Feb 26 2009
Cinderella - Lessons Learned
Few fairy tales are as timeless as the story of Cinderella. I think we all know the tale, but I’ll hit the basics anyway. Oppressed by her wicked step-family after her father’s death, Cinderella meets her Fairy Godmother, goes to the Ball, meets the Prince and ends up with her Happily Ever After in two hours or less.
Ah, you have to love the people at Fat Head, makers of life-size wall goodies. Just look at how happy that little girl is to have her idol on her wall. And notice how poised and peaceful Cinderella is to be there. Clearly, this picture was taken before Cinderella married her Prince Charming.
And clearly the little girl in the picture is still young enough to believe we all get our Happily Ever After…
Let’s chat about what Cinderella teaches young girls and see if we can all get behind it, shall we?
- Do your chores with a smile on your face and a song in your heart. This is a good one. I’m all for teaching children the value of pulling their own weight around the house. Of course, where is the Cinderella equivalent to teach boys about doing housework? Hmm…
- If you’re pure of heart then your Fairy Godmother will appear. So…what’s the lesson here? Sit around and wait for someone to pull you out of your bad situation? *sighs* No wonder there are so many people on welfare. (I’m talking pre-economic “slow-down”)
- Chores are more fun with your furry friends. Okay, since when do rats and birds help you clean? Was Cinderella on drugs?
- Be someone else to get to the party. Bad lesson on a few levels. 1) If your parents tell you that you can’t go to a party then that doesn’t mean you should sneak out and go anyway. 2) Pretending to be someone else when you’re a kid is called dress-up, but as an adult it goes by another name: Identity Theft. How about we don’t teach our kids to be felons? Just a thought.
- Be home by midnight. I’m cool with that. Curfews are a good thing for teenagers to be mindful of, but the little girl grinning over her Cinderella wall statue should maybe get home before the streetlights come on. Really, I do like this one because it introduces the concept of consequences should you break the rules. I’m just not a fan of the apparent acid trip Cinderella goes one when her car turns into a pumpkin and her talking drug hallucinations return.
- One day your Prince Charming will come. Sorry, y’all…this is total crap. Modern guys are far from being the mythical prince. They don’t come find us and rescue us when we get grounded by the ‘rents; they go make out with Snow White, Sleeping Beauty and probably Belle. (They want Ariel because she doesn’t wear her bikini bottom, but they’d have to get in line.)
- You and your Prince Charming will live happily ever after. I’m sorry…I was busy ROTFLMFAO at that one (aka laughing really hard). This is the common theme I really do enjoy in fairy tales - everything is peachy keen for the rest of your life once you kiss and tie the knot. It’s completely ridiculous to think there will be no bumps in the road of marriage. Then again, Cinderella is high as a kite through most of the fairy tale so she might not notice when Prince Charming starts working later and later each night.
It’s your turn, peeps. What have you learned from Cinderella? Did I miss anything - good or bad?
Jen
“Let your dark passenger come out to play…Be your own nemesis!”
I never knew talking mice could make a dress.
The movie: Not much more. Unless you count ‘When wearing a dress made of the castoffs of people who hate you, don’t let them see you.’ Cinderella does in the end seem to be all about “Don’t get caught”, doesn’t it?
The original fairy tale: Is hard to say. On the plus side, Cinderella technically works for her ability to go where she needs to–sort of. Taking care of the tree that grew where her mother was buried is a pretty good sign of loyalty, but, well, obsessive tendencies much? (Warning to the reader: Most trees do not produce pretty dresses. Even ones with that much emotional significance.) And while it does show ‘be nice and the world will be nice to you’, in the little birds doing her assigned tasks to cover for her, there’s still a certain element of ‘cheat and they’ll never know you left the house’.
And we have our added anti-identity theft moral in the stepsisters mutilating their feet to fit the shoe. Not only do they lose their chance and have to deal with the damage they did to themselves, but they get their eyes pecked out as well. (Speaking of your note on identity theft in the movie, is it really identity theft when you’re just creating a persona rather than borrowing someone else’s? Talk about technicalities.)
…it’s interesting how a less ‘family-friendly’ implementation results in significantly more and stronger morals, isn’t it?
Star - Mice only make dresses when you’ve been up for three days straight doing drugs.
Ravyn - I was just talking about the movie. If I was going to go back to the roots of the tale then I’d also have to discuss the Chinese version where she kills her magic fish to create her shoes (Thank you, Reading Rainbow!) and that would just be overkill.
As for the question of identity theft? *shrugs* Doesn’t really matter. The person she’s pretending to be is a princess. Making up a character is only a hop, skip and slip’n’slide trip to identity theft. Either way it’s a crummy thing to put in a kid’s head.
Interesting take on the childhood classic.
Speaking of twisted childhood classics did you ever check out that series that I mentioned before?
Stephanie - Thanks. Something tells me I’m going to be doing something similar to each of the classics.
No. I don’t get a lot of time for reading anymore so I haven’t had a chance yet.
I think the worst lesson is how after years of indentured servitude, verbal abuse and cruelty Cinderella suffered at the hands of her evil step mother and step sisters, as soon as she became a princess she just turned around and forgave them instead of filing proper action against them.
Yep, another good point. I think I’m actually more fond of Ever After with Drew Barrymore. The ending is more realistic, in my opinion.
I actually got a Karma meaning from this story. What goes around comes around. How you treat others will come back to you, and those that try to do the right thing will be rewarded in the end.
Those are good morals too…just not as much fun to make fun of as the drug-trip Cinderella ones.