Superheroes

A few nights ago, my daughter came home and said she wanted to play superheroes, but she couldn't be a superhero because she was a girl. My heart sank. Not yet three years old and she already thinks there is something she can't do or be because of her gender. I stopped what I was doing, knelt on the floor and asked her, "Who said you can't be a superhero?" It turns out one of the boys in her preschool had said it. I looked her in the eyes, made sure she was listening to me, and told her that girls can be anything they want to be. I must have said it five times in a row, at least. Then I told her that there were lots of girl superheroes, and we could play superheroes any time she wanted to.

We ate our dinner and talked a bit more about what superheroes did and how they were strong and had special powers or skills like flying. Halfway through dinner, my husband came home and I told him to tell her about how there were lots of girl superheroes, quickly explaining what happened. He said all the same things I did and when to grab our tablet, so he could look up female superheroes on YouTube for her to see. But they all had enormous breasts, tiny waists, and were sexed up to look like porn stars in a Superman rip off.

I quickly thought of the Power Puff Girls (which are not without their problems, message-wise) and put on an  episode for her to watch. I know comic books are mostly drawn by men for men, and frankly she is too young for comics anyway, but something needs to change in the superhero comic book and video game world and it needs to change fast.

Some people are taking it upon themselves to start that change. Two dads in the past year have been in the news for changing the coding in video games for daughters, one with Donkey Kong and one with Zelda. DC, Marvel, Nintendo, Sony -- are you listening? People are going to the trouble to create non-damsels in distress characters themselves. People are creating female characters to get the job done. The public are requesting this. Make it so.

FYI -- If anyone knows of some good female superheroes, let me know. I need all the resources I can find.