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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to think there is definitely way less gender stereotyping now (for children) than in the 70s?

117 replies

threemiaowingfaces · 28/04/2023 07:43

Just reading the 'I'm happy to be having a boy' thread and some of the responses made me think of the 70s!

Were my family weird or was this normal?

In those days, there was general Lego and also sets of 'Space Lego'. I wanted Space Lego for years but was told it was only for boys!

Same with Meccano.

I remember being in a bookshop, must have been about 9, and wanting a book about space, but parents flat refused and got me one about animals instead!

Does anyone remember the 70s bikes like Choppers, Grifters (?), Commandos etc. Really wanted one for about 5 years, but on my birthday, they gave me a folding shopping bike.

Same with BMXs when they came out - only for boys apparently.

I remember one year, they bought my cousin an 'Evil Kenival' toy that was like a bike with a man on it and you pulled a cord and it could do jumps over ramps and had flashing lights. The cousin gave it back because he already had two. I still wasn't allowed to play with it and they gave it away to another (male) cousin.

Were my family particularly mad or was this normal back then? What did they think would happen if I played with an Evil Kenival fgs?

OP posts:
GertrudePerkinsPaperyThing · 28/04/2023 08:29

Your family sound bonkers! And actually pretty cruel.

I thought that toys and clothes for children were less gender stereotyped back then. Certainly in the 80s they were. Even silly things like t shirts for kids being the same shape, and girls not “having” to wear frilly, fitted versions of everything.

Mamaneedsadrink · 28/04/2023 08:33

Everything seems stereotyped to me, down to the colours of drink bottles. Also lego, the girls lego is pink 😑

Original poster
threemiaowingfaces · 28/04/2023 08:33

Even though I wasn't allowed to wear trousers, I do agree girls clothes were much less pink. There were more hand-me-downs and clothes were less disposable. Some hideous clothes though, looking back.

OP posts:
MooseBreath · 28/04/2023 08:33

I have 2 boys and pretty much every piece of clothing they have been given by relatives is blue, superhero/car/dinosaur/shark-themed. Sections of shops are organized by gender, with a sea of pink unicorns in one aisle and blue monster trucks in another.

My eldest (nearly 3) loves cars and rainbows, but I can't for the life of me find anything "rainbow" without frills and glitter unless it's super expensive like Frugi. Kids are very much dictated interests by gender in 2023.

SoupDragon · 28/04/2023 08:34

There is far, far more gender stereotyping now. Everything for girls has to be pink and sparkly! There was only Lego when I was a child, not boy Lego and girl Lego. Apart from dresses/skirts clothing wasn't so gendered either. I wore hand me downs from my brothers on many occasions.

AngelinaFibres · 28/04/2023 08:35

My brothers had tomahawk bikes ( smaller version of the chopper). I had an orange shopper bike with a white box thing on the back. I didn't really like my brothers bikes so no idea if I would have been allowed one. I had 2 prams and my brothers used to use them as tanks in their battle games. We all played with lego and meccano. My tressy doll married my brothers action man and moved into action man's house in my brothers bedroom. If we fell out she moved back to my bedroom
When we were at primary school ( year 6 I think) we were separated into girls and boys on a Friday afternoon. The girls did sewing with a female teacher and the boys went somewhere else to do geography with a male teacher. My mum queried this and was told that ,as we would be getting married and not leaving our small market town, we didn't need to know where anything was and we would need to be able to sew. Was seen as perfectly normal.

TeenDivided · 28/04/2023 08:35

I grew up in the 70s. Apart from my infant school where boys did woodwork and girls did sewing, no one ever said I couldn't do stuff.
There wasn't all this pink and blue nonsense. No one told girls that if they liked X they 'must really be a boy'.
Pop stars wore all sorts of clothes and makeup.

As a child of the 70s I did a male dominated degree, went into a male dominated industry.

I think things have gone backwards.

DrinkFeckArseBrick · 28/04/2023 08:35

When I was little around the same time, people didnt know what sex baby they were going to have. Wns disposable income was low. So people that I knew anyway tended to buy toys in primary colours and pass them down irrespective of sex. People still sewed a lot of their own clothes and passed between siblings. Toys and clothes were passed between cousins.
I think in a lot of ways, gender stereotyping has actually got worse with more money and more choice and advance warning of what baby you're going to get.

Not all parents were like yours

Original poster
threemiaowingfaces · 28/04/2023 08:39

I was the first person ever in my extended family to go to uni. Nobody asked me or showed any remote interest in what subject I was applying for, it was just "Oooh, she's going to university.'

OP posts:
AngelinaFibres · 28/04/2023 08:39

threemiaowingfaces · 28/04/2023 08:33

Even though I wasn't allowed to wear trousers, I do agree girls clothes were much less pink. There were more hand-me-downs and clothes were less disposable. Some hideous clothes though, looking back.

I don't think I ever owned anything pink. I expect I would have loved it if I had. I wore dresses for school uniform but mostly I was in trousers. I have some lovely pictures of me aged about 9 in flared jeans. We were playing outside most of the time ,out on our bikes with the other children in the road, so trousers were much more practical .

IClaudine · 28/04/2023 08:40

I think there is more stereo typing. I pass a secondary school everyday when the pupils are going in. All the girls have very long hair, all the boys have short hair. The only exceptions are pupils who are black, who have more varied styles.

When I were a young 'un many centuries ago, hair was much less gendered, especially amongst older pupils.

RandomGeocache · 28/04/2023 08:40

@DrinkFeckArseBrick makes a really good point about screening in pregnancy. Ultrasound wasn't a thing until at least the 80s that women were being routinley screened and being told the sex of their baby.

So there was not the market for "boys clothes" and "girls clothes" for babies, mums who wanted to be organised just bought lots of white, or lemon yellow/green. Most of the pictures of me and sister as babies show us in very neutral clothing. Nowadays finding out the sex at 20 weeks is the norm, and everyone rushes out to start the whole pink for girls, blue for boys purchasing which continues into toddlers and beyond.

dementedpixie · 28/04/2023 08:40

I think its much worse now. And if your child happens to like a toy that's deemed for the opposite sex then they might be 'trans'. Girls clothes are all day dreams and 'be kind' and boys are all adventure and science based.

I had 2 older brothers so had lots of hand me downs and played with their cast off toys. I had short hair into my teens whereas the vast vast majority of girls have long hair these days.

KimberleyClark · 28/04/2023 08:47

lavenderlou · 28/04/2023 07:56

There are definitely fewer stereotypes in education. Back in the 70s it was still woodwork for the boys and cooking for the girls.

I was at school in the 70s and both sexes got the chance to do cooking, needle work, woodwork, metalwork and technical drawing.

I do think gender stereotyping is just as bad these days with the Love Island aesthetic. Also parents like their sons’ hair long and see it as going against the stereotypes but they don’t like their daughters’ hair short?

TheKeatingFive · 28/04/2023 08:47

There were plenty of gendered toys in the 80s when I was growing up. I played with dolls and barbies, my male cousin played with He-man and racing cars.

But if children played with toys outside gender norms, I don't think much notice was paid to that. It wasn't a big deal.

The bigger difference is clothes. I had some dresses and skirts as a child, but I mostly lived in jeans, shorts, t shirts. And they weren't pink and girly. There were more hand me downs then also, so unisex was the norm.

TheKeatingFive · 28/04/2023 08:51

Oh and I had a boys cropped haircut until I was about 7. That was a bit unusual, but not as much as it would be now.

AngelinaFibres · 28/04/2023 08:51

RandomGeocache · 28/04/2023 08:40

@DrinkFeckArseBrick makes a really good point about screening in pregnancy. Ultrasound wasn't a thing until at least the 80s that women were being routinley screened and being told the sex of their baby.

So there was not the market for "boys clothes" and "girls clothes" for babies, mums who wanted to be organised just bought lots of white, or lemon yellow/green. Most of the pictures of me and sister as babies show us in very neutral clothing. Nowadays finding out the sex at 20 weeks is the norm, and everyone rushes out to start the whole pink for girls, blue for boys purchasing which continues into toddlers and beyond.

Had my babies in 92 and 94. Both boys. The hospital they were born in asolutely didn't tell you the sex unless it was a medical need. I bought white,or yellow or pale green things for my baby and when the second one came along he had all of it as hand me downs . We all swapped and shared clothes amongst our ante natal group if someone was having a baby and someone else had finished with baby clothes. There was a fabulous secondhand place up the road that sold clothes and baby equipment. There didn't seem to be any pressure to create a nursery or buy beautiful clothes but there was no social media so no need to 'curate an image'. When my exhusband had a baby with his second wife ( our children were 14 and 15 by then) it was all fabulous nursery furniture and jojo maman bebe .

TheKeatingFive · 28/04/2023 08:52

Some hideous clothes though, looking back.

Yes 😆

Original poster
threemiaowingfaces · 28/04/2023 08:52

I do feel as if the world has gone mad in other ways though and wonder where it will all end. There are lots of girls in my DD's year (aged 15) who identify as trans or non-binary and the pronouns seem to change from week to week.

DS is at Oxford and it all seems crazy to me. I went to visit and friends were introducing themselves with "Hi I'm Zee, I'm going by 'she' today...." Well what will you be tomorrow?

OP posts:
waterlego · 28/04/2023 09:06

I agree with many of the other posters that it is much worse now than it was then- I think your family was a bit unusual OP!

I grew up in late 70s and 80s and as children we all wore T shirts and cords or dungarees in red/green/blue/brown/orange! Many of us had the pudding basin haircut of the time. I had very short hair for some of my childhood and used to get missexed frequently. I had an older brother and we both played with Lego and Meccano. I also had a Sindy doll and a Tiny Tears. When you went into toy shops, there were a range of things arranged by type of toy, rather than one side of the shop being dedicated to boys toys and the other side for girls.

And kids’ T shirts didn’t bear slogans relating to what was expected of them because of their sex ‘Be Kind’ for the girls ‘Explore Space!’ for the boys etc.

MrsCarson · 28/04/2023 09:08

I was a kid in the 70's in a house of all women/girls. I was never stopped or corrected when I played with my cars, legos, or spent time playing sports or climbing trees. It was a rare occasion when they could squeeze me into a dress I lived in trousers. I hated makeup hairdressing and other things my sister liked.
Now days I'd have been pressured into being a boy and change my name. I feel sorry for kids now days.

waterlego · 28/04/2023 09:09

I work in a baby shop and inwardly roll my eyes frequently when I hear customers talking about clothes or items they like and are drawn to but ‘can’t’ buy for their child because of the baby’s sex (which they already know in pregnancy). Even a high chair with a navy blue and red design of sailboats. Apparently completely unsuitable for a girl 🙄

Kitkatfiend31 · 28/04/2023 09:42

I think there is much more gender stereotyping now. The obsession with pink sparkly clothes etc. Toy shops clearly have boy/girl sections. The need for lego to create lego friends _in pink!...

yoga4meinthemorning · 28/04/2023 09:44

Are you kidding!

It's so much worse than when I was growing up!

Look at the Lego ads from the 80s and compare to now.

I got to be a tomboy as a child. Now I'd be called a transboy and have people trying to sterilise me!

That thread was horrific.

I have DC of both sexes. Girls with dirty knees and train toys, boys with glitter and crafts.

Sex stereotypes are so much worse now. You can't buy jeans that aren't dinosaurs (boys) or butterflies (girls). It's so frustrating. It's much worse than when I had my eldest in the noughties.

CheersForThatEh · 28/04/2023 09:46

People dont say only for boys/girls now but they stereotype as much. It's probably worse with clothes now. Lots of pink Be Kid and blue Be Brave. Even dinosaurs come in pink and blue. Princess Parties where the girls become a Disney Princess and "promise to be kind" and Superhero parties. Even bouncy castles are heroes and princesses and I remember they just used to be red and yellow.