AIBU to think Selfridges have got it wrong, here?

[SpaceForAll]

DD1 is 6 and loves space.

She was given a pair of fab astronaut pyjamas. She thinks they are great and loves wearing them.

She liked them so much, we recommended them to a friend and went to send them the website link. DD was SO put out to read that the PJs are supposedly "for him", i.e. boys' clothes.

So I emailed Selfridges to point this out, hoping they might consider changing the wording on their website to something less sexist. They replied "sorry for the inconvenience, we've passed your email on..."

No change was made to the website, so I emailed again.

In the light of their "agender" gender neutral campaign that they are running at the moment, I think they are being short sighted and somewhat hypocritical.

I've had no response, and DD has decided to put pen to paper and write to them herself...

I know IANBU, just wanted to raise a bit of feeling...

Yabu the supplier said that, it would of been put up automatically on the site and not something they can just edit quickly .

Oh you are so NBU and it infuriates me when people can't see the issue and think this is just about pyjamas, or t shirts, or yoghurts (Ooh don't get me started on the football yoghurts for boys and pink love hearts ones for girls). It is all part of a huge issue where our children are being told who they can be based on what generalisation they have which is all manner of WRONG.

Real bugbear of mine and gives me rage, especially when people tell me (as had happened IRL) that it is a first world problem. Argh.

I would have just told your daughter that someone forgot that there are now women astronauts. Perhaps she might like to remind them with a photo to show how well they look on her.

The small stuff is insidious - left unchecked it becomes the bigger stuff, or is a symptom of the bigger stuff. Not challenging the fact that a supposed gender-neutral store of all things thinks astronaut outfits are only for boys IS offensive. In this particular case it already is the big stuff! Look into how women in science studies at university are treated, how women who work in the sciences fields are treated. There are plenty of people who think they shouldn't be there, and that is not being focused on either.

These things really do matter. Off on a tangent slightly, but I was quite talented at snooker as a kid. It just came naturally to me. We had a table outside the main hall, and I could beat all-comers - teachers, students, parents. No-one ever mentioned that I should try to take up snooker as a profession and I never thought of it myself. Because when I watched snooker on TV it was all men, so I 'knew' it wasn't for me, and my snooker skills were just reduced to a funny thing I could do to shock people at the pub. Representation is extremely important especially to children. they take a lot of their cues about what they can be from what society is actively showing them. The OP's daughter loves space, and a bit of damage may have been done in showing her that some people consider space to only be a subject for boys. It's a real shame that some of you are parents and see nothing wrong with the chipping away of female self-esteem. Just shopping in the boys aisle doesn't send any kind of message and it doesn't encourage the companies to treat their female customers any better.

Well said Gator. Funny about the snooker thing, my dad taught me to a play from a young age. It came in very handy when I was a youth worker because I could beat the lads and it put paid to any sexist stuff about the girls not being allowed on the pool table!

Love this! Bit pricey though. www.sewingcircus.co.uk/product/space-black-skirt-8-12-years

Wow, everyone, thanks for your support!

Yes, my twitter name is @narnian125 sorry - I just signed up yesterday and not entirely certain how to tweet effectively let alone remember my name! How do I re-tweet to Jenny Murray / Women's hour?

YANBU we all need to challenge these sexist practices.

I wonder what the correlation is between agender fashion and ridiculously gendered clothes for children. I think there is a link.

To me it is just the pendulum swinging back too far, as pendulums normally do.

dragdown it's absolutely not a first world problem of course - how many girls in various countries are being told going to school is not for girls ?... How do you reply to the people who say that?

Well there is a link in that Selfridges are doing the two at the same time.

That they are actual incompatible seems to have passed them by.

Clothes for prepubescent children don't need to be divided and labelled by sex. It's just as easy to put all trousers together in store as it is to put them in two places. And on websites, you can have filters by colour, theme etc rather than sex.

30 years ago my sister loved goofy, all the products were for boys in boy colours - dark green blue black - nothing in nice yellow paler greens reds purples etc .,, i wrote to them and nothing changed. Minnie for girls micky for boys - 30 years!!!!!

That's really sad, momtothree

I agree with you op and I don't always agree with posters who find things like this. There did ought to be a big section of gender neutral clothing (including the item you found). There can also be boys and girls sections but most young kids clothing ought to be neutral ish. Eg a red tshirt should be able to be bought for a boy and passed down to a girl or vice versa. But you generally find a girls red tshirt to have ornate edges, tighter fit and other adornments. Whereas a boys red t will be baggier, plainer and possibly a darker shade of red to make it "boyish". Very wasteful.

Agree, like school shirts with scalloped collars. Dd ran out of school tops the other day and refused to wear her twin brother's because it was a 'boy's one'.

I'm with you Op, I get fed up of this shit. Any child or adult should be able to pursue their interests without being stuck into a little colour coded box.

Fwiw I fucking hate pink and love Batman - Batman tops aimed at women? White and bloody pink. Jog on.