Getting a tiny bit feminist on the teacher's ass!

[SolidGoldBrass]

I didn't raise my voice. I didn't unshave my legs or anything.
It just so happened that DS and I bumped into his class teacher at the playground this afternoon and we had a pleasant chat; the teacher turns out to have DC of her own, of a similar age to DS. She mentioned something about girls being very different to boys. I very very gently said that this was in fact rubbish and suggested she read Delusions of Gender, and added that I thought every teacher should read it as a lot of the stuff about gender difference you hear these days was not only wrong but dangerous...

I'm going to be 'one of THOSE mothers' forever, aren't I?

[whateveritakes]

As a nanny I looked after many girls that thought they were boys. Didn't give a crap about clothes, could play fight stand up for themselves, liked the boys toys and were no different in terms of likes and dislikes or attitudes.

But you could always tell they were girls because they just weren't as "simple". They had thoughts linked to feelings that could only be resolved through turning a feeling into thoughts. Girls have many layers and boys whilst having deep feelings can just move on.
That's my sweeping generalisation on the debate.

[exoticfruits]

I agree that it isn't what they do- it is how they feel and think. Can anyone tell me that they have a 14yr old DD who spends a week with another like minded girl doing activities and yet not know their name, anything about their family, how they were spending the rest of the summer? Who can then look at you as if you are odd when you ask a few questions and look perplexed and say 'but why did I need to know?' ! It isn't as if my DS is silent- he is the one who talks nonstop - about things that interest him. My DSs can never answer simple questions like 'did Josh have a good holiday?' because, apparently, it is nosy to ask. While I accept that thousands of boys would ask and know - I bet that nearly all girls would- and if they don't tell you it isn't because they don't know- it is because they choose not to tell you.

[exoticfruits]

In general men have a hard time emotionally because they keep problems to themselves- if I have problems I either find a friend to discuss it with or a group of people ( female)

[PacificDogwood]

I was under the impression that there is good, well respected evidence that male and female brains are 'wired' differently, from birth and before? With a vast overlap and variation.

FWIW, I have 4 boys and they are all different, but all very much Boys .

[SigmundFraude]

You're not wrong Pacific, there is plenty of up to date research stating that.

My 2 boys are completely different. Although they both like toilet humour, I'm trying to put the kibosh on that one!

[feckwit]

I've two of each, they are all very different but all very obviously girl or boys in terms of their emotional development.

[IfNotNowThenWhen]

Boys and girls CAN be different, but their similarities are much more numerous than their differences. I think that is the thing to remember.
I hate when people make comments about " boys not being able to concentrate" or " girls being manipulative" . I have a boy who loves to draw, is very emotional, worries about what people think of him, but also loves playing ninjas and hanging on the monkey bars.
A lot like I was really.
I also have five siblings, ranging from ultra competitive barrister (sister), to nurturing uber parent.(brother). Of course, my sisters and I chat more on the phone, but its my brothers that remember birthdays, and are there when our parents are ill.People are complicated, and mixed up.
I have a lot more in common with one of my brothers, in terms of humour and outlook than with any woman I know. But then, one thing ( maybe the only thing) my parents did right, was to treat us all the same.
Also, in the olden days there just wasn't the gender based STUFF that there is now. I go to my friends house, and her two dds have so much frilly, pink, sparkly STUFF. Its all very seductive, and if I was 8 I would probably love all the butterflies and embroidered cushions, but it does foster a feeling of girlyness that I just dont remember from my childhood.
When I was a girl, I didn't have a canopied bed. I wanted to be Indiana Jones.

[IfNotNowThenWhen]

Also, it shocked me when Ds went to nursery just how pervasive the whole " it's for girls" thing is.
Don't underestimate peer pressure. Ds refuses to like anything he considers " for girls". Unless he hasn't realised it isn't for girls yet. He loves playing at fighting , but when it comes to actual wrestling, he just giggles!

[IfNotNowThenWhen]

Also, it shocked me when Ds went to nursery just how pervasive the whole " it's for girls" thing is.
Don't underestimate peer pressure. Ds refuses to like anything he considers " for girls". Unless he hasn't realised it isn't for girls yet. He loves playing at fighting , but when it comes to actual wrestling, he just giggles!

[IfNotNowThenWhen]

Oops!

[CheerfulYank]

I agree, it is annoying. DS comes home from preschool saying things are for girls or boys.

I try to say "pink is just a color, colors are for everyone" or "dolls are just toys and toys are for everybody" but it's clear he doesn't believe me. Sigh...

[SolidGoldBrass]

Look, the main reason why I think this is a problem worth taking up with the teacher (who BTW has not AFAIK ever done or endorsed anything in school that I would consider harmful it was the previous year teacher who gave DS a book I complained about) is the vast numbers of DC being told that they can't have or do all sorts of things because 'that's for girls/boys'. It's so narrowing and negative and damaging for kids to hear that. And all the character traits that are considered good/bad or unusual/only to be expected but dependent on the gender of the child exhibiting them: that's horrible as well.

[seeker]

And school should be, of all places, a place where you are not defined or constrained by your gender. And for that to be the case, teachers need to be really clued up on this stuff.

[exoticfruits]

I don't think it is a problem at school - not in the early years or from the teachers anyway. I have always seen them all quite happy to play with the dolls or dress up. I agree that later the peer pressure will kick in- then you get the whole, ridiculous 'boys must like football' thing etc. as if it isn't possible to be a boy and have no interest whatsoever.
I think that parents are just as bad the other way. It's will happily take their girl out to the shop dressed as 'Bob the Builder' - many won't take their boy to the shop dressed as a fairy. They will call a girl 'feisty' if she claims trees- why can't a girl be 'feisty' if she loves a dolls tea party? It is a character thing- not what you like doing.
I do get fed up with all the people who want a girl - it generally turns out they want long hair, pretty dresses and an adult friend eventually to go shopping with. I always point out that there is no guarantee that a girl will fit any of these expectations. I can't see why you just don't respond to the DC you get and stop trying to turn them I to something they are not. It must be very wearing to be a girl who adored pink and frills to have a parent who is always disparaging and mean about it and equally wearing to have parents who insist your hair is long when it gets tangled and hurts in a comb and buy you pretty dresses when you want jeans and very short hair and don't want anything pink.
I think boys get it even worse- there is so much worry if they are a 4yr old with a favourite dolls pram! It is all very silly. The sad thing is that girls can have the whole range- even if some is labelled 'boys'( can't think why it should be) but boys are very much restricted to 'their' half.

[exoticfruits]

The difference is nothing to do with what they do- it is how they think(with exceptions)
A good example is when I was a widow. When they were 5/6yrs I knew far more boys than girls. Boys are just very accepting- x's father was dead was fine for most, I suppose the majority liked a reason. It was girls who questioned me and they always got on to ' were you very sad, did you cry?' (Of course many girls didn't question)
With my DS we had to talk about it- and we did a lot. My DS was a talkative child, he used to follow me around talking, when it was irritating I used to think 'make the most of it - he will stop as a teenager' - he didn't and he hasn't as an adult- he is a great communicator. We went into how he died, why he died, how it could have been prevented etc but never once did he ask how I felt. I would imagine that he would just take it as read. However, if his present girlfriend turns out to be long term, and I get to know her well, I would imagine that we would discuss it one day and it is far more likely to be along the lines of 'how was it for you, how did you cope as a young woman?

Just as an aside boys do like toilet humour as someone said earlier- and you only have to watch someone like Stephen Fry to realise that some never grow out of it!

[exoticfruits]

There are also always exceptions. It is like English spelling-we accept that there are exceptions to the rule and it is fine. We don't say that it is 'wrong', if it doesn't fit the rule and it should change, we just happily learn it and accept it as normal.
My ILs from my first marriage are a case in point-if I wanted to discuss anything emotional it would be with FIL because he was comfortable with it and on the same 'wave-length' -MIL is lovely but her emotions are a closed book.
There are certain characteristic that the majority of boys will have-none will have them all-and it is perfectly OK not to have any. The same with girls.
When you have your baby you have to be open minded-they may be on your 'wave-length' they may end up thinking entirely differently on absolutely everything-most are somewhere between. The relationship will be better if you accept them as themselves and don't feel the need to mould to what you happen to have wanted.

[IfNotNowThenWhen]

I don't know exotic. In a way it seems like you are saying on the one hand that boys won't think about feeling etc, and girls will, and then also saying that actually there are always lots of exceptions to that.
In which case, maybe, the exceptions are so numerous and varied, that actually, the rule doesn't really apply anyway, because in the end people are all different, whatever their sex.
FWIW, when my dad dies, ds asked me a few times if I was sad and if I missed him. I know that is just one child, but that is my experience of little boys.
I do think that girls can be more socially confident with adults than boys at 5/6/7 but I don't know how much that is a function of what is expected of them.
At the end of the day, it shouldn't matter, as you say. I was a boy-ish girl. My brother is a girl-ish boy. No-one should be expected to fit into such a narrow expectation.

[exoticfruits]

I have lived my home life with mainly men-there are general characteristics that are completely alien to me! This is despite the fact that I was a 'girlish' girl, but I don't think that you could call my brothers or sons particularly 'boyish' boys. My mother had been what people call a 'tomboy'.

[exoticfruits]

My whole point is that you shouldn't have to fit in a narrow expectation-the parent shouldn't have any expectation at all! Too many parents have decided they are having a future doctor who will be a Christian -vegetarian-wait and see-you might produce an atheist farmer who breeds sheep for the table! And why does it matter if the DC is happy and doing as they wish?

[simplesusan]

Good point made about being socially acceptable for girls to wear what some would call boys clothes and have an interest in male things. Not as acceptable for a boy to like pink, play with dolls, cooking utensils etc. All ok when they are toddlers but once they hit school age the influences kick in.
I don't know any boys who wear a dress for example and wear hair decorations.
I have know boys with long hair and I have heard negative comments about it mainly from men.
In the supermarket yesterday when I noticed the same toy, one was blue and orange, one was pink with petals on it. Guess which one had a picture of a baby girl on the front and which one had a picture of a baby boy on?

I would imagine it is difficult for anyone to buy the pink one for a boy although logically all babies should able to play with either.

My dd1 dances and has a good friend who dances with her. He is a boy. at school he is regularly bullied for it, called gayboy and allsorts. My friend tells the boys, and yes it is mainly boys, to grow up. She sites Diversity as role models which usually shuts them up. Even so it takes courage to keep dancing when you face that prejudice on a regular basis.

[SolidGoldBrass]

My DS has long hair and people sometimes comment on it negatively. DS loves his rockstar locks and why shouldn't he? But oh no, complete strangers have felt entitled to ask me if I'm not worried that 'people will think he's a girl'. When I respond, so what if they do? I get all sorts of faces.

[IfNotNowThenWhen]

Oh God, yes, the STUFF that is genderised (possibly not a word) now is unbelievable.
I don't know about some people on here still living in the 1970's, and I don't really remember them, but even in the 1980's there just wasn't this divide between stuff for boys and stuff for girls.
Wellies, for example. You wore yellow ones, or blue ones, whatever your parents got you. I don't remember there being "girls" wellies.
In a local toyshop I saw packets of word fridge magnets. They had Girls words and Boys words. I kid you not.
The girls words were things like "cupcakes" and "lovely". The boys words were "jumping" and "pirate".
And you can bet if I had tried to get ds the "girls" words (not that I would, since words are just words!) he would have reacted as though I was trying to poison him "no, mum! They're for girls".
All this crap we are supposed to buy two lots of-the pink stuff and the blue stuff, is having a direct effect on the way children see themselves, and the way society sees them.
Meanwhile, people make vast profits out of this division of everything (hot water bottles, gardening tools, bucket and spades, you name it) into girls or boys STUFF.
I agree exotic, in that I don't think parents should try and mould their kids either way. I would never try and force ds to play with dolls because I think he should. Of course, his action man is not a doll. Oh no.

[nickelbabe]

hmmm.
People are convinced that DD is a boy.
all the time.
she has almost no hair (can't do a lot about that!), but she wears clothes - sometimes boys', sometimes girls', sometimes neutral.
but because she's not swathed from head to toe in pink and dresses, everyone thinks she's a boy.

[Angelfootprints]

Well despite dd1 always in pink and even with pink on her pram (gasp, shocking) people still thought she was a boy.

Far more worrying

[persimmon]

I'm a teacher and there are marked, general differences between boys and girls.
But there are also a significant minority of startling exceptions to this every year.
Reading Raising Boys by Steve Biddulph has helped me (I hope) become a better teacher of boys.