I’m not going to talk about the video. We’ve all seen it. Out of respect for the little girls and their right to childhood and privacy, I’m not even going to link it. I’m not going to discuss the ignorance one of the girls’ parents displayed on national tv. I think they made a bad choice, an uninformed choice, but I do not think they are bad people. Most of us have already spoken out about how we feel about girls in elementary school donning sexy costumes to perform provocative dance moves to a questionable song choice.
I’m going to talk about the concept of a child young enough to be visited by the tooth fairy is absolutely too young to be wearing fishnets and lace bra tops performing a highly sexually suggestive dance routine to a cheering and screaming audience.
I’m going to talk about that video making me have such a visceral reaction that I made a beeline for Capitol Hill two days later. Yeah, the one in Washington DC. Parents were angry. People who aren’t parents were angry. I was angry. So I channeled that into activism and took my passion for ending the sexualization of little girls and Friday morning I sat myself down in the office of my Congresswoman. Our lawmakers need to hear our voices.
I get bile in my throat when I see little girls in a manner of dress similar to sex workers. I get tears in my eyes when I see little girls move or use their bodies in sexual ways that they shouldn’t even know about yet. They are, after all, little girls. Little. Girls. Their right to a childhood should be fiercely protected. The viewing or thinking of children in a sexual way SHOULD BE TABOO. And the worse part of it all, is that many times these very children don’t understand what they are doing — that is the beast of sexualization.
Friday morning I scheduled a meeting with Rep. Tammy Baldwin’s (D-WI) office in Washington DC to discuss a bill she co-sponsored and had just introduced in March – HR 4925 Healthy Media for Youth Act. The hope for the bill is to create a competitive grant program for media literacy and youth empowerment programs, facilitate research on how media affects youth, and to establish a National Task Force on Women and Girls in the Media.
“Children are consuming more media than ever, but unfortunately, the images they see often reinforce gender stereotypes, emphasize unrealistic body images or show women in passive roles. The need for more positive images of girls in the media is clear,” said Congresswoman Baldwin. “I’m proud to sponsor legislation that will help girls and young women see themselves in a new and stronger light,” said Baldwin, who co-chairs, with Congresswoman Capito, the Congressional Women’s Caucus Task Force on Young Women.
Though I fully support the efforts of this bill, if we have learned anything this past week after the firestorm after the dance video, it is that our very youngest girls are being sexualized and becoming victims of the media and sexualized consumer culture. It doesn’t start as tweens, it starts as toddlers. My purpose during my meeting with Rep. Baldwin was to bring attention to the harm that is coming to preschool aged girls, those too young for most of the programming this bill aims to support. I need the help for my four year old girl. Most programs don’t start until kindergarten or elementary school, and for the girls they serve those programs are wonderful. Wonderful. For the girls who are too young, I am concerned their parents don’t receive the outreach or media literacy training they need.
Girl empowerment cannot be delayed until school age or the tween years. The festering of sexualization, low self-esteem and poor body image starts during the toddler and preschool years when he sexualized toys, apparel, and media enter little girls’ lives. If you wait until our daughters are eight or ten or fourteen to teach them these lessons, then the festering has sat for the most formative years of their life. This is why we teach our children to wash their hands when they potty train – they don’t do it correctly yet, but you don’t wait until they are older and can do it right. You lay the groundwork for a time when they can. Girl empowerment has to be the same.
My suggestions to Rep. Tammy Baldwin’s office were:
- Media Literacy efforts and girl empowerment initiatives need to begin for parents and girls at a preschool level.
- Media Literacy efforts and girl empowerment initiatives should be made available to girls who are preliterate and therefore most vulnerable to sexualized imagery. Images and pictures are a child’s first language.
- Young children’s toys and media characters need to fit within guidelines that limit the violence and sexual stereotypes and sexual content conveyed to the young consumers who use them.
- Groups that serve girls before they reach the ages of school and extracurricular programs need to be funded and supported in order to empower our youngest of girls so that these are messages the girls are raised with, as opposed to introduced to sometime during their elementary years.
My dialog with Rep. Baldwin’s office will continue and I will keep you appraised when updates occur. What you can do until that time is contact your state’s Representatives and encourage them to endorse the bill. A phone call, a letter, an email – heartfelt and concise, asking for protection for our daughters of ALL ages. Turn that disgust and upset and disapproval and concern and anger that you felt into action. Make a change for our girls.
Look up the contact information for your State’s representative in the House.
This guest post is by Melissa Wardy, the founder of Pigtail Pals, a company that seeks to “Redefine Girly” with positive message t-shirts for girls. Pigtail Pals partners with AAUW as a member benefit.
What is the name of the video and how can I see it? Thanks.
Dear Melissa,
Everyone with whom I’ve spoken was incredibly disturbed not only by the sexualization of the little girls but also the cluelessness of the parents. As an advocate for women and girls, but even more so, as a grandmother of little girls who are 7 and 10, I was sickened by the sight of the video. I railed about it to my husband, who was equally upset. But we took no other action. Thank you for doing what the rest of us knew we should do/wanted to do/intended to do, but never got around to doing. Making something happen -establishing a multi-pronged approach to address the problem. Giving us a path to follow with some very specific and critically important steps. Brava.
You are an inspiration for taking such immediate action on the issue.
When I first saw the video over the weekend, I read the majority of the comments that were attached. Half the comments were condemning the dance, and the other half were in full support of it.
I was disappointed, yet not surprised that some people could not understand what was wrong with it and the blatant provocativeness portrayed. “What’s the big deal?” was the consensus of those in support.
Individuals like you are fighting the good fight against so much of what is wrong with our culture. Thank you for turning your anger into action, you have inspired a lot of people.
Melissa, I applaud you for tackling the very troubling issue of young objectified women. Often times, such heavy issues are put on the back burner. And if they are brought to light, they fall on deaf ears because it is something society thinks they can do nothing about.
You could have not been more spot on with the concerns you’ve addressed. The media plays a very important role in how we act, how we dress, what we eat, and how we eat it (no exaggeration). It becomes extremely evident as we start to witness it in our younger generation (which unfortunately, is the most impressionable). As a journalism major, I have studied the kinds of methods and tactics the media gets away with ever-so skillfully as they target the most naive and impressionable; And believe me, it is appalling. But you better believe, just as we are getting to the core of the problem, they are getting to the core of what satisfies the public.
The sad part about what I’ve learned is that the media does not randomly choose to market provocative clothing or display inappropriate behavior. It is what the media sees in society that allows them to provide us with exactly what we want; a mirror effect, if you will. The kinds of trends WE set, the kind of behavior WE display, etc. is delivered right back to us in a very huge package that is the media. How can the media solely be at fault for things WE have created!? It is also (as aforementioned) up to the parents to educate their kids on what’s acceptable and what is unacceptable when venturing off into the real world; where they will learn that certain clothing and behavior say a lot about who we are as individuals and will determine what kind of crowd they’ll attract. Needless to say, this will in turn, shape the kind of future they’ll have, which is hopefully a bright one.
To avoid continuing a vicious cycle, the lessons need to start at home. And if we are not parents or do not have young ladies for children, we can take any opportunity we have at engaging with a young lady to see what their goals are, their hopes for the future, and what their opinions are things such as inappropriate clothing and behavior. And if we see that their take on it is not geared in the right direction, don’t hesitate to educate them on personal experiences, be they good or bad and they will either relate or become enlightened! We can make change, we just need to all do our parts!
Melissa, thank you so much for your post. I wholeheartedly agree with you. I have devoted quite a bit of time to exploring the impact that media images have on college women in terms of body image and self-esteem. It is disgusting that we have to think about these same issues for girls as young as in preschool.
This topic really resonated with me the other night when I was flipping through channels and landed on the Real Housewives of New Jersey. I watched the mom encourage her young daughter as she wore tight clothes, exposed her body, had straightened hair, and a full face of make-up. It was devastating to see this type of behavior encouraged by her own mother.
Thank you for being an advocate for these young girls and for encouraging others to contact their state representatives. You are right, we CANNOT wait until it is too late to teach young girls lessons that will significantly impact their futures.
Bravo Melissa! Your passion for this issue should be shared by every parent of a girl in this country. I am proud that you raise your voice and even prouder that AAUW has partnered with you to offer your positive messaged shirts to the young children and grandchildren of our members.
I remember when shopping for my daughter how disgusted I was at the clothing that stores considered age appropriate. Thongs for pre-tweens, not teens…tweens!!!! Please! When challenged, stores will respond , “You don’t have to buy it.” But as you pointed out in conversation once, we might not buy it, but some other mom will. Doesn’t that child have an equal right to grow up not sexually-objectified?
Keep up the good work and thank you for making Pigtail Pals clothing to our members and their families. At least there is one place we can shop and not worry about the message our children’s clothing is sending!