To be annoyed at Grandma's Xmas gift: preening kit for a 3 yr old girl?

[mamamiaow]

Just heard that MIL has bought a Hello Kitty dressing table set for my 3 year old daughter complete with hair straighteners, hairdryer etc. I am angry and upset that my husband said this was ok. I'd rather she spent the money on some books or colouring stuff, not some overpriced plastic tat so my daughter can sit in front of the mirror and preen herself. WTF?

I hate all of this 'pink' shit. I've been going on about the Let Toys Be Toys campaign for months and husband thinks these kinds of gifts are ok for our daughter?!

I read the Girl Guides Girls Attitudes report earlier this week and its findings depress me. Girls anxious about how they look, wearing make up and going on diets when they are 8, judged on their appearance rather than ability...

I think toys like this Hello Kitty thing just perpetuate these problems. I don't want my daughter to have this shit when she's 3. She'll get to all this preening stuff soon enough, without it being rammed down her throat.

I don't think I'll be able to put on a smile and say thanks at Xmas. It goes against all my feminist sensibilities. Husband just thinks let his mum buy what she likes. Should I just put up with it this time and say something to MIL in the New Year? Or just shut up and hope daughter gets bored of it very quickly?

In my experience it tends to be less of an issue at 3. They really are less influenced by the media and advertising at that age than how you behave. DS was perfectly happy to dress up in disney princess costumes, push a pink pushchair etc

BUT there was NO WAY anyone in my family would have bought him anything like this (even if it was in camoflage) and even frowned at me getting him a pink pushchair.

I am completely gobsmacked that so many people really don't think that constant reinforcement that dressing up and make up and mirrrors and irons and ironing boards etc are all "girls" stuff and marketed in shades of pink affect what young girls see as "women/girls" things.

And why all the "grandma can buy what she likes"? AM I the only person whose mother asks what I htink DS would like for Christmas? especially for the more expensive bigger presents.

How many of you sit at a pink sparkly dressing table to put on your make up Even if you accepted that a dressing table and hairdryer etc is a perfectly reasonable idea - why does it have to be pink? How many of you have pink/blue furniture for separate sexes at home.

I htink the whole thing is mind blowingly odd - but then DS was born in a country where they don't do this pink for girls blue for boys nonsense so I have loads of pictures of him looking lovely in pink.

OP didn't say anyone was thick

Well if the child's father has OKed it, I don't think that OP can bin it or give to charity.

Hopefully there will be some non sparkly pink shit to counterbalance!

that a fair point diddl - OP is going to be fighting a losing battle if DH sees no problem.

Rather be a bit thick and give my son the choice of what he wants then outright ban it.

If my sister wants to wear princess dresses, cover her self in pink and play with only pink clothes then she can just as my son/brother can.

My son knows he can play with/ask for anything he wants for xmas/birthday and the colour doesn't matter.

At xmas he will no doubt get a shit load of cars, tractors, SpongeBob stuff as that's what he likes. If it was stereotypical girls stuff he wanted then he would get it.

I don't see what the big deal is unless you are purposely forcing your child to like things because that's what you want the to like.

Kew - I can see your point - to a point. What if we made all toys just neutral colours, much like the majority of furniture you find in homes...do you think children would play with them? I have to say, I have seen dressing up/fantasy stuff in blue marketed to girls too...

it is just one toy though in a household where obviously there are a lot of gender neutral toys and a mother who's attitude isn't all "women have to be passive little wallflowers who wait for life to happen to them rather than grab it by the horns." She obviously hasn't got a mother who project the idea that a girl's looks are the sum of her worth.

I'd be more worried when DD hits tweendom and older....now that's when the scary influences really start outside the house.

OP most certainly implied that people were thick in her last post.

Well I dont feel the need to sacrifice my gender and how I chose to define to in order to hold equalist views on the world. The same way I dont sacrfice my skin colour in order to be non racist.

The thing is that the MIL didn't just buy something, she actually ASKED the OP's DH "is this okay"?

Poor woman - a gift chosen with a parent's approval and it's STILL not right.

It's at times like this that I am glad DS is autistic and I am unlikely to have some snotty ungrateful DIL in my life!

God help all MILs who are trying to do the right thing and having it thrown back in their faces.

I don;t think there needs to be a ban (not sure where "banning" anyhting came from) I am even happy to see pink toys and blue toys. But walk into most shops and the girls department is awash with pink shiny glittery stuff and the boys with camoflage and dinosaurs. I'm not even sure why it needs to be so obviously grouped.

I have even been in a position where I wanted to buy DS (for Xmas last year) a write on/wipe of magnetic calendar type board to encourage his writing and the only one they had had pink fairies on it. I naively asked where the more neutral one (or even the "boys" one at a push) was to be told they "didn't make one for boys". This was M&S.

And some people sound like sad pompous windbags lifeofpo

how is it choice to have such an overwhelming number of girls toys in pink and/or sparkly.

Boys like sparkle under 4 why no "boys" sparkly toys?

My experience with saying that you should just accept the gift is that
1- you have no idea how many toys the child is going to receive big my family is to go by, my dcs will receive more from my ostentation & PIL than from us
2- after accepting the gift from PIL then one from a few well meaning friends and then you gave been given some second hand toys you can end up with a lot if the stuff even if you have never bought it yourself
3- the influence from the outside world is HUGE

So you then end up in the situation when your dd has been given some nice pink sparky shoes with heels that she is delighted about. Again. And her friends at play group say it's lively and beautiful.
Move in a few years and I now have a friend who bitter regret accepting all the gifts and hand me down because of the influence it had in her dd.
on the other side, my ds is known to have come back home saying that mummies are doing the HW, can't do DIY and should be wearing pink, as pink us for girls and not for boys.
All that from a child who has always had the experience if mummy and daddy doing the HW, mummy doing some DIY and generally bring told that boys and girls can do/play with the same things.

The influence of the outside world is such that if you do want to fight, even about, the influence of society and increase choices for our dd, then tou need to be very bold and make your house a place where gender stereotype do not apply. And in our culture it means avoiding pink as much as possible.

I do agree though that the OP will have to have a discussion about it with her DH. Wo his full support, this us ever going to work.

make-up and beauty toys www.argos.co.uk/static/Browse/ID72/33013368/c_1/1%7Ccategory_root%7CToys%7C33006252/c_2/2%7C33006252%7CRole+play%7C33006815/c_3/3%7Ccat_33006815%7CMake-up+and+beauty+toys%7C33013368.htm

point to the choice there - its 99% pink or pink + another colour.

Oh my god, someone call the police lifeofpo is being held hostage at a keyboard and being forced to post on a forum

That's part of being an indivdual having different opinions. Woudent it be boring if everyone thought the same. There is nothing wrong with pink, and dress up, giving the child different options is the right way.

Seriously, why are you here, Po? Sounds like you don't get much out of it - what's the point?

Kew - the is a lot of pink out there I agree and it annoys me (pink monopoly?) - I like pink but I don't want my daughter drowning in pink and I don't want her thinking that the only worth a girl has is her ability to look pretty and be a domestic goddess (however, if that's what she chooses in the end and is happy then that's her choice) ...but this post is about one toy, one single toy the OP is upset about. She obviously doesn't have much faith in her own influence if this toy is such a source of angst.

Accept the gift with good grace, mabey in the new year havea talk about the Girl Guide Study and how you want dd to play with a range of toys

SP the problem is that your ds is highly unlikely to ask for anything pink because he is surrounded by a society that tells him pink is for girls. Even ds1 who has always played with girls and being laughed at because of that has never asked for something pink.
He did play with the kitchen we imposed on him gave him as we thought he might like it but he would never have asked for it.
Sometimes to promote certain things, you have to push them a bit.

giving the child different options is the right way absolutely agree. Problem is at the moment its quite hard to offer that choice. DS would much prefer to just copy me and is baffled by the camoflage patterned stuff and why loads of craft stuff comes in pink boxes. A bit of choice which isn't pink or camflage would be lovely.

roar @ 2Tiselyylttocare

the pig talks sense

I like pink too - I look good in pink so does DS. Can;t convince him to wear it though because "pink is for girls"

Really fucking really lifeofpo?

My DD21 monthold grabs t towel puts in on her head then goes over to look at herself i the oven door

fucking hell...