THE JU: The Greatest thing Ever

So this is an essay that I read in my English 101 textbook "The Writers Way" and I think it's safe to say that it's one of the funniest things ever written/ is totally true. I have long thought about blogging about the horrors of Libby Lu but nobody says it better than Neve Chonin, so I'll leave it to her

NOTIN' BUT A TWEEN THANG

NEVA CHONIN

I live in a blessed bubble. My local cafes have free wireless, two green grocers gracet the neighborhood, my landlords babysit my pet mouse, and I have never seen a Club Libby Lu.

If you like me, knew nothing of Club Libby Lu until recently lemme tell ya, they're all the rage. Club Libbly Lu is a chain of more that 80 stores targeting girls ages 5 to 12, konwn by marketers as the "tween" demographic. This is the age where girls grow tired of toddling but haven't yet decided to hate their parents.

According to http://www.clublibbylu.com/, their stores aren't just retail outlets, but "something special!" They offer "a fun funky place to hang out" where grls can "dress up like a princess, rock star or drama queen" in a "famous Style Studio". They can get a manicure. They can "sing and dance to the latest club beat" with Libby's "inspiring Club Counselors". At Libby Lu "every girl is treated like a VIP--Very Important Princess! It's totally a girl thing!"

Totally! Libby Lu is one reason I'll never have children. The thought of sharing my home with a preening little monster in drama queen drag is enough to make me...oh, do something that would qualify me as an unfit mother. Like engaging said child in endless games of "Make the Princess Cry" and "Destroy the Drama Queen's Self Esteem--Forever". Besides encouraging kids to be egotistical brats, Libby Lu and other kiddie stores like Monkey Dooz reinforce annoying stereotypes --as opposed to legitimate sexual differences--and transform children into tiny grotesques destined for an adulthood as gender-polarized as their parents'. Do all little girls long to be pretty in pink? Really? Because by age 6, I was eating dirt and wanting to be a Japanese robot. I pulled my Barbie dolls apart limb by limb and reassembled them into hybrid monsters. I did the usual sick stuff all kids, regardless of sex, love to do as they explore their world's boundries.

There are no Japanese robots at Club Libby lu. Instead, tweenies are treated to makeovers--hair extensions, makeup, the whole shebang--and then according to a March Washington Post article, led in a dance by club counselors who urge them to "shimmy down" and "shake it" while a soundtrack instructs "Wet your lips/ And smile to the camera".

That done, the tots visit the Pooch Parlor to selcet a miniature stuffed dog, complete with couture carrier and a doggie T-shirt sloganed with something like "They Royal Heiress".

I'm sorry, did my projectile vomit just splash your coffee mug? Such is the risk of freading me in the morning. Because, I mean, dude. Just...dude. I'll say it plainly: LIBBY LU IS BREEDING MONSTERS. GOD HELP US. GRAB THE KIDS. TAKE THE DOG AND HEAD FOR THE BOMB SHELTER. GO NOW. Does the world need more vapid idiots? Does it? Look at the White House. Look at Britney Spears and K-Fed. And it gets worse! From the Post, a description of Libby Lu's interior:

The store is pink. There are pink ruffles around the light fixtures. The walls and stools

are blue and pink. The staff wears pink. There are pink cowboy hats for sale, pink

Ugg-like boots, pink phones decorated with pink feathers. There are rings with huge

diamonds, like J.Lo might wear (only fake), with pink packaging that reads "Bling!

Bling!"

Bling. Bling. Pass me an airsickness bag, cover your cup and tell me what you think of this: Libby Lu is all the rage for birthday parties. So what if a little girl's circle of friends includes little boys? Are little boys allowed to explore their inner drama queens too? The question is rhetorical. Of course their not. Libby Lu likes to keep the sexes segregated, Taliban-style. Libby Lu isn't reggressive, it's revolutionary, proposing a level of male-female isolation that this country hasn't seen since Puritanism waned four centuries ago. Sayonara, childhood friendship between the sexes. Hello, tween-boy frat parties with ginger-ale kegs. This is what really irks me, but what bothers many anti-Libby parents the most is something hinted at in yet another Post outtake (hey I enjoy my newspapers). "Sometimes people walking through the mall gather by the windows at Club Libby Lu to watch the spectacle of little girls, "with all that pink and glitter. All that flesh too."

Mmmmm. All that little girl flesh. Tastes like chicken. Now, while my thoughts turn to cannibalism, others have less savory minds. For many moms, the thought of adults watching kids parade in skimpy outfits raises the specter of--what else?--pedophilia. Yow! Perverts in the mall!

To that, I say, hush. I do think it's wretched for Libby Lu to train tots for lives as gold-digging sex-bots, but I don't think it necessarily inspires men in trench coats to abscond with the foul little princesses. Some mothers disagree. They disagree to the point where they're ready to picket, say, Kenneth Cole for dressing kids in any kind of adult attire, even suits and ties.

Where does this leave us?

On one side the pink vaccum of Libb Lu; on the other, the repressive hysteria of neo-Puritans. Stuck in between on an ever-shrinking field of sanity, the rest of us,

I've said it before, so I might as well say it again: Procreation is vastly overrated.

(San Fransisco Chronicle, Datebooks, July 23, 2006)