Super Heroes Don't Wear Pink

This is the 21^st century, but you wouldn't notice if you’d tried to find a super hero cape for a four-year-old girl.

I grew up in the heyday of comic book reading: Superman and Batman being staples, but I wasn't exclusive.  We neighborhood kids on Front Street walked or biked to Block’s Drug Store to peruse the latest publications by DC or Marvel.  For ten cents, we’d each buy a comic, plop down in our clubhouse in the Plummer boys’ backyard, and absorb a magic world where Good won and Evil was vanquished.  We’d read our own and then trade with each other.  So much magic for a ten-cent purchase.

That comic-book world was dominated by males--yes--but powerful women did exist, albeit in skin-tight attire.  It was the Fifties, a June Cleaver World, but these comics assured me as a young girl, that I, as well as the boys, could be super and heroic.

Sheena Queen of the Jungle first appeared in 1939, before I was even born.   She was followed by Cat Woman (1940) and Wonder Woman in (1941).  Batman met his female counterpart in 1954, and Super Girl strode into a Superman episode in 1958.  In retrospect, I can see that these female warriors were created by men, and, okay, were sexually objectified, but I did not notice this at the time.  They were fierce.  I only noticed that they fought crime and took down the bad guys.

With my grandsons--now nearly 7 and 5-years-old--I play Justice League and Avengers with costumes or action figures, but I did add a Wonder Woman and a Bat Woman figure to the mix three years ago.  I want my grandsons to know that we women are equally capable of fighting crime, helping out in a crisis, triumphing in a battle.  My two-year-old grandson, Lane—who says “Batman” in a low, gravelly voice—makes my heart sing.  Naturally, I bought him a hooded Batman cape for Christmas.

The only girl—Greer-- had been exposed to the DC/Marvel world, having spent summer and Christmas vacations with her cousins, playing with action figures and wearing their capes.  At home, she just co-opted Lane’s.  Greer does love the princess role and has gowns, wands, and tiaras galore, but I wanted her to have her own super person cape, too.

I began my online search, typing in “female super hero cape, 4-6 yrs.”  What popped up on multiple sites?  A plethora of purple and pink capes, some with glittered letters!  A pink cape was supposedly for Bat Girl? A purple cape for Super Girl.  Please!  No way that a female kick-butt super woman is going to put on a pretty pink cape.  She’d no more do that than put on strappy stilettos for a rumble.  It’s just not done.  I finally bought a Bat Woman action figure and a Bat Man cape for Greer.  It looks just like the boys’ capes, as it should, and it is black, as it must be. 

Come on, toy industry.  Yes, we girls do love a princess, but our interests are not as narrow as you seem to believe.  Young girls in the 21^st century are not as shallow as you want them to be.  In real life, adorable only gets a girl so far, and girls should learn that early on.  Pink is a lovely color for everyday life, but there’s nothing super about it..Period.