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I’m pretty liberal when it comes to what my 6-year-old wants to wear, and I’m all for her playing dress up at home. But I would never let my child put on lingerie -- not even inside the house. Wanting to look spectacular is one thing, but looking sexy as a kindergartener is not okay.
That’s why I have to wonder what kind of mother would buy her daughter items from Jours Après Lunes, a new French lingerie and loungewear line aimed at girls 4- to 12-years-old. Just look at how the child models are styled in those photos: They’re all wide-eyed and disheveled, like Miley Cyrus in those Annie Leibovitz Vanity Fair shots, only much younger.
I want to grab a robe and cover these girls up, just looking at them.
My issue isn’t with nudity (though, as I’ve said before, I won’t let my child be naked outside of the safety of our home). And its not with the amount of skin shown -- if you look through the collection, the apparel doesn’t show any more skin than a bikini, and plenty of kids wear those. It’s the message that’s disturbing. No one should be encouraging prepubescent girls -- preschoolers in some cases -- to act or look sexy or sexual. (Kids are exposed to enough sexy stuff as it is, no matter how vigilant we are as parents.)
Although some folks may blame the French for this -- after all, they’re the ones who recently put a provocatively posed 10-year-old in Vogue Paris -- I think it’s a worldwide phenomenon. Toddlers & Tiaras and its knockoffs routinely feature kids who are more done up than your average streetwalker.
One day, my daughter will be old enough to pick out something at Victoria’s Secret (hopefully I’ll be dead by then). But for now, I want her underwear to be decorated with princesses and fairies, not satin and lace.
