to be shocked and disappointed by this sexism?

[awfullyproper]

This is the sticker page from dd's activity pack from the lounge at Gatwick. The male chracters: captain, Steward, photographer and spy.
The female characters: stewardess, movie star and model.
Not only that, but the male characters are 4 times wider than the females. The stewardess looks like an exaggerated Barbie.
AIBU, or is this just so wrong!

[SquidgeyMidgey]

I get both sides of this argument however I would say it isn't something that bothers me. That said I have put on another thread that it annoys me when car salesmen talk to DH so there's an immediate contradiction! I 'let' my DD plaster everything in pink, play with dolls, do hair incessantly etc but she also knows plenty of women with STEM jobs and wants to be an industrial chemist when she grows up. She knows women do technical jobs, a child who doesn't might form a different idea from that poster.

[thebiscuitindustry]

YANBU. It's not trivial to be bothered by things like this. It's so insidious and should be challenged.

[dentydown]

My son challenged me on not being a girl (I fix his bike, put up shelves - basic DIY). Then he asked me to act more like a girl.
I offered to wear more make-up, get false nails, spend his pocket money on girlie clothes and oh, he needs to fix his bike himself or find someone else to do it because I didn't want to ruin my nails.
He then told me he liked me as I was and not to change

[MrsHathaway]

I find it noticeable on Let's Play on CBeebies that Rebecca takes all the science/senior/active (ie stereotypically male) roles such as helicopter pilot, knight, doctor; and Sid takes all the caring/artistic/sensitive (ie stereotypically female) roles such as ballet dancer, hairdresser, cake baker, etc. It feels deliberate and "right on" but equally it's a tiny counter to the enormous wave of "girls are, boys do" of other children's programmes (fuck off Kate & Mim Mim and Everything's Rosie in particular).

The first vicar I ever had dealings with was a woman. I was prepared for confirmation by a woman. Our curate is a woman. I find women priests unremarkable and the debate against them baffling.

I want my DC to see female scientists (SIL is a nuclear physicist) and male caregivers (their headmaster is taking shared parental leave) and female sports stars and male nurses and so on, because in my opinion and in my experience children generalise widely from what they see - if every teacher is a woman then only women teach; if every pilot is a man then only men fly.

So yes, I would prefer a booklet in which the pilot is a woman and the coffee is served by a man, even if it doesn't reflect the likely makeup of the flight crew on that day.

[LuisSuarezTeeth]

I'm a frequent flyer. In the last 12 months I estimate at least 50 per cent of the cabin crew were male. Of the pilot's and first officers I would guess maybe 30 per cent female. This is all the same airline though. Congrats to Autumn for the very tenuous SAHM bash

[ptumbi]

I've only ever once had a female pilot, the rest were always male. Had a few male cabin staff but the bulk are female so the picture is pretty accurate. - I fly Easyjet and can categorically say that male/female cabin crew is more like 50/50 - some flights the male cabin crew are in the majority.

[fuzzpig]

Of course YANBU, small things like this really add up

[Spock27]

Although I'm not sure I feel a constant battle.

I watched a video recently of male sports stars being asked the same questions that female sports stars are and they were shocked to say the least. It seemed completely out of place and was bizarre that they were being asked about their hair and clothes after competing. But it's seen as normal to ask a professional female tennis player who has just won a grand slam match to 'give us a twirl'.

I also remember a group of astronauts who were about to go on a mission various questions. The males all got serious questions to do with their jobs, the female was asked if she was worried about 'doing her hair' in space and 'missing men'

The media are terrible for it. It's the Rupert Murdochs of the world but it's also just so ingrained that it really is everywhere.

[LuisSuarezTeeth]

Ptumbi thats who I fly with.

[awfullyproper]

No replies apart from BA, who said take it up with the lounge.

[awfullyproper]

To the person who said that it's just reflecting reality. Is that how we want things to stay?

[rageagainsttheBIL]

Trying to see the positive, the female film star is probably the highest paid of the lot...? (But still paid less than her male counterparts)

I too agree the whole girly pink thing seems to be worse now. But then I think the sheer volume of consumerism is worse full stop.

[RoboticSealpup]

YANBU. If more people complained about instances of subtle sexism instead of just categorising them as 'not a big deal in the grand scheme of things', maybe our daughters and sons wouldn't be bombarded with stereotypical imagery on a daily basis during their formative years. Children don't think critically in the way adults do, and in any case, even if it does 'reflect reality' does that mean it's good, seeing as we don't exactly live in a meritocracy. Should we be depicting ethnic minorities as more likely to be in low paid employment? Because, statistically speaking, that is also 'true'. It's true because of structural disadvantages, but that's not something that children can understand, they will just think that's the way it 'should' be.

This sticker saying 'future pilot' (pictured) was given to my daughter by the female pilot on our last holiday. I almost teared up, it was so nice. We need more stuff like this.

[MrsHathaway]

Robotic you've reminded me that there are only two "ethnic" families in Postman Pat - the Indian man who works on the trains, and the Chinese man who ... cooks Chinese food.

[EnthusiasmDisturbed]

yanbu

ds told me recently that only women can be nurses

He knows women can be doctors are he has friends who's mums are doctors and consultants

I have no idea where he has got this from a s quicky corrected him

I guess from books and his Lego sets

[KathyBeale]

The first time I read Zog with my son, he laughed at the end and said "girls can't be doctors". Our GP is female, and he'd recently been to A&E where he'd been treated by a female doctor too. So his ONLY experience of doctors was with women and he still thought they had to be men.

Insidious shit like this is the reason children think that way. It is important to challenge it wherever you see it/hear it/experience it.

[StealthPolarBear]

I love zog. Women can be doctors. Knights can not want to fight and dragons can be ambulances :)
Though I did worry about that horse...

[awfullyproper]

This is their crap response:
thanks for your feedback, *. We've passed it to our Product Manager for future consideration.

Really not satisfied with that.

[awfullyproper]

any suggestions?

[BreakingDad77]

Changing a few posters won't help until many many more adults change themselves

Though the problem is that it reinforces these tropes.

As we have seen from the many examples given here, kids see women doing all kinds of jobs but still instinctively sorting women and men into jobs.

[LilacSpunkMonkey]

Send them the link for this thread and suggest they come and have a chat.

And send them a link to 'Everyday Sexism' so they can see where their bullshit leads to.

That'a a really weak response from them. Name and shame on Twitter?

[BarricadesBabe]

YANBU

DH and I bend over backwards to get message across to our DD that girls can do whatever they like, also plenty of good role models among family and friends, but all goes down the Swanee when they go out into the wider world and see crap like this.

[awfullyproper]

Got another Twitter message:
@xxxxx thank you again for your comments. Our product team will be redesigning the activity pack to better represent gender throughout
Anyone going to No1 in Gatwick can have a look. We'll see!!!

[MrsHathaway]

That's a much better response.

[RoboticSealpup]

Well done!! I do hope they follow through with their promise.