Yesterday I happened across something on TV that I didn't watch long enough to learn the name of the program, nor who was speaking, but it was interviewing experts and others about the problems young girls have who sexually mature early.
They said the effects on those children were multiple and affected them at school and at home, causing both their school mates and the adults in their lives to treat them differently than if they had not developed early.
They were teased and resented at school by their peers and subjected to inappropriate sexual attention from older males. Their parents tended to expect more of them than would be reasonable for children their age because they looked older than they were. Girls who developed early were more likely to become depressed than those who had not.
Recently the BBC news web site, USA Today, and other sites have featured items about the damaging effects on girls of commercial efforts to sexualize them.
Among the contributing elements to sexualize young girls are sexually suggestive dolls. Everyone knows that Barbie is a sexualized doll, but now we also have the very popular Bratz doll series.
Linked to the Bratz dolls are suggestive clothing for girls that match up with Bratz doll clothing.
Let's allow our children to be children.
And let's allow all females to be fully human persons, not objects.
Don't buy the dolls.
Don't buy the clothing.
Write or email companies that sexually exploit children, even if they do it indirectly, and object.
Treat children like children, even if they have developed early.
It is their right.
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