to think by and large girls are now the preferred gender?

[Bethshine82]

I have noticed a lot since having my son that girls seem to be the gender of choice. We seem to have gone from girls being discriminated against, to them being equal and now we seem to have gone past that to a point where they are now seen as better than boys.

When I had my son several people immediately said I'd have to try again for a daughter and that every woman needs a daughter. When I was pregnant and very sick people said (including midwife) 'typical male causing trouble already.' And on numerous occasions people (friends and strangers) have suggested any undesirable behaviour is due to his gender rather than him being a toddler. Won't sleep? It's because he's a boy. Won't sit still for long? It's because he's a boy. Loves tv and would watch all day if allowed? Typical man.
Even once in a shop when DS was trying to carry milk and bread for me but struggling the shop lady said 'men! Can't do two things at once.'

It really annoys me. How cone girls get to be 'princess' while boys have to be 'noisy' and 'monster' on all the clothes. Actually why is there hardly any choice in boys' clothes come to think of it.

Boys seem to be pushed down right from when they are born and the education system largely favours girls too, especially primary education.

AIBU to let this get to me? Possibly I am over sensitive but it does seem to be that girls are now predominantly favoured over boys.

I have a boy and a girl. When he was 3 he leaapt into the kitchen wearing a superman outfit, shouting TO THE RESCUE. typical boy. He was cllosely followed by his 18m old sister wearing a too big spiderman outfit :o typical boy too.
She so being showered by pink fairy stuff though, wish I could stop.it.

Hhave no probelm with little monster vests though, both mine came home in dinosaur vests!

Nah just the reality of being a mum of boys.

I've never seen this lip pursing and cats bum facing you're talking about in the direction of boys.

I have two girls, I have a few friends with only girls. And yet I've never witnessed this behaviour once.

How weird that this happens to you enough for you to label it.

"You see it in parks everywhere.The intake of breath from girl mums as boys race around, the boys are too rough,loud whine etc.I'm fed up with hearing the "I'm sooo glad I've only got girls" thing you hear constantly."

You see it everywhere and here it constantly?

I cannot believe that. I just can't.

hear it.

Probably in the same way I don't see/hear these MOBs (kind of appropriate!) saying that boys are special and looking pityingly at MOGs.

I had two girls (v demanding but possibly due to them being 16months apart so there was always someone to squabble with) then 4 years later a boy.

Boy was always easier, more contented, easy to distract when little. But this might have been because, after two girls, a boy was more wanted so, my family being complete, I was more relaxed.

DS, now 25, is more loving, happy to give his old mum a spontaneous cuddle, and seems keener to come home and visit mum and dad than his sisters.

DDs are great but just wanted to make the point boys are lovely too.

i think you do hear it ,if you only have girls you wont experience it or if you have a mix of both sexes again you wont experience it as much. honestly the amount of times i have had 'poor you four boys' or 'my you have your hands full with four boys isnt that hard work' or you house must be messy and loud etc etc and the reactions we got when having dd after 4 boys! equally the reactions would have been the same had we had a boy after 4 girls but i dont think i would have got the same comments is '4 girls poor you or how much hard work etc' tho i do hear people say that if you ahve lots of girls you must have to fight for time in the bathroom [sigh]

there are stereotypes and comments eitherway but your own personal dynamics will affect those that you come across.

now i just get lots of crap about how dd will be spoilt, or how no one will mess with her as she has four big brothers or 'pity her first boyfriend' etc etc etc.

and as for pink stuff, well dd got a pink elc windmill (happyland range) for xmas, but she also got a toy digger and quad bike the WOW toy range, tho bizarrely i picked up the toy quad bike and was pointed in the direction of the pink pony set they did when i said it was for dd and she doesnt have masses of pink clothes, hardly any infact, i have gone for bright cheerful colours and patterns boden, POP, h&m, gap etc all do lovely girls stuff that isnt pink oh and m&s and sainsburys, she does have a lot of clothes tho i may have gone slightly mad but if i had had 4 girls and then a boy i would probalby have gone just as mad buying boy clothes, its just the fact that it is different to what i have had before!

oh and my neighbour said that 'dp is a real man now he has given me a daughter... wtf?!

No, you would have got "4 girls! I pity you/your DH the hormonal teenage years!" Generally it's smalltalk, It;s what people say when confronted by a single sex family.

I agree fire, never have I once heard any of this anti-boy sentiment! My DD1 is as rough and tumble as they come she is usually the one tearing round the playground in the mud while my friend's DS is the one scared of getting his hands dirty!

And I have never ever heard anyone say 'I'm glad I've got girls' (or boys for that matter!). Sometimes I have been known to say I'm glad I had 2 the same just from a clothes point of view, but plenty of mums of boys say that too.

But I have seen this mother-of-boys persecution complex on Mumsnet before, so I guess someone somewhere must be saying these things...

Well clearly we are all missing out on something. Where it's having a girl or a boy. Or having same sex siblings or one of each. Or experiencing a large family or bringing up an only child.

Soupdragon - the having a boy is special has been said by two people on this thread, hence my mentioning it. I would search but cba, it's there in black and white though, not sure how you missed it.

I would have thought if playgrounds and toddler groups across the country were full of mothers of girls giving cats bum faces to boys constantly then I may have seen it, just once.

But there you go, clearly it all happens when I'm not looking.

And, Fire, there is plenty of negative comments about boys on this thread too so I'm not entirely sure what your point is there.

not entirely sure how you missed it but I CBA to search. [shrug]

I have never heard, in real life, someone say that having a boy is special and you would have thought I would, given it happens constantly. Clearly it all happens when I'm not around

I've never heard that boys are more special line in RL either soupdragon.

I just explained it was on the thread because you hadn't explained that you only meant in RL.

And I didn't say it happened constantly either? I said it happened twice on this thread.

Why are you trying to be a smartarse (and failing dismally)?

I have twins, one boy & one girl. She may look like an angel and be girly to look at however she is certainly the one with a kamikaze outlook whereas he is by and large more cautious. They both have their moments of either conforming to social stereotypes and then going totally against them. We've never pushed them to more gender specific toys either although they do both enjoy tag rugby.

I'm not bothered about boys clothes having monsters on them as I've always called them "monsters" collectively (as well as less polite names!).

oh and i do get that often people are just trying to make conversation, be friendly etc, but there are plenty of things you can say without being rude! and its a bit shit for my boys to constantly hear how pleased we must finally be to have got our precious dd after all 'those boys' we are quite happy with all 'those boys' thanks very much and would have been happy if dd was a boy as well, infact i was utterly convinced she was a boy (despite two scans showing otherwise) that i had a boys name picked out etc. quite happy that i have a healthy brood of children and just feel incredibly lucky to have had easy pregnancies and births etc.

and i am sure people get negatives for having all girls, i have a few friends with 3 girls and have been with them and heard negative comments they have recieved, so am aware it works both ways but even if i hadnt experienced it i wouldnt be so disbelieving that it does happen. people are thoughtless and rude and make comments without thinking and they do so regardelss of gender, buti guess having 4 boys i am more likely to have heard all the tactless 'boy' comments.

In the past boys could do more useful things - when my brothers were young (now in their 50s and 60s) they could repair a puncture and put the chain back on a bike, help dig the garden, bring in the coal, then when older replace the spark plugs, replace a wheel on a car etc etc

It's harder now for boys to achieve - being ace at a computer war game is not considered a great acheivement by their elders. Also their opportunities to shine at sports is probably less than in the past (when more time was allocated to sports).

Girls can more visibly appear to succeed.

My daughter spent several years in Australia and commented on how able the Australian lads were compared to British eg they had a leaking tap and chap from neighbouring flat happily collected his tool box from his car and came round and fixed it. Generalising here I know but maybe boys aren't as capable as in the past so are subject to the criticism OP states.

Possibly due to parents working long hours so not able to pass on this stuff.

Just because you haven't heard it or experienced smogs and there behaviour it doesn't mean either don't exist.They do- you've just not come across it.If you had more than 1 boy I can pretty much guarantee you would have witnessed the cats bum face at least once on a park visit.

Smog is a widely known expression,beyound MN.I am an aunty to twin boys,I have countless friends with multiple boys-we've all experienced it in varying degrees and are dotted it all over.

Fire your life experience doesn't speak for us all.It would be lovely if it did but sadly this isn't so.

I don't think anyone has said that boys and girls are exactly alike.
Of course there are differences. BUT the hormonal differences pre-puberty are pretty small.
What I am trying to get at is that when there are exhibited signs of "female" and "male" behaviour these are jumped on and everybody goes "ooh typical girl/boy" and when there are things that are the same, they seem to go unremarked, or are remarked on as that child showing traits of the opposite sex.

And adults perpetuate this nonsense with all the "little tyke/little princess"bollocks.

I do not belive, for one moment, that you see this all the time, and hear it constantly.

But there's little point bickering about it. You can believe what you believe and I can believe what I believe.

i know two other mums with 4 boys each and they have both experienced it as well.

most annoyinly for me is i even get it from my own family! well dp's relatives so mine by default, when ds3 and then ds4 was born the same relative said to me (on the phone call where i announced their birth) that she was 'disappointed it was another boy' she was lucky she was on the other end of a phone line, had she said that to me in person i may well have slapped her (excused by my post birth hormones of course ;) ) but seriously i call to say you have another healthy nephew and that is your response!! FUCK OFF!! and omg the doting on dd, they love the boys as well, but they do make a fuss of the dd as the 'only girl, the precious girl' yada yada dont get me wrong she is precious and i love her, but equally to my boys they are ALL MY BABIES and i am fiercly protective of all of them, there is a part of me that feels i have to stick up for my boys more tho, esp since dd arrived and is somehow seen as superior by some people/relatives.

it will be interesting to see how the dynamic changes as she gets older, at 12mths she is just a baby and plays with a doll and stacking cups and toy cars etc equally, but tbh she is happy crawling round chasing her brothers and trying to climb on them etc. other than nappy change time i dont notice a difference so will be interesting to see how she develops, she will be different because she is an individual (as all my boys are) but i am guessing more of her differences will be put down to her being a girl, not by me, but by others.

really fireandfury i get comments such as 'poor you four boys' on a weekly basis tbh, not from people that know me and know my boys infact they comment on how well behaved and polite they are etc, but when you first meet people or random strangers at the park. i remember being out with ds3 and ds4 when ds4 was new and someone asked about the new baby and said 'oh two boys, never mind next time you might get a girl' i did then point out that actually these were my 3rd and 4th boys and that there wasnt going to be a next time (we planned on having 4) and the comment was and 4 boys HOW do you cope? umm the same as any other parent tbh, you just get on with it but the comments do get very wearing.