Four year old Ellie Evangelista is from New York and her favorite superhero is of course Spider-Man. According to reports she went to her pre-kindergarten class and told some young boys about her love of the webhead. The boys then informed her that she couldn’t be Spider-Man, because Spider-Man is a boy. Her mom recently told ABC News that,
“She loves him so much,” Ellie’s mother Margaret Ryan told ABC News today. “She has a Spider-Man costume, Spider-Man pajamas, a Spider-Man shirt and Spider- Man toys. We’ve been watching superhero cartoons together, and she really wants to be him.”
The mom also told the website DNAinfo that:
“She started coming home and saying things like, ‘I don’t want to be a girl anymore because Spider-Man’s a boy, and I can’t be him if I’m a girl,'” Ryan explained. “So my husband and I started to navigate through that a little bit.”
The parents got their friends together and decided to organize a superhero parade. Kids are encouraged to dress up like whatever superhero they want and matching genders don’t matter.
“I’m really excited because even if only a few kids show up, Ellie is going to get to see different kids marching and having a good time while being dressed the way they want to regardless of what anyone else says,” Ryan said. “I can now say, ‘Hey! Look, that girl is Superman, and she can be whoever she wants to be, too!”
If you live in New York and would like to participate in the parade it will be held this Sunday at Bennett Park in Washington Heights at 11:00 a.m
Apple Podcasts
Google Podcasts
Spotify
Pandora
Amazon Music
iHeartRadio
Podbean
Amazon Alexa
Player.fm
Listen Notes
Stitcher
Love this. Spider-Man at its core has always been a story about one thing: Standing back up and smiling in the face of adversity and doing the right thing even if it’s not in your best interests. So yes, everyone can embody this and be Spider-Man !
… Matie Franklin pulled it off.
Be sure to report on the abundance of kids dressed as everyone’s favorite character, Silk.
Tyipical feminist propaganda
Alright I have to admit that’s just too cute. Hate using that word but there it is. lol. Good post. Note to Marvel to make even more cool women characters too. Not that she may not still pick Spider-man over Spider-girl but at least the option’s there & well known.
My daughter loved being Spidergirl for Halloween when I told her that Spidergirl was Spider-Mans daughter!
Of course if she still prefers Spider-Man, that is fine too.
Besides, I see no problem with her pretending to be Spider-Man on account of her gender: I mean, if you’re playing pretend that’s really a minor detail in the grand scheme of things.
This kid’s awesome. Someone should send her a stack of Spider-Girl comics. I think they’d be right up her alley.
Funny I had this conversation with a kindergartener back in the fall. She wanted to be Spider-Man but couldn’t be since she was a girl. She was told by her teacher: “There is a Spider-Girl.” So she dressed up in her costume and everyone thought it was fantastic. We also had a girl dress up as Captain America say she could be the first Avenger. We do live in a society where young kids don’t know that well known characters can be either gender and also one of many reasons the Jane Foster Thor came about. I don’t think the boys were being intentionally cruel they were just being boys who didn’t know better but sadly in Ellie’s case, it was very hurtful.
Hey you know what I know for sure that Quesada did a mean thing by taking May “Mayday” Parker away by saying having a super hero having children is dead wrong. Look at Ellie trying to be like her hero Spider-Man but she doesn’t know that there is a true kid of her hero that she can aspire to be?Darn you Mister Quesada your a bad man as the monster from the Twilight Zone episode “IT’S A GOOD LIFE” would be saying if Billy Mummy knew your disposal of a great character!