1. My daughter loves pink, fluffy, sparkly princess stuff and I love my daughter.

2. I trust my daughter—she is strong and smart and funny and, yes, beautiful, and none of this is diminished by her love of pink, fluffy, sparkly princess stuff.

3. Princesses are to girls as superheroes are to boys. It’s a costume that makes them feel powerful and happy and fun.

4. If she has decided that she loves everything princesses and we show our adult disdain for what pleases her, we do a little bit of damage to her confidence in what she believes and her trust in her own mind.

5. Girls who dress-up like princesses don’t know that we’re worried about how they’ll dress in 15 years and we have no idea who they will become or how they will dress or whether how they’ll dress will have anything to do with who they’ll become.

6. Wearing fancy dresses doesn’t hold them back one bit. They will still go on a Bear Hunt.

7. Princess is just a jumping off point, they are never just-a-princess—add a cape or a hat or a cardboard box or a wand or boots or a mask or layer anything else on top of that fancy dress and you have a fairy-princess-ballerina or a princess magician or a princess-cowgirl or a princess-mommy or a princess who runs a lemonade stand or who takes a rocket ship to Mars or puts out a fire in a fancy, fancy way. Endless creativity is possible from here.

8. Imaginary play is imaginary play is imaginary play, even when there are princesses. And creative dramatic play is important for kids—they have a lot of stories they need to tell.

9. Princess stories are rewritten every time they are lived by strong, smart girls who are raised by parents who teach them that they are strong and smart and can do anything. And when we read those old princess stories that trouble us to our daughters, we get to talk about why they trouble us.

10. Condescending to pink, fluffy, sparkly princess stuff shows our cultural bias against all things feminine and girly, and contributes to a world in which “gender-neutral” skews boyish and masculine and is never pink or purple. And that diminishes our daughters and our sons.

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