Fairy Tales

Today we read Experts Say Fairy Tales Not So Happy Ever After. I really liked this article, it really opened my eyes. This article was about fairy tales and beauty. This article pointed out that most fairy tales have this message that it pays to be beautiful and how it is harmful to the kids reading it. Also in these fairy tales are the idea that you can judge a person good or bad by the way the look. In fairy tales the evil witch, or evil step sisters are always the ugly ones and are usually punished in some way. This teaches kids that you can judge someone by the way they look. Also in these fairy tales the gender roles may make kids think that guys have to have big muscles and be handsome prince saving the woman. It may make young girls think that they have to be rich and beautiful to be happy and accepted. This article really made me open my eyes to what I had read as a kid. One example of a good fairy tale that this article gave was Shrek, the main character Shrek fell in love with Princess Fiona. This was not like all of the other fairy tales because Shrek was not the usual handsome prince, he was an ogre. Shrek rescues Princess Fiona from the castle and at first Princess Fiona is disgusted by Shrek because she was expecting the tall handsome prince. As the story progresses you learn that the princess was put under a curse and turns into an ogre herself after sunset. Shrek and Fiona fall in love and live happily ever after, even after Fiona is permanently turned into an ogre. I think that there should be more fairy tales like this one because even as an ogre she fell in love and lived happily ever after where as in Snow White and Sleeping Beauty it was based on looks to be happy.
This article also made me think about men's roles in fairy tales. In fairy tales the men are always "saving" the princess or woman from something. The males always have a somewhat heroic role in the story.