I have a few friends who have recently found out they're having girls, and every one of them has said something to the effect of "I'm so worried about all that pink princess stuff, I just don't like the message they send, I don't want her to wear pink because I don't want her to be a passive weak girl, and how do I teach her to respect herself when she's 16?" It's so hard to explain this because I felt exactly this way before Penny was born, and I don't know if what I'm about to say would have made sense to me at the time. But here goes anyway.
When your baby is born, she will be tiny, feeble, and useless. For a very long time. She and you will grow together, you'll learn how to be a mom and she'll learn how to be a person, during a very very very long series of days, then weeks, then months, and finally, years. She won't give a shit what color she's wearing, or what being a girl is, until she's at least 2 or probably 3. That's at least 712 days, but really actually more, because it won't happen all of a sudden on her second birthday. So you have more than 712 days that you have to live through every minute of, with a baby who is slowly learning to smile, roll over forward, roll over backward, drink from a bottle, sleep through the night, crawl, eat solid food, stand, cruise, walk, and talk, in no particular order. You're delighting in every one of these milestones, and you're despairing in every long night, high fever, grumpy evening, bumped head and teething episode. You're doing A LOT of work, every day. You're getting to know your kid, and she's getting to know you, your partner, and everything else in the world. And during every one of those 712 days, the biggest problem in your life is so far from pink. Or princesses. There's too much work to do before it's time to worry about pink princesses.
And really, by the time you get to start worrying about what it means to be a girl in the world, and how to guide your daughter through that fraught territory, you have already transformed into a new person with a new view of the world and a very strong understanding of who your daughter is, how she understands things, and what is the best way to get through to her. You will have so much knowledge that you don't currently have, and so much faith in the person your daughter is becoming, that it will be a much less scary prospect.
Yes, our girls should learn that they're powerful, confident, capable people. A pink onesie will not detract from that, as long as you're treating her with respect and explaining the world in a way that gives her power and potential. A princess story will only hurt her if you underscore fairy tales with a message that this is the way the world is, instead of using those stories to question whether the characters are doing the right thing. But the most important thing to know when you're pregnant with a girl is that you have a long way to go, and a lot of work to do, before you even get the opportunity to address this. By the time you get to talk to her about it, your daughter will be a real person with her very own ideas and you'll be deeply entrenched in motherhood. Don't worry too much about it for now. And buy a copy of The Paper Bag Princess. It can't hurt to start with one who defeats dragons.
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