The Ugly Duckling

I'm currently reading a book called The 101 Most Influential People Who Never Lived. Now, clearly, they use the term "people" rather loosely because #55 is The Ugly Duckling. And though most of the book's short essays are rather comical (and therefore sometimes confusing if you're not familiar with the character being discussed), I thought this one was rather poignant. So the following is that essay, taken directly from that book....

The Ugly Duckling--#55
Parents have related this story to their children for the past 150 years and will undoubtedly continue to do so unless we can find a way to successfully boycott this outrageous tale. For those of you who do not recall Hans Christian Andersen's 1844 story, here it is in brief.
On a summer's day in a farmyard, a duck hatches several ducklings, all of which are adorable except the last. He came from the largest of her eggs and was "different," ugly. Because of this, he was physically and emotionally abused.
Unable to endure this mistreatment, he ran away. During the following fall and winter, he survived many dangerous and nerve-racking adventures. He was almost killed by hunters and their dogs, but escaped and found shelter in a woman's cottage. However, she soon turned him out because he could not lay eggs.
During the winter, he became frozen to the surface of a pond. A peasant freed him and took him home, but the bird frightened his children. As a result, he was again turned out and had to spend the rest of the hard winter in misery and privation.
In the spring, he saw three lovely white swans and flew into the water next to them. Totally discouraged and depressed by his constant rejection, he told them to kill him and bent his head down awaiting death. But in the water he saw his image. He was no longer ugly, but a graceful, beautiful swan; the most handsome of them all. The older swans bowed their heads before him. In his bliss, he tells us that he could never have been this happy if he had remained an ugly duckling.
While parents may rationalize that they are merely introducing their children, especially their young daughters, to the realities of the world, they should think of the distorted values they are promoting and stop this nonsense. In fact, it's wore than nonsense. The story is downright insulting and degrading to the overwhelming majority of us who have remained "ugly ducklings" throughout our entire lives.
The tale ignores our inherent worth, our intelligence, wealth of acquired knowledge, hard work, and creative capacities. It give tacit approval to childhood bullying and marginalization of those who are "different," while ignoring the humanistic concept of the worth of each person.
We should encourage our children to develop mental, emotional, and physical strengths. We should teach them not to rely on physical attractiveness.
Let's stop telling our children that beauty is the central focus of their worth, that a woman's attractiveness is her "wealth" in life. The Andersen story reinforces the endless advertising messages that tell a girl that she is inferior unless she is beautiful. If you accept these values, you have stepped into a world in which her husband can be expected to reject her later in life for a younger, more attractive "trophy wife."
Please join those of us who have closed our doors to the offensive message of the ugly duckling because we treasure the intrinsic merit of all children.


It begs the question.....how is this still a popular story???