Are Fairy Tales Harmful?
Five Reasons Why Fairy Tales Can Be Seen as Harmful:
1. Image of Women: Fairy Tale heroines are usually women, not little girls. The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Cinderella, and Snow White, are stories about grown women. Why is that a problem? Because the issues and concerns of a little girl are different than that of a grown woman. A little girl would not think about getting married, attracting, or taking care of a man without the suggestion coming from this kind of media. I think this makes girls feel like they have to become overly sophisticated at way too young an age. Fast-forward 20 years later and your little girl is crying in the last scene of Toy Story 3, because like the boy in the film, she too had to grow up too fast. Not that this is personal. (*wink)
2. Good, Bad and Nothing in Between: Characters in Fairy Tales are either pure and perfect (Prince Charming, Snow White), or evil and ugly (Ogres, Serpents, Witches, Monsters, etc.). Why are we teaching our children that some people are inherently evil, while others are perfect as porcelain? I think this creates a damaging understanding of who we are. Everyone has shades of grey in their personality. Understanding that people will not always be exactly as you want them to be, and that's OK, is a great lesson to teach children early on. It teaches compassion and understanding for others and ourselves. It also lets children know they can make mistakes without being "bad."
3. Perpetuating Bad Ideas: Pinocchio was a little boy puppet. His "growing up" (into a real boy) involved a strange mutating nose, countless lies and deceits, running away from home, drugs, and involvement with crooks and thieves. What child is born with that much malice on their mind that they would need this lesson while still in diapers? Is this really the best way to teach children to listen to their intuition ("their cricket")? It's one thing to tell your teenager a story about the trouble you got into at their age, with the consequences, in hopes that they don't make the same mistakes. Do we really need to make a a small child aware that he or she could run away from home and join a band of miscreants yet? Now I can't be sure, but it seems that some of these ideas end up playing themselves out when they get older. A good idea?
4. Happy Endings: All the Fairy Tales that American children know finish with "and they lived happily ever after." While it is nice to assure children that there is safety in this world, life doesn't stop once you are married or attain one goal. In fact, in the yogic understand of "deathlessness" (Akaal), life doesn't ever stop. We can be happy most of the time, but life is a flow, and nothing is constant. It doesn't matter how successful you become, you can still get sad and angry sometimes. You are allowed. Each day is an adventurous flux, not a ladder to the top of a happy ending. I'm not sure about you, but it took me a while to rewire my brain around that idea!
5. Only Some People Win: In a Fairy Tale, the hero and/or heroine win, and everyone else either loses, or marvels at their friends' "happy ending." Can't we all win? You might think that winning and losing is as natural as hot water boiling, but in fact, this is a cultural norm we have blindly accepted. In Australia, for example, Aboriginal children would play a game until each team had the same amount of points. The English grew tired of trying to teach them cricket! If we are to walk into the Aquarian Age, let's take as many people with us, even the ones we think are "evil," or not as "pretty," or "charming" as we are.
Ideas on How Fairy Tales Can Support a Better World:
Children are the future, let's provide them with stories that reinforce age-appropriate values that are in alignment to today's (and tomorrow's) consciousness. Children need to know that they are allowed to express a range of preferences and emotions, regardless of their gender. For instance, women can be strong, men can be good at pinpointing what they are feeling. Regardless of sex, race, religion or nationality, everyone has different strengths and weaknesses. Everyone has something valuable to contribute. No one is completely without flaws, or completely devoid of qualities. Children need to know that they are not defined by an accumulation of mistakes, or a wall of trophies and prizes. They need to understand that problems don't stop when a goal is attained, and their vicoty is not dependent on someone else's loss. Let's write stories with an awareness of the kind of adults they will end up creating.
(Editor's Note: Beloved singer Snatam Kaur has created a new kind of fairy tale...a fairy tale with a little yogi, full of meditation, yoga and love for all. Check out Shanti the Yogi!)
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Fairy-tales actually do have a very important and deep purpose. The same as myths and rituals serve as the guidelines for our psychic journeys, fairy-tales speak directly to the child’s unconscious and because they speak in symbols and images, those guidelines can be delivered to the unconscious(as opposed to words and concepts).
It is not the superficial, obvious images that we see with our conscious, linear thinking(like the mentioned image of women or evil-doers) that do the inner “work”, but the metaphors underlying them. While little girls may not be fantasizing about getting married on a conscious, everyday level, the inner relationship between her and the man in her life(starting with her father and of course her own inner masculine energy(known in Jungian psychology as the Animus)) is very much alive and the ideas about those relationships are imprinted deeply into her psyche by the images that are communicated to her by her parents, surroundings and any other media. Fairy-tales are important guides to those relationships and looking on a deeper level, fairy-tales can be very healing and are actually used as a tool for healing deep inner wounds.
As for the battle between good and evil, since children only see the world in black and white, there is a period in their lives when that very clear and strong separation is extremely important to them, so they can set their own inner boundaries. It gives them an inner sense of security knowing that the good always wins and that it IS possible to get through the hard times. I do however agree that a lot of fairy-tales nowadays have been “abused” by ridding them of the more harsh parts, written in the older days, which was done to supposedly shelter children from anything ugly and evil and under the idea that fairy-tales are supposed to entertain and make the child feel better, so they should be all lovey-dovey and pink unicorns. In reality, since there is the “dark side” in the human psyche, it is essential for the child to receive those dark images as well, so that they have something to unconsciously relate to and then learn to deal with.
There is a beautiful, healing book written on fairy-tales, by Clarissa Pinkola Estes, called “Women Who Run With the Wolves”. I sincerely recommend it, for it is truly healing and speaks directly to the heart. It also gives a very beautiful and realistic perspective on fairy-tales and their meaning.
Thanks for the beautiful response Har Anand Kaur. My mother has that book on her bookshelf. I will read it next time I’m home.
I understand that folklore is very symbolic and meaningful. I should I have been clearer about the kind of “fairy tales” I was talking about, which are the more widely produced blockbuster versions of these stories.
I also think it’s interesting to investigate who the stories are serving, considering it is not the children who are writing them, but the adults. Authors tell stories according their own psychology and it seems to be that it is not always something we would want the next generation to incorporate into their world-view.