Politically correct parents ditch 'offensive' traditional fairy tales

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Politically correct parents ditch 'offensive' traditional fairy tales

 

By Daily Mail Reporter

Last updated at 12:33 PM on 05th January 2009

 

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Politically correct parents are scrapping traditional fairy tales at bedtime - because they're too offensive and too scary.

A survey of 3,000 parents has found one in four mums has ditched old classics like Cinderella and Rapunzel in favour of The Very Hungry Caterpillar or The Gruffalo.

One in 10 parents even said Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs should be re-titled Snow White and the Seven Vertically Challenged People - because they believe 'the dwarf reference is not PC'.

 

 

Parents have ditched 'scary' and 'offensive' classics like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs for modern children stories like The Gruffalo

Rapunzel is considered 'too dark' and Cinderella has been dumped because she is forced to do the housework and sit on cinders.

The poll of 3,000 British parents revealed 66 per cent believe traditional fairy tales have stronger morality messages than many modern children's stories.

But many feel this type of reading is inappropriate to soothe youngsters before bed.

A third of parents won't read Little Red Riding Hood because she walks alone through woods and finds her grandmother has been eaten by a wolf.

Almost one in five adults also said they had abandoned Hansel and Gretel because they are abandoned in a forest.

A fifth of parents don't like to tell their children about The Gingerbread Man as he gets eaten by a fox.

65 per cent of parents surveyed prefered to read their children happier tales at bedtime

A spokesman from TheBabyWebsite.com, which carried out the research, said: "Fairy Tales take children to a land of make-believe where they can use their imaginations and where generally the 'goodies' beat the 'baddies'.

'Children love being read a variety of stories and it's a great shame that so many of today's PC mums and dads are rejecting fairy tales which have stood the test of time, entertaining children for hundreds or thousands of years.'

 

A fifth of parents said fairy tales were no longer politically correct, while 17 per cent worried the old stories would give their children nightmares.

The most popular book read at bedtime is now The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle.

The simple tale, which features a greedy caterpillar eating too much food, was written in 1969.

It also emerged 65 per cent of parents prefer to read their children happier tales at bedtime, such as the Mr Men, The Gruffalo and Winnie the Pooh.

Three quarters of mums and dads try to avoid stories which might give their children nightmares and half of all parents wouldn't consider reading a single fairy tale to their child until they reach the age of five.

Mum-of-three Sarah Pilkinton, 36, of Sevenoaks, Kent, said: "I loved the old fairy stories when I was growing up.

'I still read my children some of the classics like Sleeping Beauty and Goldilocks, but I must admit I've not read them The Gingerbread Man or Hansel and Gretel.

 

'They are both a bit scary and I remember having difficulty sleeping after being read those ones when I was little.'

 

Top 10 bedtime stories of 2008:

1. The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Eric Carle (1969)

 

2. Mr Men, Roger Hargreaves (1971)

 

3. The Gruffalo, Julia Donaldson (1999)

 

4. Winnie the Pooh, A.A. Milne (1926)

 

5. Aliens Love Underpants, Claire Freedman & Ben Cort (2007)

 

6. Thomas and Friends from The Railway Series, Rev.W.Awdry (1945)

 

7. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame (1908)

 

8. What a Noisy Pinky Ponk!, Andrew Davenport (2008)

 

9. Charlie and Lola, Lauren Child (2001)

 

10. Goldilocks and the Three Bears, Robert Southey (1837)

 

Top 10 fairy tales we no longer read:

 

1. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

 

2. Hansel and Gretel

 

3. Cinderella

 

4. Little Red Riding Hood

 

5. The Gingerbread Man

 

6. Jack and the Beanstalk

 

7. Sleeping Beauty

 

8. Beauty and the Beast

 

9. Goldilocks and the Three Bears

 

10. The Emperor's New Clothes

[Famous Old Painter]

Jesus Christ :rolleyes: What next?

[Saffire]

I don't really care so much about political correctness, but there are plenty of Disney movies that teach kids the wrong stuff:

 

http://www.cracked.com/article_16905_7-classic-disney-movies-that-taught-us-terrible-lessons.html

[WV Gal]

Oy vey! People need to get over this s**t and get a freaking life. Fairy tales have their place in the world of literature and reading and they should not be ditched. You can't sugarcoat things all the time for the sake of the kids.

 

Though off topic but as for Disney films...they're just movies. If they're teaching kids the wrong things then that's probably because the parents are not teaching them anything anyways. Most parents don't want to take the time to teach their kids anything but bitch about things that they think are not PC. :rolleyes:

[Corkus]

Oh, for crying out loud. Nursery rhymes are perhaps even more non-PC and negative (Jack & Jill, Humpty Dumpty, etc.), and they're probably next. Parents, your kids are gonna find out that life is full of tragedies the hard way, anyways. Save them some disappointment later in life.

 

And Winnie the Pooh isn't a "happy" story. Heffalumps and Woozles are some seriously frightening shit.