Tag Archives: Stupid Grown-ups

Eighth Grade: a movie by Bo Burnham

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by smibbo (c) 2023

SUMMARY

The movie Eighth Grade, written and directed by Bo Burnham, was released by A24 films in 2018. The movie is available to stream for free with a Max subscription. It is also available to rent on Prime.

The principal characters: Kayla Day, a 13-year old girl in the last week of eighth grade; Mark Day, Kayla’s father; Aiden, Kayla’s classmate and secret crush; Olivia, a high school girl who mentors Kayla for a day; Riley, a friend of Olivia’s; Kennedy and Steph, both classmates of Kayla’s; and Gabe, Kennedy’s cousin.

The movie opens with Kayla making an entry for her video blog. This is the framework of the story; each blog entry sets up Kayla’s actions for the next or on-going scene.

 There are many familiar themes in Eighth Grade that we have covered in class, but I will focus on the following four: Family, Identity, Intimacy and Peer groups.

THEMES

Family

In the movie, the only family member that exists is Kayla’s father, Mark. Kayla’s mother is nonexistent. Mark mentions her leaving when Kayla was a baby, so it is clear her absence is normal for them both. As is mentioned in the textbook, Adolescence: 10th ed, children of single parent homes who did not live through the conflict of divorce or custody issues, fare marginally better than children from two-parent homes that have conflict  of any sort (Steinberg, 2014). In a meta-study titled Early Mother-child separation, parenting, and child well-being in Early Head Start families about early-maternal abandonment, assumptions are made about maternal abandonment signaling unstable households that are chaotic for the child (Howard, 2011) But Kayla and her father do not suffer from poverty nor is their home life chaotic or unstable. They clearly have a stable routine; they eat dinner together, Mark has clearly expressed rules, and he bids her good night every evening.

According to the textbook, Mark’s parenting style of expectations and attention fits well into the Authoritative style (p. 130). One might think he leans slightly towards Indulgence, due to his quiet style of allowing Kayla to talk to him rudely, but he imposes his rules by successfully insisting she pay attention to him when he speaks. When he speaks, it is to encourage her and show he supports who she is.

As Mark reveals near the end of the movie, Kayla was always a compassionate, kind child  indicating she did not need an abundance of discipline or correction. Mark’s style is a response to Kayla’s personality as much as her behavior towards him is a response to his parenting style. This bears out the claim outlined in the textbook that parents influence how their children behave towards them and vice versa (p. 128)

One scene in particular show’s Mark’s authoritative side clearly: the mall trip. Kayla goes to hang out with her new friend Olivia at the mall. After socializing for a while, someone notices Mark from afar; he has been watching Kayla with her friends. Only Kayla knows who he is and is immediately furious and humiliated. She runs away to confront him in private. As soon as Kayla sees Mark, he knows he has crossed a line with her, and immediately apologizes without fanfare or excuses, saying only “sometimes dads are weird and… I’m just being really weird.” He gives her money, apologizing again, and accepts it when she says she will get a ride home.

In that scene, Mark respects his daughter enough to admit he has wronged her, apologizes, and lets her come home without him.

Later, Kayla comes home disturbed by her experience with Riley and Mark attempts to comfort her. At first, she rebuffs him angrily, but he eventually rubs her back and talks to her soothingly. Their relationship is both realistic and loving, with mutual respect.


Identity

The movie begins with one of Kayla’s video blog entries about “being yourself” Watching Kayla throughout the movie, the obvious question arises “but what if you don’t know who you are? Or what if you don’t like who you are? What if you want to be someone else?”

This is Kayla’s current struggle. Her current identity is not clear to her. The very first thing we see at school is that the person voted “most quiet” by her classmates is Kayla. According to her blog post, she does not believe she is quiet; she simply has no one she wants to talk to.

Adolescents build and discover their identity over the course of their maturity. One of the first steps is differentiating their self-concept. As per the textbook, Kayla is learning that personality traits can be a spectrum, rather than binary (p. 256). Kayla does not just say “I’m not really quiet” she contextualizes it. This is a subject that comes up again when she is with her new friends at the mall; she tells Riley “I used to be quiet too” and they tease each other about it. This is true of all her efforts to change. She wants to have more confidence, and more self-esteem, but it is not straight-forward. Confidence may not help you make friends at a party where you are unwanted, but it might work when you decide to sing karaoke. With each success, you can see Kayla’s self-esteem move up. Likewise, with each failure, you can see her disappointment in herself.

Kayla is a member of Generation Z; the internet and social media is effortless and embedded in her life. Her self-perception centers on how she presents herself online, not so much as how she is in real life. In the beginning, this presents what the textbook defines as false self-behavior; describing oneself in ways that are opposite of how one is while being aware of the dissonance (p. 256).

What’s interesting, and probably the crux of the movie, is that Kayla exhibits uncommon bravery wrestling with Erikson’s struggle of Identity versus Identity Diffusion as mentioned in the textbook (p. 266). In trying out different personality traits in social situations, Kayla uses the reactions of others (mostly her peers) to judge herself. She knows she has succeeded or failed to achieve those traits. To wit, Kayla  actively decides to start taking her own advice.

It is not until she meets Olivia and hangs out with her that Kayla feels like she may have finally found someone she can “be herself” around. When she is with Olivia’s group, Kayla mostly observes but is not too overwhelmed to join in occasionally. It is the first time we see Kayla relax and have fun. Her identity, at least with this group, is comfortable.


Intimacy

Like all humans, Kayla craves connection. But Kayla has no intimate friends at all. Until she meets Olivia, Kayla is isolated; she has no friends, no group, and despite playing in orchestra, does not seem to socialize with her peers at all. Her only intimate relationship is with her father.

Early in the movie, Kayla reacts to seeing Aidan, her secret crush. Later, she is in her bed, pretending to kiss him while watching a video he has posted online. Romantic interest in early adolescents who have no other history of intimacy is highly unusual. Studies mentioned in the textbook state that girls’ romantic intimacy grows from previous intimate relationships (p. 338) but Kayla has none. This makes her sudden romantic aspirations and subsequent actions inauthentic. It becomes clear that Aidan is only interested in sexual matters which Kayla is not knowledgeable about.

In a later scene with Riley, Kayla is overwhelmed by his sexual overtures, and adamant about not complying. Her ability to stand up for herself is also inauthentic; it is well known that girls in early adolescence who are pressured for sexual activity often end up becoming sexually active against their will. (p. 343)

This was one of the only parts of the movie that did not ring true. However, the study Patterns of Romantic Relationship Experiences and Psychosocial Adjustment from Adolescence to Young Adulthood has shown that dating among adolescents is highly variable and correlations with self-esteem and life satisfaction are not statistically significant (Gonzalez Avilés, 2021). So perhaps it is merely unusual rather than inauthentic.

Near the end of the movie, Kayla has a date with Gabe, whom she met at Kennedy’s party. They simply talk and eat McDonald’s nuggets. It is a sweet and natural scene showing Kayla’s newfound ability to relax. This scene is authentic, in that it shows a natural progression from intimacy in friendship, to intimacy on a deeper level. A meta-study titled Teenagers in Love has shown that dating fulfills varied needs for young adolescents, from social status to feeling “normal” to simply getting rid of loneliness. Early experiences with “love” are often more a visual infatuation (Moore, 2016). By the time Kayla has her first real date, she seems ready to try actual dating, rather than fantasizing.

Peer Groups

The textbook delineates peer groups into cliques and crowds. Crowds are a large, group of people who share some kind of status or reputational identity. Crowds are often formed from many cliques. A clique is a small group of friends who all are roughly the same age and sex who usually have a few things in common (pp. 158-159). Kayla is part of neither. The textbook outlines different forms of popularity as sociometric popularity (how much others like you) and perceived popularity (where you fit in the hierarchy) (p. 174) Since Kayla is well aware that she has no perceived popularity, the only thing she can change on her own is her sociometric popularity by trying to get others to like her.

What is crucial to the identity theme, however, is that Kayla has actively decided to become someone different. In her social context, she needs her classmates to see her differently. As the textbook explains, crowds and cliques help adolescents define who they are by adopting the traits of their peer group and positively reinforcing that identity (p. 183).

Kayla’s efforts to get the popular girls, Kennedy and Steph, to like her fall flat. It is not until she bonds with Olivia, someone who is a likeable, kind helpful person, that Kayla feels like she does not have to change everything about herself.

One of the last scenes in the movie is Kayla waiting to graduate. She suddenly decides to talk to Kennedy and Steph. She politely informs them that they are not good people, while she is a good person. By doing so, Kayla reinforces her confidence and self-regard. Afterward, Kayla smiles, knowing she has been true to herself. This self-perpetuating cycle of confidence and self-esteem is a result of maturing prosocial reasoning and though it’s somewhat early in Kayla’s maturation, it is reasonable due to her father’s positive parenting, her early signs of empathy and her successful attempts at self-regulation (i.e. the panic attack at the party). This cycle fulfills the outline from the textbook neatly (pp. 305-306) and is believable and accurate.

CONCLUSION

Overall, the movie Eighth Grade is a highly accurate portrayal of early adolescence. From the anxiety, the transitions, the burgeoning intimacy/sexuality, and the social struggling, it highlights what adolescence is all about: change. In the very end of the movie, Kayla promises her future self that whatever change comes, she will be able to weather it. What a perfect message for any teenager to learn.

Though Kayla’s progress is early, and quite fast, this can be attributed to the media chosen; in order for a two-hour movie to be worth watching, we need an appealing and relatable protagonist, and we must have some kind of resolution.

Kayla is a wonderful role model for both other adolescents to learn from, and for students of adolescence. She makes mistakes, stumbles blindly sometimes and yet picks herself up and tries again. This persistence is indicative of what it means to be human, whether teenager or adult. In that respect, it is a movie worth watching for anyone.

References

Gonzalez Avilés, T. F. (2021). Patterns of Romantic Relationship Experiences and Psychosocial Adjustment From Adolescence to Young Adulthood. Journal of youth and adolescence, 50(3), 550-562.

Howard, K. M.-G. (2011). Early Mother-child separation, parenting, and child well-being in Early Head Start families. Attachment and Human Development, 13 (1), pp5-26.

Moore, S. (2016, June 8). Teenagers in Love. The Psychologist, p. 2016. Retrieved from The Psychologist: The British Psychological Society: https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/teenagers-love

Steinberg, L. (2014). Adolescence Tenth Ed. NYC: McGraw-Hill.

Millennials

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Everywhere I go, especially on the internet, I hear about how “entitled” Millennials are. At the same time, I see a lot of refutations to this claim. It’s been pointed out numerous times that millennials are living in an era where the economy is pitiful, the prospects are dim and life is in many ways stacked against them. It’s also pointed out that millennials grew up without certain parenting attitudes that “build character” and “toughen” a person. They are called “soft” and “overly sensitive”, the ultimate insult being they “want everything handed to them”

I have had enough of this circular argument.

We cannot continue to denigrate the latest generation of adults with such vague, pointless and unmoored attacks. We also cannot continue to defend them against attacks by pointing a finger back at the older generations. It’s true that the millennial generation doesn’t exist in a vacuum, but it must be acknowledged that the expectations they have aren’t traditional either. We must understand what it is that Millennials truly want before we can begin to discuss whether their wants are extraordinary or not.
What do they want? They want the same thing every generation has wanted: they want to live and flourish. But what is different is not the Millennials in general, it is the privileged Millennials that is different than generations before: they want the rest of society to live and flourish too. Their expectations aren’t just about themselves; they don’t believe anyone, privileged or not, should have to suffer just to survive.

Who can truly blame them for their desires? Even before the “free love” days of the 60s, the youth of our country has turned its attention to their fellow human and little by little changed how society runs. This did not happen overnight. It did not happen in a vacuum and it wasn’t done for any other reason than to rectify grave injustices in our culture’s past. The youth has always been capable of the kind of enthusiastic energy that begets true change. Indeed, it is very nearly a defining characteristic of social revolution that leaders are young, and full of fire. Without mundane things such as a day-job, children and age-related illness, it has always been the youth en masse who lead us into the future by their actions and their numbers. As a society, America has pushed ever outward to create an egalitarian, inclusive culture that does not discriminate; does not crush some groups in order to reward others. Over decades, every successive generation has “woken up” to some extent and declared, “I do not want these benefits if they come at the cost of someone else”

What have the older generations done with this growing movement through the decades? We have derided, denigrated and even punished them at every step. We have tried to tear down these social revolutions with our words, our labels and our fists and our laws. But we have always lost in the end. Because ultimately, society moves forward. It is not a logarithmic movement, it is not even exponential, but it is always a groundswell that reaches a breaking point for every new awareness of inequality.

There have always been those who do not join in the enthusiasm for remaking our society. There have always been and there always will be. Backlash is real and often dangerous. But where backlash has sometimes slowed progress through the weight of oppressive defensive tactics, progress eventually wins out. Because as society has grown, technology has brought people closer together with every generation. No longer do people live in villages, sharing space with strangers based on proximity alone. No longer do young people feel the familial obligation that binds them to the land of their upbringing. People know that their tribe is out there, it exists and all they must do is meet it, to finally feel at home.

So, it is that we come to an understanding of the millennial mindset. The young adults of today are called “entitled” and it is true. But “entitled” does not mean someone who is lazy and wants the world handed to them on silver platter. “Entitled” is someone who expects to reap the rewards promised them. In the case of previous generations, this has always meant achieving “the American dream” but the tacit understanding was that this was an entitlement of the privileged. The definition of that dream was different depending on who you were. Millennials are the generation that rejects that final nuance; the notion of equality only for the few. Millennials believe the bar of life should be set at a point not just for themselves but for everyone. How is “privilege” defined? Why is privilege only for certain subsets of specific groups? Why should that rule continue unchecked? The very existence of a privileged group exposes the existence of imbalance in our American dream. Millennials aren’t entitled because they want a good life, they believe a good life is something everyone is entitled to.

It is this imbalance that is the root of Millennial discontent. Not for themselves but for their world. For what is possibly the first time in American history, we have a whole generation that wants to encompass all who were born into it, not just some of them based on how they were born or what family they were born to. For the first time in American history, there is a generation that is willing to carve itself into subsets and groupings of its own choosing. Based on hobbies, fandoms, feelings, visions and declarations of dedication, Millennials separate themselves by what is important to them, not what previous generations tell them. For once, a generation comes along and self-defines. So naturally, this generation cannot sit by and accept a society based on artificial and unmoving mores. They choose who they are yet remain free to change at any time. They reject the previous generations’ chains of birthright. This is their true difference and why they feel so “entitled”. From their viewpoint, they are “entitled” to a world they were promised in books, movies and songs – a world that values cooperation, tolerance and strong will to succeed. Yet we have not arrived at that world and nobody knows that more than Millennials.

Most millennials grew up being told over and over that what mattered most was trying, giving it your all, believing in yourself, and hard work, and they came of age knowing that it was all lies. Today, in their adulthood, they see how different races, different religions, different body types and different genders are treated in our society. They see the reality of what they were raised with. So the word that describes millennials isn’t really “entitled”, it’s “disillusioned”.

It’s not about “participation trophies”, it’s about the idealized worlds we showed them again and again, hoping that they would forge a better path for everyone. But along the way, we forgot that the path was being overgrown by ominous forests of inequity and patrolled by intimidating wolves of economic despair. We wanted to nurture their fighting spirit, sense of fair play, and love of learning but we failed to create an environment that would keep those dreams alive and let them take over. We raised them to be ninja turtles but let the cities turn into sewers. We nudged them to swim but never gave them land to walk on, and all they can do now is tread water. Is it any wonder they are angry? Is it any wonder they refuse to participate in the culture we have brought them to?

The most important aspect of the millennial culture isn’t their disappointment or their bitterness at having been duped, it’s their steadfast refusal to give up and give in to the state of the world. Of course, they are angry and full of criticism: they inherited a quagmire of economic slavery, outrageous societal expectations and laws that whiplash with every change in the government. They were taught, by Sesame Street, Reading Rainbow and Mighty Morphin Power Rangers that all they had to do was cooperate, put their minds to work and be ready to fight for truth and justice, and our society would happily hand them a perfect world. Yet none of this has come to pass. Yet still they fight.

What is a genuine wonder, is that they continue to fight at all. Millennials are so irritating and annoying precisely because of what we taught them; to keep fighting for truth, justice and “the American way”. They threaten us because we never realized that their fight would be against us. Their fight underscores our failure as a previous generation. This humble, cooperative, egalitarian world we kept pushing them towards didn’t happen during our time and we full well know it. We overpromised and now they fight us for it. They will not let us rest until we let them bear the fruit of their labors… even if that means pushing us out of relevance.

Millennials do have a “problem with entitlement”. It’s a problem we created and the only solution is to accept their discontent, acknowledge the inequities they point out, give them the tools they need to recreate our society, and stop grumbling while they change the world.

Cultural Similarities

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I remember having the talk with my parents.
When I was pregnant for the first time I actually thought about how I would deal with the talk with my kids.
I dread the day I have to have the talk with Lil Miss.
I realized there’s just no good way to say it.

Our “people” got where they are today by slaughtering millions of people who had every right to hate us and want to kill us. Because originally there was enough room for all of us but we weren’t content with that. We felt threatened by their very existence. There were decent folk who were willing to live in harmony (on both sides) but overall, war was what prevailed. And we “won”. Because we had “superior firepower”. We also had other countries backing us. So of course we “won”

Won what?

Why the right to claim this land as OURS. The right to make the rules. The right to go back and whitewash history to make us look like “the good guys”

“Are there any of those people left?” is the inevitable question.
“yes, actually there are. A very very few. We pushed them into tiny patches of land that we didn’t want”

And I will have to explain how we acted as if this was very magnanimous on our part. How we have a history of pushing Stockholm syndrome on the people who were here first. I can spend all day talking about the various nuances of the history. I can talk about how some of the “other side” were in fact scary horrible people who never had any intention of letting us live in peace. I can talk about how some of “our side” were good decent folk who really wanted the rest of our people to stop warring the original inhabitants. Even so, I will have to talk about greed and how discovery of the land’s riches made most people willing to step all over anyone in order to be the first in line to lay claim to more of the sanctified earth. How even our moral views were warped enough to pretend that we had some intrinsic right to be here and take over this land. How our pretense at compromise was torn down again and again as we decided again and again that the tiny patches of land we gave them were actually worth something to us after all. Our pretense that we were ever interested in letting the other side continue as a people

I will have to explain how our people also had others backing us, how we would never run out of firepower. I can explain how we used propaganda to paint the other side as evil and savage and bloodthirsty. I can talk about how our people came to truly believe the other side weren’t even human beings, just disgusting animals worthy of death. I will definitely talk about how we incorporated this disdain and disgust into our culture so that generations to come would also distrust, despise and demean the other side – so that our children and their children’s children would never successfully make peace.

This talk will happen. Its part of where we come from. Its not the only history we have. It doesn’t negate the good things we have done any more than the good things negate this part. I hope that when we have this talk, my daughter will be suitably horrified and sad that our cultural lives rose from the bloody pyre of vanquished people whose only crime were to be here before us, live differently than us, and want different things from life than we did.

Then the inevitable end question will come.

“We don’t still do this, do we?”

Don’t you get it?

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Lil Miss: Okay here’s a joke. When did the doorknob say to the puppet?
Me: I don’t know, what?
Lil Miss: No, not ‘what’ WHEN?
Me: okay, when?
Lil Miss: when he was on the SPOOL bus! Get it? get it? SPOOL BUS?
Me: it seems like you almost got one right that time..
Lil Miss: isn’t it funny? *laughs*
Me: hilarious

The Princess Phenomenon

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I began the following when my daughter was 2-3 yrs old. I put it aside because I wanted to make sure I still felt this way after time had passed. I do so here it is

Lil Miss just came up the stairs carrying her portable DVD player (we bought it for her second-ever car trip to florida and it was probably the best $30 we spent all that year)

Lil Miss: Hi mom!

Me: hey, wassup?

Lil Miss: I just doing my homework!

Me: uh….

Lil Miss: See dat princess? Dat’s me.

Me: ah, I get it now.

My daughter is very “girly”. Non-PC or not, that’s the term for it and when I use it, everyone knows what I mean; she likes pink, wants to be a princess, loves to play dress-up, likes nail polish, has an obsession for shoes, collects hairbands with flowers on them, prefers to wear skirts and dresses, color-coordinates her clothes, anything shiny or sparkly gets her vote, loves having long hair, draws homey scenes with the family and flowers and rainbows, is always on the look-out for the latest Disney Princess doll to add to her stash, et cet.

I have a very uncomfortable relationship with this. Yes, I am a feminist (first wave trying to move to third wave) and I heartily support women’s equality in all things (duh).

I am also a development wonk. Any time there’s a new article, study or finding of any kind on sociological and psychological/psychiatric issues, I am all over that like white on rice. The things I’ve learned through the years (decades, really) have completely turned my head around, though.

When I was younger, I firmly believed gender was a complete social construct, that men and women were absolutely no different and everything that smelt of gender roles was entirely induced by society. As I’ve grown and become more educated, I’ve discovered (right alongside of science) that this is in fact, not entirely true: men and women ARE intrinsically different in some ways. The sexes are generally the same but there are some key differences that cannot be explained by nurture alone. This has been borne out by the scientific method over and over and in recent years it has some basis in evolutionary psychology as well. We can not only see how men and women are different but we can begin to understand how and why those differences have been fine-tuned through humankind’s descent from the trees. So consider that by the time my daughter was in utero, I had come to a place of understanding about gender and the “roles” of the sexes. I wasn’t pleased about it (who likes hearing that  certain traits are ‘stuck” within you?) but because of my struggle against my behaviorist past I can at least accept this intellectually.

However, the whole notion that “girly” is somehow innate is extremely bothersome to me. In all my readings and study I simply have not come across anything that “explains” how and why the tendency to be “femme” exists in women from a innate standpoint. It remains firmly fixed in my psyche that “girly” is a learned thing. Perhaps some inclination to “girly” things is merely personal preference, but to go whole hog into the world of barbie and pink and frills seems to me just so… forced.

So when I knew I was going to have  a girl, I naturally assumed that MY girl was going to  be a great feminist, nurtured into embracing her “macho” self at least as much as her “girly” self. I will admit right here: I hoped and expected she was going to be a little “tomboy” (I know its an old term, look it up) just like I was. Sure, I was an extreme tomboy but I chalked that up to my lack of maternal nurturing in the early, formative years. So she’d probably like some “girly” things but I was absolutely certain she’d be more “macho” than “femme”. Knowing how society subtly pushes that persona on little girls, I also had a fairly comprehensive plan to help this happen. It involved avoiding the mainstream media, carefully selecting that which I thought to be properly progressive and feminist-friendly as well as exposing her on a regular basis to all things “boyish” with the help of my many mom-friends. Several of my mom-friends have girls too and the more we talked about it, the more I was certain that we were going to have little trouble counter-balancing the outside world’s mantra of “be a girly girl”.

Of course, like pretty much all parenting ideals, this was not going to happen the way I wanted it to.

My daughter seemed to come into the world the femmie-est of the femmes. First off, she was strikingly beautiful, for a newborn. This is not mama pride talking, this is me remembering every comment made about her looks with a lot of SURPRISE in the tone. People expect babies to be cute (most of them) but they don’t expect them to be beautiful. She was absolutely gorgeous from day one. I have pics to prove it. Nurses embarrassed themselves by saying “wow, she sure is pretty! most of the babies around here aren’t really but she is actually pretty!” -followed by a blush and an expression that said “please don’t tell people I think most babies aren’t pretty”   And they were right; most babies pass through a bizarro alien-type phase wherein features are not matching or sized in proportion before they get “pretty” but my daughter? never passed through that.  That was a little jarring, really. I have three sons before her and though they were adorable babies, they took a bit of time to stop looking like overboiled versions of Winston Churchill.

The next thing I noticed was her viewing preferences. Like my boys before her, I did not plan on her watching any broadcast or cable tv that had not been completely screened by me first. In this wonderful day and age, that is a lot easier to accomplish than when my boys were growing up. We found many fantastic kid videos on youtube, many from other countries. Well, before she was a year old, language didn’t matter to her anyway. So lots of Pigloo, Ilona Montricey, babe Lilly, Yo Gabba Gabba!, Elmo – you get the idea. She LOVED watching videos as young as six months when she couldn’t even crawl yet. I’d sit next to her on the floor and we’d watch together. I’d sing along, sometimes translate a little (just in case, you know, she was a language whiz or something) and clap her hands along… the usual mommy-kid fun. Before long, we had a nice collection of cool kid-vids for her. Very convenient when mommy wants a break.

It didn’t take long to realize she had a definite preference for pretty girls. Aside from Elmo and YGG, the girl was nuts for any video featuring “girly girls”. Our first tip was when her father was at the grocery store with her. She saw the DVD rack and leaned towards a video with Abby Cadabby on it. She’d never seen Abby Cadabby before but out of all the videos on that rack, she sure as hell noticed her and made it clear she wanted that video. So her dad bought it and we all watched.  Abby Cadabby is pink. Abby is a fairy (in training) and Abby says things like “hmph!” and Abby laughs all the time, much like Elmo but in a very high-pitched, girly kind of giggle. Specifically, Abby says “hee heeeeee!” Lil Miss, ADORED Abby Cadabby. Don’t get me wrong, she loved Elmo too, but Abby was clearly FOR HER.

Next thing you know, she’s looking at the DVD rack every time she’s taken to the grocery store. Mind you we are talking about a baby who can’t walk yet. She made very clear her preferences. She wanted pretty girls. We held firm in some respects – no barbie vids or bratz or anything remotely fake like that – but how can you say no to Dora? Dora wears pants! Dora is adventurous! Dora teaches sequential logic!

Yeah she barely liked Dora.

Next thing I know, she’s showing decided preferences for her clothing choices. Next thing I know, she’s intentionally coordinating her clothes by color. Next thing I know, she’s drawing nothing but flowers and cats. Next thing I know she’s demanding to have a princess outfit. A princess outfit? How in the world did she even know what a princess was?! I thought I was so careful!

You know where she saw her first princess? Yo Gabba Gabba. They have ONE character on the whole show who is a fairy princess. The entire show has tons of super-cool females doing really nifty empowering stuff like martial arts, rock drumming, skateboarding, marathon racing et cet but the one girl she decides she wants to emulate? The fairy princess with a wand. The princess who appeared maybe all of three times on the show. That’s all it took.

Next thing I know, we’re swimming in Disney princess stuff. We didn’t even have the movies for half the dolls she liked. Next thing I know, I find myself avoiding the “pink aisle” at every store because I can’t stomach another “WanT~! want!! WANT!” of some overpriced pink crap with glitter that catches her eye. How did she get into that aisle?” by noticing it was pink from across the whole freakin store and booking ass into it just to check it out. Why? Because she loved pink. That too, was something we had tried to avoid. Now, pink exists in clothing for kids as surely as all the other colors so its not like I was going to avoid having ANY pink. Truth be told, when she was a baby I didn’t avoid it at all. But once she was crawling age, we moved, of course, to clothing suitable for that phase which means pants and regular shirts. We stopped having pink hardly at all. She stopped wearing dresses or skirts or anything “girly” because it was impractical and most of her clothes were regifted from friends who had boys older than her. But somehow, between the learning-to-walk stage and the running stage (stage? that’s a stage? it ends?) she “discovered the joy of girly clothes.

We gave her pink stuff not because we loved her in pink (actually I like her best in black- it sets off her brown eyes nicely) but because she’d throw a holy hell fit if we didn’t let her dress in pink most times. We didn’t put her in skirts because WE loved her in skirts but because it was a way to make sure she didn’t freeze her butt off in cold weather – leggings or tights under the skirt is apparently permissible but not under a dress so we compromised. Next thing I know we’re drowning in Hello Kitty (which I admit, I like too) not because we’re such huge fans (although I think her father kind of is) but because it too was a compromise foisted upon her to draw attention away from other, less “respectable” commercial fare. (Besides, pink, kitties, what’s not to love?)

Every time I thought we had steered her into more neutral arenas (Minecraft, Duplo, Thomas the Train) she’d veer off into “girly” land again. Truth be told, it was getting ridiculous.

At some point, I really thought long and hard about the whole situation. As always, when you’re a parent, I struggled with the notion of imposing my will upon her. Was it “fair” of me to restrict her choices so much or was I trying to maintain a healthy balance in her life? Was I really working against the societal pressures to be “girly” or was I just trying to cut and paste MY values over her own bona fide desires? How wrong was it to let her indulge in the petty superficial trappings of femininity? She’s a child, barely out of toddlerdom and I’m really sitting here freaking out because of what color she wants to wear?

The turning point came when I got into a fracas on Facebook. A dear friend of mine posted something about this whole dilemma and the doors opened, of course, for internet mud-slinging. I admit to having a certain sensitivity to the accusation of gender-biased parenting, after all, that’s exactly what I was struggling with. But at some point in the throw-down, some stranger I don’t even know in essence told me I was foolish for believing my child was actually CHOOSING to be “girly”. No matter how much I detailed my efforts to avoid putting the pink on my child, I was told it didn’t matter, society was doing the dirty work for me. It didn’t take long before someone was insinuating that I was lax in my feminist duty and had more or less “allowed’ this to happen anyway.

I bowed out of further discussion. It just riled me far too much to attempt to have an intelligent exchange on the matter. After some thought, I realized something important though; the other people, the ones who were so smugly painting a huge “FAIL” on my feminist mommy-card were JUST as angry and JUST as clouded by their own ire to be really having an intelligent conversation about this subject. I briefly wondered why but overall, it didn’t matter. Because I had been busy second-guessing myself for so long and because I couldn’t really find a negotiating meadow for my concerns, it was so easy for someone else’s ire to color my own confidence. Yet their confidence was betrayed by their own volume level. Suddenly, I had every reason to trust my own choices and beliefs and no reason whatsoever to keep accepting the blows from someone else’s feelings of failure. I found it interesting how anger was what clarified the issue for me. As if the darkness of impotent rage created a silhouette for me to trace and the profile was the answer I’d been looking for all along.

And the answer in all this?

Maturity. Children Don’t have it yet.

I know, of course, society pressures us. It pressures children. It pressures adults. It sure as hell pressures parents.

But who is “society” anyway? Everyone but me?

The pressure of society radiates outward. This, I truly believe. There is some strength in numbers, sure, but the truest strength lies in connection. As connections between people moves outward, the ability to influence becomes weaker. The more you move outward in society, away from connection, the easier it becomes to make your own choices. Yes, strength in numbers -having 100 people yelling at you means more than having one person yell at you – but true strength, lasting strength? Is in the connections.

So what’s the strongest connection?

The self.

What is the strongest form of self-connection?

Self-determination.

All along, while I was obsessing over my child’s choices and the options before her, I should have been looking at her ability to make those choices. Her confidence, her self-esteem, her self-trust, all those things are what determine how well we follow our own dreams. All things being equal, the ability to make good choices boils down to the ability to know what you want, understand the options and be brave enough to choose what’s right for you. That means more than anything society yells at us.

First off, my children (at all ages) are going to make mistakes. I love being allowed to watch them do that and learn from their mistakes. It is my honor to be one of the people who can help them back up when they fall and watch them try again. It is one of the greatest pleasures in my life to be one of the people to which my children turn to in times of indecision and uncertainty. Whenever possible, though, I do my best to not give them the answers, but open the doors they need, turn the lights on and let them understand the world in front of them. Sometimes that’s meant I’ve had to pull them away from pitfalls they didn’t understand, turn them back from paths they cannot travel or maybe just warn them against consequences they can’t possibly predict. I’ve even been wrong on some occasions. Happily, joyously wrong. Those are the best times because not only have my children surprised me with their ability to bounce through rugged terrain, they’ve surprised themselves. But falling or bouncing, they’ve always been able to see that the roads are for them to choose.

So where are we with all this?

Again: maturity. choice.

All those times I felt uneasy because my daughter chose things I associate with negative context, SHE was choosing those things. If other people want to believe she was pushed or coerced or whatever that’s their baggage to carry. The whole point of my “job” as a mother has been to make sure my child chooses with the best of options, the best of knowledge and the best of her confidence. So if she chose things that society maybe pushes, those choices were still HERS. And that’s what I should have been “worrying” about all along. Except I didn’t worry about it. Because its a part of what I see as my goal anyway. I wasn’t worrying about it, I was doing it. My job, was to use MY maturity to make sure her choices were as free as I could possibly make them and allow her those choices even if I didn’t like them. Because she is a child and I am an adult. Our preferences are not going to be the same no matter what I do. Even if she was a carbon copy of me she’s still a child while I am an adult. She does not have the same criterion, the same experiences nor the same internal self-regard I do, to prefer the things I do. I like sushi, I couldn’t get her to like sushi if I dipped it in cinnamon sugar and deep fried it. This is how it is. She likes to have tea parties. The only reason I ever sit down to drink watery tea with stuffed animals is because I love my daughter but frankly there are days I’d rather roll myself in cinnamon sugar and get deep fried than endure another minute of the stultifying game she loves so much. The difference between us isn’t that my daughter has been pushed harder than I am (or was) to accept stratified gender norms, the difference is that she is a child and she has different tastes than I do as an adult and as a wholly different person. Maturity. Choice. I have one, she has the other. Between the two of us, I think we can handle her decisions about what color she wears to school.

So lastly, there’s the issue of all those other feminists who want to argue this into the ground. Yes, my daughter has often chosen to enjoy superficial things that society pushes upon girls. She’s a child and she is supposed to like superficial things. I don’t know any child five and under who doesn’t like superficial things. I mean, I tried reading Plato and Lao Tzu to my boys when they were little and it just didn’t go over, you know? Heck I could barely keep them awake with Bob Dylan lyrics.

“deep” stuff just isn’t what kids like. Why is Disney so beloved? Because what they show us is a world that is simple, codifiable and romantic. Children respond to those things because they are, well, children. And superficial things don’t have to stop being attractive either. As we grow, we add to our recreational loves, we rarely subtract. More importantly, we add as we grow, at a pace that matches our maturation. So to expect a child to appreciate adult values and mores is to expect the impossible.  I don’t want to be forever pushing my kids to act like adults because they aren’t. Its something I see people forget all the time.

Children are not looking at Tiana and Belle and Diego with love and awe because they are sharp minds, with a wonderful work ethic and plenty of charity in their souls, children look at them because they are attractive. The deeper qualities are something the children pick up on later, over time. The deeper qualities are what lead us to have long-standing respect and love for a character (real or imaginary) but it is the outward characteristics that get us – especially children – to pay attention in the first place.

This idea that little kids can only respect greatness if its wrapped in a pretty bow with sparkles is as ridiculous as the idea that little kids will only ever want to eat sugared snacks for every meal ever because they like candy. Some people grow up with some overblown expectations but most people do this crazy thing called maturing and it means that they can appreciate subtle, unseen qualities no matter what the surface looks like. This journey from superficial, obvious enjoyment to the deeper, more complex respect is a part of growing. To act as if there is something wrong with little kids because they like pretty sparkly things is to act as if there’s something wrong with them being kids. Kids also prefer stars, hearts, basic shapes, bold colors, smiles, smoothness and sameness as well as flowers and kittens. As they grow their personalities change and they find beauty in other areas they didn’t see before. This is part of becoming an individual. We are putting adult values and perspectives on kids again when we flip out so hard about the princess phenomenon. Its not the princesses versus the GI Joes, its offering everything and showing everything and waiting for their immature minds to catch up.

What matters is giving them all the options, accepting what they choose and always be ready to accept their changes. Because they will change. I doubt my daughter will ever stop loving Disney princesses – I still love Alice from Wonderland – but she will add to that love over time. She will begin to appreciate other, deeper qualities as she matures. I must be ready to accept this slow journey without judging her or myself and trust that over time she will become confident and love herself enough to not need approval from anyone. Not even me.

my daughter is now six. she still loves dressing up, playing with dolls and having an occasional tea party. She also loves Minecraft, Batman, and clashing light sabers or pirate swords