“Why we don’t tell our daughter she’s pretty”
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Six months ago, my husband and I made a conscious decision to stop telling our daughter she was pretty. This rather unusual decision, was based on the cumulative effect of a few random acts which put together, had us re-thinking our parenting lingo. We found that every time we told her that, she would find a mirror, look in it and smile; She would look at her end of term photos from play school and say “pretty girl”; and she would go through item after item in her clothes cupboard and say “pretty / not pretty enough”. Our daughter was just two and a half years old at the time.
How does an almost-three-year-old even know to do that? How does a little person have that level of awareness to assess if something is pretty or not pretty enough? Is it something they say and know instinctively or is it something that they learn through subtle nuances and gestures that they learn from the environment around them? I suspect it is the latter. I am not qualified to make a scientific assessment, however, based on my observations, experience and instincts of a mother, I would hazard a guess that this is learned behaviour.
Recently it seems the word “pretty” is used all too often and all too loosely to describe anything from a table cloth to a hairstyle, with a multitude of stops along the way. We use the term to describe a pattern on a dress, a child’s drawing of a fish, a flower pot, a glass jug, the twilight sky and even a bathroom set. Is it a lack of imagination, vocabulary and emotion that makes this six letter word so very potent and useless at the same time?
I have always said that I was so far removed from worrying about being ‘pretty’ when I was young, because it was a term that was never given much emphasis and weight in our home. As a young girl and teenager, I was always encouraged to be strong – physically and mentally – so that I was no pushover. Interestingly my parents-in-law too, seem to have attended the same school of parenting. So my husband and I were in perfect agreement when we decided to stop telling our daughter and our son that they were just “pretty” and “handsome”, but instead made a conscious decision to call them clever…smart…kind…and strong. To stop encouraging the mindset that people are judged by what they look like. To teach our children from a very early age, not to judge a book by its cover, but to actually read the book and make a decision about whether they like the story or not.
An article I read recently by an Australian author, Kasey Edwards, highlighted similar issues with the word ‘cute’ being used to describe little girls. A term we also try very hard not to use with our children. It highlights vulnerability, fragility and a nothingness that translates into very little use, when the child finally grows up. It somehow gives out the notion that little children, adolescent teenagers and young adults are best described using superficial words that give emphasis to the way they look, and less to being able and empowered.
I grew up in a household where sweet and pretty were not favourable words to use. This, in a household where the matriarch was a certified Beauty Queen, was certainly unusual, but I remember very distinctly that being ‘pretty’ was never a qualification to strive for, and so was never overly emphasised. My mother never relied on being ‘pretty’ to get any job done – she got the job done in spite of it through sheer effort and dedication and by doing so taught both her children to do the same. My father taught me how to drive and I got my licence the day I turned 18. There was no bargaining, pleading, or cajoling on my part – only one condition on his: that I was able to change a tyre myself if ever the need arose.
So six months ago, I thought about the impact of not being told I was pretty or sweet when I was growing up: Did it make life any less fulfilling and less meaningful? No; Did it ever give me a complex? I’d like to think not; Did it make me feel less loved and cherished in any way? Most certainly not. In hindsight I realise that it was one of the things that shaped the person I eventually became, because I never wasted my time or energy on trying to be ‘pretty’. Growing up in an all girls school, I never worried about whether my hair was out of place or my uniform wrinkled, and the fact that I was not shackled by useless musings about my appearance as a child, gave me the freedom mentally to explore every after school activity and embrace every unusual learning opportunity that came my way. It allowed me to just BE ME.
In my perfect world, using the word pretty is best kept for describing inanimate objects or mother nature herself. Being confident and feminine are certainly not mutually exclusive, just like being strong and gentle. If we encourage our daughters in particular, to think of themselves as strong and capable, rather than sweet and pretty, we will eventually shape and mould a nation of young women who are confident being feminine, comfortable with their own opinions, are able to take charge of their own destinies and perceive beauty as something that comes from within. We would live in a world where women were recognised as capable, strong and clever, while still being soft, feminine and beautiful. Waking up in that world? Now that would be pretty sweet.
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