Value and worth?

Listening to an ad on the radio this afternoon that has me somewhat stunned and wondering what decade we’re in.

Here’s the gist of it… “the perfect diamond engagement ring will be with her forever – even when you can’t be there…the next time she doubts herself, the ring on her finger will tell the world that this woman is loved, that she matters and has value…” You get the idea.

I actually spoke out loud in my car, what?! So stunned was I that a radio ad was being broadcast that carried the message that I had just heard. A message that, by its nature, implies that a woman cannot believe in her own abilities and live a confident, independent life without a man to support and encourage her. That insinuates that she has less, or no, worth or value if she doesn’t have that ring on her hand that shouts to the world that she is “good enough” for someone to marry… The message that she will need to have a ridiculously over-priced bauble on her finger to remind her that she has worth and value and strength because someone loves her…

Is this the message that we are still feeding ourselves? I had hoped that the fairy tale that every little girl just needs a prince to make her life perfect had been swept off the books. That fairy tale that told our girls that they were incomplete without a man was finally put to rest. A fairytale that instilled the pressure in our boys that they were responsible for a woman’s happiness.

Apparently that fable is alive and well though and has been prettied up and skewed just enough to be more about feeding materialism than measuring a woman’s worth based on her ability to find a mate.

Sad to think that as far as our society has come, there’s still so far to go.