Post Three

As someone who online shops (or should I say online window shops) a lot, I get target marketed a lot. Those are the very specific ads that pop up on your Facebook or Instagram feed.

Like this one. These ads bait me in most of the time but I never realized that the women in the ads are almost always skinny white models. You probably can't tell just from this online post but I'm a brown girl. I've been so, for 25 years of my life, and I'm only now realizing how little women of color are represented in media.

I'm not from the US, but because Hollywood is everywhere, I grew up watching a lot of western shows, movies and cartoons. I'll start with cartoons. I grew up watching: Dexter's Laboratory, Johnny Bravo, and all the Disney movies. And here's a breakdown of some the problems of these shows and movies:

Dexter's Laboratory - A white science dude, hella smart, doing science stuff with an annoying white sister. Dexter is intelligent, DeeDee (his sister) is a "dumb blonde" who only cares about boys, gossiping with her friends, ponies and boys.

Johnny Bravo - This show was pretty much all about a white blonde guy hitting on women. If I remember correctly he might've even be catcalling women. Here's a video that might explain better.

Disney Movies:

Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White - Well first of all they were all white girls. Second of all, they were girls. Not women. All under the age of 18 and their goal in life was to find a man to be it. These movies also emphasized on gender roles and prioritized "looks."

I'd be lying if I said these cartoons and movies had no positive sides to them. They did. But I'm focusing mainly on the underlying sexism, gender roles, etc. Like, why were Cinderella's evil stepsisters better known as her "ugly" stepsisters? Why do the features of all the Disney Princesses fall under what's considered beautiful by society? Why aren't there more princesses of color? Why did the princesses have the same type of body?

From shows and movies come merch. I see kids going to school with backpacks, water bottles, hair clips that have these Disney princesses on them. These little kids are told that they ARE these princesses but how much do these characters represent them? When they realize they don't look like these princesses, they'll try to look like them or question what's wrong with them.

The Walt Disney Company, were founded by two brothers. Two white, heterosexual males. So it makes sense why the women(princesses) are represented the way they are. The characters are not a reflection of real women but the product of what men want women to look like.