John Lewis removing gendered sections in kids clothing

[moutonfou]

John Lewis has announced they are no longer having 'boys' and 'girls' clothing sections. Just kids clothing. Which to me sounds fair enough. I had to buy several football shirts from the boys section as a kid and always felt like they weren't 'for me' and that someone was going to notice and call me out on it.

On some of the news outlets' Facebook posts about this, there are the most OTT comments from people who seem to have interpreted this as an attempt to make all kids be 100% gender fluid, stop calling them boys and girls at all, make all boys wear dresses, etc etc.

AIBU to be frustrated that people can't see the value of just letting kids like what they like, and that it's not all some sinister agenda??

All the pink shite didn't really happen till' the 80s. It was almost timed as a kickback to the 1970s feminists and all the work they did.

John Lewis have been doing this for a while anyway - they used to have labels saying JohnLewisBoy and JohnLewisGirl inside clothes, and now they don't.
And on their website, they give a much wider range of clothes when you pick the option "Girl's clothing" (there isn't an option yet to just pick children's clothing, so I am looking forward to when there is).
And they already put all the underwear and socks together in my local one.

Much quicker shopping by type, you can look at all the jumpers or whatever in one go instead of traipesing from one end of the shop to the other to see what there is.

People are so spectacularly missing the point. It's really not an attempt to get all boys wearing dresses. It's removing unnecessary labels so the parent can decide if a certain item fits their child.

Here's a random John Lewis Baby top. It does not say if it's for girl babies or boy babies. What exactly is the big deal? If your boy baby and neighbour's girl baby both show up wearing this, they will get all confused and turn intersex?
www.johnlewis.com/john-lewis-baby-artroom-mouse-print-top-cream/p3279320

Personally I can't stand the mouse print top and wouldn't buy it for either sex. My concern is that all clothes will be going unisex and that choice will be taken away. The likes of John Lewis are missing out by perusing this agenda. My social media feed is full of young start up companies selling Spanish baby clothing, bows and girlie shoes, socks and blue boys clothing. I think youngsters will resist this trend.

persuing this agenda

Isn't your social media feed just a reflection of what you and your contacts like and what your search engine feeds it?

Of course but I may search for baby clothes or Silver Cross prams! I haven't searched for JoJo bows. Maybe Facebook is more insidious than I realise and I am a chav.

Of course but I may search for baby clothes or Silver Cross prams! I haven't searched for JoJo bows. Maybe Facebook is more insidious than I realise and I am a chav.

My concern is that all clothes will be going unisex and that choice will be taken away.

Why on earth would JL (or any shop) do that when there is still a huge market for typically boy and girl clothes?! Fgs, all they are doing is stopping telling you that you should be choosing your child's clothes according to a label or a location on the shop floor. They are not changing the actual clothes they sell! People who want to buy pink frills for their dd can go right ahead and carry on buying them!

They will put on sale clothes that will sell - this won't end in unisex sludge coloured clothes.

I have one of each and this will definitely help with my shopping! Eg underwear - much easier to buy all pants at the same time.

M&s mix the underwear and pj's. My kids pick what they like and there is no discussion of whether it's for boys or girls.

Well time will tell.

My concern is that all clothes will be going unisex and that choice will be taken away. The likes of John Lewis are missing out by perusing this agenda^

All children's clothes are already unisex, Chester. The only difference in John Lewis now is that children aren't told otherwise. If you want to buy a pink dress, or a t-shirt with an astronaut on it, I am sure you will still find them there, in the unisex aisles. (Do you imagine they will only offer beige gender-neutral shifts?)

Remove the boy/girl label and both happy to wear pink if they like it

My son actively seeks out pink, he's frustrated that the only bright pink Converse are in the girl's ranges. This is a problem because they stop at smaller sizes and so he can't get any. Many boys will happily wear pink and don't need a designer label to do it. He's not teased for his love of pink.

unisex sludge coloured clothes.

Colours don't have sex.

Just as an example, Nike do men's football shoes in pink.
store.nike.com/gb/en_gb/pw/mens-pink-football-shoes/7puZbqcZ896Zoi3

As well as "lifestyle" shoes
store.nike.com/gb/en_gb/pw/mens-pink-lifestyle-shoes/7puZbqcZoneZoi3

And under "boys" too
store.nike.com/gb/en_gb/pw/boys-pink-shoes/7pvZbqcZoi3

Although they call it "kids", no fuss.

Well time will tell.

Seriously, what reason would a shop actually have for deciding to only stock green, brown and beige clothes? That is not what this is about at all. It's about saying all colours are great, but no colour has to be 'just for boys' or 'just for girls'. I don't see what's so difficult to understand about that.

Red - great, any child can wear it
Green - ditto
Blue - ditto
Yellow - ditto
Orange - ditto
Black - ditto
Silver - ditto
Brown - ditto

Get the idea? Pink and purple might not catch on among most boys for a looong time yet, but who knows! What I do know is that we don't actually need to tell children that pink (or sparkles or unicorns) are for girls. If they don't like those things, they don't have to choose them (whichever sex they are).

BTW,
persuing this agenda
perusing this agenda
pursuing

Perusing is a lovely word and should be used far more often, though ideally only when that's what you mean.

These are from M&S.

Any guesses under which section the t-shirts on the photo are under?

Or these

If they can put all of these under the same Kids section and sell them to boys and girls, it makes financial sense.

It's amazing how easily people misunderstand simple things in their desperation to be outraged.

If you're planning on more than one child it makes sense to get a lot of basics in neutral styles and colours.

Pink and purple might not catch on among most boys for a looong time yet, but who knows!

My son and most of his friends love bright pinks and purples. DS has neon pink football boots, pale pink shirts, salmon coloured jeans and purple football tops and a jacket.
The younger fashion concious boys love those colours!

It's amazing how easily people misunderstand simple things in their desperation to be outraged

Yes, absolutely! There's a lot of it about.