:21,66 --> 00:07:25,75 Arizona to familiarize himself with the brand and he saw all these little girls 98 00:07:25,76 --> 00:07:30,82 coming to this ice show and they were dressed in princess outfits but they were not 99 00:07:31,22 --> 00:07:37,83 official Disney licensed products they were making their own costumes huge profit 100 00:07:37,97 --> 00:07:44,33 potential lost so he went back and for the first time in the history of Disney he 101 00:07:44,37 --> 00:07:48,10 pulled these characters out of these different movies and group them together to 102 00:07:48,11 --> 00:07:53,84 market separately from the film's release and call them Disney princesses now this 103 00:07:53,85 --> 00:07:57,60 movie was incredibly controversial within Disney and I'm going to tell you my very 104 00:07:57,61 --> 00:08:03,41 favorite piece of Disney trivia now. Roy Disney who was Walt's nephew was totally 105 00:08:03,42 --> 00:08:07,43 against this because he said you know if you put Cinderella and Snow White on the 106 00:08:07,44 --> 00:08:07,93 same T. 107 00:08:07,94 --> 00:08:12,69 Shirt it's like mixing mythologies and you know I don't know the world implodes I'm 108 00:08:12,70 --> 00:08:16,99 not I'm not really sure what they what he thought would happen but I can't do it so 109 00:08:17,00 --> 00:08:23,87 to appease that faction. When you see multiple princesses on an item 110 00:08:24,39 --> 00:08:30,43 you'll notice that they're all looking slightly different directions and that's 111 00:08:30,44 --> 00:08:36,35 because they're not supposed to know the other ones are there and now that you know 112 00:08:36,36 --> 00:08:41,99 that it's going to drive you crazy every time you say yeah. Yeah it also has this 113 00:08:41,100 --> 00:08:46,43 weird thing after like staring at this for several years now of of isolating the 114 00:08:46,44 --> 00:08:49,95 prince and you know I mean Prince this is don't have girlfriends right you know God 115 00:08:49,96 --> 00:08:53,39 forbid you know Cinderella should give Sleeping Beauty 116 00:08:53,40 --> 00:08:58,62 a little support. So it does sort of also have this kind of subtle effect of 117 00:08:58,63 --> 00:09:02,25 communicating you know it's all about you and it's not about anybody else and it's 118 00:09:02,26 --> 00:09:06,88 not about any other girls so you know there is that aspect of it too I think that's 119 00:09:06,92 --> 00:09:10,56 my take anyway and so anyway they put these out there they put these characters out 120 00:09:10,57 --> 00:09:11,71 there in the first year they did 121 00:09:11,75 --> 00:09:15,31 a three hundred million dollars business which you know pretty good lunch money 122 00:09:15,32 --> 00:09:20,11 right. Ten years later it's a four billion dollars 123 00:09:20,12 --> 00:09:25,85 a year business there are twenty six thousand plus Disney princess products which 124 00:09:26,90 --> 00:09:32,32 when you consider that they can't put them on. Cigarettes liquor cars or 125 00:09:32,33 --> 00:09:37,06 antidepressants. You know how to even think about twenty six thousand products 126 00:09:37,07 --> 00:09:41,76 which is why you start getting things like Disney princess grapes Yes those are 127 00:09:41,77 --> 00:09:48,68 grapes and when you know as Disney goes so goes childhood they define childhood 128 00:09:48,69 --> 00:09:50,46 especially when they're making four billion dollars 129 00:09:50,47 --> 00:09:53,92 a year off of childhood so that's why everything from the T. 130 00:09:53,93 --> 00:09:58,82 Shirt vendor at Etsy to bookstores this is I don't know if you can see this but now 131 00:09:58,83 --> 00:10:01,18 in bookstores they have a princess section and 132 00:10:01,19 --> 00:10:05,56 a pretty pink and fancy section Pink has become a apparently a John wrote 133 00:10:05,57 --> 00:10:12,02 a book. To Dora the Explorer have all gone princess 134 00:10:12,73 --> 00:10:17,41 I do really love this one. Says future princess underneath that says President. 135 00:10:18,54 --> 00:10:24,66 Princess is crossed out but I also think that it sort of points out you know what 136 00:10:24,67 --> 00:10:26,27 the difference is in those two messages on the T. 137 00:10:26,28 --> 00:10:30,02 Shirt and I was thinking about this the other day I got this is 138 00:10:30,03 --> 00:10:31,53 a little far afield but I got 139 00:10:31,96 --> 00:10:37,74 a piece of research that went across my desk was. By an economist from MIT who had 140 00:10:37,75 --> 00:10:42,47 gone to four hundred ninety five towns and villages in India and she was looking at 141 00:10:42,51 --> 00:10:48,99 the differential between how. The aspirations parents have for their sons and their 142 00:10:49,00 --> 00:10:54,53 daughters for education and in most places she found that parents were forty two 143 00:10:54,54 --> 00:11:00,45 percent more likely to. Want their son or assume their summer graduate high school 144 00:11:00,46 --> 00:11:03,85 than their daughter and with what we know about the importance of educating girls 145 00:11:03,86 --> 00:11:08,94 for alleviating poverty that's concerning the only place where that was not true 146 00:11:09,06 --> 00:11:14,98 was in West Bengal where for the last several decades they have reserved thirty 147 00:11:14,99 --> 00:11:21,57 percent of positions on local in local government for women and only 148 00:11:21,58 --> 00:11:27,29 there were parents aspirations for their kids' education equal between boys and 149 00:11:27,30 --> 00:11:28,92 girls and you know although it's 150 00:11:28,93 --> 00:11:33,43 a little far afield I also think it's shows how important women's leadership is to 151 00:11:33,44 --> 00:11:37,84 little girls for their aspirations something beyond princesses because you know 152 00:11:37,85 --> 00:11:44,72 they really if they can't see it it's really hard for them to be it so. You 153 00:11:44,73 --> 00:11:50,14 can't look at girls culture without talking about the color pink and you know I 154 00:11:50,15 --> 00:11:53,03 want to be clear here because Pink is not intrinsic pink is just 155 00:11:53,04 --> 00:11:56,76 a color right it's nothing really in transit about about pink It's just that it's 156 00:11:56,77 --> 00:11:57,52 such a strain 157 00:11:57,53 --> 00:12:03,57 e slice of the rainbow you know and it just kind of goes on and on and on one hand 158 00:12:03,58 --> 00:12:10,00 you could say that it celebrates girlhood. But on the other hand it it 159 00:12:10,01 --> 00:12:16,60 fuses. If uses girlhood with girls 160 00:12:17,10 --> 00:12:22,84 a girl's identity to an obsession with appearance and then it presents that not 161 00:12:22,85 --> 00:12:29,45 only as innocent but as evidence of innocence so you start having things like. The 162 00:12:29,46 --> 00:12:34,09 pretty pretty princess board game where this is the Sleeping Beauty version where 163 00:12:34,10 --> 00:12:37,43 you connect you collect a ring a bracelet a necklace and 164 00:12:37,44 --> 00:12:41,09 a crown to match your gown and then you win the game and now you're ready to meet 165 00:12:41,10 --> 00:12:44,87 your prince. One of my favorites here's Princess with 166 00:12:44,88 --> 00:12:49,16 a loving heart make up kit What gives you your loving heart is your make up this is 167 00:12:49,17 --> 00:12:55,55 really my favorite reponse will escape from the tower lip and nail set. Because 168 00:12:55,56 --> 00:12:59,38 that's what that character was about and that's what you see is that as as these 169 00:12:59,39 --> 00:13:00,91 products have proliferated they become 170 00:13:00,92 --> 00:13:07,32 a lot less about maybe some of the better lessons from the movies some of the more 171 00:13:08,24 --> 00:13:11,92 admirable character traits that some of the princes You don't see Cinderella 172 00:13:11,93 --> 00:13:18,43 anymore in her rags you just see it being about the bling and it may seem like Pink 173 00:13:18,44 --> 00:13:21,28 is is naturally in coded in girls' D.N.A. 174 00:13:21,29 --> 00:13:25,83 Like they go for it like heat seeking missiles but in fact that's not true and if 175 00:13:25,84 --> 00:13:27,14 you look back historically 176 00:13:27,37 --> 00:13:31,14 a little over one hundred years of the turn of the last century you find that back 177 00:13:31,15 --> 00:13:35,84 then all small children and babies were white as 178 00:13:35,85 --> 00:13:39,51 a practical matter because they didn't have made tag and they had to boil close to 179 00:13:39,52 --> 00:13:44,64 get them clean and when color first came into the nursery pink was actually 180 00:13:44,65 --> 00:13:50,17 assigned to boys because it was seen as the more the pastel version of Red and read 181 00:13:50,18 --> 00:13:55,19 was associated with masculinity and the God of War and all of that and blue was 182 00:13:55,20 --> 00:14:00,59 assigned to girls because it was associated with constancy and faithfulness and the 183 00:14:00,60 --> 00:14:07,04 Virgin Mary and when and where that switched is not really clear but as late as the 184 00:14:07,05 --> 00:14:08,14 one nine hundred thirty S. 185 00:14:08,34 --> 00:14:10,47 The New York City department store Lord and Taylor did 186 00:14:10,48 --> 00:14:15,70 a poll of its customer base and thirty percent of them still said Pink was for boys 187 00:14:15,71 --> 00:14:22,29 and blue is for girls so I don't think anybody would get that you know wrong today 188 00:14:22,79 --> 00:14:29,40 and even in well what Disney movies Pink was. Was the color for boys and blue for 189 00:14:29,41 --> 00:14:34,31 girls so if you look at this is. Peter Pan when he's wearing 190 00:14:34,32 --> 00:14:36,35 a blue dress and Michael has his pink P.J. 191 00:14:36,36 --> 00:14:41,17 On this is the jolly pink giant and this is you know Sleeping Beauty Sleeping 192 00:14:41,18 --> 00:14:43,29 Beauty had a blue dress now she's a pink one but she's still 193 00:14:43,30 --> 00:14:48,90 a blue dress and prints Prince Charming was dressed in pink and for me it really 194 00:14:48,91 --> 00:14:55,78 pointed out how much of what we think is natural with kids is naturalized and also 195 00:14:55,79 --> 00:15:01,07 how much marketing can define how we think about kids development so when I did 196 00:15:01,08 --> 00:15:07,74 a little more digging I found out that. Toddler the word toddler I 197 00:15:07,75 --> 00:15:09,56 assumed like at least somebody with a Ph D. 198 00:15:09,57 --> 00:15:11,75 Made that up but in fact it was 199 00:15:11,76 --> 00:15:17,55 a marketing gimmick and it was. Developed because it was for boys because it was 200 00:15:17,56 --> 00:15:21,30 thought that parents who thought that their child was going to be treated more like 201 00:15:21,31 --> 00:15:25,07 a little man would be looser with their purse strings so this is how children dress 202 00:15:25,18 --> 00:15:29,34 little boys dressed in around one thousand nine hundred and this is the thirty 203 00:15:29,35 --> 00:15:34,60 second president of the United States Seattle who would that be anybody. 204 00:15:37,54 --> 00:15:41,48 I like that there that Franklin Roosevelt That's Franklin Roosevelt Isn't he the 205 00:15:41,49 --> 00:15:45,57 prettiest little girl you ever saw Yeah if his white dress and his patent leather 206 00:15:45,58 --> 00:15:51,68 Mary Janes. So that was that was why toddler came about and it was only after it 207 00:15:51,69 --> 00:15:54,28 became shoppers parlance that it became 208 00:15:54,32 --> 00:16:00,46 a full on developmental phase and if that seems difficult to believe. 209 00:16:01,25 --> 00:16:04,94 Think about the trajectory of the word tween tween was 210 00:16:04,95 --> 00:16:11,13 a marketing construct developed in the eighty's mostly applied to girls and used 211 00:16:11,14 --> 00:16:16,43 for girls I've seen it used as for girls as young as seven when. They're adept old 212 00:16:16,44 --> 00:16:21,10 enough to be adept with the lip gloss wand to girls as old as fourteen and I would 213 00:16:21,11 --> 00:16:25,39 said to you that that is an age range that does not and probably should not have 214 00:16:25,40 --> 00:16:31,53 a whole lot in common and that's one of the main. Issues with tween is that it 215 00:16:31,78 --> 00:16:38,59 raises the lines between little girl and big girl and it creates this kind of mass 216 00:16:38,63 --> 00:16:44,35 of consumer little girls and removes that kind of protective layer that used to be 217 00:16:44,53 --> 00:16:49,89 between childhood and teenage And yet even as on one hand there's this 218 00:16:49,93 --> 00:16:54,60 a ratio of difference there's also this magnification in the other direction so 219 00:16:54,91 --> 00:16:55,27 this sounds 220 00:16:55,28 --> 00:16:59,77 a little contradictory but contradictory but dividing people into smaller and 221 00:16:59,78 --> 00:17:06,58 smaller groups actually increases sales so an executive at Leap Frog called this 222 00:17:06,59 --> 00:17:09,62 the pink factor to me she said you know if you have 223 00:17:09,98 --> 00:17:11,71 a little boy first and then you have 224 00:17:11,72 --> 00:17:15,76 a little girl you're so excited to have the little princess that you're going to 225 00:17:15,80 --> 00:17:19,32 buy everything all over again in pink and conversely if you have the little girl 226 00:17:19,33 --> 00:17:21,35 first and you buy everything in pink and then you have 227 00:17:21,36 --> 00:17:26,25 a little boy loops gotta buy it all over again in boy colors but either way you 228 00:17:26,26 --> 00:17:32,96 double your sales and so we're seeing this unprecedented emphasis on gender 229 00:17:32,97 --> 00:17:36,61 differences at at the youngest ages so when I went to the I went to the 230 00:17:36,62 --> 00:17:42,36 International Toy Fair in New York and I went into the Fisher Price room and. There 231 00:17:42,37 --> 00:17:46,83 were two rooms in there one was for girls one was for boys the girls said had 232 00:17:46,84 --> 00:17:53,40 a banner in pink that said beautiful colorful pretty beautiful and 233 00:17:53,40 --> 00:18:00,17 pretty are synonyms they could not think of three separate words for 234 00:18:00,18 --> 00:18:07,06 girls. Boys got energy heroes and power. So there 235 00:18:07,07 --> 00:18:11,13 was this you know this magnification on the order of feeling like made me feel like 236 00:18:11,14 --> 00:18:14,31 I was on the set of Mad Men. And 237 00:18:14,32 --> 00:18:19,59 a magnifying and inventing of differences where they didn't exist so you guys 238 00:18:19,60 --> 00:18:23,83 remember that little toy phone Fisher Price fun that you probably had when you were 239 00:18:23,84 --> 00:18:27,55 a kid with little eyes on it now they make a girls version of that 240 00:18:28,50 --> 00:18:30,57 a pink one. They make 241 00:18:30,58 --> 00:18:36,85 a pink Fisher Price bust now. Remember the popcorn popper they make 242 00:18:36,86 --> 00:18:41,54 a pink one of those now and here's the new Fisher Price brilliant basics teethers 243 00:18:41,77 --> 00:18:46,97 it's a little hard to tell but the little glamour kit for your six month old has 244 00:18:47,26 --> 00:18:48,98 a purse a diamond ring and 245 00:18:48,99 --> 00:18:54,51 a charm bracelet and the fund of fix kit for your boy has a hammer that's a hammer 246 00:18:54,55 --> 00:19:01,20 a saw and wrenches. So you might say what's the big deal right 247 00:19:01,25 --> 00:19:06,52 boys play with some toys girls play with other toys that's the way it goes you know 248 00:19:06,65 --> 00:19:08,71 yes and no so I want to take 249 00:19:08,72 --> 00:19:13,46 a little moment here to discuss nature versus nurture talk about that with gender. 250 00:19:14,80 --> 00:19:18,82 And the first thing to understand is that little kids don't understand gender the 251 00:19:18,83 --> 00:19:24,97 way that we do. My favorite example of this is 252 00:19:24,98 --> 00:19:27,59 a story that is told by Sandra Brown who's 253 00:19:27,60 --> 00:19:31,26 a psychologist to Cornell about her son who's probably forty no one hates 254 00:19:31,27 --> 00:19:36,18 a story but. When he was in preschool he went to preschool wearing his beloved 255 00:19:36,19 --> 00:19:40,55 barrettes to class and he got there and this other little boy was just mocking him 256 00:19:41,26 --> 00:19:43,23 saying you're a girl you're a girl and he said No I'm 257 00:19:43,24 --> 00:19:44,93 a boy I'm going to read about in C.P.S. 258 00:19:44,94 --> 00:19:50,30 Can I I just did OK so. There you go I'm a boy I have 259 00:19:50,31 --> 00:19:53,95 a penis and and the other boys you know said Now you're a girl you're 260 00:19:53,96 --> 00:19:56,18 a girl you're guys that know I'm a boy I have 261 00:19:56,19 --> 00:19:59,73 a penis and finally this went on and germy got so disgusted that he dropped his 262 00:19:59,74 --> 00:20:02,96 pants and he said See I'm a boy I have 263 00:20:02,97 --> 00:20:09,47 a penis and the other little boy totally unimpressed said everybody has 264 00:20:09,48 --> 00:20:15,88 a penis only girls wear barrettes. Yeah 265 00:20:16,85 --> 00:20:21,06 but you know that is that's really how kids see it they don't understand that you 266 00:20:21,07 --> 00:20:23,85 know for the great majority of us that the sex we're born with is the one we're 267 00:20:23,86 --> 00:20:28,35 going to stay. And they think that if I left this room and I put on 268 00:20:28,36 --> 00:20:31,47 a suit and tie and cut my hair short I would turn into 269 00:20:31,48 --> 00:20:35,10 a man that you can either you can turn to change sex as easily as changing your 270 00:20:35,11 --> 00:20:38,76 clothes which is partly why three year old girls don't want to be you can't 271 00:20:38,77 --> 00:20:42,86 suddenly stuff your three year old into pants why they want to have the long hair 272 00:20:42,87 --> 00:20:46,76 and stuff because they are trying to cling to the idea that they're girls with 273 00:20:46,77 --> 00:20:52,85 whatever extreme representation Zz their culture gives them that's what kids need 274 00:20:52,86 --> 00:20:55,56 because you know if you thought that you could just like suddenly inadvertently 275 00:20:55,57 --> 00:20:58,10 change sex or choose to be a mommy or make you 276 00:20:58,11 --> 00:21:02,47 a little nervous so they tend to gravitate towards these extremes which when we 277 00:21:02,48 --> 00:21:06,54 were little may have been like baby dolls and baby buggies and you know playing 278 00:21:06,55 --> 00:21:12,02 house and now are princesses and spawn make overs for three year olds. So there's 279 00:21:12,03 --> 00:21:17,79 a way that the rigidity of little kids is natural and there's 280 00:21:17,80 --> 00:21:24,35 a way that this developmental phase is is natural and being exploited but is real 281 00:21:26,22 --> 00:21:32,12 however early childhood is also the time when the brain is the most plastic. 282 00:21:34,89 --> 00:21:39,50 In most open to change and then kids are laying down tracks that will last the rest 283 00:21:39,51 --> 00:21:43,17 of their lives about gender about everything so every experience a little you know 284 00:21:43,18 --> 00:21:46,60 a child has and the younger the child the bigger the effect the first time they 285 00:21:46,69 --> 00:21:51,07 speak they learn to walk then or to talk they would laugh they cry they fall down 286 00:21:51,08 --> 00:21:55,14 they run everything affects their brain and their neurological level strengthening 287 00:21:55,15 --> 00:22:01,68 some neurons at the expense of others so when children play in gendered worlds and 288 00:22:01,69 --> 00:22:05,73 are only exposed to the ways styles and experiences that are attributed to their 289 00:22:05,74 --> 00:22:10,19 SATS it has an impact on them and when they're exposed to 290 00:22:10,20 --> 00:22:16,65 a broader range of styles and and. Experiences that has an impact too 291 00:22:17,14 --> 00:22:17,59 so there was 292 00:22:17,60 --> 00:22:22,37 a study of more than five thousand three year olds and they found that among those 293 00:22:22,38 --> 00:22:27,66 three year olds that the girls who had older brothers had better spatial skills 294 00:22:27,94 --> 00:22:31,85 than girls with older sisters or boys with older sisters so there was 295 00:22:31,86 --> 00:22:38,27 a way that exposure to whatever it is that older boys do. Changed the little girls 296 00:22:38,28 --> 00:22:45,20 brains and made them more. Strengthen their stock with their spatial skills so 297 00:22:45,24 --> 00:22:50,27 rather than thinking about nature or nurture the issue is actually how nurture 298 00:22:50,31 --> 00:22:56,67 becomes nature how what we expose kids to becomes natural to them 299 00:22:57,16 --> 00:23:02,10 and if we don't want those little inborn differences to become big gaps and we want 300 00:23:02,11 --> 00:23:05,65 children to be able to realize the whole range of their potential it's really 301 00:23:05,66 --> 00:23:11,20 important for them to experience the whole range of play styles and there's also 302 00:23:11,21 --> 00:23:15,87 some indication that kids who experience cross sex play who have friends of the 303 00:23:15,88 --> 00:23:20,91 opposite sex when they're in preschool or kindergarten or early elementary grades 304 00:23:21,03 --> 00:23:25,94 have better dating relationships when they're older so it's really hard though to 305 00:23:25,95 --> 00:23:29,66 do that when you know when there's this hyper segmentation So here's a box 306 00:23:29,95 --> 00:23:31,81 a Lego box from the one thousand nine hundred fifty S. 307 00:23:31,92 --> 00:23:36,11 It's yellow There's two little girls. On the little boy playing together this is 308 00:23:36,12 --> 00:23:41,31 Lego aisles today it's very clear who's supposed to play with what and it's just 309 00:23:41,35 --> 00:23:42,66 really hard when 310 00:23:42,67 --> 00:23:47,15 a girl is sitting in an all pink room reading pink Alicia's in her pink princess 311 00:23:47,16 --> 00:23:51,43 dress looking at her pink magic eight ball to make those cross sex friendships 312 00:23:51,50 --> 00:23:56,77 happen and they do happen to really easily the upside is that it's easy your kids 313 00:23:56,78 --> 00:24:00,89 will naturally choose to play in their own groups but they often do play together 314 00:24:00,90 --> 00:24:06,60 and when preschool teachers comment on it they do it more so these things that 315 00:24:06,61 --> 00:24:12,24 separate them unnaturally just drive them apart and make them other to one another 316 00:24:12,24 --> 00:24:18,55 . So back to the world of toys as girls move from two to three to five there's 317 00:24:18,56 --> 00:24:19,53 a shift that happens in 318 00:24:19,54 --> 00:24:24,28 a new idea starts to be attached to that fusion of the inevitability of pink pretty 319 00:24:24,29 --> 00:24:28,54 and in a sense and that shopping. So this is 320 00:24:29,44 --> 00:24:32,90 a pizza place mat this is all the same placemat that was sent to me by 321 00:24:33,53 --> 00:24:36,73 a reader in Philadelphia and you'll see you know there's the pink rim around in the 322 00:24:36,74 --> 00:24:42,68 upper The first picture you can see that there's. A purse and nail polish It's all 323 00:24:42,69 --> 00:24:47,74 to be colored in your cell phone there's the word search where you're looking to 324 00:24:47,75 --> 00:24:54,72 find mall Queen born to shop. Diva party shopper sales that's 325 00:24:54,73 --> 00:25:01,39 OK. And then down is the unscramble where you can unscramble shoe and 326 00:25:01,50 --> 00:25:05,33 hat and sunglasses and then there's the ever popular help the high heeled shoe find 327 00:25:05,34 --> 00:25:11,65 a shopping bag maze. I know right and you know I'd like to tell you that that was 328 00:25:11,99 --> 00:25:18,89 unusual. But not so much here's the Hasbro has made pink versions of classic games 329 00:25:18,90 --> 00:25:23,30 so all the things girls love is the tagline for the pink monopoly where you can 330 00:25:23,34 --> 00:25:29,18 wear instead of houses they have shop. And instead of hotels they have malls. 331 00:25:30,60 --> 00:25:34,20 That's on the bottom there that's those are Scrabble racks from pink Scrabble and 332 00:25:34,21 --> 00:25:36,94 guess what's a seven letter word F.A.S.H. 333 00:25:36,95 --> 00:25:41,80 Iowan Yahtzee They've replaced the numbers on the dice with flip flops hearts 334 00:25:41,81 --> 00:25:48,66 flowers dresses and cell phones. And we first came across this kind of shift 335 00:25:48,70 --> 00:25:53,43 in the in what happens post princess when my daughter was given a make 336 00:25:53,44 --> 00:25:57,01 a run messenger bag for his sixth birthday and you know it had like iron on 337 00:25:57,02 --> 00:26:02,43 transfers hearts flowers that kind of stuff and then it had iron on transfers that 338 00:26:02,44 --> 00:26:08,77 said spoiled and Brat. And you know to her credit my daughter said mom why did they 339 00:26:08,78 --> 00:26:12,33 want me to put spoiled on my purse and I said you know I don't know honey let's 340 00:26:12,34 --> 00:26:12,98 throw that out get 341 00:26:12,99 --> 00:26:19,40 a cookie. And. But I thought 342 00:26:19,41 --> 00:26:24,83 a lot about it you know and I came up with this idea of of girls Power Girls with 343 00:26:24,84 --> 00:26:25,48 a Z. 344 00:26:25,52 --> 00:26:31,41 Because anytime you see that. You've got trouble. Where is girl power that we used 345 00:26:31,42 --> 00:26:32,93 to talk about in the one nine hundred ninety S. 346 00:26:33,42 --> 00:26:40,38 Celebrated ability over body the new girl's power casts physical perfection 347 00:26:40,66 --> 00:26:41,57 as not only 348 00:26:41,84 --> 00:26:47,45 a source but the source of empowerment for girls and it sells girls self-absorption 349 00:26:47,49 --> 00:26:52,22 self-confidence and the kind of hope Prince part drops out and female independence 350 00:26:52,23 --> 00:26:57,80 empowerment and identity are expressed through materialism and narcissism and 351 00:26:57,81 --> 00:27:01,94 putting spoiled on your purse So another way that I think about this is the car 352 00:27:01,95 --> 00:27:08,56 dash in ization of girlhood. And you start walking through Toys R Us and the tone 353 00:27:08,57 --> 00:27:13,21 of the toys and the time in the color of the pink begins to change and it becomes 354 00:27:13,22 --> 00:27:14,36 a lot less Cinderella and 355 00:27:14,37 --> 00:27:18,96 a lot more wicked stepsister So you start seeing the new dolls tie girls remember 356 00:27:18,97 --> 00:27:22,67 those ones on the upper left fuse put those in your minds and talk about them again 357 00:27:22,68 --> 00:27:29,59 later. Brats Moxy girls Monster High That's the new line of undead sesame street 358 00:27:29,60 --> 00:27:36,26 walkers that. Mattel has put out most popular toy for Christmas last year sassy 359 00:27:36,27 --> 00:27:38,58 which is sexy with training wheels there's been 360 00:27:38,59 --> 00:27:43,23 a rise of birthday parties for little kids so that's the bit. In the upper left. 361 00:27:44,80 --> 00:27:47,52 Disney World where you can pay two hundred dollars for your daughter to be made 362 00:27:47,53 --> 00:27:52,26 over here as her famous favorite princess upper right is sweet and sassy 363 00:27:52,30 --> 00:27:56,12 a mall store over store another one called raspberry lips and that little girl on 364 00:27:56,13 --> 00:27:59,81 the right she's. I took that off to somebody is blog she was on 365 00:27:59,82 --> 00:28:06,28 a hope you know here I. Did it without permission. But that she's been to 366 00:28:06,29 --> 00:28:13,19 a raspberry lips party so you see sort of the girls power thing in this. Craft 367 00:28:13,20 --> 00:28:19,31 kits for girls has started to be about this too so you have make your own lip ball 368 00:28:19,32 --> 00:28:25,81 make your own pedicure nail art flip flop that's creativity for kids science kits 369 00:28:26,51 --> 00:28:30,92 for girls are perf human lab beauty pampering boutique baths just as 370 00:28:30,93 --> 00:28:37,70 a comparison science kits for boys physics and chemistry. Go go go 371 00:28:37,71 --> 00:28:43,92 figure right perils of the deep rocket slime so and then there's the pink in the 372 00:28:43,93 --> 00:28:49,67 purse and let's. Just go the pink. Pink. 373 00:28:52,06 --> 00:28:57,85 Notice it everywhere now. Do you feel bombarded by those girls are you know they're 374 00:28:57,86 --> 00:29:02,90 really bombarded by this stuff and you know the thing about girls power is that 375 00:29:02,91 --> 00:29:07,85 with disease it's not collective change through community through gathering with 376 00:29:07,86 --> 00:29:11,90 other girls through leadership through engagement it's individual change through 377 00:29:11,91 --> 00:29:18,78 make over and the ultimate achievement of girls power is fame which becomes kind of 378 00:29:18,79 --> 00:29:23,21 a value in its own right independent of hard work and skill you know famous for 379 00:29:23,22 --> 00:29:24,31 just being famous. 380 00:29:33,94 --> 00:29:37,82 So one of the terms marketers talk about when they talk about all this is K G O Y 381 00:29:37,86 --> 00:29:42,37 which is kids getting older younger and. That's the idea that kids are more 382 00:29:42,38 --> 00:29:43,45 sophisticated at 383 00:29:43,46 --> 00:29:47,02 a younger age than they used to be and so they want more sophisticated playthings 384 00:29:47,03 --> 00:29:52,79 and media and it's an interesting concept because they're also saying adults are 385 00:29:52,80 --> 00:29:58,18 staying younger or older. So if kids are getting older or younger and adults are 386 00:29:58,19 --> 00:30:03,15 staying older younger or older our kids are going to be older than we are at some 387 00:30:03,16 --> 00:30:09,94 point. Or we're all going to need it forever twenty one right. Which is 388 00:30:09,95 --> 00:30:13,11 not irrelevant because I think there is 389 00:30:13,12 --> 00:30:17,68 a piece of this that is about how we adult women talk about and view our own bodies 390 00:30:17,69 --> 00:30:22,36 and beauty and how we talk about it in front of our girls and how we deal with our 391 00:30:22,37 --> 00:30:26,68 own issues around these and it's complicated I mean I'm very clear in the book I am 392 00:30:26,69 --> 00:30:28,71 contradictory I'm hypocritical as 393 00:30:28,72 --> 00:30:33,79 a mother I go against my own beliefs sometimes because you know that's part of 394 00:30:33,80 --> 00:30:40,57 navigating this world. So I'm very much in the soup with you know with with all of 395 00:30:40,58 --> 00:30:43,69 you and with everybody that I talk to but anyways 396 00:30:43,70 --> 00:30:48,88 a part of K G O Y is age compression and that's the idea that products are pitched 397 00:30:48,89 --> 00:30:52,14 to older kids and then younger kids wanted to be cool like their older brothers and 398 00:30:52,15 --> 00:30:55,05 sisters reach up and grab them and then the older kids immediately don't want to 399 00:30:55,06 --> 00:30:56,55 anymore so Barbie is 400 00:30:56,56 --> 00:30:59,84 a really good example when Barbie first came out she was pitched 401 00:30:59,85 --> 00:31:03,59 a ten to twelve year old girls and now if you're still playing with Barbie when 402 00:31:03,60 --> 00:31:05,38 you're six kind of 403 00:31:05,39 --> 00:31:12,28 a baby so. For girls that age compression that 404 00:31:12,29 --> 00:31:18,22 attempt to be cool increasingly means looking hot so that explains the growth 405 00:31:18,52 --> 00:31:20,01 market that we've seen in cosmetics for 406 00:31:20,02 --> 00:31:23,86 a twelve year old girls market research independent market research showed recently 407 00:31:23,87 --> 00:31:28,62 that close to half of six to nine year old girls say they regularly use lipstick or 408 00:31:28,63 --> 00:31:30,65 lip gloss the percentage of 409 00:31:30,69 --> 00:31:34,95 a twelve year olds who regularly use mascara or eyeliner doubled between two 410 00:31:34,96 --> 00:31:39,52 thousand and eight and two thousand and ten the biggest cosmetics growth market 411 00:31:39,75 --> 00:31:44,56 right now and really the only one is eight to twelve year old girls so Wal-Mart 412 00:31:44,57 --> 00:31:49,97 just came out with I swear to God an anti-aging line. Last year for eight year olds 413 00:31:49,98 --> 00:31:53,63 and it's not like makeup that you play with you know to like try to be look like 414 00:31:53,64 --> 00:31:57,26 mommy and then wash it's like I missed my bus to third grade because I was putting 415 00:31:57,27 --> 00:32:01,80 on concealer kind of thing and here's Nair pretty which is fruit flavored hair 416 00:32:01,81 --> 00:32:07,80 removal for your unwanted hair when you're nine. And and you know remember that 417 00:32:07,95 --> 00:32:13,63 premature sexualization and early focus on appearance puts girls at risk I think 418 00:32:13,64 --> 00:32:18,39 that yeah I did you know so you can look at that slide again talking and it also 419 00:32:18,40 --> 00:32:22,46 takes tremendous mental resources so there's just 420 00:32:22,47 --> 00:32:27,94 a couple studies that I like to try to just kind of. Illustrate this point one is. 421 00:32:29,15 --> 00:32:34,78 Was at Stanford and they took two groups of young women in advanced calculus and 422 00:32:34,79 --> 00:32:39,02 they saw girls who were good at math and they showed them each for thirty each 423 00:32:39,03 --> 00:32:39,57 group for 424 00:32:39,58 --> 00:32:43,57 a thirty second answer the first group saw just kind of generic neutrally ads and 425 00:32:43,58 --> 00:32:48,64 the second group saw two ads that were neutral and two ads that were more were 426 00:32:48,65 --> 00:32:55,18 either stereotypically or overtly sexist in their depiction of women and 427 00:32:55,19 --> 00:32:56,26 afterwards they gave them 428 00:32:56,72 --> 00:33:01,93 a survey gauging their interest in STEM careers science technology engineering math 429 00:33:02,23 --> 00:33:07,33 and the young women who had seen the sexist ads reported 430 00:33:07,37 --> 00:33:11,10 a lower interest in pursuing those careers after just seeing two ads and it seemed 431 00:33:11,11 --> 00:33:17,08 like I read that I thought really could that be but there's this idea of stereotype 432 00:33:17,09 --> 00:33:20,75 vulnerability that when the stereotype of your group is presented to you you 433 00:33:20,76 --> 00:33:25,73 conform to it so if I told you that you know girls don't do very well on this math 434 00:33:25,74 --> 00:33:29,51 test you would not do as well that math as does he would have if I told you that 435 00:33:29,52 --> 00:33:34,76 girls do well on this Methodist so another study that showed this was I actually 436 00:33:34,77 --> 00:33:39,09 really like this one even better they took four groups two men two women college 437 00:33:39,10 --> 00:33:43,22 age and put them in dressing rooms and they had half the men and half the women try 438 00:33:43,23 --> 00:33:46,29 on a sweater and half the men and have two women try on 439 00:33:46,30 --> 00:33:48,40 a bathing suit and then they gave them 440 00:33:48,41 --> 00:33:54,84 a math test I don't know who funds the stuff but you know and. The 441 00:33:55,20 --> 00:34:00,60 young women who were wearing the bathing suit their scores were lower compared to 442 00:34:00,61 --> 00:34:04,57 all the other groups and there was no such difference with no difference in the 443 00:34:04,58 --> 00:34:09,11 scores with the men between the sweaters and the being suits so you know maybe they 444 00:34:09,12 --> 00:34:14,13 were cold I don't know but I tend to think that there's something for young women 445 00:34:14,49 --> 00:34:21,08 that happens when their mental resources or their attention becomes focused on 446 00:34:21,12 --> 00:34:24,96 their appearance and on the vulnerabilities of their parents that can directly 447 00:34:25,11 --> 00:34:30,46 affect their performance so when we talk about what girls are playing with what 448 00:34:30,47 --> 00:34:36,51 they're watching what they're absorbing it does become really relevant and 449 00:34:37,24 --> 00:34:40,96 girls are focusing on an ideal body image at 450 00:34:40,97 --> 00:34:45,51 a younger and younger age so. I don't know if you guys remember Strawberry 451 00:34:45,52 --> 00:34:50,25 Shortcake that doll from the so. She got 452 00:34:50,26 --> 00:34:54,75 a remake this is the new. This is the new rainbow bright. 453 00:34:57,87 --> 00:35:03,52 Holly Hobbie trolls with a Z. 454 00:35:03,52 --> 00:35:08,37 . Care Bears on 455 00:35:08,38 --> 00:35:15,06 a diet My Little Pony Lego one thousand nine hundred. 456 00:35:16,96 --> 00:35:23,55 Eighty. And Dora so I know Dora this new 457 00:35:23,56 --> 00:35:29,38 Dora is for tweens which Nickelodeon described to me as five to eight year olds. 458 00:35:31,73 --> 00:35:37,23 So but we know with age compression which we just talked about that you know old 459 00:35:37,24 --> 00:35:43,05 Dora is probably going to be given the boot along with boots. Pretty soon. You know 460 00:35:43,06 --> 00:35:49,57 so there's no Dora It's not that she's sexy but she's pretty and she's skinny and 461 00:35:49,58 --> 00:35:53,60 that's part of the package and it's telling little girls that they better get with 462 00:35:53,61 --> 00:35:54,28 that program at 463 00:35:54,29 --> 00:35:58,66 a very young age and they are because they're already rejecting things that don't 464 00:35:58,67 --> 00:36:04,15 fit that image when I when I talk to manufacturers about why they had done this to 465 00:36:04,16 --> 00:36:09,72 these toys they said that little girls won't play with the little chubby child like 466 00:36:09,73 --> 00:36:14,49 looking toys they want pretty skinny dolls so they are realizing at 467 00:36:14,50 --> 00:36:19,47 a very very young age now that that is the way to go so we've talked 468 00:36:19,48 --> 00:36:25,64 a little bit about. Cognitive issues about nature versus nurture. 469 00:36:26,75 --> 00:36:27,95 About body image I want to talk 470 00:36:27,96 --> 00:36:32,64 a little bit about the ex the impact of sexualization and on girl sexual health 471 00:36:33,01 --> 00:36:37,44 because when girls are encouraged to play sassy when they're encouraged play sexy 472 00:36:37,45 --> 00:36:41,79 too soon even if they don't understand what they're doing and maybe especially if 473 00:36:41,80 --> 00:36:46,19 they don't understand what they're doing it undermines their sexual development and 474 00:36:46,20 --> 00:36:50,92 it can be because they are old enough to understand to connect that Iran that 475 00:36:50,93 --> 00:36:54,89 performance with any kind of authentic erotic feeling the risk becomes that that 476 00:36:54,90 --> 00:37:01,70 disconnect becomes permanent and that girls continue to see sexuality as 477 00:37:01,71 --> 00:37:06,09 a something that they perform rather than feel and eventually make choices that are 478 00:37:06,10 --> 00:37:10,77 against their own self-image interest me and I think it's really important for us 479 00:37:10,88 --> 00:37:15,21 as adults not only to protect the littlest girls from that but also to help older 480 00:37:15,22 --> 00:37:20,99 girls by helping them distinguish and disentangle the ideas of sexualization from 481 00:37:21,00 --> 00:37:25,49 sexuality because you know and this is how you can help to not feel like 482 00:37:25,50 --> 00:37:26,34 a prude which I know 483 00:37:26,35 --> 00:37:29,66 a lot of people think you know I just I just don't know how to talk about this but 484 00:37:30,23 --> 00:37:34,34 sexualization is something that's externally foisted on girls and sexuality is 485 00:37:34,35 --> 00:37:38,91 something that's developed from within and the way that I think about it is the 486 00:37:38,92 --> 00:37:43,73 different kind of Rorschach to use is the difference between learning that you are 487 00:37:43,74 --> 00:37:48,78 supposed to be desirable and that your focus should be on being desirable versus 488 00:37:48,82 --> 00:37:54,55 learning to understand and connect to your own desire. And I think that that bait 489 00:37:54,56 --> 00:37:58,97 and switch is really nowhere more evident than in what Disney wants girls to go to 490 00:37:58,98 --> 00:38:02,85 after the animated princesses which is the flesh and blood princesses like Miley 491 00:38:02,86 --> 00:38:07,92 Cyrus being you know the most famous but not the only example and initially these 492 00:38:07,93 --> 00:38:12,29 girls it's the same cycle every time they're marketed as wholesome right and they 493 00:38:12,30 --> 00:38:14,77 wear those true love waits rings that promise that they're going to be 494 00:38:14,78 --> 00:38:20,43 a virgin till they get married. And Miley you know when she was fourteen right 495 00:38:20,44 --> 00:38:24,29 before she was fifteen she was on Oprah and she said you know I look way young and 496 00:38:24,30 --> 00:38:28,60 I want to stay that way and I try to choose clothes that moms will approve of and 497 00:38:28,61 --> 00:38:34,36 girls will love and you know three months later the remember that Vanity Fair shoot 498 00:38:34,37 --> 00:38:39,65 that raise that this was an image of her in Vanity Fair the one on the left. Where 499 00:38:39,66 --> 00:38:41,29 she looks kind of like she just got out of bed with 500 00:38:41,30 --> 00:38:47,56 a lover that was the thing that made parents man I think the other image is way 501 00:38:47,57 --> 00:38:53,55 creepier That's her dad you know that's really weird. But anyway that was my late 502 00:38:53,56 --> 00:39:00,31 fifteen This is Miley at seventeen this is Miley it eighteen and again the issue is 503 00:39:00,32 --> 00:39:06,97 not sexuality right sex is OK it's that Disney made Miley's virginity into 504 00:39:06,98 --> 00:39:11,28 a marketing gimmick and so inevitably what came after became 505 00:39:11,29 --> 00:39:17,76 a marketing gimmick as well and that virgin whore transformation that those girls 506 00:39:17,77 --> 00:39:22,73 go through over and over and over again when they make this big statement teaches 507 00:39:22,74 --> 00:39:27,45 girls over and over over again that self objectification is 508 00:39:27,46 --> 00:39:33,22 a feminine rite of passage so you take that thirteen year old girl who has been 509 00:39:33,23 --> 00:39:36,41 marinating in the Princess industrial complex since she was 510 00:39:36,42 --> 00:39:42,88 a toddler and you set it loose on Facebook. With her six hundred twenty two B F F's 511 00:39:42,88 --> 00:39:48,52 . And suddenly she becomes her own mini Miley complete with the adoring fan base 512 00:39:48,53 --> 00:39:51,68 that she has to maintain and there's this research from the Children's Digital 513 00:39:51,69 --> 00:39:54,14 Media Center in U.C.L.A. At U.C.L.A. 514 00:39:54,45 --> 00:39:58,95 Which is found that college students are beginning to talk about identity about the 515 00:39:58,96 --> 00:40:05,17 self as something not cultivated from within but something that you developed as 516 00:40:05,25 --> 00:40:05,49 kind of 517 00:40:05,50 --> 00:40:12,08 a brand that your marketing and your friends become the equivalent of fans or 518 00:40:12,09 --> 00:40:17,71 consumers or now on Facebook and subscribers and building that brand they found 519 00:40:17,72 --> 00:40:23,09 that girls are rewarded with the most positive feedback when they post pictures 520 00:40:23,10 --> 00:40:30,06 that are provocative but not too provocative so just like the stars just 521 00:40:30,07 --> 00:40:34,26 like Miley and all those girls girls become engaged in the super public negotiation 522 00:40:34,27 --> 00:40:39,07 that used to be you know maybe as perennial but didn't used to be so out there and 523 00:40:39,08 --> 00:40:45,72 voted on so clearly between being sexy but not slutty 524 00:40:46,27 --> 00:40:52,47 and I think that that gives the lie to any idea that the pervasive sexualization of 525 00:40:52,48 --> 00:40:56,84 girls in any way empowers them or gives them more control over their are their 526 00:40:56,85 --> 00:41:01,09 sexuality and you could even argue that it gives them less because now you know 527 00:41:01,13 --> 00:41:06,18 their photographs and such can spread further faster and speaking of that spreading 528 00:41:07,75 --> 00:41:09,59 in two thousand and nine I wrote a poll by A.P. 529 00:41:09,60 --> 00:41:13,60 That said twenty two percent of teenage girls had Center posted nude or seminude 530 00:41:13,61 --> 00:41:18,83 photos of themselves online or or texted and my initial response to that was come 531 00:41:19,12 --> 00:41:23,30 on really that just sounded like a sex panic to me and then just 532 00:41:23,31 --> 00:41:27,13 a couple days after that one of my dear friends called me up was of ninth grade boy 533 00:41:27,59 --> 00:41:32,06 and she was looking at his computer you know snooping around and she found 534 00:41:32,10 --> 00:41:37,13 a. Picture on there of a classmate of his that he didn't even know very well 535 00:41:37,20 --> 00:41:43,35 a girl naked from the waist up and she called me up to say look. I'm trying to 536 00:41:43,36 --> 00:41:48,10 teach my boy to respect women I'm trying to teach him that girls are not playthings 537 00:41:48,24 --> 00:41:50,33 How am I supposed to do that when some girl sending him 538 00:41:50,34 --> 00:41:54,50 a new tee shot and I really wrestled with it because I really you know I tried to 539 00:41:54,51 --> 00:41:58,34 be sort of open mind and I thought like is there some way that this could be spun 540 00:41:58,38 --> 00:42:04,70 as positive. Seriously like you know maybe she's feeling comfortable in her body 541 00:42:04,71 --> 00:42:05,77 maybe she's you know we have 542 00:42:05,78 --> 00:42:09,67 a double standard and she's transcending that you know I'm not really sure but it 543 00:42:09,68 --> 00:42:14,07 you know just didn't really say what was she getting out of this Exactly and and so 544 00:42:14,08 --> 00:42:17,69 I called Tallman who is at Hunter College in New York in 545 00:42:17,70 --> 00:42:22,75 a sort of the guru of female girls' desires she is working female desire and she 546 00:42:22,76 --> 00:42:29,72 said that what they've been seeing is that increasingly sexual agency the idea that 547 00:42:29,73 --> 00:42:35,22 you're you have untitled to entitle me to express sexuality to be sexual you know 548 00:42:35,23 --> 00:42:39,49 to have an erotic life that that in itself has become the latest performance for 549 00:42:39,50 --> 00:42:44,33 teenage girls so it becomes singing that they have to do or prove rather than 550 00:42:44,34 --> 00:42:49,47 authentically feel and that makes it really tricky to talk about to girls about 551 00:42:49,51 --> 00:42:52,96 sexuality and about their desire and about something authentic and she said that 552 00:42:52,97 --> 00:42:58,12 what she was finding was and she was interviewing teenage girls and asking them to 553 00:42:58,16 --> 00:43:04,76 describe how. Experience of of 554 00:43:04,83 --> 00:43:09,89 sexual arousal felt to them they would increasingly respond by how they felt they 555 00:43:09,90 --> 00:43:12,99 looked and she had to tell them that looking good was not 556 00:43:13,00 --> 00:43:15,98 a feeling and what I think should be a T. 557 00:43:15,99 --> 00:43:21,25 Shirt. But I think that there's an arc there that is worth considering and worth 558 00:43:21,26 --> 00:43:24,02 thinking about and I'm like looking out at you guys and even though it's kind of 559 00:43:24,03 --> 00:43:27,23 bright and I can't see you and still sing that you're all looking like so bombed 560 00:43:27,72 --> 00:43:34,03 you're saying they're going. This is sad but. So I just want to 561 00:43:34,04 --> 00:43:39,40 say that you know I say all this because I really believe that understanding and 562 00:43:39,41 --> 00:43:43,20 awareness are the first step to change you know understanding the culture that 563 00:43:43,21 --> 00:43:48,53 girls are in helping your daughter understand and she grows demanding strange and 564 00:43:48,54 --> 00:43:53,31 we you know adults in girls' lives whether your parents or grandparents or aunties 565 00:43:53,32 --> 00:43:58,06 or uncles or teachers or advocates you know we have so much more power than we know 566 00:43:58,30 --> 00:43:59,51 and I was thinking about that 567 00:43:59,55 --> 00:44:06,91 a lot last week when or maybe two weeks ago now when. The 568 00:44:06,95 --> 00:44:07,35 Susan G. 569 00:44:07,36 --> 00:44:11,18 Komen Foundation pulled its funding from Planned Parenthood and it was forced to 570 00:44:11,19 --> 00:44:18,07 reinstate it because collectively with one voice women and 571 00:44:18,08 --> 00:44:24,92 men put down they just went no you don't. And took this huge basically corporation 572 00:44:25,20 --> 00:44:27,45 and didn't let them do something and it was 573 00:44:27,46 --> 00:44:31,81 a tremendously powerful moment and I think that we can you know we can really learn 574 00:44:31,82 --> 00:44:34,56 from that with the Lego girls which recently came out that I showed you 575 00:44:34,57 --> 00:44:39,80 a couple slides of the girls can build you know beauty parlors or cafes. 576 00:44:41,61 --> 00:44:45,89 And more and fifty two thousand people signed 577 00:44:45,90 --> 00:44:51,25 a petition on Change dot org saying you know we want girls to play with Lego not 578 00:44:51,29 --> 00:44:56,53 like this and Lego has now called for a meeting with the heads of 579 00:44:57,12 --> 00:45:01,67 a number of girls advocacy organizations to discuss how they can really shaped this 580 00:45:01,82 --> 00:45:08,47 to make it something that is more you know amenable to parents and to girls and 581 00:45:08,48 --> 00:45:13,11 less insulting meets better criteria so there was this way that you know the 582 00:45:13,12 --> 00:45:16,86 parental pushback particularly in the consumer culture makes 583 00:45:16,87 --> 00:45:18,76 a big difference and I think about it 584 00:45:18,77 --> 00:45:25,40 a lot because I'm from Berkeley as being like the food movement and how you know if 585 00:45:25,41 --> 00:45:29,20 I stood up here ten or fifteen years ago and talk to you guys about trans fat and 586 00:45:29,21 --> 00:45:31,37 free range chicken you have thought I was 587 00:45:31,38 --> 00:45:38,20 a crazy person and now I hope you don't now because of you know 588 00:45:38,21 --> 00:45:38,42 really 589 00:45:38,43 --> 00:45:42,43 a couple of books because of Omnivore's Dilemma and Fast Food Nation that sparked 590 00:45:42,44 --> 00:45:46,78 this national conversation not everywhere not everybody for sure but 591 00:45:46,79 --> 00:45:48,39 a lot of places a lot of people 592 00:45:48,40 --> 00:45:55,19 a lot of communities have changed or are making change to make the way we eat more 593 00:45:55,20 --> 00:46:00,88 wholesome more sustainable you know more environmentally sound and healthier for us 594 00:46:00,92 --> 00:46:04,76 and the way that we talk the language we use when we talk about food is the same 595 00:46:04,77 --> 00:46:09,44 language we use when we talk about media and culture you know our kids consume the 596 00:46:09,45 --> 00:46:12,64 junk it's unhealthy for them and I think that there's 597 00:46:12,65 --> 00:46:16,27 a reason that that language is the same and you know if we could get McDonald's to 598 00:46:16,28 --> 00:46:21,90 put healthier items on its menu we can change Mattel you know for going to sakes so 599 00:46:21,91 --> 00:46:22,01 on 600 00:46:22,02 --> 00:46:27,39 a collective level I see change and I see possibility and on an individual level. 601 00:46:28,35 --> 00:46:29,02 You know no is 602 00:46:29,03 --> 00:46:35,81 a good word when kids are little and it does work. It's also not 603 00:46:35,82 --> 00:46:38,32 enough and I learned that the hard way remember 604 00:46:38,33 --> 00:46:41,68 a long time ago I told you remember those Thai girls dolls they look like Bratz 605 00:46:41,69 --> 00:46:47,85 dolls but plush. My daughter and I were walking in the Los Angeles Airport when she 606 00:46:47,86 --> 00:46:49,12 was four and they had a 607 00:46:49,27 --> 00:46:53,24 a rack of those at the airport and she just was like I don't know if I can emit 608 00:46:53,25 --> 00:46:58,51 a gamma rays and she was like Mommy can I have one of those and something in me 609 00:46:59,12 --> 00:47:05,61 snapped and I just I just I was like No no you cannot ever ever ever 610 00:47:05,62 --> 00:47:12,04 ever ever have one of those and. Mommy was and he was very inappropriate like why 611 00:47:12,05 --> 00:47:12,35 are they on 612 00:47:12,36 --> 00:47:16,53 a program I just thought I don't want to explain why they're inappropriate you know 613 00:47:16,54 --> 00:47:21,51 I just I'm so darn sick of the teachable moment you know. 614 00:47:22,90 --> 00:47:26,24 So sick of it and I thought they had me over 615 00:47:26,25 --> 00:47:31,11 a barrel because you are never going to be able to convince your daughter that she 616 00:47:31,12 --> 00:47:37,26 has broader choices when you're always saying no and so I came to the conclusion 617 00:47:37,27 --> 00:47:43,45 that you know the issue the way to go is to limit you know but not censor but also 618 00:47:43,46 --> 00:47:49,29 really focus on expanding expanding girls' ideas of what and boys to of what it 619 00:47:49,30 --> 00:47:54,39 means to be female and feminine and so I actually on my website which is Peggy 620 00:47:54,40 --> 00:47:57,43 Orenstein dot com are Cinderella at my daughter dot com I've been developing 621 00:47:57,44 --> 00:48:02,61 a resources list which you're welcome to look at and and also add to by emailing me 622 00:48:02,79 --> 00:48:07,71 of playthings and books and movies and all kinds of things that offer not just the 623 00:48:07,72 --> 00:48:11,30 neutral stuff you know I think and I think we tend to think either neutral or we 624 00:48:11,31 --> 00:48:13,01 think binary you know you know my daughter's wearing 625 00:48:13,02 --> 00:48:17,26 a princess dress or she's sleeping with a football. But I think there's 626 00:48:17,27 --> 00:48:22,32 a third way and that's about creating an idea of the feminine that is positive and 627 00:48:22,33 --> 00:48:27,43 strong and internally based and as an example of that again you know when my 628 00:48:27,44 --> 00:48:31,48 daughter was little we started reading child friendly versions of Greek myths so 629 00:48:31,49 --> 00:48:35,34 you don't like the ones where Homer Hercules killing all these kids but you know 630 00:48:35,35 --> 00:48:40,45 other ones and. And she went trick or treating that you're dressed as Athena 631 00:48:40,46 --> 00:48:45,24 goddess of war and wisdom so she's still got to wear like the cool dress thing and 632 00:48:45,25 --> 00:48:48,37 she's got to wear like that meat thing on her head a little silver crown 633 00:48:48,38 --> 00:48:52,47 a thing but it was a totally different archetype 634 00:48:52,51 --> 00:48:58,20 a totally different image of what it meant to be feminine than Disney Cinderella it 635 00:48:58,21 --> 00:49:02,03 was in China Lee based it was powerful it was from the inside out rather than the 636 00:49:02,07 --> 00:49:05,49 outside in and it's you know it allowed her to celebrate herself as 637 00:49:05,50 --> 00:49:08,66 a girl and feel that feeling of I'm a girl I'm a girl but in 638 00:49:08,67 --> 00:49:13,58 a way that I could totally embrace and say yes to so I think we have to do that 639 00:49:13,59 --> 00:49:18,18 kind of creative thinking also as girls get over older giving power back to them is 640 00:49:18,19 --> 00:49:22,70 really great getting them involved in their own media literacy and talking back and 641 00:49:22,71 --> 00:49:25,62 getting them control of reproduction. There's 642 00:49:25,63 --> 00:49:30,04 a happy girls this is what we want so Girls Inc and Girl Scouts both have great 643 00:49:30,05 --> 00:49:35,57 programs this way. Girls Leadership Institute. For those of you who are reading the 644 00:49:35,58 --> 00:49:39,31 standards wanted to put this up there are Girls Leadership Institute org is 645 00:49:39,32 --> 00:49:46,24 a great source about face dot org has ideas of things that you can do 646 00:49:46,25 --> 00:49:51,97 with girls as to spark summit they have things you can download activities and 647 00:49:51,98 --> 00:49:56,33 things that you can download healthy hearty girls healthy women so this is powered 648 00:49:56,34 --> 00:49:59,89 by Girl which is part part of hearty girls healthy women and what they do is they 649 00:49:59,90 --> 00:50:06,71 have the girls take existing ads and talk back to them so the one on the right is 650 00:50:06,72 --> 00:50:10,62 it ad for Diesel jeans and it says in third grade I learned the appropriate way to 651 00:50:10,63 --> 00:50:10,96 act in 652 00:50:10,97 --> 00:50:17,84 a museum it didn't look like this. And on the left the person she's 653 00:50:17,85 --> 00:50:24,50 saying she's thinking can't blink don't breathe and I'm cold so firing my agent. 654 00:50:25,56 --> 00:50:28,90 And so there's this kind of funny way that girls can you know engage and interact 655 00:50:28,91 --> 00:50:31,86 and talk back and you can actually go on their website and they have ads up there 656 00:50:31,87 --> 00:50:34,73 that you can do that too and your daughter can do that too which is 657 00:50:34,74 --> 00:50:38,97 a great way to I think you know it can be transformative to get control over the 658 00:50:38,98 --> 00:50:43,60 culture for girls and it can really help them turn you know from Princess to hero 659 00:50:43,61 --> 00:50:49,34 am. And I think our task as parents Diane Levin talks and wrote so sexy so soon 660 00:50:49,35 --> 00:50:54,06 talks about these two boxes that kids carry around in their had and one is the box 661 00:50:54,10 --> 00:50:57,40 that has all the popular culture stuff and all the values there and the other is 662 00:50:57,41 --> 00:51:01,11 the box of stuff that we want for them you know to fulfill their potential to be 663 00:51:01,12 --> 00:51:05,58 competent to be kind to be compassionate all that you know all the values that we 664 00:51:05,59 --> 00:51:11,76 have and the culture box is too big right now and so the task is to kind of make it 665 00:51:11,77 --> 00:51:16,87 smaller to limit it as long as you can but also to create bridges between the boxes 666 00:51:17,03 --> 00:51:20,32 so that you're helping children have vocabulary and 667 00:51:20,33 --> 00:51:25,15 a critical eye when they look at these things so that they can that we're with them 668 00:51:25,19 --> 00:51:30,72 in it with them as allies not as adversaries and they are able to decode them for 669 00:51:30,76 --> 00:51:37,67 themselves and I just want to say and by. I love the fairy tales 670 00:51:38,19 --> 00:51:40,80 you know I want to talk about the fairy tales for second and I particularly love 671 00:51:40,81 --> 00:51:45,55 Cinderella Cinderella the oldest Cinderella is from eight fifty A.D. 672 00:51:46,19 --> 00:51:53,01 It's called the action she's Chinese and there are. Over seven hundred 673 00:51:53,06 --> 00:51:56,23 Cinderella stories they it crosses all cultures it's like 674 00:51:56,24 --> 00:52:02,43 a universal story and something that common I feel like it has to have something 675 00:52:02,47 --> 00:52:07,07 worthy in right and one of my favorite ones is the Grimm Cinderella it's it's 676 00:52:07,08 --> 00:52:11,88 actually called. But I'm going to call it Cinderella because my throat's trying to 677 00:52:11,89 --> 00:52:17,74 hurt and so in that scene wrote like OK it's incredibly bloody I don't know if any 678 00:52:17,75 --> 00:52:22,09 of you have read it incredibly bloody the stepsister one cuts get one cuts off her 679 00:52:22,10 --> 00:52:26,27 heel to get in the shoe and blood is spinning there because of her toe and blood is 680 00:52:26,28 --> 00:52:32,20 spurting and flying and then Cinderella seems to be nicely asking them to be her 681 00:52:32,21 --> 00:52:35,39 bridesmaids when she finally is going to marry the Prince and they walk in on 682 00:52:35,40 --> 00:52:39,78 either side of her and Central has these dogs perch on her shoulders that pack out 683 00:52:39,79 --> 00:52:46,37 the stepsisters eyes like imagine the wedding photos you know. So it's really gross 684 00:52:46,38 --> 00:52:50,49 and gory but it has this great you know you read these things differently at 685 00:52:50,50 --> 00:52:55,11 different times of your life which I think is really the beauty of them and so when 686 00:52:55,12 --> 00:52:56,84 I read Cinderella Now this is what I see 687 00:52:56,85 --> 00:53:00,26 a Cinderella story about these about this father goes on 688 00:53:00,27 --> 00:53:06,34 a business trip and he asks his daughters what they want him to bring back and the 689 00:53:06,67 --> 00:53:13,15 you know the wicked stepsisters came and Chloe. They. Ask for bling 690 00:53:13,94 --> 00:53:20,61 and. Asks him to bring back a branch that brushes his face 691 00:53:20,65 --> 00:53:22,33 a twig so he brings her 692 00:53:22,34 --> 00:53:28,54 a hazel branch and she plants it in the grass her dead mother's grave and she 693 00:53:28,55 --> 00:53:35,22 waters it with her tears and this tree grows from that and there's no no fairy 694 00:53:35,23 --> 00:53:40,92 godmother there's no pumpkin she walks to the ball. Gets on by her but 695 00:53:42,15 --> 00:53:46,94 it's the tree that provides the wherewith all for her to go to the ball and there's 696 00:53:46,95 --> 00:53:49,72 this way that this story is about 697 00:53:50,01 --> 00:53:55,69 a mother's love transcending death to help guide her daughter from girlhood to 698 00:53:55,70 --> 00:54:02,70 womanhood and when I read the story that way I think we've got to bring back the 699 00:54:02,71 --> 00:54:08,35 tree I mean we whether we're women or men whatever we are we adults and girls' 700 00:54:08,36 --> 00:54:13,84 lives need to be those deep roots and those sheltering branches that help them 701 00:54:13,85 --> 00:54:18,46 navigate through the thicket of what this culture tells them it means to be female 702 00:54:18,86 --> 00:54:19,79 you know not lock them in 703 00:54:19,80 --> 00:54:25,47 a tower like the other fairy tale but help them have the tools to get through so 704 00:54:25,48 --> 00:54:31,92 that they can find their real and their true happily ever after so with that 705 00:54:32,39 --> 00:54:34,61 and I'm happy to take questions thank you for coming. 706 00:54:40,81 --> 00:54:44,16 I have. Across the country for me and has 707 00:54:44,17 --> 00:54:51,06 a wonderful. Wicked bright and gorgeous and I I just 708 00:54:51,07 --> 00:54:55,44 don't know what to do sometimes because some of her talk about you know about how 709 00:54:55,45 --> 00:55:01,02 she likes that she and other things just make me super uncomfortable and I don't 710 00:55:01,03 --> 00:55:04,44 know how to address it without. Getting into 711 00:55:04,45 --> 00:55:10,98 a business that's not mine because she's not my daughter. Without doing that thing 712 00:55:10,99 --> 00:55:14,58 where you know she's at the age where if you start pushing for something she's 713 00:55:14,59 --> 00:55:21,43 going to run the opposite way so I just was looking for some guidance on like how 714 00:55:21,44 --> 00:55:28,07 to be positive. Without you know being there in person and without being and 715 00:55:28,30 --> 00:55:31,40 actually parent right well I think there's 716 00:55:31,41 --> 00:55:38,39 a couple things you know one is. One is. You know giving 717 00:55:38,40 --> 00:55:41,96 her positive feedback for things that you think are great about her that are not 718 00:55:41,97 --> 00:55:48,63 about her looks you know giving her positive feedback for you know her art or her 719 00:55:48,64 --> 00:55:52,43 sports or her whatever it is that she does know that that are about her as 720 00:55:52,44 --> 00:55:58,47 a person. And asking her questions you know I think it's fair to engage 721 00:55:58,51 --> 00:56:02,27 a kid by asking open ended questions it's the best way to engage them on these 722 00:56:02,28 --> 00:56:05,64 things because if you start lecturing them and saying you know this is what I think 723 00:56:05,65 --> 00:56:08,66 and this is bad and you are not this is false empowerment I mean that they would 724 00:56:08,67 --> 00:56:13,38 use that language with an eleven year old but essentially right. That it's not 725 00:56:13,39 --> 00:56:16,92 going to it's not going to work but but just sort of trying to engage her in 726 00:56:16,93 --> 00:56:18,58 discussion without having 727 00:56:18,59 --> 00:56:23,46 a goal for what the discussion ought to be and how it ought to come out is your 728 00:56:23,47 --> 00:56:28,15 best bet in that position and then you know having stuff when she's at your house 729 00:56:28,16 --> 00:56:34,14 that you do together that is model some other things. I would say that would be the 730 00:56:34,15 --> 00:56:37,20 best and then presume of the two of us step daughter you have 731 00:56:37,24 --> 00:56:42,19 a daughter's father in the house with you and I just you know would want to say 732 00:56:42,20 --> 00:56:46,56 a word that men's roles here fathers uncles grandfathers you know where were the 733 00:56:46,57 --> 00:56:50,84 man in a girl's life as are tremendously important in how 734 00:56:50,92 --> 00:56:55,50 a girl grows up and how she sees herself both in terms of how that man talks to the 735 00:56:55,51 --> 00:56:57,96 girl's mother and also there's 736 00:56:57,97 --> 00:57:04,34 a lot of research that girls who have support from emotional support from their 737 00:57:04,35 --> 00:57:09,05 fathers not about being pretty but about who you are have 738 00:57:09,09 --> 00:57:14,54 a stronger body images. You know less distorted negative body image and also that 739 00:57:14,55 --> 00:57:19,30 they're more likely to go into nontraditional fields than other girls so 740 00:57:19,51 --> 00:57:24,93 a fathers. Regard positive regard in 741 00:57:24,97 --> 00:57:27,24 a girl's life can really be 742 00:57:27,47 --> 00:57:31,56 a wonderful thing and so I'm always really pleased when men come to see me or 743 00:57:31,57 --> 00:57:33,59 listen to me or call into the radio for that reason.