To wonder why communal parks are so biased towards boys

[arethereanyleftatall]

Looking around our parks, it occurred to me all the normal type equipment paid for by the council is geared towards a certain type of play.
You tend to see a slide/swing type area (great for everyone) plus football goals, skate parks, and basketball hoops.
Of course either sex could play on the last 3, and do, but in general, these 3 types of equipment are occupied by boys.
Or, let's take sex out of it - these 3 types of equipment are played with by energetic/sporty/rough and tumble type children.
Where's the community stuff for the children who prefer more gentle/imaginative role play/dance games.
Where's the netball courts, the fairy houses?
I'm actually not even sure what you would build to make it more even, but at our local park yesterday.... 8 approximately 10 year old boys playing football; about 10 teenage boys on the skate park;basketball hoop unused; swing area equal girls/boys.

I'm with @AllThingsServeTheBeam - if you had a sensory garden, before long vandals would have it pulled up or people would let their dogs shit in it. A fairy house would soon become somewhere for druggies to congregate.

Round here we have a wonderful 'Secret Garden' where local businesses have contributed benches for the adults and a wigwam for the children, but if you go down there at 8am its awash with drug paraphernalia and empty bottles from the night before. Sadly there was a man actually living in the wigwam for a short time last winter.

In that example we just tidy up because it's only small and volunteer led, but a council would have to do this for every single playground or invest in heavy security, something you don't have to do for football goals and skate parks which are much harder to damage and render useless. This doesn't answer why there are no netball courts mind you...

And even if girls are seen less than boys in parks, it doesn’t mean that they aren’t engaged in physical activity elsewhere. Round here I see girls riding bikes, going running with a parent. My youngest dd does 8 hours of dance classes/week, my middle dd, having not enjoyed sport as a child, took up Thai boxing in her teens.

Yes I think this demonstrates that ‘girls prefer to sit and chat’ has now become engrained here. I entirely disagree. Space should be inclusive for girls before that judgment can be made. There are other places that accommodate girls better and have better participation. The U.K. is oddly behind on this.

But we do have to challenge the sterotypes and instead askwhygirls aren't skateboarding and playing football and apparently prefer to sit and socialise rather than exercise in public. I'd like to see that change before I agreed to see money ploughed in to making sure girls don't exercise.
Excellent idea, because this is not just when males are around. Groups of teenage girls tend to just want to hang out chatting whereas groups of boys tend to chat then start doing something physical.

I was at a skate park yesterday with dd and ds. I would say there was about a 50:50 mix of the sexes of all ages from about 3-40ish on skates, scooters and boards. I did notice multiple teen girls which was good to see.

Is the issue the fact that there's "nothing for girl's" or is it a problem with our attitude as to how girls should play?

This. The problem isn't the parks or the equipment in them. It's the social attitudes that give some girls the idea that exercise isnt for them.

The answer isnt to say "no dear, it isn't - we'll give you some pretty benches and a playhouse instead". That simply perpetuates the problem. We should be challenging the fact that girls don't want to exercise and trying to change the behaviours that lead to that.

I (as a girl) spent my entire childhood on football pitches and basketball courts. The reason they are there is because all you need is a ball. They are accessible for many many children who don’t have money for dance classes or gymnastics etc. If you don’t think your girls should be using them then more fool you.

Girls aren’t ‘overlooked’ in parks, they choose not to use the equipment which is there for ALL to use.

Yes. Why though?

I mean, we can continue designing and implementing playparks which girls won't use, because they feel intimidated, or dominated over, or self conscious and then wonder why girls choose not to use public spaces. Or we can keep shouting that girls need to do more active exercise and wonder how they do that exactly when they won't use the public spaces.

Or we can look at ways to make public spaces more attractive to girls in general and the exercise part of it will follow on from there.

Obviously for some women on here, the lack of participation of girls in public spaces is because they're not enough like boys.

But we do have to challenge the sterotypes and instead ask why girls aren't skateboarding and playing football and apparently prefer to sit and socialise rather than exercise in public.

Why should girls who prefer to sit and chat in the park be ‘encouraged’ to skateboard?

My DBs loved football, skateboarding and cricket. I wanted to play tennis or chat with my friends in the park.
They hated swimming and I loved it.
What’s wrong with that?

My DH loves to spend his leisure time walking up hills and cycling. Should I be ‘encouraged’ to join him?

@Clymene

Obviously for some women on here, the lack of participation of girls in public spaces is because they're not enough like boys.

No it isn't. It's because they are expected to be sitting down chatting nicely or playing "house"

Talking about girls doing physical activity elsewhere I was surprised at how popular in my area cheerleading is.
I have been a long to watch a few rehearsals and I have very mixed feelings about it.
It is very energetic, the girls are working as a team and they really enjoy it. The girls are committing to a regular weekly activity. But and it's a big but for me it's for the benefit of Male dominated sports. Its seen as something that is easy on the eye and a bit of a pastime. It is enjoyed by the ( mostly middle aged) dads at the events they cheerleading for which makes me uncomfortable.

Why should girls who prefer to sit and chat in the park be ‘encouraged’ to skateboard?

They shouldn't be. But it should be explored why they are choosing to sit and chat rather than exercising, which is what parks are supposed to be provided for.

Our local playgrounds are heavily climbing orientated. We have 5 different playgrounds within 15 minutes walk from us which is nice unless you have a DC who is afraid of heights. They all have different rope climbing equipment, climbing walls, steps, ladders planks for climbing. Forts that you access by climbing a wall. Monkey bars. It's also not great for younger children who aren't able to independently climb or reach the steps.

But and it's a big but for me it's for the benefit of Male dominated sports

But it isn't. It also isn't just for girls. It may have started out that way but it has evolved into what is essentially just a combination of gymnastics and dance.

How is basketball hoop different to netball?

There are skater chicks, does nobody remember Avril Lavigne?

In my town the fairy houses would end up being late night crack dens

What are you talking about??
Girls like slides etc too.
What a load of sexist BS.
Fairy houses 🤬🤦‍♀️

@SoupDragon -perhaps you too should read the Make Space for Girls website?

A clue - some groups have talked to actual girls about what they would like in play spaces. I know it's a shocking concept to speak to intended users and ask them what they like rather than dictating to them and complaining when they don't use it.

Perhaps one of the main issues is the lack of loos?

No clean and safe loos for girls means they cant stay at the park for as long, and may lead to a reluctance to go to the park? Of the 5 parks near us, only one has half decent loos to use (but still not ones you’d want to sit down!).

Let’s face it, boys use any available bush / tree with a carefree ease!

I'm not saying sexism doesn't exist

But I do think some people see sexism which isn't there

I feel this is one of those times

Not all boys want to skate or kick a soccer ball.

A skate park could be used by someone on a scooter or bike - these don't have a gender.

What kind of equipment at a playground can encourage dance? Isn't a dance class required?

Also we had no internet in my day so doing gymnastics like turning cartwheels & handstands was the norm. We used to tuck our school tunics into our undies for modesty

@CatJumperTwat

It's sad but not surprising to see women falling over themselves to deny this is a problem. Recognising female socialisation is not "sexist" and we don't have to pretend everything is equal between female children and male children.

But we have two aspects of this, space and socialisation. Space is the smaller issue compared to socialisation which turns girls off active play and sport and means that they don't claim their entitlement to the space that exists.

Some of that is positive role modelling to girls. Some of that is boys' attitudes to girls.

Moot point as I don't have daughters. I have a sporty DS2 who loves traditional sport. I have DS1 who has dyspraxia and ASD so is not inclined to do more clichéd masculine sports and prefers solo persuits. They have both had a foundation in the more "feminine" gymnastics because I felt it developed skills that were transferable to other sports and generally beneficial. They swapped to Karate when they stopped enjoying it... largely because they were the only boys left in the class (it cuts both ways). They see me being active, doing weights classes, they join me at parkrun. I'd hope that whatever sex they are, I'm a positive role model to them for females being active, and hopefully they shouldn't develop attitudes that put girls off sport... (if they had been girls I'd hope that they'd feel empowered to keep activity up). DS2 has a girl on his football team and he respects her as a player and her skills, she just happens to be the only one of the opposite sex.

We are very slowly seeing progress on women's sport in the media, but it's a long process. Active women need to be an unremarkable image (and I don't mean rollerskating in white jeans to advertise sanitary products )

@FrancescaContini But ALL little girls love fairies, don't you know that?!

We have a park that has a little garden and some small paths and wooden chairs around the side of it... I imagine they were aiming for imaginative/fairy play in that.

I've got to say, though, it's rarely ever used. I see more teens sitting on the chairs; or occasionally drunk people, than kids.

We used to have wooden huts, but they were removed. Sadly anything small and under cover tends to get abused for drugs/sex or trashed by drunken people; which feels really sad to write, especially as I live somewhere that's considered very middle class!

But we do have to challenge the sterotypes and instead askwhygirls aren't skateboarding and playing football and apparently prefer to sit and socialise rather than exercise in public. I'd like to see that change before I agreed to see money ploughed in to making sure girls don't exercise.

Surely an equally validate question is why can't boys sit and socialise and talk face to face, why do they always have to be "doing" something to be socialising?

And why are activities like football and skateboarding the only acceptable ones?

@icelollies your parks don't have toilets?

So what, the boys are just all pissing in the bushes?

Madness. I bet pedos are lurking in every corner at parks where kids are weeing out in the open

I'd be rallying the council to put some bloody loos there!