Why is it so hard to call my daughter's soft toy monkey 'she'?

I can remember watching my brother's little girl, aged 4 or so, building something out of Lego. "I'm making a house for Mr Brown", she said. "How about doing it for Mrs Brown", I asked (not wanting to confuse the issue with Ms when she's so young) but she wouldn't hear it for a moment. "No, Mister Brown", she said, without looking up. She already knew who owns the property in this world.

But I have a friend who told me about her much-loved bath toy (which ended up getting lost) which was a model fish named Fanny Flounder. So there are a few female toys around. (No, I don't think the name was a joke by the parents.)

I don't do it. Ds's blue glow worm is 'she' as last night we had a story about her losing her music, loads of things are she here.

Funny though, DH assumed a medic going to help a trapeze act (who fell) was a nurse because she was a woman......I assumed she was a doctor.

I do understand that historical, people or gendered "things" (e.g. toys, pets, cartoon characters, etc.) were by default referred to as "he" to mean both genders or until it is shown that they are female. However, I do think this convention DOES impact on how we come to see "male" as "normal" and "female" as somehow "other," so not equal at all.

I don't think it's just being fussy about pronouns, particularly when talking about toys, books and other products for children. A little boy experiencing lots of interesting characters that share his gender pronoun will feel reassured that he's part of the concept of "normal." A little girl, struggling to find characters that aren't 100% obviously female (e.g. princess or mother), and even then have a pretty marginal role quite possibly will see themselves as "other," as "outsiders" as "not so good." It saddens me.

interesting.

we do this a lot too. everything is "he". dd2 actually insists most things are girls (goign through a "girls only" stage - sadly along with a princess stage, which I try to counteract at all times - she insists she is beautiful when wearing a dress, I insist she is beautiful at all times even when she has been playing football in the mud etc etc)

I must try harder actually. if dd2's default setting is "she", then this is a huge positive, and I really need to stop unwittingly correcting her. she will currently say things like "Bear is a girl. He has pretty shoes" all because dh and I default ot "he"

I have this problem too! It really annoys me that I do it. But the reason for doing it is a good one - it has how English has worked - the "rules" say that if no sex is specified then default is male. Things do move on - very few books or leaflets use "he" as default any more when they mean a man or a woman - but for people the way they speak and the language they use is so hard to break. And so important I think. But still, when I say pass x toy it's always "him". BAH!

Oh yes, tricky one this! When my DD's were small we had various picture books, and when reading out the stories it was very hard to say, "Blue Donkey is having her lunch," rather than "Blue Donkey is having his lunch."

And I say that as a feminist .