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Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

Lauren Faust on Television for Young Girls

by Susana Polo | 10:22 am, April 1st

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I was extremely skeptical at first about taking the job. Shows based on girls’ toys always left a bad taste in my mouth, even when I was a child. They did not reflect the way I played with my toys. I assigned my ponies and my Strawberry Shortcake dolls distinctive personalities and sent them on epic adventures to save the world. On TV, though… female characters [in children's shows] have been so homogenized with old-fashioned “niceness” that they have no flaws and are unrelatable. They are so pretty, polite and perfect; there is no legitimate conflict and nothing exciting ever happens…

This perception, more than anything, is what I am trying to change with My Little Pony.

– Lauren Faust, creative head and executive producer of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic.

We already loved the My Little Pony mashup videos, but, okay, now I’m seriously considering paying an extra $2 in Netflix a month to get My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic DVDs. Faust’s whole post on My Little Pony and her attempts to create a show for girls that says “There are lots of different ways to be a girl,” can be found here, and it’s well worth a read.

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  • Cahi

    My family has long been into cartoons*(it’s an epic battle between Disney and Warner Brothers EVERY DAY), and this has been on our watch list for a while, especially with its popularity and twisting of the ‘toy tv show’ idea. (That didn’t make sense). Glad to hear Ms. Faust’s opinion on it.**

    *They loved ‘Foster’s Home’, so it only makes sense.
    **That, and the blog battle about the show’s stance on girls was getting on my nerves.

  • Anonymous

    Brony checking in here! Lauren must be doing something right if she can appeal to such a wide demographic. Good role models for girls… and men from 18-35.

  • Zirman

    WHY DID YOU QUIT D: