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Gender Roles In Disney's Fairy Tales

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Disney is internationally known for its extravagant fairy tales containing romances amongsts princes and princesses. These stories are meant to poke fun at the idea of a damsel in distress awaiting her hero. Although, these tales possess ideals that are intended to come across as playful, there may be an underlying dig towards the female gender. A child’s most critical years of learning stem throughout the first five years of life (1). These first five years are when children begin to understand appropriate behavior, empathy, boundaries, and many other social skills that shall remain with them for the rest of their lives (1). Children are most impressionable from birth to five, but instead of creating a steady foundation for learning, parents …show more content…

It is a common theme shown in a majority of princess tales. Princesses are not allowed to define their lives, instead the men in their lives define it for them. For example, rendered motionless until true love 's kiss set her free, Aurora would lay in bed desperately awaiting the arrival of her prince charming. Not only does this highlight the weakness that Disney denotes women to, it represents these horrifically impossible standards of love. Disney’s fairy tales implement gender roles and irrational expectations of love and life, which affects the mental perspective that children have on these topics as they grow …show more content…

Parents refuse to engage in conversations on relationships and sexuality, so fairy tales become children’s first impressions on these serious topics. Due to the young ages of the children exposed to these nonsensical stories, they are in turn incapable of identifying the tales as fiction. Children who interpret fairy tales by themselves will digest the information and reflect it in their own lives, defining their relationships how they self-taught themselves, and ultimately carrying over these false perceptions into their daily lives. Fairytales highlight what love should be rather than what it truly is. Statistically speaking, a majority of women who grew up in the era of Disney fairy tales blame these stories for their misconstrued vision of love and

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