I think she's smart, curious and willing to learn. It's just what she did that was stupid, but still, she was just a teenage girl.

average, like most of the girls.

Anyone who knows how to keep it together when being attacked by a shark must have a pretty good head on their shoulders. She's still in the dumber half of the princesses, though.

She is smart, but I agree with dimitri_is_hot and she made a stupid choice (she thought with something other then her head)...But hey everybody makes mistakes especially when they are young and inexpierenced)

Just what SweetPea2007 said :)

Not smartest but not either dumb

she's neither here nor there

she's not dumb, she's just reckless.

but she's not smart either....

Agree with dimitri_is_hot & SweetPea2007 :)

She's very smart and just makes bad choices because she was young, yeah like none of you have made stupid choices before. No ones perfect!

She doesn't do anything that makes me say "Whoa, that was smart. I would have never thought of that!"(Like Jasmine or Mulan) but she certainly isn't dumb!

She's a little ditzy and sometimes makes bad choices, but she's certainly not dumb.

The fact that almost half of the votes say she's stupid but there's no comments saying why that proves how biased Ariel haters are

Ariel is highly intelligent. But she is often blinded by love and pride.

Just because you make some stupid choices does not mean you are automatically 'stupid'.

^ Agreed with KataraLover. Now, there's nothing wrong with having an opinion and even not having or bringing up any points to back it up with because when it comes to fiction even the "I hate it because I just do" is technically a valid argument, as I'm entirely convinced. However, just admit it that you dislike a character without a reason and move on instead of clicking the "she's dumb" option. I dislike Giselle from Enchanted and don't think she is dumb, I'm just not particulary fond of her character and the way she was written.

Ariel makes one reckless decision whereas most of other princesses made dozens of them. Lets take a look, shell we? Rapunzel, my other favourite, repeatedly trusts a wanted criminal without possessing any knowledge on what he is about and not taking the possibility of him hurting or manipulating her into consideration, relying solely on her frying pan. Pocahontas, again, one of my favourites, immediatelly jumps into a relationship with a man who about a minute ago aimed a loaded gun at her and proceeds to date him secretly despite knowing that he and his people came to her father's land in order to take it away while putting her entire tribe in danger. Jasmine runs away from home, steals food in order to give it to poor boy on the market and nearly loses a hand. Snow White, being entirely aware of the fact that the Evil Queen was after her and already had an attemopt at her life using the third person, willingly lets the stranger into the house and even eats something given by that stranger. Tiana kisses a random talking frog because he claimed to be a risc handsome prince with tones of money and it backfires immensely just as in Snow White's case. Compared to those completely conscious acts of silliness/dellusion, Ariel's deal with Ursula was her moment of weakness and despair when she - for once - let her heart rule her head, but it was not a moment of stupidity. Her father in just few seconds trashed her entire collection that she had been working on for YEARS of her life because she was determined and open minded enough to want to LEARN about a different culture instead of blindly negatively judging it which already highlights her intelligence.

I've explained like a million times why I think she's stupid.
Also, not being able to see the flaws in your favorite character is also biased.
And yes, all the princesses made reckless choices, but only in Ariel's case an entire kingdom was at stake.

I NEVER said I was not biased. In fact, I am just as biased and subjective as every single person in this club. We are all biased to an extent and it would be pretty immature to even try to deny it.

Tiana's reckless choice could have cost her friend's safety (when she didn't immediatelly warn Charlotte about what was going on and that she was possibly dancing with the wrong guy who was not the actual prince) and later Naveen's life when he was almost eaten by aligators whereas she only cared about getting his money for her resturant. Belle's recklessness nearly led to the rose being damaged which could have resulted in unpredictable consequences for Beast and his entire castle - that despite her being DIRECTLY told to not go to the West Wing. Pocahontas was entirely aware of Smith's intentions and of the goal he and his people were initially planning to achieve aka possessing her father's land and yet still kept sneaking around with him just because he was hot which resulted in one of her people ACTUALLY being killed. Ariel on the other hand only subscribed to the terms that implied HER being the only person in danger and facing consequences on her own if she fails to kiss Eric within 3 days. Was it reckless? Yes, totally. Was this particular decision of hers stupid? Again, yes. But it does not make her dumb in general and underestimating her objective intelligence in terms of other things, being unable to give her credit where credit is due is being biased in my opinion. Then again, we all are so it's not like I'm calling anyone on it.

^ You always have valid points