"We are waiting to see what we have before choosing the colour for the babies room"

[FlipFlippingFlippers]

This is not an anti pink thread but seriously?! For what its worth I am female and I like pink. And blue. And green. And yellow. You get the idea. It just bugs me that people give colours gender. I do have a pink hating, dinosaur loving dd so I might be a bit more sensitive to this.

They are sensible to realise the baby does need own room straight away anyway.

'I find pre birth and early years gender stereotyping the absolute worst'

I work with 0-5 year olds and their parents, as well as Early Years professionals like nursery staff. I can confirm that this sort of crap is RIFE and I come across it all the time. Boys cant play with dolls or it might turn him a bit.........., girls who like runnning 'should have been a boy', 3 year old never listens to a single word I say but 'hey, he's a boy', 'boys don't cry' and on and on and on and on. Dear god its wearing.

Tortoise, I cannot agree more about women's clothes. I was trying to buy a suit-style jacket recently - I looked at over 20 styles and not a single one had any pockets! Not one! But most had those fake pockets that look like a pocket but there's actually no hole there. What the jeff is that all about????

Well, girlies [women] always carry handbags you know .

wow, alot of hating on this thread

I cant fathom the energy to answer the OP

However I think things are changing slowly, and certainly there is a helpful pink backlash ongoing right now. Its doesnt help that alot of little girls unfortunaterly like the pink cak.

But awareness is changing, and amongst my social circle I am seeing a massive growing awareness of this issue.

We need to stay steady, one day at a time. we cant expect a system that has been in place for a millenium to change overnight. But bloody hell we have come a long way.

I actually done have an issue with pink walls, and I do accept that its part of a complex issue.

But cant we celebrate whats been accomplished? in a few decades. The only way is up

lotta It is so very depressing that boys are told not to cry...and with the threat of looking girlie if they do..thus driving home the message that there is nothing worse than looking girlie....and that crying is bad.

Crying is fantastic. It releases the pressure, rebalances the brain chemistry. Crying is GOOD for toddlers in particular. How terrible that people are depriving male children of their natural stress release and simultaneously teaching them that women are inferior....and then tutting over the levels of male violence in society.

You would have to be nuts to think this is the way to create a stable safe society.

Once the hair gets long- I seem to pick up yeast deposits that don't come off with any kind of product. So I just whip it all off and start fresh

sweet jesus

I know IceBeing - talk about setting them up for a lifetime of emotional problems! I always challenge all this crap and I really hope that it makes a parent think about what they are saying maybe a bit too hopeful

Also a big fan of crying having been brought up not to have any emotions myself - so incredibly damaging

fromparistoberlin73 LOL She did ask

Me: I mean wouldn't if be more efficient just to ask my child which one is preferred? It would also avoid treating people differently based purely on gender while disregarding their true personal preferences...for which the technical term is sexism.

icebeing did you really say this to a bloke in a bike rental place?!

we cant expect a system that has been in place for a millenium to change overnight.

See I don't see it as a system in place for a millennium. A lot of it is very recent and done to commercialism rather than a system that existed previously. In the past the concern would be just having clothes, not whether they were dressed for the right gender or had the right colour walls. I'm not sure too many children in the past had their own rooms either. The need for one bedroom for each child, is comparatively modern.

The pink/blue thing is definitely very modern, less than a hundred years. It used to be white all around for babies/children, no gender difference.

It really is depressing fascinating how gender differentiation for children has increased in the last few decades, at the same time so much progress was being made in terms of gender equality.

that all "girl" toys have to be pink and glittery is definitely a new thing. When I was young, Lego was lego and it was not boys' toy. And toy kitchens, prams etc came in all colours. Not so much now.
pbs.twimg.com/media/BLiT7ZWCQAAiJ41.jpg

let's start the minute they are born!

My daughter has a pink and green room. I like it. :)

She also has pink clothes, and I have fun getting her cute outfits. I only have a few short years to dress her cute and how I want before she makes her own choices. I have a friend who refused to give her daughter girly things, and her daughter, to her dismay, is all about pink.

I have a cousin who grew up all girl and grew up to be an engineer who travels the world and is very good at her job. Your interests aren't going to determine intelligence or career.

I just find it amusing that as parents you think your child is a blank slate that you can force to like or dislike something. I think it's proven by the girls that were forced to have pink and hated it when their brothers got Batman. You can't make your child dislike pink anymore than you can force them to like it. They'll have their own interests.

The important thing is to let them build their own identity and support them on the path they want to follow, whether that's a girly girl or a tomboy. I'll be proud of my girl if she decides to be a beautician equally as much as if she becomes a mechanic.

But in the mean time, I happen to like pink and the cute girly outfits they sell for babies, so I'm going to dress her in what I prefer. When she's old enough to decide between spiderman or barbie, I'll let her make that decision.

See I don't see it as a system in place for a millennium. A lot of it is very recent and done to commercialism rather than a system that existed previously

agree that the pink commercial shite is a recent trend. However its strange that its occured adjacent to a growing awareness of gender issues

I am 40 but now discuss feminism with the 20 something girls in my office. when I was 20, feminism did not even occur to me. We now have the internet and a growing awarness and anger around the treatment and injustice against women. I dont think this tide will go back, it just cant

I just find it amusing that as parents you think your child is a blank slate that you can force to like or dislike something.

No you can't. But you can plant a seed to get them to question something for themselves, rather than accept the messages they are bombarded with from elsewhere.

When she's old enough to decide between spiderman or barbie, I'll let her make that decision.

I'd actually question this too. Given that adults fall for the pink/blue thing or the lady razor thing, then I have concerns. There are rules about advertising to children as its been proven that children are more heavily advertised by advertising than adults. And when adults are still absorbing these messages and behaving in line with them, then I'm not sure how much you can simply let a child decide.

In order to let them really decide, you have to counter educate them and arm them with the knowledge that this is only one point of view and that they don't have to go with that.

Thats why I think its important to engage with your child and understand why they want that particular thing rather than the other. They may really still want the barbie or the spiderman, but unless they are taught to understand why they are choosing....

I try to say to DS that there aren't boys' toys and girls' toys, there are just fun to play with toys and toys that aren't your own personal favourites (and your friends may have different favourites). So he has had a toy cooker (a friend's exH actually tried to stop her getting their son a cooker on the basis that it was a girl's toy - so glad he's an ex), a pushchair and my old doll's house (as well as the tanks, toy guns, toy cars... some of which also date from my childhood).

Lego gives me the rage - instead of extending the city range (which is basically "celebrate male policemen and fire fighters" with about 3 female characters in the whole range - one of whom is a blonde with her cat stuck up the tree for the male firefighter to rescue - her head has now been recycled and attached to a chima warrior's armour to make our own DIY Eowyn to go with the Lord of the Rings stuff...). Meanwhile, all the things like vets surgeries are part of the pink and purple Friends range... DS saved up and bought a Playmobil vet's surgery and camper van - no doubt those would have been pink and purple had he wanted the lego versions. He loves them.

I can see what some posters are saying re. devaluing girl's traditional stuff (which then extends into adult life in the form of devaluing unpaid women's work around the house and childcare). I was flummoxed recently by one of DS's female school friends (with whom he climbs trees) saying she hates girl's toys and activities... I tried to introduce the idea that you shouldn't carve the world up that way...

And other random adults can be a pain too. DS decided to grow his hair long (wanted to look like Legolas). We had long discussions about how to handle peer pressure (e.g. googling famous footballers with pony tails), but in the end the thing that drove him to request a haircut was adults continually assuming he was a girl. GRRRR.

Incidentally, we are currently painting his room blue together... not because it's a boys' colour, but because he wants an "underwater" themed bedroom!

Totally agree with Icebeing that this stuff will cease to matter when women are actually paid the same as men, get the same amount of autonomy as men, wield the same political power as men... and anyone who can't see that gender stereotyping our children stands in the way of achieving this is kidding themselves.

I just find it amusing that as parents you think your child is a blank slate that you can force to like or dislike something.

well, children are definitely blank enough slates that society can force a majority of girls to like pink, and a majority of boys to dislike pink. It's certainly not a "natural" preference at all.

'well, children are definitely blank enough slates that society can force a majority of girls to like pink, and a majority of boys to dislike pink'

Excellent point Chachah.

well, children are definitely blank enough slates that society can force a majority of girls to like pink, and a majority of boys to dislike pink. It's certainly not a "natural" preference at all.

Yes and no. Obviously the choice of pink for girls and blue for boys has been randomly chosen by the society we currently live in. I do think tho that the majority of children do have a natural preference to conform to their gender stereotype- regardless of what the current fashion for that particular sex is. If the clothing designers that be started making green clothes for girls and lilac clothes for boys our childrens' wardrobes would soon change to reflect this.

I'm sure posters upthread would just put it down to the "conformity monster" but from my experience of having toddlers (who are the worst for sexist games and clothes) I think it's just a developmental phase they all go through. Having "rules" to stick to seems to help them make sense of the world and their own identity at a young age rather than hinder. They do eventually move past it and start to consider themselves as a true individual- rather than just a "girl" or "boy".

I can't bear all this gender stereo-typing angst. Who cares? What's wrong with pink? Stop being so judgemental.

I have a mate who bangs on and on about girls being able to do anything they want, not wear pink, bla bla. Then guess what? The example she's setting to her daughter is SAHM, cooking, baking, cleaning and washing, while daddy goes out suited and booted. I don't think she sees the irony.

I agree to some extent Saucy that there is a phase that late toddlers go through when they are fascinated by gender and by knowing where they fit (and much as I dislike most evo psych, I am prepared to buy the fact that the urge to breed is one of the strongest biological urges we have, and that in order to do so, we have to know which sex we are...) But (see for e.g. Lise Elliot's book "Pink Brain, Blue Brain" - which despite the title is actually a neurobiologist debunking a lot of the pseudo science round supposed gender differences), there's quite a lot of evidence from studies in child psychology to suggest that the age children enter this "girls are polar opposites of boys" phase and the length it lasts is dictated by parental influence. If you "pinkify" your daughters and "khakify" your sons, they will go into this phase earlier and stay in it for longer. My DS went into it about 4.5 (relatively late, if Elliot's account is correct) presumably because neither I nor his nursery made a big thing about gender, and came out of it relatively quickly (about 5.5 going on 6).

And peer pressure is enormous. One of my friends tells the story of her daughter coming home from a toddler group (very young, before she was secure with her colour words) and saying "I love princesses and my favourite colour is pink.... Which colour is pink?"

I love 'khakify' - excellent word!

For me this is all about nurture. And I fully agree that parental influence is hugely significant and largely underrated.

But (see for e.g. Lise Elliot's book "Pink Brain, Blue Brain" - which despite the title is actually a neurobiologist debunking a lot of the pseudo science round supposed gender differences), there's quite a lot of evidence from studies in child psychology to suggest that the age children enter this "girls are polar opposites of boys" phase and the length it lasts is dictated by parental influence. If you "pinkify" your daughters and "khakify" your sons, they will go into this phase earlier and stay in it for longer.

Is there any harm for going in early and coming out late? What are the studies on kids that came out too late or went in too early?

Aside from being obsessed with cooties for a bit longer, what happens to kids that leave late? They all seem to eventually even out by the time they hit high school, and certainly by uni when it's the in thing to buck all social expectations before you figure out which ones you should conform to and which ones are ok to bend.

100% YABU.

We knew it would be a nursery before I was pregnant so we painted it a lovely lavender colour knowing I would 'accent' it to go with the gender of whichever gender I would have.

It was a boy, I went with teal accessories before he was born. So fucking what?!