Thank you for opening the crappy television floodgates Hayley. I watch Toddlers In Tiaras when I’m depressed, to get more depressed.
Recently while eating a bowl of fuck-it-all-Honey-Nut-Cheerios, I caught a riveting episode of My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding. And I learned from the mouth a desultory sixteen-year-old bride, that she’d never met a gypsy girl who’d gone to school. Why? Because they don’t need to. They don’t need to because boys make the money and girls keep house. I mean, what kind of idiot would ask a girl how school was? Also, she added, while adjusting her strapless gown and checking her cleavage, that looking good WAS a full-time job. After we were introduced to her husband–a young man who planned to make a living doing, ya know, odd jobs. I really hoped her plan of being taken care of by him worked out.
I have another reality television confession. I saw an advertisement for a new show, Russian Dolls. And I’m looking forward to catching the premiere. Who would pass on a show about first generation Russian daughters who are being groomed for success via becoming airbrushed humans? The futility of the very idea, led me to the kitchen for another bowl of cereal.
I’ve learned important things during my reality television binges. I have. Second to gypsy girls not going to school, the most amazing factoid that I’ve gleaned? Flippers. Flippers are fake teeth worn in the mouths of six-year-old beauty pageant contestants who are flawed because they have lost their teeth.
The ultimate goal of toddler beauty queens, gypsy brides and the Russian dolls seem divergent when floating down a river of Honey Nut Cheerios. But they are related.
Each show also features the mothers of the girls or women the show is ostensibly about. The mothers are generally (not always) flirting with obesity. They are often filmed eating or clutching water bottles and giving their daughters instructions. Always they also gaze at their daughters with something disturbingly like envy.
The mothers in each show perpetuate the beauty industry’s most important tenant: there is always something to be fixed and a new flaw to discover. The mothers school their daughters to believe that they are fundamentally and outwardly flawed. And what does this do to their daughters inner world of self-worth and ideally self-love? I would guess overbearing focus on flaws, and attainment of perfection, compromises the chaotic task of mastering self-love.
Do the mothers of these girls campaign so hard for the beauty industry as a preemptive strike? Is their goal to let their daughters know that without diligence and make-up galore, posturing and cultivation of feminine wiles their daughter’s will not survive the judgements of others? Is their reasoning in fact a manifestation of mother-love so complete it only looks like abuse?
If girls grew up to love their freckles and plump thighs, they’d have a lot more time for other activities. For example, Sarah Palin may have learned more history. I may have learned how to add or punctuate. Okay, I have no idea if any of that is true. But the point is, a lot of brain power goes into which mascara to buy and that’s just for the typical woman. AKA me– the fuck it all cereal eater. The toddlers and the gypsy brides and the Russian Dolls? Buying mascara is ALL they’re doing.
These three shows are just symptoms. They couldn’t exist if there was not an appetite for them. They are like extreme sports. They showcase something women are familiar with (flexing our feminine wiles, heck we’re trained/socialized and learned on the subject) and bring it to a new and altogether terrifying height. We watch like we watch base jumping, awe-struck and curious if it will kill the jumper.
If I watch these shows and I don’t use the excuse of sociological research for scathing social criticism? Then I’m not part of the solution. I’m part of the problem. I can’t believe that’s where I’ve wound up.
I felt clever. But it turns out I’m just a consumer of sexy toddlers (an oxymoron), teenage gypsy brides and Russian women turned doll-like. I will look for something familiar in the faces of the Russian women. Because I’ve got some Russian in my veins. It’s unlikely anything stout or ruddy will be found. But I’ll look anyway.
Judy Elkin
September 6, 2011
Decided to actually post something instead of writing you directly (and discretely). Another fabulous piece here and particularly loved your ending. I think your implication is right….that while it’s highly unlikely, I’ll even say impossible, that you’ll find that Russian woman in you if you scratch face just a little – nonetheless – what those reality shows do is show us the extreme form of some of our obsessions, which seem extreme enough to us as it is. I caught an interview with the mom and grandmother of one of those toddlers in tiaras….couldn’t believe it. As you allude in your piece,…I did feel it was child abuse. And yet, I have in my own way been obsessed enough with my daughter’s appearance that I’ve spent more than I wanted buying something she didn’t need, cared about her looks more than I wanted to admit, and there’s more I’m not remembering right now. Is it a matter of degree? Is it a cultural thing? Or is it just downright wrong?! I wonder.
Cousin Judy
Miriam Novogrodsky
September 6, 2011
Cousin Judy! thank you for your always wise insights. I love when you share them here — btw, people have been asking where you went — so your following will be thrilled. I am. You bring up caring how our own daughters look…I didn’t touch on that at all. Thank you for bringing that uncomfortable piece to the conversation. I have certainly put energy into how my daughter looks and whether or not she is dressed nicely, etc. I have also had to let a fair amount of control re. what she’s wearing go because we have to ‘pick our battles’ — it is hard to let our girls out into a world that is looking to sexualize and criticize and fix them…we want to protect them from that barrage of negativity.
Kristen Goodell
September 6, 2011
Hear, hear!
This is a timely post for me. My 8-year old daughter is beatiful. I often gaze at her with wonder – Wow! Look at her strong legs running and jumping along the beach! Look at that flexible back doing roundoffs in the sand! Look at those gorgeous sparkly eyes and smooth, dewey skin! It almost makes me believe in God to see such a beautiful sight as a healthy child. She has, also, an unfortunate overbite (inherited from yours truly) and a line of tiny white dots across the bridge of her nose that I think are cute (except when they turn into actual pimples on her nose) but I might be the only one that feels that way. She was lying next to me reading the other day and I almost touched her white dots and made a comment about them (something like “I love your nose, Z”) but then stopped. Because she doesn’t like them, and doesn’t think they’re cute. And she is NOT self-consious in general, but she is getting more focused on her appearance. I stopped myself from saying anything (even complimentary) because I so don’t want her to have the burden of thinking about how she looks. Average or stunning, thinking about how you look is a huge burden, and I want to keep that off my 8-year-old’s back for as long as possible.
In the second moment, I thought about those toddlers & tiaras (I have watched a few episodes, generally shaking my head and tsk-tsking) and felt awful for them. They are getting the message – explicitly, every day, that their appearance is what matters. After that, how could you possibly be OK with stretch marks, acne, or spider veins? How could those things not damage your sense of self-worth if you have learned from infancy that what makes you special (worth spending thousands of dollars, hours in the car driving all over the south, and days in hotel ballrooms) is how you look?
One of the greatest gifts my mother gave me was to somehow give me two messages #1) I was a pretty little girl (I was not. I have seen photos. See aforementioned overbite) and #2) looks aren’t particularly important. I don’t know how she did it, but I hope I can do the same for my kids!
Hayley Krischer
September 6, 2011
I’m not sure where to begin. Flippers? Are you kidding me? “There is always something to be fixed and flaw to discover.” Miri, I believe you have nailed it there woman. How do we stop perpetuating this? Even as adults?? It has to start somewhere, at least our girls should be spared of this temporarily.
And as Kristen said, how can you be okay with all of the spider veins and the acne and the back pimples and the stretch marks if you start being unforgiving to your appearance at such an early age?
Miriam Novogrodsky
September 6, 2011
ok, great, great conversation. thanks kristen and COUSIN JUDY & ms h. while i was supposed to be running on the treadmill this a.m. i tried also to read ‘good housekeeping’ why? because the aug issue had an article about toddler beauty pagents & some great quotes: “…these little girls are being trained to look and act like sexual bait.”
& when Jon Benet Ramsey was murdered? Dan Rather on CBS evening news compared the footage of Jon Benet at a beauty pagent as kiddie porn.
so, our tolerance for sexualing girls had grown. Jon Benet would have turned 21 in august. amazing. the aricle also has a bit about two washed up former toddler beauties who, at 14 and 21, struggle to find their identity…then, one final quote from a pageant advocate”it’s easy to slam pageants, but maybe that’s because no one wants to deal with the bigger picture, whic si the day-to-day sexualization of our daughters.” hmmmm, so pageants operate in a world that is not part of the bigger picture. phew.
(there’s also a very nice recipe for a lentil dish and an article on how to look ten pounds thinnner by adding a belt to any and every outfit).
Miriam Novogrodsky
September 6, 2011
btw, i only borrowed ‘good housekeeping’ mag from the Y — i will return it tomorrow.