Girl in boyish clothes = YES, boy in clothes that are even the tiniest bit feminine = NO!

[GrahameSylvia]

Does anyone else think its a bit unreasonable that when dressing young kids (babies, toddlers, and perhaps also a bit older), a lot of people now seem to think that dressing girls in slightly more boyish clothes (blue, dinosaur print, stuff with 'strong girl' etc printed on it) is great, progressive, cool etc. But that if you put your baby or toddler boy in one item that is even the slightest bit feminine, even when paired with other boy-ish stuff (I'm talking blue dungarees with a tiger on them and a vest that has gone a tiny bit peach colored in the wash) people instantly assume they are a girl and / or are made quite uncomfortable and ask why your kid is dressed as a girl??

I'd say we dress our one year old somewhere between 'standard boy' and what we think of as neutral - not that this should matter. There is plenty of blue, brown green in his wardrobe, though also some yellow, brighter prints and the occasional bit of dark purple or fawn. But anytime he has the slightly 'girlier' things on everyone calls him she. We've also had a couple of instances of relatives (not always older ones) being uncomfortable or mocking him / us when he's been dressed in supposedly 'girly' things e.g. a red cardigan, a bonnet with earflaps instead of a beanie, dungarees printed with sweetcorns.

Since then I've started to look round and noticed that even in our relatively progressive, affluent bit of the world some girls are dressed very femininely, but plenty are dressed in stuff that is boyish or neutral and everyone still assumes they are girls. But every boy is wearing camouflage, sludge colours and vehicle prints. The same extends to toys, plenty of girl toddlers being encouraged to play with lego and cars and get muddy, but parents at our local affluent play cafe actively discouraging boys from picking up dolls or dollhouses - despite the fact that most of these girls will grow up to own cars and drive and the boys will own houses and have babies.

So why do all these progressive folks feel it is okay and positive for girls to be 'boyish' but still seem to be (consciously or unconsciously) very against their little boys being the slightest bit feminine?

Has anyone else seen the same / seen different / think its unreasonable to condition little boys to be against anything 'soft', 'feminine' or 'caring'? Doesn't feminism / progress cut both ways?

My sons can be dressed head to toe in blue trucks and dinosaurs and people still ask if they're girls (Inc the 7 yo) because their hair isn't short. I just say no, they normally I apologise, I say no need to apologise as they are indeed beautiful children and that's it. Where are you going that when you say "oh he's a boy" that they recoil and declare "but he's dressed like a GIRL!!"?

The best answer is to laugh it off and say "don't be silly, rabbits / pink / frills are for everyone!"

Generally tho it's cos boys are "better" so girls should want to emulate them whereas girls are lame so no one even girls should want to emulate them. See the horror for pink that simy doesn't exist for blue.

You can challenge the uncle without rocking the boat although frankly if its upsetting you so much and your DH refuses to speak to his brother for fear of upsetting HIM, you have a DH problem

those dungarees are a bit girly aren't they, I'll have to play football with him when he is older to make sure he gets the right idea
You don't need to get confrontational and threaten him with his wife with "what's wrong with looking like a girl, got something against girls have you, wonder what your wife would make of that?" and why is it HER job to parent his speech??
Just make a joke like "they're fine, I checked, no need to extra penis space until he's 20. Actually did Steve tell you we've signed baby Bo up for ballet class?"
Or simply "he's 2, why does it matter which aisle I got them from?"

It’s definitely got more rigid, red jumpers and sweetcorn didn’t used to be exclusively for girls!

Actually did Steve tell you we've signed baby Bo up for ballet class
No,please don't say this. Comments of this nature feed the problem.
In this kind of context whether intentional or not this comment is likely to be perceived as meaning that you also think there is something amusing or shocking about a boy doing ballet. It's often used to epitomise the worst "girlyness" a boy could be exposed to and even used as a kind of threat on occasion.
Whenever we make a joke of a boy doing a "girly" thing or try to use it to shock, we are in fact playing right into the hands of the misogynists and homophobes. It effectively says "We agree with you deep down."

While I totally agree with what you’re saying I think feminism is primarily trying to get women’s prospects on a par with mens which it is still trying to do. Not too long ago girls were taught how to keep a home, cook, sew and boys got woodwork. Just a couple of decades ago my sister was encouraged not to do science and maths to become a doctor and was the only girl. I am amazed at the progress made in a relatively short time period but changing peoples thought processes takes time. I think what you’re talking about definitely needs to change if soft skills and hard skills are truly to be shared but I suspect it’s a subconscious fear of a loss of social standing that is at play and needs to be challenged. For that to happen caring roles need to be better paid with better prospects and soft skills truly valued which they aren’t right now. Hopeful for the future though.

It's not really upsetting, it's just an example of a wider trend we've both started noticing a bit more since having a kid. So far we've just responded to his comments with a hard stare and a deadpan "yes it is a bonnet". If the comments continue we'll say something more direct.

Not implying it's his wife's job to police his speech, more just wanting to draw attention to the fact that there are women in his life that he loves and values, to make him see that his implication that there is something wrong in being mistaken for a girl is a bit wrong footed.

I don't especially think it's a problem to let one partner's preference for how their side of the family should be dealt with take some precedence, so long as there is a discussion about it and its in the context of a generally equal relationship. Total refusal to ever confront their side of the family, if family members are being unreasonable and its affecting your kids is clearly a problem. But in this instance we've discussed the issue, both agreed that uncle dickhed is a bit of a dickhed and that we'll try a softer route first then be more direct if needed. And it's DW not DH, not that it matters in this context 🙂

fair enought. i was thinking more of pushing them to elaborate on what their issue is so you can point out how bloody ridiculous it is but i see your point.

Do girls get sweetcorn cos its SWEET? Do boys get brussel sprouts then? What about carrots? Its a bit like how unicorns - badass big horn mythical creatures which should in theory go on TEAM BOY end up with the girls because they're just over excited ponies / horses which sparkle

Yes agreed. I suppose I think that rather than trying to get women's prospects to be equal to men's by making it easier for women to aspire to do traditionally men's roles - at work and in the home. It would be better to do that, while at the same time questioning why we ascribe higher status and higher pay to jobs and roles that have traditionally been held by men.

So remove some of the barriers to girls becoming engineers or coders fine. But at the same time work to make professions like teaching or nursing come with better training options, better pay and to be treated with more respect by governments, so that eventually the jobs will be equally as desirable to men and women and kids can chose to do what they have an aptitude for, rather than getting women to go after things that are thought to be high status, because they've traditionally been done by men.

When you look at teachers pay compared to cost of living overtime, you can see that pay started to decline for the profession as a whole when women started entering the workforce en masse and were steered into jobs that mirrored traditional women's roles. Before that teaching was a male dominated profession and teachers were looked up to and seen as high status.

Yes it's hypocritical, imo. I hate that it's ok to give girls boy names but not vice versa too.

Fwiw, people often assume my DD is a boy when she's in gender neutral clothing or blue. Or sometimes even if she's in a frilly dress. Some people are just dumb.

There aren’t boys/girls clothes. Wear what you like. Personally like most people I bought well made hard wearing comfy stuff from the Dino/lion side of the shop and beautiful Colour’s/textures from the butterfly section. I have no idea why this is an issue for you today. My children are adults…this was barely a thing when I was a child.

Whether it should be so or not, it is socially accepted that a pink frilly dress or a My Little Pony swimming costume are girl clothes. You can tell people to dress their so

*their sons in those, but you can't pretend like that wouldn't draw judgement and comments

What about sweetcorn though?

a pink frilly dress or a My Little Pony swimming costume are girl clothes. this sounds true. I didn’t dress either sex like that though I do remember dds having party dresses, so perhaps I was just focusing on the shorts/T-shirt part of their wardrobes. I suppose what I meant was boys wore pink in the 70s and I personally think the vast majority of clothing is not sex segregated especially play clothes.

They problem is it is in shops, so to find yellow leggings today I had to go through all the girls stood as in pink, frills, prey animals in clothes, knickers not pants, cozzie not trunks. I mean I still brought my three lads leggings from there, I don't care but my sister wouldn't even let her son wear leggings because it's "girls".

But why is it a problem to go through clothing to get what you want. Your sister doesn’t want leggings so of course she wouldn’t look. I

My DS 5 has long blonde hair (my DH also has long hair) and everyone always thi ks he is a girl, even when he has obviously boys clothes on. What annoys me is that when my DD was about 18 months old I took her out in her pushchair, she had a blue dress on, with blue tights and little black paintent shoes and everyone thought she was a boy, yet when my boy has on ba blue top with cars on, blue trousers and blue 'boys' trainers he is still a girl all because he has long hair 🙄

Tbh I just wish I could look in "our" side of the shop and find leggings. Why can't boys wear leggings and it be widely accepted?

But it's also the having to guess. I want a trolls tshirt. Search all the boys and then all the girls. I'd prefer to search the tshirt section. I want something with sweetcorn on @WooNoodle which I assume is boys cos they'll phallic and a bit country and western, but no. Appropriated by girls cos someone called them sweet. And now it's only tops with frills on cut tighter and shorter.

John Lewis doesn't segregate children's clothes by gender any more. Got DD two pairs of pyjamas, one green, one orange, with skateboarding llamas in dark glasses.

Are these boys' clothes she said?

Skateboarding llamas code as male apparently.

I not rich enough for John Lewis 😂

I hope you gave her the look 🙄

Ah ok I see.

What about an avocado. I'm going female with that.
Tomato - male?
Asparagus- unisex?

T shirts often cheaper in boys side as they don't have the added frills and sparkles.

I completely agree with this. We like to dress our baby boy as a baby rather than as a boy. This includes various cardigans in red, white, light green etc., because they're adorable! I get told regularly that he'll hate me for dressing him like that. Couldn't care less, I think he's adorable and much more appropriate than 'cool dude' slogans, little baseball jackets and things

I'll trot out my little mantra that I wrote about in the Eighties. Until the 20C for the most part well-off small kids had long hair and were put in white dresses (lots of servants doing laundry) until the boys were put into shorts/trousers (or "breeched"). Pink as a subset of red was an expensive dye, so often boys wore this colour. Blue was traditionally the colour of the BVM so often ascribed to girls. Less well off in coarser fabrics with basic dyes. With the advent of synthetic colours in the late 19C, and synthetic fabrics in the 20C, it was all to play for and manufacturers and advertisers played their part. My DC wore hand me downs of both sexes - my DC have been in sports clothes most of their lives but have always liked "dressing up" to go to parties.

It is easier for girls in many ways except for the oversexualisation of clothes for preteens, the Love Island looks and influencers. Unfortunately the tom girl is still in for a hard ride and now both he and the tomboy are being told they are trans - rather than just being allowed to get on with it and work out their own path. The usual caveat - of course if they are genuinely unhappy they need support and help.

Everyone should be able to wear what the hell they like, I live in jeans and T-shirts. Never wear skirts or dresses, and think if a boy or a bloke wanted to wear a dress then he should be able to.

My dd had a dalamation dressing gown when she was 2/3 years old. After she grew out of it ds had it. My dbil commented on ds wearing it, saying it was a girls dressing gown because the inside of the dog ears on the hood were pink 🙄🙄 we took no notice and laughed at him. His 2 year old ds obviously decided to rebel against this, as he then spent the next 5 years dressing up in his sisters princess and Cinderella dressing up clothes 😉