The Disney Princesses

Disney has 11 official Disney Princesses - Snow White, Cinderella, Aurora, Ariel, Belle, Jasmine, Pocahontus, Mulan, Tiana, Rupunzel, and Merida.  I have seen many feminists cringe at the mention of them and based on this did not watch them all.  I finally decided to sit down and watch them for myself so I could form my own feminist opinion.  I split the viewing into 3 days.

The first day I tackled Snow White, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and The Little Mermaid.  And here's what I learned - boys don't like girls for what they have to say, they like girls for how they look, and vise versa.  Boys are silly enough to risk their lives for pretty girls they know nothing about.  I also learned that the only thing giving girls worth is a man's love and their ability to do housework. These princesses are pretty pathetic and left me rolling my eyes and groaning.  Thank goodness the Disney kept making princess movies after these four.

The next Disney princess day consisted of Beauty and the Beast, Aladin, Pocahontus, and Mulan.  These princesses aren't motivated by a search for true love, they're motivated by love for fathers, love for nature, and the desire for freedom.  In the end, they all find the right man for them, but they also have adventures and face danger.  And the love that they find is not 'love at first sight', but rather a more realistic love where two people slowly fall in love as they get to know one another.  There are many problematic elements to all these movies, but a child isn't going to read too hard into them so neither will I.  The lessons I got from these movies were that if you follow your heart and do the right thing then you will meet and slowly fall in love with the man of your dreams.

Next came The Princess and the Frog, Tangled, and Brave.  The first two fit in with the last four movies - the young women are motivated by something other than the pursuit of true love, but end up finding it any how.  Brave is different.  Brave focuses on a young princess' relationship with her mother and how a desire to remain unwed causes tension.  From it comes the lesson that true love doesn't complete a person and it's okay to not pursue relationships.  Again, these movies are not perfect (in particular Disney needs to learn to deal with race better), but they add to the diversity of princess role models young girls have.

I don't know that it's possible to make a perfect, unoffensive film, and I don't expect Disney to.  In its entirety, the Disney princess movie collection shows a variety of young women.  The similarity between them all is that they're good at heart, do the right thing in the end, and live happily ever after as a result - and I don't think that's a horrible message to send little girls.