A thread on my Facebook wall made me think long and hard (that’s what she said) about Disney’s brand of fairy-tale endings.
I love Disney and everything, but I firmly believe that these stories have scarred every girl on the planet for life. They have put these crazy romantic ideas in our heads that have nothing to do with life as it exists.
Snow White agreed to be carried off by a man that she had never even had a conversation with (not unless you count squeaky songs about wishing wells).
Cinderella married a man who probably just had a massive boner for her after grinding with her on the dance floor all night and got left behind with blue balls.
Ariel ran away from home and had a species change to be with a guy she hadn’t even been acquainted with yet.
Belle dumped one conceited, self-absorbed hairy suitor for another conceited, self-absorbed suitor – but covered with even more hair, and violent – because he gave her expensive stuff.
Jasmine left her cushy palace to be with a smelly man who stole stuff for a living.
Aurora danced with a strange man in a forest who told her that they had met in a dream.
In real life there would have been no happily-ever-afters for these girls. Snow White, Cinderella and Ariel would have been the princes’ booty call/one-night stands. Belle would have been a battered housewife. Jasmine would have had to support her good-for-nothing bum of a husband. And Aurora would have been raped and murdered (seriously, did no one else find that scene extremely creepy???).
In real life, there are no happily ever afters.
In real life, happiness is a choice; a choice that one must work at every single day for the rest of his or her life. Whether happiness comes in the form of a relationship, a career, a family…it just doesn’t happen by magic.
