Real Women Don't Wear Dresses/Western Animation

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Examples of Real Women Don't Wear Dresses in Western Animation include:

Played with in an episode of American Dad: In the beginning, Francine is practicing for a pie-baking contest, leading Hayley to belittle her and ask her questions like when she plans on giving back the vote. Later at night, Francine catches Hayley, wearing a frilly, outdated dress, baking pies of her own.
- Played with in another episode. Hayley makes a video of Francine, mocking her status as a typical housewife who sews, cooks, and cleans. Francine is distraught and recieves a fake doctor's license, then works for the handicapped mafia. Things get out of hand, but once Francine takes care of things Hayley apologizes for claiming Francine couldn't do anything important.
Avatar: The Last Airbender averts it, too. Yes, there are very masculine and kick-ass female characters like Toph and Azula, but then there're those like the Team Mom Katara and the incredibly perky Ty Lee. There's also Suki, leader of the Kyoshi warriors, who makes a point of showing how her fighting out-fit is very feminine, and she's just as good for it. And all of these girls could probably kill you.
- Also averted in the sequel series. The first episode alone introduces the title character Korra and Chief Lin Bei Fong, both of whome are quite masculine, but also the Jinora, Ikki and Pema, who are girlier (and all related, incidently). We later get Asami, a girl who despite her beautiful looks and polite manners is an expert racer and fighter.
Usually averted in The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes; The Wasp fights crime in a black and yellow dress, but still proves tough in battle. However, she spends a good portion of Ms. Marvel's first episode griping about how Ant-Man always puts work and science ahead of returning her love for him. This builds up to Wasp interrupting a battle with a destructive robot to complain about Ant-Man's priorities. Ms. Marvel is still an ordinary Army major when this episode takes place, so she wears her uniform while investigating the night's potentially dangerous disturbance, and keeps a constant focus on eliminating the threat. She also advises Wasp to keep her jealousy at bay.
- Ms. Marvel wears a women's leotard when performing super-heroic duties, creating another aversion.
The Barbie movies avert many clichés thrown at the Disney Princesses line. The heroines always have interests and hobbies of their own, as well as sisters and female friends with whom they pass the Bechdel Test. Heck, even the female love rivals are well-portrayed (like the sweet female Paolo from Barbie: Jungle Princess) and one even features a girl saying that, much as she loves the prince, she cannot marry him because she has to travel the world and pursue her dreams first.
Averted in My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic: we've got two tomboys of different flavors (one athlete and one workaholic), we've got three girly girls - a Shrinking Violet, a Genki Girl and The Fashionista - and we got Twilight Sparkle who can serve as counterpart for both groups. Neither are Applejack and Rainbow Dash permanently superior nor are Rarity, Fluttershy, Pinkie or Twilight weaker or stupid. They all have different approaches to something and it depends on the problem what will work (In Rarity's case the approach is passive-aggressive whining, proving that you don't have to be on the physical side to take action). Not to mention their Physical Godess Princess Celestia is very, very feminine. And, well, several thousand years old, lifts the sun every day and is noone to mess with in general.
- Series creator Lauren Faust herself is 100% opposed to this mentality in fact, stating that the reason why feminine characters come off badly is usually due to poor writing/direction.
- And let's not forget the occasional all-out brawls. The Fashionista? Mean left hoof. Genki Girl? Ends up parking the show on the Gatling Good page.
Nicely averted in Phineas and Ferb. Isabella is a cute little girl who dresses in pink and bows, and loves fluffy unicorns- she's also a leader of her Fire Side girl troupe, a master fighter and sports player, and is capable of building time machines. There's a variety of other female characters- both the girl Candace and Stacy, and the more tom-boy-ish Vanessa, and they can all kick-ass when the situation calls for it.
Deconstructed in Wonder Woman. The Amazons are trained early in life to be warriors, but are secluded from mankind for centuries. Something Persephone calls Hippolyta out on near the film's climax. Diana herself manages to find a balance towards the movies end. She moves to New York and is in a relationship with Steve, but she still maintains her status as an Amazon and fights crime whenever she's needed.

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