My daughter was assigned “Life Doesn’t Frighten Me” to memorize for school. Tonight, I got to listen to her recite it over and over.
Thank you, Maya Angelou, for an incredible evening.
Here’s the poem.
Life Doesn’t Frighten Me by Maya Angelou
Shadows on the wall
Noises down the hail
Life doesn’t frighten me at all
Bad dogs barking loud
Big ghosts in a cloud
Life doesn’t frighten me at all.
Mean old Mother Goose
Lions on the loose
They don’t frighten me at all
Dragons breathing flame
On my counterpane
That doesn’t frighten me at all.
I go boo
Make them shoo
I make fun
Way they run
I won’t cry
So they fly
I just smile
They go wild
Life doesn’t frighten me at all.
Tough guys in a fight
All alone at night
Life doesn’t frighten me at all.
Panthers in the park
Strangers in the dark
No, they don’t frighten me at all.
That new classroom where
Boys pull all my hair
(Kissy little girls
With their hair in curls)
They don’t frighten me at all.
Don’t show me frogs and snakes
And listen for my scream,
If I’m afraid at all
It’s only in my dreams.
I’ve got a magic charm
That I keep up my sleeve,
I can walk the ocean floor
And never have to breathe.
Life doesn’t frighten me at all
Not at all
Not at all
Life doesn’t frighten me at all.
Venker argues that women have always had it better than men. Here’s why:
Prior to the 1970s, people viewed gender roles as as equally valuable. Many would argue women had the better end of the deal! It’s hard to claim women were oppressed in a nation in which men were expected to stand up when a lady enters the room or to lay down their lives to spare women life.When the Titanic went down in 1912, its sinking took 1,450 lives. Only 103 were women. One-hundred three.
Compare that with last year’s wrecked cruise line, the Costa Concordia. It resulted in fewer deaths, but there was another significant difference. “There was no ‘women and children first’ policy. There were big men, crew members, pushing their way past us to get into the lifeboats. It was disgusting,” said passenger Sandra Rogers, 62.
Let’s just leave aside for a moment the idea that if women and men actually had equality, there’s a better chance that a woman would’ve been captain of the Costa Concordia– not to mention the Titanic– and the ship wouldn’t have sunk in the first place.
Here’s a question for the women of America. What would you rather have: equal pay for equal work or men standing up when you enter a room? Do you prefer to rely on chivalry for your well being or financial and political autonomy?
Yes, women, there’s a chance that you might find yourself on a sinking cruise ship someday. And at that moment, you may be incredibly grateful that you gave up all of your rights so that a fellow passenger is noble enough to die for you. (Then again, you might not. You might be old or sick and decide it’s your time to go.) But far more probable than that life outcome, harm is likely to come to you from your husband or boyfriend. On average, more than three women are murdered by their intimate partners in this country every day. One in four women (25%) in America are victims of domestic violence. (Stats from the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence)
With violence against women being a national epidemic, you’d think that stopping it would be high on the U.S. government’s agenda. Yet, our congress stalled the Violence Against Women Act. I don’t get it. I thought that protecting women was a #1 priority. Women and children first, right? What happened here? Talk about chivalry being dead.
Perhaps, instead of hoping that men do the right thing for us, women are better off getting the power to do the right thing for ourselves.
Women are half of the population but underrepresented in the U.S. government. In 2013, women make up just 18% of congress. There are only 5 women governors. Throughout U.S. history, only four women have held the office of Supreme Court Justice. There has never been a female President of the United States.
But according to Venker, the problem for women is feminism. Besides using shipwrecks, she provides other evidence for the ultimate good of systemic sexism. Contradicting the idea of gender equality, Venker writes:
Those of us with children know better. We know little girls love their dolls and boys just want to kick that ball.
But Venker knows better. The whole purpose of her post is to promote her book, How to Choose a Husband and Make Peace with Marriage. According to her, “Its premise is that if women want to be successful in love, they should reject the cultural script they’ve been sold and adopt a whole new view of men and marriage.”
That cultural script is feminism. Can you imagine taking this woman’s advice on how to choose a husband? I’m happily married, by the way, and have been for ten years. What great wisdom will Venker bestow on women? Pick someone who loves cruises so that chivalry will come in handy? Brush up on shuffleboard?
My daughter has been waking up super cranky in the morning, so last night when we put her to bed, we unclipped her reading light. An hour later, my husband went down to check on her and found her with a flashlight. Back again, he removed 2 more lights. This is what I saw on the kitchen counter this morning. She’d managed to get her younger sister’s clip on light as well. I have no idea how she acquired light #6. Yet another reason to be pissed off at her partner in crime, Rick Riordan…
A new Muppet movie is coming out in 2014. On Disney’s site for the movie, the characters listed are Kermit the Frog, Miss Piggy, Animal, Fozzy the Bear, Gonzo the Great, and Walter. So here we have a typical gender ratio in children’s media of 1:5. Females, half of the kid population, are once again, presented as a minority. Miss Piggy is a Minority Feisty.
Make that 1:6. The human star of the movie is Ricky Gervais.
In case you forgot, here’s the poster your kids got to see for the 2011 movie.
When females are marginalized and sidelined in a fantasy world created for children (not to mention creatures from a world that originated on PBS) how can we expect them to get equality in the real world? If we can’t even imagine it, how can we achieve it?
WTF? I just posted about the offensive chicklit makeover for Plath’s Bell Jar that I saw on Jezebel and didn’t realize, it was only the beginning! They are fucking with the great heroines of YA who we already don’t have enough of. How can they go back and mess up those we love just in time for our children to read about them? Publishers gave Anne of Green Gables a blonde makeover.
Thankfully, here’s my nine year old daughter’s edition, bought last year and waiting for her on the bookshelf:
This is Anne! Looking out of the window, thinking, wondering about the world! Not smiling coyly for some invisible admirer (my daughter?) The edition above is illustrated by the amazing Lauren Child of Charlie and Lolafame. Child also illustrated our edition of Pippi Longstocking.
How could they do this to Anne?
As Jezebel writes, the publisher chooses “to ignore that Anne had red hair—which was such an important part of the book. She had red fucking hair!”
Sadly, we’re not done yet with this retroactive sexism. Now, for Virginia Woolf:
Do you think the ghost of Ted Hughes could be haunting Britian’s Faber publishing house? It seems like only he could’ve come up with something so distorted to cover Plath’s work.
For a book all about a woman’s clinical depression that’s exacerbated by the suffocating gender stereotypes… it’s pretty fucking stupid to feature a low-rent retro wannabe pinup applying makeup.
Couldn’t agree more.
Total bummer, but I’m going to leave you feeling slightly better about depictions of women in good old America in 2013. Here’s a very cool new stamp celebrating Rosa Park’s 100th birthday:
I first saw the post “The Importance of Roughhousing with your kids” on the Pigtail Pals Facebook page, where I get much of my information. I wish Melissa Wardy were the editor of the New York Times, because the post she linked to is about a year old, and I’d never seen it, heard of it, or heard any of the information about roughhousing before I saw it on her page.
Helping your child develop a resilient spirit is one of the best things you can do as a parent. The ability to bounce back from failures and adapt to unpredictable situations will help your kids reach their full potential and live happier lives as adults. And an easy way to help boost your kids’ resilience is to put them in a gentle headlock and give them a noogie.
Roughhousing requires your child to adapt quickly to unpredictable situations. One minute they might be riding you like a horse and the next they could be swinging upside-down. According to evolutionary biologist Marc Bekoff in his book Wild Justice, the unpredictable nature of roughhousing actually rewires a child’s brain by increasing the connections between neurons in the cerebral cortex, which in turn contributes to behavioral flexibility. Learning how to cope with sudden changes while roughhousing trains your kiddos to cope with unexpected bumps in the road when they’re out in the real world.
This theory resonated with me because if I could define health in one word it would be “resilience” and sickness would be “stuck.”
Roughhousing as a positive influence for kids seems consistent with what Po Bronson wrote about years ago in Nurture Shock: New Thinking About Children. According to Bronson’s research, you don’t compliment the kid on the finished task, but on the effort. The most important skill for success and happiness is learning to tolerate frustration and learning to work through it. Rewarding the process, not the end goal. (Artists, are you listening?)
A similar thesis is presented in a new, popular book: How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character. The author, Paul Tough argues that the qualities that matter aren’t test scores, but emotional intelligence, skills like perseverance, curiosity, conscientiousness, optimism, and self-control.
Art of Manliness describes roughhousing as just that:
Additionally, roughhousing helps develop your children’s grit and stick-to-itiveness. You shouldn’t just let your kids “win” every time when you roughhouse with them. Whether they’re trying to escape from your hold or run past you in the hallway, make them work for it. Playtime is a fun and safe place to teach your kids that failure is often just a temporary state and that victory goes to the person who keeps at it and learns from his mistakes.
Remarkably, back to testing:
Psychologist Anthony Pellegrini has found that the amount of roughhousing children engage in predicts their achievement in first grade better than their kindergarten test scores do. What is it about rough and tumble play that makes kids smarter? Well, a couple things.
First, as we discussed above, roughhousing makes your kid more resilient and resilience is a key in developing children’s intelligence. Resilient kids tend to see failure more as a challenge to overcome rather than an event that defines them. This sort of intellectual resilience helps ensure your children bounce back from bad grades and gives them the grit to keep trying until they’ve mastered a topic.
In addition to making students more resilient, roughhousing actually rewires the brain for learning. Neuroscientists studying animal and human brains have found that bouts of rough-and-tumble play increase the brain’s level of a chemical called brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF). BDNF helps increase neuron growth in the parts of the brain responsible for memory, logic, and higher learning–skills necessary for academic success.
I love this theory from a feminist perspective as well. I am so sick of hearing about “boy energy.” As I’ve written about extensively on this blog, girls are not intrisically quieter than boys. Boys’s roughhousing is tolerated, but girls are told to settle down and be quiet. They are rewarded when they do. I see this all the time, and I’m sure you do too. Not to mention ridiculous generalizations like girls are “artsy” and literary, quiet activities. Girls are “artsy” when its about construction paper and Elmers’ glue. If we’re talking great artists, paintings that sell for the most money, or shows at the MOMA, all of a sudden, it’s boys who are artsy. The same is true with “great” writers; wow, men are verbal! Who knew? Not to mention “cooking” becomes masculine when we’re talking about great chefs and who gets the most cooking shows and awards. “Masculine” and “feminine” qualities have everything to do with stereotypes and status.
My nine year old daughter is tearing through the Rick Riordan books for the third time. Third time. She’s obsessed. She reads them at breakfast and then in the car on the way to school. She’ll forget the book at school and beg me to go to the bookstore down the street and buy her another because she can’t imagine getting through the night without huddling under her covers, reading, with her flashlight. Of course, I refuse, so she calls up her seven year old cousin who is also addicted and asks to borrow it. She won’t give it up because she’s reading it.
Middle Grade experts recommended that I read Rick Riordan since I am writing an MG book and he has “perfect pacing.”
I read the first three and liked them very much. The characters and stories are compelling, and I’ve always loved Greek Mythology, though there is a challenge for female characters in a series based on legends of a patriarchy. That patriarchy is not something in the background but an integral part of the narrative. In the three books I read, there is a lot of talk about “the big three:” Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades. When I blogged about Lightning Thief, I rated it ***H***.
There is a strong female character, Annabeth. It is striking how similar the gender ratio and relationships are to the Harry Potter series: two boys and a girl who are BFFs. This is the essence of the Minority Feisty set up: there is a girl and she is strong, so we can all sigh with relief, but she is not the protagonist. She helps the male on his quest.
I know, don’t judge a book by its cover, but but there are so many Riordan books, and so many covers. Let’s check them out and see what they have in common.
The Lightning Thief:
Here’s the movie poster from 2010:
Sea of Monsters, the second book in the series:
Here’s the movie poster, coming out this year and shown in Reel Girl’s Gallery of Girls Gone Missing From Children’s Movies in 2013. On Google, you can find posters with Annabeth, but I doubt that is the version our kids will see around town. This movie, like the Harry Potter movies, prominently displays the male protag’s name.
Next in the series is The Titan’s Curse and the cover shows a solo male astride a magical creature. It’s a beautiful, exciting image and a thrill females in the imaginary world rarely get to experience:
Battle of the Labyrinth:
The Last Olympian:
So that’s the first Riordan series: 5 books, 2 movies, male protag/ male star, male solo on 4 out of 5 books. Male’s name in the title every time. Once again, I am a fan of Riordan. These books are great. But just imagine your kids– girls and boys– getting the opportunity to read a fantasy series of 5 books with a female protag, her female BFF and male BFF helping her on her quest. And just to be clear, this series is the definition quest narrative.
Girls fare better in the Egypt series: The Red Pyramid is narrated by siblings Sadie and Carter. Though there are more males than females, there is another very cool female, Zia. I wish the book was all about her. The cover is good, too. Sadie makes it on, though behind Carter.
And now, my favorite Riordan cover: Throne of Fire.
The Serpent’s Shadow also has a pretty great cover:
The next Riordan series, Heroes of Olympus, goes back to the standard Minority Feisty imagery. Here’s the first cover. See those three on the cover? They are not Percy, Annabeth, and Gus. They are Jason, Piper, and Leo. Guess who the protag is?
In Son of Neptune, Percy is the protag again, and this time, his friends are Hazel and Frank. It’s remarkable how consistent, persistent, and repetitive the Minority Feisty model is in the imaginary world.
Are you ready for the next one, and this is the BEST one, really according to my daughter and her aunt: Mark of Athena. YAY. A female makes it into the title! There are 7 main characters in this one and 3 are female. Less than half, so still the Minority Feisty, but not a bad showing for the consistent sexism in fantasy kidworld, right? But check out the cover:
WTF? No girl riding a pegasus and the owl of Athena fading into the background. ARGH!
Finally, Reel Girl is here! Her mission: to liberate the imaginations of children and grown-ups everywhere.
This blog’s new banner was drawn by the artist, Cynthia Rodgers, AKA Theamat. I first saw her work on the internet when I came across the fabulous “If I don’t get pants, nobody gets pants.”
Theamat created Reel Girl’s face from these images of my daughters. Before taking the pics, I asked them to imagine they were up against something powerful; it was up to them to save the world.
In creating Reel Girl, Theamat used Lucy’s intense eyes,
I love Emily Thorne, the protagonist of “Revenge.”
Thorne is unlike any female protagonist I’ve seen on TV or film. First of all, she is independently wealthy. Viewers learn of her financial status on the first episode when her friend is planning a benefit. Thorne casually says “Count me in” for a $10,000 ticket.
My mouth dropped open when I heard that line. A young, smart, beautiful, strong female who is also rich? That doesn’t happen. It’s way to much power to give a girl.
If you don’t believe me, check out the Forbes 15. Every year, Forbes does a survey on the 15 richest imaginary characters, including Scrooge McDuck, Richie Rich, Smaug (dragon from Tolkein) Bruce Wayne (Batman), Mr. Monopoly, Carlisle Cullen (Twilight saga), C. Montgomery Burns (Simpsons). At most, 2 females make the list, in 2012 Lisbeth Salander (Girl With Dragon Tatoo) and Jo Bennett. Women are rarely permitted to control billions, in the imaginary world or the real one.
But Emily Thorne isn’t just rich. She is super smart. Every time I watch someone try to get the better of her, I have total confidence she’ll outsmart him. If it doesn’t come down to a battle of wits, Thorne can kick some serious ass. She’s a black belt in karate and this woman has no fear. She is driven and focused in every way. I feel a unique combination of calmness and excitement watching Thorne get into trouble that I’ve only felt before watching superheroes or James Bond: it’s fun to watch the action, how she pulls it all off, but you know she’ll be OK.
While “Downton Abbey” does a great job depicting how much it sucks to be a woman in 1900s upper class British society, “Revenge” shows women breaking through the limits imposed on them. I quit watching Downton because though the acting is good, it’s too prissy for me. “Revenge” doesn’t have Maggie Smith’s acting, but it all takes place in the Hamptons so you still get to gawk at rich people in fancy clothing who spend most of their time at parties.
I’ll be honest and admit that after more than one episode I’ve groaned and said, “I cannot watch this again.” But I always do.
![THRONE_OF_FIRE_jktFINAL[1]](http://reelgirl.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/THRONE_OF_FIRE_jktFINAL11.jpg)
