#i forgot s1 had an episode where jackson had a crisis bc he accidentally picked out a 'girl car' | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

britneyshakespeare · 21 hours ago

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you know miley stewart is a fun character because she's in no way a "not like other girls" lead, but she still has a little bit of an outsider thing going on for being a tennessee girl living in malibu. she's a BIG girly girl and is absolutely not ashamed of being crazy about cute clothes and cute boys, but she differs from amber and ashley because she is actually nice to people.

and this was like not a hard thing to do; it feels like, pretty typical actually. this is what most female-led media was like in the early 2000s, before it devolved to toning down the overall "girliness" of many protagonists, but often without replacing it with anything much more substantial as a personality. like, the mean hyperfeminine popular bully girl trope STAYED for the antagonists, and the protagonists were not defined in many ways other than NOT being like them. they weren't supposed to be so obsessed w going to the mall anymore; the popular bitches won that in the trope custody battle. even though going to the mall is fun and should not considered a thing only vapid kids can enjoy.

#totally spies was also like this. lizzie mcguire. really anything from that period w a female lead #the mean girls were actually a lot like the female characters in interests. thats why they were threatened by them. they were 'competition'#but when you put a character like gigi from wizards of waverley place against someone like alex russo #or sonny monroe against tawni #it's like. what do these girls really have in common other than gender and location?#alex russo was actually a character who had more of an inner life as far as media from that time goes of course #like her hobbies were diverse and realistic. she was neither a complete girly girl or tomboy #sonny monroe was pretty girly but also felt like she had no believable interests other than 'funny'... sort of. and they gave up on it #like they never let her be too girly it was more her sense of style that did the talking for her. and i LOVED her clothes as a kid #you better believe i bought my first day of school outfit for sixth grade from target's sonny monroe collection #i kept that skirt well into high school lol. actually i might still have it somewhere... unless it ripped at some point #text post #yeah lilly in s1 had some tomboyish aspects like her style and skateboarding but she was not completely un-girly either #like she indulged in the same girly hobbies and activities as miley #and to be clear i'm not saying that 'girly' (vaguely defined term as it is) is necessary for every female lead to have #but this time was so much farther from representing realistic and believable positively-depicted tomboyish characters. WE KNOW THAT #the 2000s was such a backwards time for gender representation in kids media it's crazy #i forgot s1 had an episode where jackson had a crisis bc he accidentally picked out a 'girl car'#YES. THE CAR. IS GIRLY. oh my good lord #it was literally just red i think. like i saw nothing particularly feminine about it. but his friend cooper called it a 'skirt scooter'#man what the hell

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