Decoding the Tamil Daddy's Little Princess Memes

 

Q: What's behind Tamil Daddy's little princess memes? A: Tamil men's insecurity, jealousy, and anger.  💀💀💀

Daddy's little princess memes is endemic to Tamil men. When I started the Karuththu Kannammaa page in 2015, Malaysian Tamil men who couldn't even write basic English inundated the comment section in fake profiles, telling the female admins to go cook and wash dishes.

The fear in these men that women will no longer cook, clean, serve them and their families is becoming prevalent due to feminism. (Now, feminism never says that women shouldn't cook, clean, and take care of their families - we are just saying that they are not our birth purpose.) The same fear primarily drives Daddy's little princes memes.

1. As Tamil women focus more on education and career before marriage, they often don't learn how to cook and clean because they need to slog for exams, internals and all. This poses a huge threat to Tamil men who are still stuck in the Padayappa age - they want a replacement for their mother, not an equal partner.

Tamil men still intend to marry so they can have a wife who cooks delicious food even though she's a PhD holder and a rocket scientist. In recent years, many dads pamper their daughters with a lot of love. For example, I was 12 and I was cooking when my dad came to visit me unannounced. (My mom left my dad in the village and came to the city to work and educate me when I was eight.) When my dad saw me cooking, he got very upset. The complex here is, "daughters shouldn't suffer by cooking and cleaning but wives must cook and clean." These men fail to see that cooking and cleaning are life skills men and women must know. For them, daughters are princesses, wives are maids.

Such little princess memers and proponents also fear that they must share the load at home when they marry such "coddled" women. So, they make these memes not only to warn women that they must know cooking and cleaning but also to amplify that if women don't cook and clean, they will get abused by their mothers-in-law, resulting in their dads losing face.

This is nothing but to preserve patriarchal culture that include:

• No matter how highly-educated and pampered a woman is, she must know how to do household chores. Because she will be going to another house and do household chores there.
• If a woman doesn't know how to cook and clean, it's ignoble for her parents.
• If a woman doesn't know how to cook and clean, she'll be abused by her husband and in-laws.

2. Dads these days don't worry if their daughters can't cook. Memes like these show how dads "adjust" to their lil princesses' inexperienced bad cooking. The sons are not Sanji by any definition - their cooking will be just as bad - BUT THEY WON'T SHOW IT. Because, "cooking is a woman's job." 

The mollycoddling, son is king treatment are now being given to daughters too.

The age of daughters being burdens and being killed is slowly fading in Tamil homes. Since sons always had privilege but daughters are getting the same now, these men are envious.

Don't get me wrong. Sexism is prevailing in Tamil households. And it's those households that produce such men. They can't stand it when their sisters don't get reprimanded for bad cooking. They fear that such women will be married to them and they need to adjust and even cook. 

These men are also in angst because the dads think that their daughters shouldn't suffer by cooking and cleaning after marriage, thus searching for well off husbands for their princesses.

In a world where men think women must serve their husbands, this little princess trend makes them a worrywart that stays awake all night, petrified that they don't make enough to get a wife.

3. It doesn't matter if it's cooking or filmmaking, Tamil Dad's little princess memers take every opportunity to dumb women down and limit their abilities.

Again, it's jealousy and insecurity for Tamil men when women venture into different fields with their dads support.  

4. Men always talk about how unfortunate they are to marry dad's little princesses, immersing in victimhood and self-pity. They sit and make such memes but never upgrade themselves to learn cook and clean, hoping to pile it on women by capitalizing on patriarchy and shaming.

5. These men like to paint themselves as the poor creatures suffering in a marriage coz dad's little princesses can't serve them. For them, a woman shouldn't learn cooking as a life skill - it's to serve their husbands and their families.

I was hungry one day when I was 10 years old. So I whipped up fried rice. As a teen, I cooked on sleepovers and made vegetarian dishes for my elder sister when she was doing a penance. My cousins and I used to cook elaborate meals for ourselves (all girls). Baking and cooking are my hobbies. Men don't like this. They want women learn cooking for them, not for ourselves.  

6. These men can never think of anything else a dad's little princess is inept at. It's always cooking, cleaning, and washing. This denotes their mindset that a girl's purpose in life is being a housemaid for her husband and in-laws.

7. It's the men who don't move out of their parents' home after marriage, expect all the comforts they enjoyed before marriage to continue after marriage, and want dishes made to taste exactly like their moms'. But they have the audacity to shame women via dad's little princess memes.

This phenomenon may sound like a joke but the underbelly of it is patriarchy, sexism, and gender roles.

These guys want women to be ready to serve them by the time they get married = insecurity and entitlement. They don't want women to get pampered by their dads but want to be pampered by their moms even after marriage = selfishness. Finally, they want women to do all the housework even when they work jobs.

8. Rarely, there are Tamil Dad's little princess memes that are genuinely funny and pinpoint the close relationship between dad and daughter positively. Having a close relationship with my dad didn't stop me from learning life skills. I used to take my late dad to hospital appointments, skipping school and we used to have long conversations.

Somehow, in our society, the bond between mom and son is never seen negatively although it's the main reason for incapacitating our men from being home-independent. But when daughters and dads are close, it somehow generates discontent and every step is taken to ensure the daughters be wives and daughters-in-law who serve their husbands and in-laws well.