Editor’s note: Guest blogger Casey McNulty is a senior at Boston University. She’s interned for CosmoGIRL! and has worked on her school newspaper. She writes a blog for the Albany, New York newspaper the Times Union, where a longer version of this blog post is published (so you can also weigh on the discussion about this article there, in Casey’s comments section… which might get a little heated!). She also pens an awesome personal blog that you can visit here, called a Tree Grows. She spent the spring semester living in Europe, and now she is living NYC-style in Brooklyn. Not to mention, Casey is also an excellent dinner date. Here’s Casey!

“It’s Totally A Girl Thing”: Libby Lu and the Marginalization of Tweens
By Casey McNulty

“Go ahead and complain as much as you want about the clothes…but it builds self-confidence for girls.”

“Yes they have make-up and racy clothes there but it is up to us to show our daughters what is appropriate and what is not.”

“It’s pedophile bait, pure and simple. Don’t you wonder who’s looking at your daughter when she’s walking around the mall dressed like that?”

These comments come from mothers embroiled in a debate on a Washington Post blog about the retail and “experience” chain Club Libby Lu, a store (with about 100 locations nationwide) that gives 5-to-11-year-old girls the chance to very publicly live out every little girl’s fantasy: to be a princess.

It is a “fantasy land” where tweens can have their hair and makeup done by the employees of Libby Lu, who call every girl “princess” and grant all of their wishes of fake eyelashes and pink hair extensions. Oh, and they have costumes that would likely infuriate their fathers if they could enter the store without being mistaken for dirty old men. Girls who do not yet have breasts or hips walk around the store in costumes of halter tops and low-slung jeans and are given lots of attention by friends and moms.

I am by no means accusing mothers and fathers who let their daughters go to Libby Lu of poor parenting. It is hard to tell a child she can’t go to her friend’s birthday party because Mom and Dad don’t agree with going to Libby Lu – especially when hugely popular celebrities like Miley Cyrus and the Jonas Brothers are partnered with the store.

Take-home goodies from birthday parties or individual visits can include makeup compacts, picture frames, sashes, temporary tattoos, hair accessories, pink sequin tank tops, feather boas, sequin bracelets, and small stuffed animal dogs. You have probably guessed that pretty much all of these things are pink.

Since when did all little girls want to be – or have to be – princesses? They walk under a huge crown logo just to get into the store, and as writer Sree Roy points out, they are greeted by large mirrors with decals that read “spoiled,” “you’re gorgeous,” and “I love your hair.” Contrary to popular belief, little girls are not programmed to love pink. Or makeup. Or “pretty” things that are forced upon them by a society unwilling to accept girls who deviate from the ultra-”feminine,” Hannah Montana and High School Musical norm.

What about the girls who like to read? Or girls who like soccer better than dressing up? What if the costumes that are supposed to fit the customers just won’t fit? What about girls who can’t afford to go to Libby Lu, or the parents who work two jobs to pay for their daughter’s birthday party but still don’t earn enough for a Libby Lu party?

This is just one more thing to keep little girls from being anything but a princess. Libby Lu is simply following suit behind Barbie and Disney princesses in the race to keep little girls from stepping outside of their gender roles. It keeps girls complacent by making them pink-and-sequin consumers, all the while teaching them that peer validation is contingent upon cool hair extensions, glittery eye makeup and pink gloss.

Libby Lu is a fantasy land. Because while it may be “natural” for little girls to want to dress up and wear makeup, they wouldn’t know how to do those things if their female relatives weren’t so beholden to makeup and “feminine” accessories, or if we grown ups didn’t tell them it was okay to walk around a mall shop with a tube top on at age five.

Girls learn about sexism early on at Libby Lu. Stores like Libby Lu teach girls that it doesn’t matter if you’re a smart girl or a sporty girl on the inside unless you’ve got the halter top and sexy makeup that will make people look at you in the first place. Let’s hope that, in the future, Libby Lu won’t have such an eager audience.