While the '80s were the decade of frizzy hair, scrunchies, spandex, Michael Jackson and other horrors of female fashion, the cartoons of that decade certainly inspired girls to be, well, girls. Political correctness and a preoccupation with gender equality in 90s cartoons has ironically drawn a greater distance between the sexes - no pun intended.
The fact that girly cartoons existed in the 80s shows the networks' awareness that boys and girls are different without taking a crack at the idea of women's (girls') empowerment.
In the 90s, femininity is out of vogue.
Take the Power Rangers. There's a healthy ratio of girls to boys, true. Come battle time, however, they're all wearing identical outfits, virtually indistinguishable from one another except for color. None of them had any real uniqueness to them, and they all worked as a team. I'm all for teamwork, but what about initiative? And why is the leader of a co-ed team always a guy?
And then there's Misty, the girl from Pokmon. Her androgenous body and clothes hardly accent her femininity. She herself is a useless member of the team, which points to her existence as a PC afterthought.
But in the '80s, for instance, Rainbow Brite was beautiful because she was distinct. She was beautiful because she had a real purpose in bringing color to the universe. There were no boys in her land to dull the brightness of her individuality under the guise of 'equality.' She wasn't afraid of facing danger alone. Rainbow Brite made judgement calls that was respected by all members of her team, male and female. And in her show, the boy on her team, Red Butler (cute, no?), was the one who was the PC afterthought.
Being powerful didn't mean a girl had to sacrifice her individuality or her femininity. Isn't this the message our young girls should be getting?
It's like when she retorted to Chris the 'warrior' when he grabbed her by the hand after he caught sight of a spacemonster in Rainbow Brite and the Starstealer, "Some of us aren't used to running away."
You go, girl. You tell him good.
