Batgirl is pink and other true lies

I always knew I wanted to have girls.  I was one, to start with, so at least I would have some experience to work with.  And I liked being one, for the most part.  I just always had in my head a relationship with daughters -  and sure enough I have two wonderful girls who brighten each and every day.

 Now, however, I'm in the "Holy hell, girls are going to be hard" space. It all started when O moved up to the preschool class at age 3.   She started coming home with specific ideas of gender roles - boys needed to be with boys and girls with girls, pink is for girls, blue is for boys.  A girl's shirt is "pretty" and a boy's shirt is "cool."

 Then to make matters worse, she has become obsessed with princesses. Trains and dinosaurs have been largely put aside for the likes of Rapunzel and Ariel and Cinderella.   She demands to wear a dress nearly every day, and often smiles, flutters her eyelashes at me and asks me if she looks pretty. She still seems attached to her RGIII jersey, so that is keeping me sane for the time being.

 As background, I was never the princess type girl. I had stuffed animals and an embarrassingly large My Little Pony collection as a kid (seriously, 32 of them), but didn't really like pink or dolls or whatnot. In fact the one Barbie I did have, I cut her hair off and used her as  a sacrifice to my Miss Piggy puppet. Mostly I played outside, pretending to be a warrior or an animal (or a warrior animal), and had lots of boys as friends. My stint in ballet at age 6 lasted approximately 2 weeks, because it "made my tummy hurt" yet I played rugby, flag football and soccer for years when I got older.  Which made my whole body hurt (still…hurts..).

 So when O came home telling me that she wanted to be Batgirl (in fact she had to be Batgirl because J was going to be Batman and L was going to be Captain America) and was adamant that Batgirl was pink, I admittedly lost it. I went on a bit of a tirade that Batgirl in fact was NOT pink, and while we are at it, if O wanted to be Batman, not Batgirl, that was totally ok, nobody gets to tell her who she had to be.  And after repeated proclamations that Batgirl was in fact pink - "Mama, that's the TRUTH!!" -- I took my battle to the interwebs and pulled up some images of Batgirl.

Well, crap.

I did in fact prove that Batgirl is not pink…I also proved that Batgirl apparently has a 32DD sized chest and an impossibly thin waist.  Awesome.

All this had me in a bit of a panic. I want to raise strong girls who know they can solve problems themselves, that they don't need to be pretty or frilly or whatever to fit in. I want them to have a strong sense of self-worth that is not defined by their looks or if a boy likes them.   I want them to feel confident in exactly who they are, to know exactly what they deserve, and what they are capable of achieving.  A pretty mermaid making bad deals with a sea witch and relying on a man, a fish and a crab to save her doesn’t seem to be the best example. And the few superhero females out there are so over sexualized I can't even point to them as an example. I was prepared for the fact that kids get exposed to these images and messages in 10x the places we did as kids, but I was not prepared for how young it would start.

But taking a lesson from my friend's awesome blog on the same subject, I realized I need to just take a deep breath.  Forcing my own preferences on them will likely have the same effect of creating tension between what they think they *should* be and who they truly are.  After all, I wasn't the princess type and I had my fair share of confidence issues. And the whole "leaning in" movement can have equally difficult consequences of defining what "success" looks like for a woman.  I figure the best thing I can do is teach them that I will love them unconditionally, and that they are valued no matter how pretty, smart or thin they are.  That they deserve to be treated with kindness and respect, and they should treat others the same way. And that they have a world of choices out there - they can like princesses, football, boys, girls, math, art…they can choose demanding careers or staying home with family or something in between…whatever.  Ultimately it's about finding their true path of happiness, believing they can achieve that path no matter what and living authentically throughout.   Yes I of course filter the images and messages that are extreme or not age-appropriate  - but I can't shut everything out…and even if I could, I don’t think that would be helpful. The girls need to learn and assess on their own what is good and bad and what aligns with the values I hope to instil in them.

So I will wear my tiara proudly during dress-up and accept that Batgirl is pink.  And I will also have football on EVERY Sunday. If they don’t want to watch, that is totally ok. :-)