The Misrepresentation of Women

Throughout the thousands of years that folk and fairytales have been told, women have always been a central issue of most of them. Yes, women are recognized in many of these tales, but are they portrayed fairly? The Fisherman’s Wife by The Brothers Grimm is a perfect example of how women are unjustly represented in fairytales.
Reflecting back on all of the tales and stories I have read, I keep coming to the conclusion that women are almost always painted as one of two things. The first category is that which is portrayed in stories like Snow White and Cinderella. Yes, in both of these stories the girls are treated badly by people, but both of these women do nothing except benefit from their stupidity or their incapacity to act self-assertively. Snow White letting the old woman in the cottage for the second time, Cinde...