To get really quite cross about gender separation starting from newborn?

[ComtessedeFrouFrou]

In M & S today and thought I'd look at their newborn basics for DC1, due in early October. We're not planning to buy masses for DC1 as my sister warned me that we're likely to get given lots, but obviously I don't want to be out shopping straight from the labour ward.

Clothes for 0-2 years, already separated into boys and girls. There are a few bits in white and almost nothing else that could properly be described as being gender neutral. We don't know the sex of the baby but even once he or she is here I am determined that whatever sex the baby turns out to be, they will not spend their lives dressed exclusively in blue or pink (delete as appropriate).

Why is it so hard to find stuff that is neutral? I tend to buy more neutral things for friends with children, even if they are obviously for a boy/girl. For my DC1, I have basically had to tend towards the more boyish end of the spectrum in order to avoid being drowned in sugary pink. I wear blue about 4 days out of 7, so why do little girls have to spend their lives in pink?

Ironically, given everything I have heard about how shit they are in all other respects, Mothercare seems to be one of the few places you can get genuinely gender neutral clothes for very small babies.

[parttimer79]

For soon to be born DD I have bags of stuff in different colours which I've been given by various nice folk who have no more plans for a new born. She'll be in whatever is clean that day :)

My mother and M&S however would have her exclusive in pink from birth. (My mother threatened to return aforementioned pink clothes if bump defies the sonographer and is a boy!)

[Nicknamegrief]

MrsOakenshield. I agree.

[ComtessedeFrouFrou]

Right:

1. I do not object to pink per se (or blue for that matter).
   

1. I do object to wall to wall pink/blue and obligatory fairy princesses, sequins, dinosaurs and tractors so that you can't put your boy in a pink shirt without it being obviously on the "wrong" gender.
   

1. I too prefer to buy less girly/boyish clothes for friends' children, not least because i don't know their stance on this.
   

1. I object to the segregation of children's clothes because, once they get to an age where they become conscious of this, it reinforces the message that certain things are only for boys or only for girls. That is wrong on principle. See, for example, the PP who reported that her DD was questioned by a boy of the same age as to why she was wearing a dinosaur t shirt.
   

Its interesting that many of you mention Gap. In my local branch, there was not one item for newborns that was in anyway gender neutral.

[AmandaPandtheTantrumofDoom]

MrsOakenshield - I roll out this quote from the Cement Garden quite frequently:

"Girls can wear jeans and cut their hair short, wear shirts and boots, because it's OK to be a boy, but for a boy to look like a girl is degrading, because you think that being a girl is degrading. "

I don't think it is so much that girly is bad for a girl. It's that for a boy to look girly would be unthinkable. Whereas it is socially more acceptable for parents of girls to express opinions about clothes that don't conform to pink/frilly. I have dressed my DDs in lots of boys clothes. Would I dress a son in a pink frilly dress - despite my feminist reasoning that it is no different, no I wouldn't have done.

I agree that boys clothes are even more homogenous. But I think parents of boys feel less able to complain, or it doesn't occur to them to do so.

[HazleNutt]

declaring that purple clothes with kittens are for girls and brown ones with puppies for boys is quite similar to carrots for boys - apples for girls. A vest is a vest, baby boys and girls don't need different cuts to justify the separate aisles.

I have a baby DS, by the way, and he looks very cute in his coral and purple clothes, which I have to, for some odd reason, get from girls' section.

[MrsOakenshield]

I agree about the images on clothes (fairies for girls, diggers for boys), but that's not the same as the colour, as such.

I know I sound like I'm defending the shops, but presumably they are responding to the market - that there are a lot of parents out there happy to dress their children in this way. But, that doesn't mean you have to, and I haven't every found it a problem to buy stuff in a variety of colours (though I'm in London with bigger stores and more choices, which must help).

Amanda - I agree that, in general, people still think that for a boy to do unboyish things or dress in unboyish clothes isn't 'right' (and I'm talking about educated people who would happily dress their daughters in boys' clothes and want them to play trains, but would think it awful if either child, but especially their boys, wanted to dress in pink or playing fairies or whatever). I had a conversation with a friend (who has a boy and a girl) about the film Peter Pan, and she was saying what an awful role model Wendy was, but afterwards I noticed she hadn't said a thing about what a vile little boy Peter Pan is!

[HorryIsUpduffed]

MrsOakenshield he's mine, all mine I agree. I went to great lengths to get a friend a non-pink outfit for her newborn DD, settling on a very frilly smocked lavender blue tunic and knickerbockers. She opened it, and said "oh, it isn't pink" not in a "thank goodness for some variety" way but in a "wtf am I meant to do with this then?" way.

[AbuseHamzaMousseCake]

Across the world and over time, men have worn and still do wear dresses and skirts. Personally I think people should be able to wear what they like. This male clothes/female clothes business is rubbish. I wear trousers, skirts and dresses as and when I feel like it and think men should have the same choice available to them.
I also think that schools should allow children to wear skirts, trousers, shorts as they choose/is practical, not restrict to gender. After all Scotland has kilts and very attractive they are too! Other cultures have smocks, sarongs etc Look at the Mughal Emperors outfits!

[OxfordBags]

I don't care if people think Ds is a girl or looks girly - precisely because I do not think there is anything wrong with being a girl, for the reasons AmandaP gives - but their hostility and weirdness and ignorance fucks me right off. My Ds loves pink, butterflies and cats. Since when were fucking cats an indicator of feminity, but you try getting anything that isn't like an explosion in a sequin factory with a cat on it. He also likes trains and ambulances, but dislikes dull sludge colours. And MrsOakenfield, I have an issue with my son being corrolled by societal bullshit into being what IT defines as boyish. I do not want him to wear clothes that make him look stereotypically boyish, or laddish, as I see it.

Waffly, schemas are not specific to, or connected with, either sex or gender. However, it is how people perceive children working through schemas that make them wrongly assume that their children correspond to given gender stereotypes, and also the way in which the schemas are allowed to play out, if at all (ie the tools, such as toys, or environment in which to work on them). I think most people here will have seen parents telling their daughter that they don't like cars, when she picks one up, and persuading her to play with a toy oven, or a boy being given a toy dinosaur when he's trying to put on some fairy wings, etc. They don't realise they are preventing children from making free choices or from following schemas. Here on this thread, people are talking about how their DSes love vehicles, etc. This is not because this is an innate gender truth for male children, it is because those boys are following a trajectory schema, and our culture says that males like vehicles, and therefore boys will be given and exposed to and encouraged to play with vehicles from birth, so it very easy for them to express a trajectory schema that way, and it might even push them into that schema when their actual true drive is to follow one that is most easily expressed in our culture in feminine ways (even though it is not feminine) but is constantly thwarted, either actively through discouragement, or passively, through there being zero opportunity to work on it. And vice versa for girls following schemas.

[anastasiakrupnik]

YANBU

My friend said that when she had a boy she was glad to avoid all the pink girly gender-stereotyping shit, but I'm pregnant with DS now and really shocked to find how much the boys is stereotyped too! General formula of predominantly Newborn=cream Pink=girl Blue=boy is tedious. Bhs is especially painful.

And what's with all the cars. They are bad for the planet. I'm limiting it to public transport.

I've found stuff in red/yellow/orange/green but personally I like pink so want to buy it (as I'm the one who'll be looking at them most!) but feel self-conscious buying pink clothes for DS, in case people think I'm making a point. I try to imagine if DH would wear that shade of pink - if yes then it's OK, otherwise I'm probably pushing it.

[5madthings]

Yes we can buy what we want but does all reinforce gender stereotypes and young children pick up on this. Its the same with toys as well and its bloody annoying.

My dd loves dinosaurs but in order to get her clothes with dinosaurs on I has to buy boys clothes. This is fine and I don't care but as she gets older she may well do. And yes to others making comment, a random man in a shop told her she was too pretty to play with dinosaurs...wtf?!! And my mil will consistently ignore her when she is playing with the dinosaurs and ask her to fetch a doll/tea set etc. Just reinforcing stereotypes.

People say its not a big deal but it has a real affect on our children, and the crazy thing is that as women have been getting more equality and in an age where discrimination is not OK we are actually modeling the reverse to children and its not a good message for them. Its also relatively recent esp with the toy market, its got much worse since I had ds1 (14). But go back to when I was little and it wasn't as bad.


And others have mentioned how baby clothes didn't used to be gendered. Plus pink used to be seen as a boys col our and blue for girls... It has been exploited by marketing as a way to make more money.

[slightlysoupstained]

" a random man in a shop told her she was too pretty to play with dinosaurs...wtf?!!"

[HorryIsUpduffed]

I looked at the range of baby clothes (0-18m) in Morrison's today and although the colours are not pink/blue there is definite gender division.

Girl things have puffy sleeves or scalloped edges or flower-shaped buttons.

Anyway I still recommend them but looking closer has been a bit

[Jengnr]

Tesco have loads of lovely babygros in all kinds of colours.

[MrsMook]

DS has a baby grow with pink stars. Wasn't quite what I expected as I ordered online, and thought it was going to be much deeperin colour, not neon from the picture. Still taught enough boys who wear neon pink!

I loved his (H&M) purple skinny cords. Unfortunately most "girls" garments are defined not only by colour but by trimmings. It was unusual that these were devoid of frills, embroidered flowers etc which tend to stop mums of boys venturing in the girls department.

I was trying to get some yellow for DS1 at some point. Having failed to find anything inspiring in the boys section of Mothercare, I spotted a pack of yellow and blue vests on the wall in girls. Lovely shades, went up to investigate... Flowers.

Girls things are often impractical for being active and outside and the pale colours prone to permanent marking from grubby knees. Some shades of pink are just vom (OK, maybe I'm thinking of the strawberry bootlace overindulgence incident. DM never could work out why it was so pink...)
Boys things are very restricted and monotonous.
There's lots of colours that are underused in children's clothing regardless of gender.

If DS2 had been a girl, I was planning on re-using a lot of DS1's clothes and feminising with some more girly vests and accessories. Yes, I'd buy some prettier things too, but certainly for the crawling stage, DS's dungees would do very well.

[ceeveebee]

I had b/g twins and for the first few months of their lives they shared their clothes - I had loads of babygros in neutral colours - white, yellow, red etc, but also quite a few in blue and pink, they just got put in whatever came out of the drawer first. It's really not hard to find gender-neutral clothes, all the major chains that OP mentions have them online at least if not in store.

[MrsMook]

Oh and DS2 wore a very feminine hat yesterday, pink broderie anglaise with flower to trim- was visiting a friend and we went for an unexpected walk so he borrowed one of her DD's. I didn't expect him to look so fresh and glowy in pink! He's only 13wks, so just looked like a cute baby in a white outfit and pink hat, not too much of a gender bending mission. Mistaken gender identity Vs sunburn... I know which is healthier!

I'd still buy things like cars/ trainsets for a girl. I facilitate DS's transport interest, but he isn't pigeon holed into it. He's got lots of neutral basic toys, as well as domestic things. Our toy collection would look very similar if he had been a girl. Probably less cars- but they were mainly hand-me-downs from older cousins/ friends (I particularly love the orange Escort with 1978 copyright on the bottom ) There would be more dolls accesories, but unfortunately they only seem to be avaliable in vom pink (certainly at the cheap end of the market, and I'm not paying extra to get something less über girly when DS's interest in them is lower.

[Pobblewhohasnotoes]

We didn't find out the sex of our child and didn't have any problems buying white/yellow/green baby gros and vests.

Sainsburys have some lovely babygros at the moment. The ones with elephants are particularly cute.

I have a friend who dresses her baby DD only ever in pink, I find it a bit strange. I'm not a very girly girl.

[ComtessedeFrouFrou]

Pobble the ones with elephants (really bright red and turquoise?) are the ones I have bought from Sainsburys

[JoInScotland]

My son loves purple, and I currently am taking the "puffs" out of the sleeves. One is "I am 3" (he is 3 1/2) and has 3 mice - great - and three buttons. But puffy sleeves. Another has a cat - he loves cats. Another has children around the world in different costumes. They all have puffy sleeves. Thank heavens for a seam ripper and a serger sewing machine!

I didn't expect him to like any particular thing. He likes cats, because we have two of them (I suppose). He loves flowers, because he likes helping in the garden. We make fairy gardens out of shells, moss, stones - he likes fairies. I note some folks say their boys run to the cars and dinosaurs when in a toy store or library - mine runs to the flowers and fairies. You can see other people's eyebrows shoot up. Like he's gay at 3, and that all gays like flowers, and that gay = bad.

I agree with other people saying that a girl can put on a Bob the Builder costume, no problem. A boy puts on a tutu, suddenly there's a problem.

[ljny]

And if you don't buy pink they won't stock it in such huge quantities.

Not so simple. Decades ago, there really was more choice (pastel yellows and greens, bright primary). And yes, the categories were Baby and Toddler. With an additional section of pink, frills, whatever.

Nowadays, even prams and carseats are divided into 'Girl' and 'Boy'.

It's simple - the more manufacturers subdivide baby gear, the more people will buy - as nowadays, too many feel they can't hand down baby girls' clothes to a baby boy, or vice versa.

Result: more sales.

[JoInScotland]

It gets harder and harder to find "unisex" yet still "cute" things the older they get. After age 2, for example, most clothes either have trucks/monsters/pirates/skulls/slogans and come in grey, black, bilge, sludge, beige or navy.... the other ones have flowers/fairies/princesses/girls and come in pink or if you are lucky pink/purple, pink/green, pink/yellow, etc.

It really is hard to find clothes that are just yellow. Or just red. Or just green. I found a place that sells polo shirts (I think it really is for schoolwear) and bought a shirt in every bright colour for my son this summer. He regularly get compliments and I am asked where I found them! Ebay! Or I buy plain white t-shirts and applique shapes on myself - whatever he is into, like penguins at the moment.

But I have to work at it, I really do. It isn't there on the high street, on a rack. I have to go out of my way and spend more money and time in order to dress my child in something that doesn't scream "stereotypical boy".

[StormyBrid]

It seems even white isn't gender neutral these days either.

When DD was about a week old, I took her with me to the local shops. Many shop staff came round the counter to look and coo. One asked "Boy or girl?" All the others assumed a boy - "Isn't he lovely?" and so on. By the fifth shop I'd got rather annoyed, and asked the next one (in a friendly way) if my daughter looked particularly masculine. "It's because she's not wearing any pink," the woman explained.

She wasn't wearing any blue either. White from head to toe.

[Summerblaze]

There are bloody loads of gender neutral stuff out there. Obviously there are pink and blue things too as lots of people want to dress their babies in those colours too.

Think sometimes it is just something for people to get up in arms about. I wanted a walker for dd. There was a pink one and a multicoloured one. I bought the multicoloured one as it was the nicest and would do for subsequent dc's.

A few weeks later I had a similar choice to make and went for the pink as I preferred it. I have 3 dc and it has never been a problem. DD's favourite colour is blue and has been for ages. Never have a problem finding things for her.

Don't think you are looking very hard.