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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to find the "dream jobs" page in the ELC catalogue annoying?

65 replies

MrsFogi · 04/02/2008 22:00

Why is it that the girls dressed as a nurse and some pony girl and the boys get all the other jobs? Surely it would not be too mindblowing for a little girl to be a vet, doctor or policewoman? Do the people who put these things together live in the 1950s. The other pages seem fairly segregated as well.

OP posts:
binkleandflip · 04/02/2008 22:05

YABU

MotherFunk · 04/02/2008 22:09

Message withdrawn

JetPeanut · 04/02/2008 22:12

YANBU. Blatant gender stereotyping happens all around us, all the time. I find it bloody annoying too.

HollyGoHeavily · 04/02/2008 22:13

Yep - it irritates the hell out of me also.

Hulababy · 04/02/2008 22:15

ELC has always had quite specific gender biased toys, even down to the colours. Presumably their current market research shows that this is what works best for their products.

TBH it doesn't bother me. I buy what I like regardless of who it is being marketed primarily at.

harpsichordcarrier · 04/02/2008 22:15

no yanbu
my friend's ds refuses to believe his mum is a doctor and dad is a nurse, and insists it must be the other way around.
and I taught a class of 14 year old girls the other week, and I got one to pretend to be a surgeon and she said "can a woman be a surgeon"
geneder stereotyping is alive and well and this doesn't help tbh

Original poster
MrsFogi · 04/02/2008 22:19

I'll still go ahead any buy what I fancy for my dds what annoys me is the stereotyping. Much like my annoyance that my choice of non-pink clothes is limited.

OP posts:
MightyMoosh · 04/02/2008 22:30

Reminds me of the bloody tweenies. How much gender stereotyping do kids need? YANBU

hunkermunker · 04/02/2008 22:33

I periodically email ELC to rant about their shiteness wrt genderisation and colour of toys. Why make a keyboard blue or pink? Why not yellow? Green? Orange? Red? Blue AND pink?

I spoke to a member of staff there the other day who was equally, if not more, incensed by this! She was Most Happy I'd emailed them - perhaps you all could too. Equal rights for all colours! ELC are yellowist! And greenist! And orangist! And purplist! The bastards!

hunkermunker · 04/02/2008 22:35

HC, I had a geography teacher when I was 14 who was also my form tutor (I say had, I don't mean had - that would've been very wrong. He wore tight bottle green trousers and his chest wig was Always Visible, anyhoo...).

He said to us, one day, PC light glinting in his eyes, "I don't want ANY of you girls to be secretaries, OK?".

Which kind of missed the point, I think.

MotherFunk · 04/02/2008 22:36

Message withdrawn

Habbibu · 04/02/2008 22:36

YANBU. It pisses me off that the boys play with pirates and the girls with irons. Possibly why DD has many many books on pirates, including a very good one on little girl pirates, a parrot birthday cake, pirate birthday invitations.... Dear Lord! I'm raising an outlaw!

Lubyloo · 04/02/2008 22:37

That doesn't bother me so much but it does irritate that they can't spell (or proof check) separately

BroccoliSpears · 04/02/2008 22:37

The John Lewis catalogue this year had fancy dress for boys: doctor, fireman, policeman, and fancy dress for girls: pink fairy, gold fairy, bride.

Bride? Ffs.

Habbibu · 04/02/2008 22:38

MotherFunk - you are clearly a balanced woman, but many many threads on here suggest that the gender-specific society we were brought up in has taken its toll on others...

MotherFunk · 04/02/2008 22:39

Message withdrawn

edam · 04/02/2008 22:39

I'm sorry, I really don't see any romance in limiting little girls to playing at being nurses or stable lasses while the boys get to choose from a whole range of more exciting stuff.

Mrs Fogi, YANB at all U. Wonder why on earth ELC do this - when they first started up they were very right-on. (I was only little but my mother and stepmother both commented approvingly.)

hunkermunker · 04/02/2008 22:40

MF, it's the fact that they go "Binoculars? Yes, they'd be a good toy for boys AND girls! What colour shall we make them in? I know, pink and blue! Sandpits? Yes, they're good toys for boys AND girls. What colour shall we make them in? I know, pink and blue! "

I have nothing against pink - DS1 has a bright pink potty he chose because he loves the colour - it's the "pink is for girls, blue is for boys" that I loathe.

edam · 04/02/2008 22:41

Um, thing is, little boys soon get the message from society that pink is for girls and not for them. No idea how old your ds is, but children do learn that colour = gender.

hunkermunker · 04/02/2008 22:41

Cross-posts - I am absolutely NOT making stereotypical judgements - I am annoyed that ELC limit the choice of colour of SO many things to pink or blue. Blue or pink. Any colour you like, as long as it's pink or blue.

edam · 04/02/2008 22:42

(that was to motherfunk, btw)

Another MN thread on a similar issue revealed that it used to be the other way round - back in the Edwardian (?) days pink was for boys, blue for girls.

MotherFunk · 04/02/2008 22:43

Message withdrawn

edam · 04/02/2008 22:43

cross posts again! My post about little boys learning that pink = girl was to motherfunk.

harpsichordcarrier · 04/02/2008 22:43

I disagree, actually, that we were brought up in a more gender specific society.
in the 70s and 80s, we all wore brown I mean little girls were much less likely to wear pink and sparkly until they were much older, if at all.

edam · 04/02/2008 22:44

Why is a boy wearing a fairy costume crazy PC? Ds used to be very taken with fairy costumes. Had a lovely time at his friend's third birthday, prancing round in friend's big sister's tutu.