I wrote this piece for the amazing Liz Funk’s awesome blog for tween girls, Girl Headquarters. (Send this site to your daughters, nieces and sisters, it rocks!) I thought I would re-post it in its entirety here and on my blog for the Times Union. Enjoy!
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“Go ahead and complain as much as you want about the clothes…but it builds self-confidence for girls.”
“Yes they have make-up and racy clothes there but it is up to us to show our daughters what is appropriate and what is not.”
“It’s pedophile bait, pure and simple. Don’t you wonder who’s looking at your daughter when she’s walking around the mall dressed like that?”
These comments come from mothers embroiled in a debate on a Washington Post blog about the retail and “experience” chain Club Libby Lu, a store (with about 100 locations nationwide) that gives 5-to-11-year-old girls the chance to very publicly live out every little girl’s fantasy: to be a princess.
It is a “fantasy land” where tweens can have their hair and makeup done by the employees of Libby Lu, who call every girl “princess” and grant all of their wishes of fake eyelashes and pink hair extensions come true. Oh, and they have costumes that would likely infuriate their fathers if they could enter the store without being mistaken for dirty old men. Girls who do not yet have breasts or hips walk around the store in costumes of halter tops and low-slung jeans and are given lots of attention by friends and moms.
Before I begin my tangent, I am by no means accusing mothers and fathers who let their daughters go to Libby Lu of poor parenting. It is hard to tell a child she can’t go to her friend’s birthday party because Mom and Dad don’t agree with going to Libby Lu – especially when hugely popular celebrities like Miley Cyrus and the Jonas Brothers are partnered with the store. In our media-saturated age, it gets harder and harder to protect girls from believing they are too fat or too ugly to be accepted.
One representative of Libby Lu said that it is necessary for employees to use “girlfriend-language.” The representative also added, “We get into the heads of our customers, with phrases like ‘hey, girlfriend.’”
Unfortunately, that’s not the only way Libby Lu gets into customers’ heads. Because their customers are impressionable young girls, or tweens – the group most marketed to in America.
For group birthday parties (the Libby Lu specialty), parents can expect to pay about $25 to $50 for each fellow “princess” their daughter invites to her party, depending on the store and which package she picks.
Take-home goodies from birthday parties or individual visits can include makeup compacts, picture frames, sashes, temporary tattoos, hair accessories, pink sequin tank tops, feather boas, sequin bracelets, and small stuffed animal dogs. You have probably guessed that pretty much all of these things are pink. Talk about an all-in-one deal; parents can look forward to their daughters following in the footsteps of Paris Hilton – including looking like a fool in public – with just one visit to the store.
Many parents don’t have a problem with the store because they say it’s a place where their daughters can dress up as pop stars and princesses, or just put on makeup and pink hair extensions for fun. And mothers (who possibly transfer their wishes to be little princesses again onto their own daughters) not only condone their children walking around as older, more extravagant versions of themselves – they encourage it and even post their daughters’ pictures on the Internet. A quick Google Images search of “Libby Lu” is not only a rich resource for pedophiles, but examples how oblivious these mothers are of who can see photos of their daughters looking like the Pussycat Dolls (minus 15 years).
Since when did all little girls want to be – or have to be – princesses? They walk under a huge crown logo just to get into the store, and as writer Sree Roy points out, they are greeted by large mirrors with decals that read “spoiled,” “you’re gorgeous,” and “I love your hair.” Contrary to popular belief, little girls are not programmed to love pink. Or makeup. Or “pretty” things that are forced upon them by a society unwilling to accept girls who deviate from the ultra-“feminine,” Hannah Montana and High School Musical norm.
What about the girls who like to read? Or girls who like soccer better than dressing up? What if the costumes that are supposed to fit the customers just won’t fit? What about girls who can’t afford to go to Libby Lu, or the parents who work two jobs to pay for their daughter’s birthday party but still don’t earn enough for a Libby Lu party? These girls are all ostracized from their friends at school – and possibly bullied by girls who can go to Libby Lu – because they are different. That hardly promotes equality and understanding.
This is just one more thing to keep little girls from being anything but a princess. Libby Lu is simply following suit behind Barbie and Disney princesses in the race to keep little girls from stepping outside of their gender roles. It keeps girls complacent by making them pink-and-sequin consumers, all the while teaching them that peer validation (and validation by the mothers who bring them there) is contingent upon cool hair extensions, glittery eye makeup and pink gloss that makes their lips look more childish than the girls wish them to be.
Libby Lu sure is a fantasy land. Because while it may be “natural” for little girls to want to dress up and wear makeup, they wouldn’t know how to do those things – and wishing their childhoods away as they do – if their female relatives weren’t so beholden to makeup and “feminine” accessories, or if we grown ups didn’t tell them it was okay to walk around a mall shop with a tube top on at age five. Tweens are not meant to wear fake eyelashes and midriff-baring shirts, but we as a society are preparing them to do so when they start to grow breasts in their teens.
Libby Lu may boost their confidence, but that’s because moms and employees are calling them princesses as they stand around all dressed up, and perhaps don’t tell them that enough when they look like actual plain-old little girls. In actuality, we are teaching girls to feel good about themselves only as hypersexualized, done-up versions of themselves. It teaches girls at an even earlier age that they must look hot and sexy to be understood and accepted. This same mentality is what drives teens and women toward eating disorders and body image issues.
Girls this young are incapable of making judgment calls and knowing that it is inappropriate for five-year-olds to be sexy. It is necessary to teach children to be critical of these trends, to know that people are trying to make money off of them and to know what they are comfortable with. If mothers take their kids to Libby Lu, they should stand their ground and let their daughters know what pushes the limits of appropriateness and why.
It doesn’t matter if you’re a smart girl or a sporty girl on the inside unless you’ve got the halter top and sexy makeup that will make people look at you in the first place. Girls learn the way of the world early on at Libby Lu, because in thousands of years, women still have to put on high heels and eyeliner to be important.
1 Comment
June 29, 2008 at 10:49 pm
I love this one! I so agree with this woman! Miss you!