Happily Ever After: The Ugly Truth of Beautiful

            Beauty is truly one of the most subjective terms. Beauty is as beauty does; beauty is in the eye of the beholder; beauty is only skin deep – people regurgitate these old proverbs when unattractive rears its ugly head. Placating and concealing one’s true feelings about what is attractive and what is not changes nothing; the real predicament lies in the source of people’s standards of what is appealing and what is not. Fairy tale literature entertains its readers with stories of princesses and happy endings; however, the real message of these antiquated tales suggests that society should distinguish what is good from evil on the sole basis of physical appearance. Parents teach their children sexism and racism with each “Once upon a time,” they share.

            Beautiful princesses and handsome princes fill the pages of most typical, classic fairy tales. Though the stories and their protagonists change with time, the motif of beautiful being good and ugly being evil remains the same. Professors Lori Baker-Sperry and Liz Grauerholz’s analyses reveal that 31% of all stories associate beauty with goodness and 17% associate ugliness with evil (718). A perfect example of this standard appears in Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm’s Snow White. The story describes the characteristics the queen hopes that her child will embody. The queen never mentions health, intelligence, or courage; she asks for her child to have skin “white as snow,” lips “red as blood,” and hair “as black as the wood of the window frame” (249). According to the tale, Snow White possesses the traits her mother requests, and she becomes “as beautiful as the bright day and more beautiful than the queen herself” (250). This beauty saves Snow White from the huntsman who seeks to kill her. He cares not about her empathy towards others or her philanthropic nature; the huntsman’s reasoning for sparing the young girl’s life stems solely from her physical appearance. Sparing a person’s life because she is good-looking suggests that beautiful people deserve to live and ugly people deserve to die. It sends a very negative message about the characteristics upon which society places value.

            This emphasis on beauty over virtue continues throughout the tale Snow White. After the huntsman spares the young girl, she seeks shelter in the home of seven dwarfs. When the dwarfs discover Snow White sleeping in their home, they do not react in typical hysterics; any reasonable person would exhibit anger and fear upon discovering an intruder napping in their home. The dwarfs, however, “were so delighted to see her that they decided not to wake her up, and they let her keep sleeping in the little bed” (Grimm 253).  Baker-Sperry and Grauerholz state that “women who achieve a high degree of attractiveness are psychologically and socially rewarded” (712). According to the dwarfs’ reaction, laws against breaking and entering do not apply to pretty people; the law of the land exists to keep ugly, evil people from wrongdoing. The dwarfs do not consider the possibility of danger, and they do not mention arming themselves against a potential threat; the dwarfs assume that a beautiful girl is trustworthy and her inappropriate actions do not need permission. Like the dwarfs, society allows pretty people to break the rules. Attractive female teachers who engage in sexual relationships with young male students easily earn forgiveness, glamorous celebrities who drink and drive walk away with a slap on the wrist, and beauty queens who are not able to spell rudimentary terms proudly wear their crowns.

            People who are not born with perfect bone structure and piercing blue eyes suffer a fate more horrific than the physically attractive. Entitlement evades them and warrants far less appealing identifiers. Snow White’s evil stepmother prides herself on being the, “fairest of them all” (Grimm 254). As evil takes hold of this once beautiful queen, her looks fade. It is not fathomable for a beautiful queen to engage in calamity; therefore, she takes on the form of an ugly, old peddler woman before she sets out to kill her stepdaughter. Scholars agree that “both men and women are being increasingly manipulated by media messages concerning attractiveness” (Baker-Sperry and Grauerholz 722). The queen’s transformation from the “fairest in the land” to an ugly peddler woman parallels her transformation into evil. As her looks fade, so does her sense of morality. The juxtaposition of the ugly, evil queen and the beautiful, wonderful princes, Snow White, confirms the stereotypes still present in society. When the nightly news regales the events of a beautiful, young couple’s carjacking, society shudders at the thought. Replace that attractive couple with a few old, toothless, dirty bikers and many argue justification for the attack.

            If old and ugly set the standard for evil, it is no wonder so many older women despise their younger competition. Snow White’s queen, the stepmother, mentions no ill-will towards her stepdaughter before the mirror tells her, “Snow White is a thousand times more fair” (Grimm 250).   The queen reacts with sudden jealousy and immediately plots the death of her young, beautiful stepdaughter. The queen is evil, and readers label her the obvious antagonist; however, the true antagonists are the people who confirm that with age comes a lack of desire. This message taunts the insecurities of all aging women and forces them to metaphorically destroy young, beautiful girls. One Western Folklore article states that “attention to specific social and cultural interactions is in part responsible for the complexity of today’s feminist responses to fairy tales” (Bacchilega 11). Women come with an expiration date, according to these tales, and in order to maintain any form of social or sexual status, they must rid their lives of all present threats. Though potentially unintentional, the messages fairy tales, such as Snow White, reveal transcend the period they were written and affect cultural beliefs, even hundreds of years later.

In today’s society, women are synonymous with petty fights and catty remarks. Men often comment on the simplicity of their friendships and the ease with which men befriend other men. Fortunately for men, their age denotes wisdom and experience.   The Hudon Review adds that “because their power was not primarily a sexual power, men in fairy tales never develop envious murderous passion against younger men; whatever power men have does not erode with time” (Sale 390). Women hear that they are only as powerful as they are beautiful; their power stops when their sexual prowess fades, and their flight or fight instincts engage. From a very young age, literature and society teach women that younger women are potential threats. Rather than embracing and training the upcoming generation, older women lose their sexual status, and in turn, their power. Any attempt to maintain their power results an association with evil. Society takes older, powerful women and reduces them to cut-throat villains or reassigns their powerful stance to credit male characteristics. A queen can rule, but only with a king by her side.

   Many little girls dream of sparkling crowns and giant castles; they call themselves princesses and hope to someday meet their very own Prince Charming. Imagine the damage these desires cause when the young girls grow up lacking the luster of which true princesses are made. Princesses do not adhere to set physical standards; however, due to direct and indirect characterization, a mental image of the typical princess is not hard to ascertain. Disney princesses typically have blonde hair, blue eyes, and a beautiful voice. They are naturally skilled dancers, and oftentimes, woodland creatures befriend them. Disney movies have shown progression throughout the years, and as a result, many non-typical princesses light up the big screen. Despite their best efforts, racial internalization regarding princesses already plagues many young children. A study from The Journal of Negro Education states that “most if not all children including children of color see ‘White’ as good, living happily ever after, and pretty” (Hurley 223). If white portrays all that is good, black obviously represents what is foul or unpleasant. Hurley states that “black and white color symbolism in … is pervasive and powerful” (225). She provides examples from various cinematic adaptations that clearly label white as good and black as bad. Case and point, readers most easily identify Snow White by her notably pale skin, white birds, and white-horse prince. Granted, her hair is dark, unlike my typical princesses; however, her hair is a minute detail in the evil presentation of black. Hurley notes that the tale, “features a wicked queen dressed in black who lives in a black castle and has black rats, a dangerous black forest containing black bats, and black owls” (225). Readers and viewers see black as threatening and dangerous. Sadly, this trend regularly presents itself in society. Fairy tales, like any form of literature from any time period, reflect the norms of that society. Understandably, older versions of the tales focus on a white royal family and present a white heroine. The problem with dismissing these issues under the guise of history is the magnitude of the effects racial stereotyping has on young, impressionable minds.

Fairy tales teach children, from very young age, that they must look a certain way or descend from a certain ethnicity to meet a handsome prince, fall in love, and live a life of prosperity. “The Science of Fairy Tales?” argues, “In all societies, the accidents and vicissitudes of line need accounting for in terms of the body of knowledge available to the members of society” (Jackson 121). Take Grimm’s Briar Rose for example, without the royal family’s social clout, the young, beautiful princess would face sure death. Had one of the Wise Women not intervened, Briar Rose would have to suffer for her father’s ridiculous choice. Many children, like Briar Rose, face punishment stemming from selfish choices their parents make. Briar Rose’s father excludes one of the thirteen Wise Women, “since the king had only twelve golden plates for them to dine on” (Grimm 241). His arrogance nearly cost him his child. Fortunately, she is a princess; therefore, consequences are not hers to endure. Give the royal princess a dark complexion and low socioeconomic status; it stands to reason that her fate may not be as pleasant.

Strong independent heroines often serve the protagonist role in fairy tales. Attractive women rise above their social status; they do not succumb to the pressures and abuses their unattractive counterparts subject them to. Sadly, however, much of the credit for overcoming said oppressions falls upon the male characters in the tales. Ruth B. Bottigheimer, author of “Tale Spinners: Submerged Voices in Grimms’ Fairy Tales,” focuses on the symbolic task of spinning and the motif of spindles. She states that “spinning is the symbol for and the visible attribute of the penury and personal degradation into which a princess is plunged when she is deprived of male protection” (147). Women who work menial jobs, such as spinning, simply need men to rescue them. Consider the rags-to-riches story of Cinderella. Before the handsome prince swoops in and saves poor, dirty Cinderella, she is nothing more than a low-class servant. It takes a man to come in and clean Cinderella up; this is clearly a task she is not capable of handling on her own. Snow White and Sleeping Beauty both follow this same trend; only true love’s kiss holds the power to save these beautiful women from certain death. The obvious translation is that women need men – typically well-off white men – to pull them from the wreckage of their lives.

Many parents share classic fairy tales with their children. They paint lovely images of castles and horses. They allow their daughters to wear tiaras and pretend ball gowns. Though these princess dreams are innocent and these stories are part of most people’s childhood, parents should consider their implications. The older, wiser women should not feel threatened by an immature novice. Powerful women should not have to feel ugly and evil. A person’s value should not have an expiration date that draws closer as her looks fade. Children should not be exposed to the concept of white superiority and black inferiority. Fairy tales should come with a label – “Warning: Sexism and Racism Ahead!”

Works Cited

Bacchilega, Cristina. “An Introduction to the ‘Innocent Persecuted Heroine’ Fairy Tale.” Western Folklore, vol. 52, no. 1, 1993, pp. 1–12., www.jstor.org/stable/1499490.

Baker-Sperry, Lori, and Liz Grauerholz. “The Pervasiveness and Persistence of the Feminine Beauty Ideal in Children's Fairy Tales.” Gender and Society, vol. 17, no. 5, 2003, pp. 711–726., www.jstor.org/stable/3594706.

Bottigheimer, Ruth B. “Tale Spinners: Submerged Voices in Grimms' Fairy Tales.” New German Critique, no. 27, 1982, pp. 141–150., www.jstor.org/stable/487989.

Grimm, Jacob and Wilhelm. The Annotated Brothers Grimm. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2012. Print.

Hurley, Dorothy L. “Seeing White: Children of Color and the Disney Fairy Tale Princess.” The Journal of Negro Education, vol. 74, no. 3, 2005, pp. 221–232., www.jstor.org/stable/40027429.

Jackson, Anthony. “The Science of Fairy Tales?” Folklore, vol. 84, no. 2, 1973, pp. 120–141., www.jstor.org/stable/1260418.

Sale, Roger. “Fairy Tales.” The Hudson Review, vol. 30, no. 3, 1977, pp. 372–394., www.jstor.org/stable/3850269.

Tatar, Maria. “Why Fairy Tales Matter: The Performative and the Transformative.” Western Folklore, vol. 69, no. 1, 2010, pp. 55–64., www.jstor.org/stable/2573528