Mild, mild life.(Girls Gone Mild: Young Women Reclaim Self-Respect and Find It's Not Bad to Be Good)(Book review)

Girls Gone Mild: Young Women Reclaim Self-Respect and Find It's Not Bad to Be Good, by Wendy Shalit (Random House, 352 pp., $25.95)

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Baby, baby, it's a wild world--from your earliest days. Recalling a 2002 controversy over Abercrombie and Fitch's marketing of thongs to ten-year-old girls, Wendy Shalit now observes: "Parents no longer debate the merits of thongs for tweens but instead whether I'M TOO SEXY FOR MY DIAPER is a 'healthy' message for an infant girl's onesie."

The mother of a toddler, Shalit begins her new book with an account of a trip to her local toy store--which had disturbing echoes of a red-light district. Never mind that Marvin Gaye was singing "When I get that feeling, I want sexual healing" on the store's speakers. "In the doll section," Shalit recalls, "only dolls in tight-fitting, provocative outfits stared out at me, all wearing heavy makeup and self-satisfied, flirty expressions. The young sprite browsing next to me, who looked about seven years old, wore a purple cropped top and peep-toe wedges with heels two inches high--an outfit that seemed to mock the very idea of finding a suitable doll for a little girl."

The "Bratz Babyz" dolls Shalit was looking at included a "Babyz Nite Out" doll wearing "fishnet stockings, a hot-pink micromini, and a black leather belt." The box tells you the Babyz are for the "four-plus" set, but kids of two and three can be seen with them at your local playground. Shalit visited the manufacturer's website, and observed: "Many of the 'Babyz' ... are posed very seductively, showing off their slick lips and teeny-weeny underpants. The Baby Bratz doll 'Phoebe' is garbed in a fluffy pink fur with matching lingerie, and her twin, 'Roxxi,' is stuffed into red-hot lingerie and a black leather jacket." Companion Bratz books that are advertised to girls three and up ask girls what they wear when they "want to look hot for an extra special occasion." Shalit is right to call this "creepy."

So much for the bad news, the "Wild"; now let's look at the "Mild."

Shalit says that in a culture where "being publicly sexual has become the only acceptable way for girls to demonstrate maturity," it's heartening that it's not so much the older folks--like Tipper Gore and other politically connected angry moms--who are fighting back, as it is the young girls themselves. The smut is still out there, and it's often in your face--even when you're with your kids. But it's not going unchallenged.