The New Disney Princess - Strong and Independant

I love Disneyland. I love seeing kids excited, I love feeling like a kid, I love the magic, I love the music and parades, I love it all. Except the lines, but who thinks of Disneyland and says 'Gee, I can hardly wait until we get there so we can wait in a line.' But I digress... I love Disneyland. And Disney movies. I have a lot of friends who are... how to put this in a way that is honest and yet shows I actually value this characteristic... Crunchy. My friends are mostly crunchy. They are environmentalists, composters, backpackers, organic-food-eaters and feminists. Something about this crunchiness also lends itself to hating Disney. Not everyone of course, but there is a good chunk of overlap between Crunchy and Disney-hater. And I kind of understand where they are coming from when you look at the old Disney Princess model. Snow White - hid in the woods where she cooked and cleaned for 7 strange men and was saved from being a vegetable by the magic kiss of a man she didn't know at all. Ariel the little mermaid - left her family and her entire life behind and changed her whole identity for a guy she barely knew. Cinderella - treated like scum by her step-mother. She was too afraid to do anything about it until a guy she'd snuck off once to see came and took her away from it all. These are weak sounding women. And by women I mean Princesses. These chicks *should* have power because they are Princesses but they don't! They give it away! I don't have a daughter, but I certainly don't want my son to think this is what women should be. I get it. I still like these movies, but I get it. However, it has come to my attention after a fantastic Friday night at the drive-in watching the newest Disney movie Frozen, that my Crunchy friends are wrong about Disney and their Princesses. Disney has a new style of Princess lately and she is awesome. Get ready Disney-lovers, because here come some movie spoilers. Frozen is about two sisters - a Queen and a Princess - who discover that true love can save them. But it's not the true love of a handsome strange guy they barely know - NO! It's the true love between sisters! And they save themselves while said handsome strange guy turns out to be a total punk and dorky woodsy nature guy turns out to be dateable (but they don't need him to save them.) Or take the Disney movie Brave - a princess has suitor-princes come to battle for her hand in marriage. But NO! She decides she doesn't want that so she joins the battle herself to fight for her own right to be alone and she wins because she's a stud with weapons! And in the meantime she develops a better relationship with her mom! Or the Princess and the Frog - a maid's daughter who dreams of owning her own restaurant. Spoiled rich prince becomes frog, turns her into a frog, they travel around and she saves his butt, he becomes a better human being because of her influence and poof - HE changes his life for HER! He changes so that she can have her dream. They live happily working like crazy in a restaurant! These Princesses are awesome amazing women! They are not the old-school Disney princess damsel-in-distress characters that used to be. This is the new Disney. So friends... stay crunchy. I love those qualities. But also stay open to changing your mind about Disney - it might just be magical after all!