Christina Romero

Web Essay

In class when we had the discussion about fairy tales I was very interested. I have never taken apart a fairy tale and saw how each was structured. It seems to me that these fairy tales (at least the most famous ones like snow white, Cinderella, and sleeping beauty) are completely male dominate and unrealistic. I was surprised to find out all the hidden facts about the fairy tales. When you are a child and you watch you favorite movie it might be snow white or Cinderella but what ever it is you watch it with out knowing what the story is really telling you.

In all of these fairy tales it is just telling little kid that step moms are ugly and evil, you are not going to live happily ever after unless you are with a man, and that you are nothing unless you are beautiful. When I finally realized this I was appalled. Every villain in one of these stories is an ugly woman who is miserable with her self, she always loves her own kids more and she is a bitch to her step child or to whom ever she is picking on.

You go through life wanting to meet your prince charming and it is because of stories like these ones. Your prince charming is supposed to be the man who rescues you from you “miserable life.” All these women in the stories live miserable lives. They are usually peasants, unloved step children, and worthless humans to those around her. So not only does it give women the wrong idea about love and what a man can do for you but it tells those less fortunate children that a prince will rescue them. They put off the perception that you must be beautiful and at least seem rich or important to become anything or to meet somebody worth marring.

I would like to think we as grown ups are instilling modern thoughts and educating the children of today but the reality is that we are not. Most people still live in the fantasy world that men are dominating and no matter what will always be. It is sad to see that the kids today try and mimic these fairy tales. Even when reciting plays it is always a girl playing a girl part and a boy playing a boy part. It isn’t until high school when you learn that every body’s role was played by a guy, but then again was it because girls weren’t allowed? There are just so many unanswered questions as to what goes on in these stories or how and why they even came about. When I found out that Disney himself was raised by a step mom he hated it kind of all made sense. It made sense why he would make these movies, but haven’t they been around for years before him? At lest most of them?

These days’ women have close to equal right to men and they should update the movies and make them a little more modern. But then again we talked about that in class and there really wasn’t any way we change the story to make it better. If we made the villain a man people would say that we are making the story look like men are evil and have the upper hand. No matter what there is no way around making a fairy tale look like reality…but maybe that is why they call it a fairy tale.