I’m sure a lot of you remember the Barbie doll that said “Math class is tough! Let’s go shopping!” (often misquoted as “Math is hard!” Same sentiment.). With a new awareness of how culture and the education system encouraged the dumbing-down of girls in math, parents reacted quite vocally to this doll. The last thing girls needed, they said, was a doll who told them math was too difficult and that vanity and other shallow frivolities were where it’s at. Mattel responded by removing that phrase from the doll’s litany of inane statements.
Girls aren’t bad at math by nature. They don’t struggle more because of something miswired in their brains. The difficulties with math (or perceived difficulties) were programmed by culture — girls were treated as being poor at math, so many rose to fulfill that destiny. We’ve gotten better about that. Recent studies have shown a marked improvement in how girls performed in math when taught in a gender-equitable manner. When encouraged in science and math, rather than solely in the arts, girls not only perform as well as male peers, but excel. Time magazine had an entire issue on women in math. When all is said and done, girls are not bad at math. They’re just told they are, repeatedly, by society and institutions, until they believed it. Now many of us are working our damnedest to make they aren’t being told to believe it.
Today, I stumbled upon a t-shirt listing on Hyena cart, for a pink shirt made from fabric that says “I AM TOO PRETTY TO DO MATH.” Yes, too pretty to do math. That this fabric is even manufactured is repugnant, but the listing for this shirt is simply beyond the pale:
I AM TOO PRETTY TO DO MATH. Youth Raglan T, YPS 10, 12, 14, or 16
Most of us have an instant imagine of someone who this suites…
that little lady who just HATES doing her math.
Or that girl who just knows she is too pretty for this…
or the one who just don’t have the time to waste doing math.
Apparently, girls might also be too pretty to use proper grammar, capitalization, or punctuation.
Too pretty to do math. “Too pretty for this.” “One who just don’t have the time to waste doing math.” Too pretty to do math. Waste time doing math. Really? Really? ”
What is the message here? Don’t worry your pretty head with thinking, because it’s a waste of your time? What would be a better use of that time? Finding a good husband, perhaps? Or maybe the message is that only ugly women need to do math, because only ugly women need to have any kind of career. Never mind that beauty fades, husbands leave, and you little bubble heads who can’t add 2 and 2 are going to have an awfully hard time balancing your little pink sparkly checkbooks.
Does the work-at-home mom who made this listing, with its sexist and insulting message, and who chose Psalm 139:13 to adorn her store banner, believe God knit girls together too stupid for math, too vapid to do anything but fluff their hair and paint their nails? Does she really believe beauty and brains are not only mutually exclusive, but that beauty is preferable to intelligence, effort, or achievement? Who will buy this shirt, I wonder, and what lessons are they teaching their daughters? Certainly not that a girl can be both smart and beautiful, that there’s a great deal of value in making an effort (even if it doesn’t come naturally to you), or that girls can do anything.
For the record, Patchfire’s daughter, Eclectic Girl, is a math whiz, doing algebra at age 9. Math comes as naturally to her as breathing, or as naturally as language comes to Captain Science. She’s a pretty, vivacious, empowered little girl with stunning eyes and a bright pink room…and she can knock your freaking socks off with math. Don’t tell me that a girl can be “too pretty” for math. Don’t you dare.
If you’re looking for t-shirts with girl-empowering, intelligence-valuing messages, try Mind Candy Clothing.
