What Little Girls Are Made Into (Adree Style)

37 7 18
                                    

Adree Richards @AdreeSchmadree_dancer

Greetings lovely people! Let me tell you why we should appropriate @DallasDelaney 's poetry remix challenge! #WhatLittleGirlsRMadeInto

What Little Girls Are Made Into (Adree-Style)

Published on January 27, 2015

Youtube Video Transcript:

I always loved the poem about how little girls are made of sugar and spice and everything nice. It's just a poem...it's not like little kids are taught to take it literally. Kids aren't stupid...they know cows can't jump over moons and people aren't made of cake ingredients and animal parts. I do see Dallas's point with her recreated poem, but I think she's going too far with this.

It's become pretty clear that she operates from a perspective that totally embraces the theory that gender is socially constructed, that we perform as men or women because of constructed expectations.

As a feminist, I like this theory—but I don't buy into it 100%. I do believe there are a lot of ideas that are constructed by society, like the idea that girls like pink and boys shouldn't. But I also think men and women probably do have some inherent differences, and that should embrace those differences. I think our brains and bodies do work differently. I mean, doesn't it seem obvious that girls are more in tune with their emotions? And obviously boys have the capacity to be much stronger. We are different.

Dallas doesn't think so. She is one of those feminists who wants women to stop performing like women and to start performing like men. She wants more women in currently male-dominated workplaces, but she wants those women to act like men. She wants women to be dominant leaders who are aggressive in their interactions, and she wants them to enter our positions with knowledge that matches men's knowledge—you know, "STEM" knowledge.

But, women with femininity have some stellar stuff to bring to the table. We don't want to dominate—we want to listen and to engage in communication that isn't led by one alpha male, but shared by everyone. We want to encourage cooperation. We don't want to be aggressive—we want to be sympathetic, respectful, and compromising. And some of us, like me, aren't ever going to be good at math and science, so stop putting us down, Dallas. Accept us for what we are and value us for what we can contribute to the world.

After all, you know what they say: women weren't created to do everything a man can do. We were created to do what men can't do. And that's pretty cool.

So here's my recreation of the sugar and spice poem:

Good listeners and cooperators, nurturing problem-solvers, and artsy thinkers—that's what little girls are made into.

If any of you have more optimistic views on women, you should also infiltrate Dallas Delaney's recreated poem challenge, using her hashtag #WhatLittleGirlsRMadeInto. Show her that what girls are made into isn't so bad! Show her the world needs to be balanced with our femininity!

I'll retweet the poems I like the most. 



After watching Adree's video, I sent out a raging tweetstorm.

Dallas Delaney @DallasDelaney

If u comfortably tout the BS that "women aren't created to do everything men can do, they're created to do what men can't do"

Dallas Delaney @DallasDelaney

then U deserve to live in a world where ur valued only for your childbearing and caring abilities.

Dallas Delaney @DallasDelaney

The rest of us will go on to make society a better place for all the children you bear in your "role." Learn to love the idea that women can do what men do.

Dallas Delaney @DallasDelaney

I have. Biology is not my destiny, @AdreeSchmadree_dancer. Wench!

Dallas Delaney @DallasDelaney

Guys, would Adree even be able to think of ideas without being able to feed off of my contributions first? Leech!

Adree Richards @AdreeSchmadree_dancer

Wow @DallasDelaney, a wench and a leech? Way to resort to name calling.

Hey there Dalilah @MissDalilahFox

That quote u used about women not being created to do what men can do is absolute crap. I don't always agree w/@DallasDelaney, but she's right about this.

Helen Sharp @TheSharpest_inthebox

if you think that women are only good for childbearing, then you think that they are ONLY good for a secondary role in society

Cathy O. @Catherine_64_Ogburn

As a woman who cannot get pregnant, I find your ideas very harmful. I am more than my failed ovaries.

Jinger Spice @JingerMelson

As a woman who doesn't care to get pregnant, I also find your ideas harmful. I am more than my womb and vagina.

Mizz Claudia @Smile4AWhile

She isn't just saying that women are only wombs; she's saying that women's roles are to nurture the young members of society into adulthood (1/2)

Mizz Claudia @Smile4AWhile

That's why women make such good teachers, librarians, and pediatricians. Not just mothers (2/2)

Jinger Spice @JingerMelson

As a woman who doesn't CARE to nurture any young members of society into adulthood, I will tell YOU: (1/2)

Jinger Spice @JingerMelson

my brain has capacities far beyond teaching manners and cataloguing books. I can father, too. (2/2)

Jinger Spice @JingerMelson

Heck, I can do way more than just father. I can firefight, do karate, be the president, ANYTHING I WANT

I put more gasoline on the fire tormenting my insides by reading the tweets that answered Adree's call to appropriate my remix challenge. The worst ones were those Adree had retweeted:

Hey there Dalilah @MissDalilahFox

The sorts of mothers, teachers, pediatricians, librarians, etc. that OUR WORLD NEEDS #WhatLittleGirlsRMadeInto

Vivian Carmen @PeanutButterMilk2

The half who actually subscribes to the Golden Rule. #WhatLittleGirlsRMadeInto

I couldn't believe that she retweeted those—who in their right mind could think girls were the ones who "actually subscribe to the Golden Rule"? Yeah, we were nurtured into thinking we needed to be nice all the time, but a lot of us weren't or it was super fake or passive-aggressive. I knew that Valerie Devant didn't always treat others the way she wanted to be treated. She could be nice, but I'd seen her rude side.

Thinking about Valerie made me decide to look to see if she'd engaged in our debate, and if she thought littler girls were made into the sorts of pediatricians our world needs, because her mom was a pediatrician. And I was delighted to see she hadn't! However, she had totally retweeted someone else:

Patricia Fenway @Sooperheero

Scientists, Technologists, Engineers, Mathematicians #WhatLittleGirlsCANBecome

That's when I realized there was an entire thread of discussion of what girls can become that had branched off from my discussion. And that made me feel like a Negative Nancy who only ever looked at the glass as half full, because why hadn't I thought of that? Was I still doing what Ms. Brooks had told me to be careful not to do, and losing sight of my ultimate goal?

So I retweeted some of those, too. 

#GirlsShitTooWhere stories live. Discover now