Her.meneutics: Another Assault on Little Girls

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January 3, 2011

Another Assault on Little Girls

Vogue Paris's "Gifts" photo spread is one more example of how our culture robs children of innocence.

Jennifer Grant

The most recent issue of Vogue Paris (or should I say l'issue de janvier/février?) struck a nerve when it hit newsstands, upsetting the very readers who count on the magazine to be provocative. They’re guaranteed it. Vogue Paris’s editor in chief, Carine Roitfeld, once told a British journalist that she tries to include “something every month that is — how you say? — not politically correct. A little bit at the limit. Sex, nudity, a bit rock'n'roll, a sense of humour.”

Wait, I should clarify: Roitfeld is French Vogue’s former editor. Within a few weeks of the December issue’s release, Roitfeld announced that she was leaving the magazine. Some commentators speculate that the Cadeaux, or, for English speakers, “Gifts,” photo spread went too far, even for French Vogue. What, in this unfailingly erotic publication, could be so troubling that it would arouse rumors such as that one?

In “Cadeaux,” the models are very slim — but that's nothing new. Nor is it earth-shattering that they wear too much makeup or that there is something suggestive in the picture of the model inexplicably holding a toothbrush in her mouth. Aren’t such photos de rigueur for Vogue? It couldn’t be the opulence of the props or that the stiletto-wearing models recline on animal skins. Nor should their blank (yet at the same time, somehow, hostile) expressions raise eyebrows. Non, c'est vrai, all of that is to be expected.

So what could be so bad that it could possibly have cost Roitfeld her job?

I suppose the fact that the models are no older than six or seven years old might have something to do with it.

Wait, a minute, though. Are fans of the December issue correct when they say that those of us who find some of these images disturbing are just dirty-minded ourselves? The girls, after all, aren’t naked or engaged in sexual acts. What’s wrong with a game of dress-up? Don’t all little girls love to raid their mommies’ closets and put on high heels and silky slips from time to time? Could I be — how you say? — prudish or naïf to find the pictures unsettling?

The Romantic poet William Wordsworth is known for having written poems idealizing the innocence of childhood. His "Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood" explores the damage to "delight and liberty, the simple creed of childhood" as children glimpse and then engage in the adult world.

That poem came to my mind a few years ago when my older daughter moved out of size 6X clothes. Suddenly instead of the lollipops, ladybugs, and butterflies that had adorned the shirts and dresses on the racks in the little girls’ department, I found myself in a land of low-riding, “distressed” blue jeans and where skulls leered at me from the fronts of T-shirts. They were clothes that seemed suitable for young adults experimenting with an edgy new look or for Jennifer Beals’s character in Flashdance. They didn’t, however, feel appropriate for my daughter’s first day of kindergarten. I retreated online to Hanna Andersson and L. L. Bean — the latter a name so often seen on my kids’ clothes that, once or twice, one of my kids was called by that name. I liked the way these companies viewed children as children. The models in their catalogs smiled brightly. They were pictured on swing sets or skiing or jumping rope. Not to get all poetic on you, but they seemed to embrace Wordsworth’s notion of childhood’s creed. The children were happy, and they were free.

And, yes, of course toddling around in your mom’s high heels is a happy pastime for many girls. But the French Vogue spread is different. Its purpose is to sell high-end products, such as parfum, to adults. That there is so much sex in the surrounding pages also affects the way these images are understood.

Fashion designer Tom Ford was the guest editor and designed the controversial issue, including “Cadeaux.” Is it relevant that Ford is a close friend to photographer Terry Richardson (whose work is featured elsewhere in the December/January issue), and that Richardson has been accused of preying on child models and has written and gleefully performed a song called "Child Molester's Coming For You"?

I think so.

It’s not only the surrounding pages or Ford’s affiliation with Richardson that trouble me in regards to the photos. It’s some of the elements of the wider culture as well. This is a world in which many very young girls look to Paris Hilton as a role model, a woman who was arrested for the third time (most recently for cocaine possession) last summer and who addresses her young fans about the perils of making sex videos with their boyfriends. “I want young girls to never put themselves in that situation. . . . Don't ever let someone talk you into doing something you don't want to do," she advises. It’s a culture in which teen clothing companies add maternity lines to their offerings. (And what’s with Justice’s “Monster High?” Blech. It makes me long for the soft embrace of my old Raggedy Ann doll.)

Fashion can be inventive and fun. It can drive us to question some of what we take for granted — and I think those are good things. But the cynical “Cadeaux” goes too far. Instead of eroticizing them and presenting these little girls as sexy pushers of luxury items, mes amis, I say let them eat cake.

Fresh out of the Easy-Bake Oven.

Comments

yeah, a bit creepy, but not quite as bad as the Toddlers and Tiaras stuff!

This edition of your magazine has huge potential to harm young girls. It's not 'edgy' journalism. it crosses a clear line and moves towards thr sexualization of early childhood. This is anathema to most of society including your readers and is deeply offensive.

Our daughter, now 20, made her First Communion/Confirmation in second grade, and she wore the traditional fluffy white dress, little tiara and veil, white lacy socks and little white girly shoes. I was stunned to see that many of the other girls were dressed in slinky, clingy long dresses, spaghetti straps, and one girl had a slinky dress with one bared shoulder. Many of the girls wore high heels, pantyhose and makeup, and very few wore hats or veils. It just seemed odd to dress 7-year-old girls like that for the occasion of being received into the church and partaking of the Lord's Supper for the first time. Or to dress them like that at all. I know that on that day, our daughter looked like a sweet little angel.

Jennifer, it is a disturbing cover. Perhaps there'll be another outcry just like there was about the "how to" book about pedophelia (Her.meneutics covered that not too long ago).

It is good that this is brought up and that a warning is clearly sounded. Images are powerful, far more powerful than we realize. Also, thank you for the helpful referrals to clothing lines. It won't be too long before I'll have to look into them. My 3 1/2 year old will be a 6x much sooner than I expect I am sure! Great article.

Excellent article. Vogue is pushing the boundaries of acceptable journalism by exploiting young girls. This blog should run on op-ed pages all over the country.

In our small town neighborhood, the little girls all love their "American Girl" dolls. We saved all year to buy our daughters theirs, and their grandparents purchased the cute outfits and accessories. Today, the 9 year olds hosted a doll play date and played all afternoon with their look-alike dolls. Bravo to American Girl for tasteful, age appropriate fashion. Companies like this are helping to direct girls towards health, inner beauty, friendship, and care of the environment. I wish Vogue would take direction from American Girl.

Aren't there other ways the magazine can "cross the line" that does not involve children? The other day I was at the mall and saw a group of girls (they could not be any older than 12, at the most), all walking out of victoria secrets with bought goods. Why would preteens even want to buy anything at a victoria secrets? Because victoria secrets advertise to young girls...absolutely sickening.

There is one silver lining to this situation, I think, and that is - especially if this is why Ms. Roitfeld is no longer working for Vogue - that it is making regular people in a country as anti-religious as France sit up and take notice of how contemporary fashion is exploiting little girls. In fact, the whole photo spread could be viewed as a biting satire about people who are shocked by what Vogue has done but think it's adorable to dress their seven year-olds in platform shoes and tight pants with suggestive words printed across the butt.

The photos remind me of two little girls in Thailand who were explaining to a U.S. reporter how they aren't old enough to take care of men like the 11 and 12 yr olds They were holding cans of pop given to them when they are shown to men for picking.

While I was shopping for nieces I was stunned by the shirts for toddlers that had very suggestive sayings on them for regular men and perverts too apparently. Children are always taken advantage of in any society but its usually not so open as now and so its acceptable by the average person. It's up to moms to go through the racks like I did to find the "right" clothing with no suggestive writings and no see through material and no exposing sections, etc. If the girls want to dress like that let them make the decision after they're 18. As long as they live with you, teach them the right way to catch a decent man, not through exposure, free sex, etc. And for you men, how about picking the decently dressed girls instead of grabbing the suggestively dressed girls for marriage. You can help with decency, too, you know and save the little girls for an adulthood without psychological problems and physical damage.

Oh, you can also pull up your pants above your rearend and keep them there.

The only possible positive I could see coming out of these images is the reminder that even consenting women who are normally featured are often only physically mature forms of these innocents, still seeking the acceptance and affirmation that these little girls especially need. Edgy presentation of beautiful women in the latest couture fashion is often lauded, but we've had a recent reminder of the devastation that this industry can bring into the lives of those who give it a face with the death of the French model whose lasting legacy was to make herself an example of anorexia nervosa's death sentence.
Most definitely, these decisions are disturbing, but I wouldn't want to ignore the opportunity to examine the industry yet once again and consider the long-term ramifications.

This is just a different version of child pornography. How to use children for greedy sexually starved perverts. How much did you pay them to do this? How much did you pay their parents to have them do this? What did you tell them in order to get them to wear all that makeup and show a leg seductively? Who were they trying to please when they did this? The magazine should be fined and the young girls and women who are being exploited, murdered, molested, raped, beaten, etc. across the globe should also be in this magazine since that is what results from procative pictures like these are used to promote more hostility against women everywhere. Shame on the people putting this kind of filth in magazines. Protect the children~!

Thanks for highlighting this. It's not new of course. Some decades ago I went into a restaurant in Central England and as I ate my meal became aware (as a Child Protection specialist) of a copy of a painting on the wall. It was Victorian with a little girl of 6 or 7 in a beautiful frilly dress etc. Something about it disturbed me and rang a bell at the back of my mind. She was leaning with her elbow against a wall. Her feet were crossed at the ankles. She looked directly at the viewer in an uncomfortable way. It gradually registered with me that this was was a the pose adopted by women selling themselves by the dockyard bars in the town I had just left. I was too young to do what I think I would do now. Offer to take it off their hands, destroy it, and buy a replacement.

Hm, it's not just the sexual content on the surrounding pages that affects how these images are interpreted. Just the word 'cadeaux' emblazoned across them makes them highly objectionable. It means 'gifts', possibly implying that the little girls are gifts, all wrapped up nicely in luxurious clothes and accessories, goods to be 'gifted'. Yuck yuck yuck!!

Not only should the editor, photographer, et.al Vogue be held accountable, but the parents of these little girls should be have their parental rights terminated! If this is what their parents subject them to at 5, I shudder to think of what they'll push them into at age 10 or 15!

I think this is just another way that society is exploiting children and trying to make little girls grow up too fast. Not to mention, I don't think it is too far a stretch to think that there is something inappropriate in the pictures when the magazine is known for sexually charged ads and the title of the photo shoot is called "Gifts." It would be very degrading in my opinion if it was grown women to be in a photo shoot with a name like that. It just seems to imply that the people IN the photos are the gifts. Besides, the photographers shouldn't have been using children in their photoshoots anyway. If there were so-called innocent pictures of children in a magazine like Playboy, people would be outraged. It doesn't matter what's going on in the picture, it's the point of the magazine they are appearing in.

The photos accompanying this post made me feel ill. The sexualization of childhood, particularly of young girls, is a serious concern. When CHILDREN are presented in a SEXUAL manner, it crosses a boundary. I don't even have the words to express... It's sick. I have been concerned about this issue for some time since I have a young daughter myself. I am constantly on alert for media and situations that would be inappropriate for her. I want her to be a CHILD at the age of 5. Parents, please, please, please censor your children's exposure to all forms of media. They simply cannot grow up thinking that it's okay for a 7 year old to be sexy.

I also want to point out that the fashion industry regularly uses adult women models who LOOK LIKE children. The extremely thin, straight bodied, flat chested preference for models implies child-like youth. This is not an accident. It's purposeful. The global culture often accepts sexual uses of children. There are somewhere between 3 and 5 million children worldwide who are sex slaves (as they are not able to consent at the age of 8 or 10 or 12). Photos like this, and many others even if they are adult women, contribute to the acceptance of this horror by many people.

If these girls are playing dress-up, why don't they look like they're having fun?

Thanks for thoughtful comments. Mary - who posted just above - YES that is an exceptionally succinct response to the pictures and would have been a great post all by itself, without my longer one! (Thank you!)

I agree with Robyn 100%. The modelling agency does pick women who are so stick thin their figures resemble that of a girl's figure that you'd expect a 12 year old to have not a woman who is say 20+. Women are supposed to have curves, it's natural, it's healthy. But the modelling industry seems to want to portray child like features as being more attractive than a natural woman. It's like trying to attract men to little girls who haven't developed properly yet and I find that a bit sickening and wrong. Why can't girls just be allowed to be children instead of being turned into adults and be carefree and have fun, without added pressure and the responsibilty to turn into adults before they are ready? A 7 year old girl being curious about her mum's makeup and clothes and trying a bit on for fun and role play is a bit different to plastering a 7 year old top to toe in make up,and dressing them like a woman and making them pose and pout because we all know that woman in the media are portrayed as sex objects, they have to be attractive and bare some skin because that's all that matters is seduction. If a 12 year old boy is made to dress up as a man it still suggests trying to make children grow up too fast but not as bad as the girl being made to look like a woman and dressing her seductively because men aren't seen or portrayed as sex objects like women are. Also women have the choice of whether they want to do a sexy shoot or not, or promote their looks or whatever. A girl doesn't really have a choice, she doesn't have as much knowledge or awareness as a woman does of what she's portraying and what she's up against and usually they've been pressured into it by their parents. The parents make the decision to apply to the modelling agency for their child. I was also sickened by Katie Price plastering her 2 year old daughter in fake tan and false lashes recently and think Peter Andre had every right to be outraged by it. She's basically teaching her daughter to be insecure about her looks, that she can't be naturally beautiful and that she has to plaster herself in make up in order to be attractive. She's also teaching her that a female's only function is to look good for the boys/men and her only function is to please the opposite sex by trying to look immaculate all the time. Experimenting with say a bit of nail varnish or lipgloss when she's older is fine but going over the top with it and on someone who is only 2 years old is crossing the line in my opinion.

And also that picture, the magazine is not just saying that women have to be immaculate, look good, make more effort then men to dress up, be physical, sexual objects but now girls have to follow suit. Girls are not women, for goodness sake! And shouldn't be dressed up to look like it! Just leave them alone the way they are.

I seem to recall a fall Chico’s catalog with several images of a fairly young girl dressed up in make-up and jewelry, yet no one was outraged. The company sells women’s clothing to the 35+ demographic, yet it chose to include this young girl in its catalog as a way to market its products. The girl has not appeared in catalogs since then, but I don’t recall anyone saying that this company was robbing little girls of their innocence when the catalog appeared since the idea of “dress up” was more easily conveyed because of the product. But the little girl did NOT look like the typical “dress-up” child; rather, the girl was photographed as a high fashion model would be—picture perfect hair and make-up and not with any outlandish “costuming” or “pretend” posing. Vogue is actually late to the game.

Barbara wrote: "Thanks for highlighting this. It's not new of course. Some decades ago I went into a restaurant in Central England and as I ate my meal became aware (as a Child Protection specialist) of a copy of a painting on the wall. It was Victorian with a little girl of 6 or 7 in a beautiful frilly dress etc. Something about it disturbed me and rang a bell at the back of my mind. She was leaning with her elbow against a wall. Her feet were crossed at the ankles. She looked directly at the viewer in an uncomfortable way."

Fronia E. Wissman wrote in her book "Bouguereau" (Pomegranate Artbooks, 1996): "Such images as 'Rest in Harvest' or 'Child at Bath' (1886; Plate 40) set off alarm bells in the late twentieth century, with our awareness of child abuse in its many forms. It is important when looking at these pictures and others by Bouguereau, his contemporaries, and precursors back to antiquity--in which children, nude or clothed, are depicted in what to our eyes are provocative poses and situations--that we remember we are looking at art, a complex system of symbols and conventions that only rarely reflects life as it is lived. In antiquities fat little babies painted on vases and in murals played at all sorts of grown-up games, from assisting at romantic assignations to forging iron or waging mock battles. Artists in the Renaissance revived the babies-as-adults theme, and the tradition continued.

. . .

"In Bouguereau's paintings the only element of interest is the figure, and when that figure is a seminaked child, whose direct gaze meets ours, we grow uneasy. But Bouguereau's intended audience did not. If they acknowledged the undercurrent of sexuality, either they repressed it and enjoyed the superb painting technique, or they admitted an appeal in a way perhaps more honest than our contemporary mores permit. Think of Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll), who was able to photograph little girls in the nude only because the parents of the girls allowed him to do so. An appreciation of the fullness of childhood, which encompasses innocence and sexuality, informs both Dodgson's photographs and Bouguereaus's paintings." (p. 60 and 62)

Barbara: it is good that, as a a Child Protection specialist, you saw the danger present several decades ago, of children made to look like prostitutes of the day. The painting you saw, however, came from Victorian England, a time when Englishmen and -women held a far different value system than the one promoted by both the prostitutes of several decades ago and by the odious Vogue article in question. Your alarm bells rang true: they just rang for the fire raging in England of several decades ago, not of a fire raging in Queen Victoria's England.

I could be wrong, of course: not all artists were as principled as M. Bouguereau. What do you think?

GREAT piece. Sometimes I breathe a sigh of relief that I'm not raising girls.

And to think I was enjoying climbing trees when I was 6 or 7! I'm glad this article brought this to light, but I wish the author would have researched the Forever 21 maternity line a little more thoroughly. Forever 21 is not solely a teen clothing line, but have loads of customers in their 20's, 30's, and up. They have cheap, fashionable clothing, and when my husband and I decide to have kids you can guarantee I'll be buying maternity clothes from them. Fashionable maternity clothes are hard to find so Forever 21 is filling that niche and I think it's great! Let's choose our battles wisely.

'Your alarm bells rang true: they just rang for the fire raging in England of several decades ago, not of a fire raging in Queen Victoria's England.'

Sorry Les, if you don't think this was an issue in Victorian England you realy are very unaware of the the major issues there were with the white slave trade and child prostitution in that era. The British Parliament was corrupt enough to have numerous members who wanted to lower the age of consent from 12 to 10 years so that they could legally rape ever younger girls.

That they were prevented from doing so was in large part due to the work of WT Stead of the Pall Mall Gazette and the leadership of the Salvation Army who fought to see the age of consent raised to it's current 16 years. Do a search on The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon for more infor on the subject.

Unfortunately the same issues of child prostitution are still being swept under the carpet. See this Wednesday's issue of 'The Times' (of London) for an up to date UK expose.

As a dad of 17 and 5 year old daughters, I am well aware of (and involved in) the battle to keep them protected without their being naive. Sometimes it just needs enough people going in to complain to the stockists, especially if they are major chains. Raise your voices where they can have maximum financial impact as well as here.

Good article.

the other thing is having worked in fashion before becoming a christian i have been exposed to rumours of editors preying on models, 60 year men finding 14-16 year old models.. it is the SAME thing, i'm sorry. the whole industry is from the pit, I am glad i am on my way out.

Iain wrote: "'Your alarm bells rang true: they just rang for the fire raging in England of several decades ago, not of a fire raging in Queen Victoria's England.'

Sorry Les, if you don't think this was an issue in Victorian England you realy are very unaware of the the major issues there were with the white slave trade and child prostitution in that era."

Iain, thank you for clarifying the issue.

"Cadeaux" presents us with a complex, interlocking set of problems: what people do in real life and what people do in art. "Cadeaux" is horrible both levels: on the level of life and on the level of art.

First, on the level of life, the artists and publishers actually exploited real little girls in order to sell their magazines. That is wrong. That is evil.

Second, "Cadeaux" is horrible on the level of art because it says that artists can legitimately seuxally exploit little girls as art and such exploitation can remain good art. No, it cannot. It is bad art. It is evil.

Third, in 2011, in today's culture, the article writer perceived correctly "Cadeaux's" problems.

In my previous post, I was speaking to the poster (either Barbara or Robin Forrester, I am not sure which) about the problem she correctly perceived in the England of Elizabeth II. I do not denigrate the poster for her insight, I congratulate her on it.

At the same time, I wanted to to tell the poster that when she observed the painting on the restaurant wall, she perceived the problems of an age later than, and of a culture different than, that of the painting. Very likely the painting she saw did not show the problems of the England of Victoria.

I then tried to illustrate the differences of time and culture with the (apparently) correct behaviors of the Roman Catholic artist Bouguereau in France who lived across the Channel from Victoria's England.

In your post, Iain, you very forcefully (and correctly, I believe) laid out some of the awful problems that plagued Victorian England. I will search out the sources you cited and will read them with great interest. The painting the previous poster saw on her restaurant's wall in Central England may not have presented those problems. Just as Dr. Wissman wrote: "Such images as 'Rest in Harvest' or 'Child at Bath' (1886; Plate 40) set off alarm bells in the late twentieth century, with our awareness of child abuse in its many forms. It is important when looking at these pictures and others by Bouguereau, his contemporaries, and precursors back to antiquity--in which children, nude or clothed, are depicted in what to our eyes are provocative poses and situations--that we remember we are looking at art, a complex system of symbols and conventions that only rarely reflects life as it is lived. . . . " Wissman wrote that Victorian Englishmen (and -women) responded differently to such art than we do today.

That said, did horrible things occur in Victoria's England? Yes. At the same time, across the Channel in France, did horrible things happen, in art and in life, at the same time as M. Bouguereau endeavoured through his decades of work to do the right thing? Yes. But I don't want us to comfuse the three times and cultures.

So, Iain, the situation "Cadeaux" presents us with is complex. Some people are doing horrible things to little children in real life. Some people are doing good things to little children in real life. Some artists are doing horrible things in their art while still claiming respectability and demanding acceptance. Other artists are doing good in their art. Some art customers see art made in the present and correctly perceive present problems in the present art. Other art customers see art made in the past and project today's problems into the past. The past had its own problems, both in life and in art. I posted because I don't want us to confuse the problems.

As the dad of a prima ballerina, Mila Izotova, I am well aware of (and involved in) the battle to keep her and all dancers protected without her being naive.

Sincerely,

Les Nordman

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