To be 'proud' of DD for her refusal to accept gender assignments for colours.

[Tallaween]

DD is 5 (nearly 6) she is a pretty girly girl in some ways - she likes dresses, and shoes, and sparkles - so she is not immune to gender stereotyping but I have done my best to convince her that there are no boy colours or girl colours. That if she likes something she can bloody well have it regardless of hue or location in store.

As a result her sparkly dresses are generally green, and accessorised with monsters inc headwear and wolf feet with claws (because she's very into monsters alongside her penchant for fairies) which she picks herself from the 'boys' section of the shop.

The other day I was evesdropping on her conversation with one of her little boyfriends and he told her that blue is a boy colour.

She got a touch of The Rage and told him "that's stupid!" Colours are for everyone"

I had a little rush of smug pride at her forthright behaviour and refusal to back down AIBU

Yes you are proud went you lol.

you need to find seomthing else to worry about maybe?

*aren't you

Stupid phone!

Well they say pride comes before a fat fingered fall!

Good for her!

I thought every parent did this as a matter of course

all of my girls just choose whatever they like, there is no boys and girls nonsense

Hurrah for your DD!!! Thats fab

Dd chose the blue glasses over the pink and purple ones the optician was pushing infront of her. No big deal. She likes what she likes.

Well done your DD!

trinity IME the parents of girls tend to be more aware of it as an issue.

Certainly 95% of the little boys I have come across wouldn't chose a 'girls' hat for example. Even if they liked it, and I have definitely come cross several men who 'jokingly' tease their sons about liking anything perceived as feminine (dresses, fairy wings, listening to Disney songs sung by a woman etc etc)

There is never an outright 'no' but children aren't stupid they can read an openly mocking tone.

That's why I feel I need to gently encourage DD to pick what she likes regardless because her choices should reflect herself, not what a random collection of 'others' think she should like.

So when she is a princess, the princess has claws, or a tail, or a light sabre... because that is the kind of princess DD (genuinely believes she) is

My DS regularly dresses in DD's dressing up clothes but loves dinosaurs etc. Never thought to be smug about it.

Meh!!!!!

I think it's easy to think that all parents do this when you're on MN, but a quick look at other parenting sites show that the pink for girls, blue for boys thing is still going strong.

So you should be proud Talla. We'll done your DD.

Of course you are right.

On this theme, am preg with second child who is a boy. Have a dd already. All of her winter all-in-one snow suit thingies (i.e. one newborn, one 0-3, 3-6 etc) were pink (she was born in October followed by a cold winter). These had been gifts - I was keen on neutral baby clothes with dd. I was looking at blue ones on line, and DH said why don't we just put baby in the pink ones - the ones I was looking at were £36 so I could see the sense.

However, I mightn't have had the confidence to do this if DH AS A MAN hadn't thought it was OK. He was put in pink coats as a baby himself, but don't think he would inflict it on the baby if he thought it had been a bad thing for him.

So I think your dd is right - colours are for everyone.

Also - I love dd in blue because she has blue eyes!

Yay for your dd!

I get a smug proud face on when I hear Ds and his gender equality. I have always taught him boys and girls are equal, we all have strengths and weaknesses. I love hearing him tell adults this when they create a boys against girls game.

You get the usual girls are slow, boys are smelly and then a little voice pipes up with 'actually they're all equal '

Or recently after a person who will remain nameless told Ds that boys can only marry girls we have "anybody can many anybody as long as you love them"

YANBU - I overheard DS1 saying that too a while back. Hopefully she'll carry on refusing to be packed into her little gender box

I think with a girl it's quite easy to put them in boys stuff. Much harder the other way around.

PervCat

Maybe worry about girls getting better grades at school/uni but not being paid as much perhaps?

O boys thinking they should be waited on because they are, er boys?

But noble what is boy stuff and girl stuff?

Are blue things boy stuff? If you have blue eyes are they boy eyes?

Does having girls or boys written on the label define the gender of stuff? So my DD's purple hat is a girl hat because it has girl written on? It's just a purple hat ffs what is girl about it.

Why is a pink baby vest 'girl stuff' it is exactly the same as a blue baby vest or a white one. The baby doesn't care... what makes it girl?

And while we're at it, why is a pink zebra? Just why?

Possibly noble is referring to the fact that people in general react worse to boys being put in pink or playing with dolls etc. Because it's okay for girls to aspire to being boys and play with/wear 'boy's' things but not the other way round. They might catch The Gay you know .

exactly
not chuffing colours

But, Perv, the colours are just the start of it all.

My dd is 18. She wears what she wants. I have only ever imposed practicality on her regarding clothes.

IMO it's the apparently little things like children accepting that certain colours are for girls and others for boys that add up and create bigger problems later on.
Children are told from a very early age that pink is for girls and blue is for boys, not a problem you might think, but then the toys later on get gendered and colour coded so pink irons/kitchens/dolls' houses and the 'boys' stuff is usually in 'real' colours or blue.
Girls are allowed to play with boys things but not vice versa because boys are taught to see girls and 'feminine' occupations as inferior.

i think believing that is trite and simplistic.
the colour of your bedroom will not affect your BRAIN fgs

No one said it would