Trans/pride flag in children's stickers

[timeforacoffeebreak]

This was included in a pack of squishmallow stickers... why???
AIBU or is this totally wrong ??

@DistrictAndCircle to be fair to OP the cats belly really is the LGBTQIA+ flag (google it)

my suspicions are the OP has either mistakenly bought a special edition pack or they are deliberately stirring up shit. Hard to know without seeing the packet

Please tell me where I said that and I will IMMEDIATELY apologise.

And actually the packet probably wouldn’t help because there would be nothing to stop someone claiming it was in there after taking it from another

Trans activism = misogyny. It is anti woman. It seeks to erode the boundaries of children, it is anti safeguarding, it is anti consent.

The pride flag used to be a beautiful thing. Trans activism has highjacked it.

YANBU. It's a political symbol that's promoting a particular viewpoint. Seems inappropriate to me. Happy to be called a bigot if people disagree.

Saudi banned all rainbows on children's toys didn't they, perhaps you should petition your MP to do that

@AtrociousCircumstance 100%, absolutely agree. It's the subtle attempt at normalising an ideology that is anti-women and homophobic.

Perhaps not but the fact remains that children, even very young children are being prepped to accept this bogus ideology which causes real life harms. It is immoral to teach children that they might really be a girl if they are actually male or vice versa based on a "feeling" nobody is born in the wrong body. Its an ideology that is certainly being pushed on children and if that isn't some kind of attempt to brainwash them I don't know what is.

FFS it’s a cat with a rainbow design behind it. Get over it and stop being homophobic!

If you don’t want your child to have the sticker, put the sticker in the bin. But plenty of kids have LGBTQ parents, siblings and family friends, so I don’t see why this would be inappropriate for children. My niece’s boyfriend has two dads, and four siblings, the youngest of which is four. Why shouldn’t those kids be proud of their family? Why Those children understand that two men like their dads can love each other, just like they understand that children (like them) can be adopted when their biological parents can’t look after them. There’s nothing confusing or sexualising about it.

Small children are not trans

It’s a sticker with a Pride flag on it, not a sticker saying “I am trans” or “I am gay”. It doesn’t advertise the sexuality or gender of the wearer.

Get over it and stop being homophobic!

If only you realised the irony. <sigh>

Nope you are not being unreasonable. The trans flag is symbolic of a dangerous religious ideology that teaches children that they are not perfect and sets them on a life long pathway of medicalisation.

I would be hopping mad and complain to the manufacturer.

Nope its women, lesbians and mothers standing up for ourselves and our children against an ideology that seeks to erode our boundaries and rights for the benefit of men's sexual freedom to to what they like to whoever they like.

This for the hard of understanding at the back. Why are people conflating being gay with trans?

It isn't the trans flag (blue, pink white, pink, blue stripes horizontally) its the lgbtqai+ flag, which now includes bame people too.

Try and get the basics right while clutching at your pearls.

insert whole body eye roll

It's a sticker supporting gender ideology and activism. Political and ideological messages have no place in children's marketing.

I say that as someone who has always been extremely pro-LGB going (which are sexualities not ideologies - still not especially relevant to Squishmallow children's marketing imo).

To everyone saying 'it's just a rainbow'. It's not, it's a very clear political/ideological flag which children will begin to recognise at an extremely young age if it's repeatedly presented in their toys and activities. Why not have a cat with an ordinary rainbow? That would give a nod to inclusion but is also 'just' a rainbow if you choose to interpret it as such. Children love rainbows 🤷‍♀️ Why must the sticker represent a contentious activist movement? (The inclusion of the trans flag goes beyond sexuality).

I do think it's weird, unless the packet was specifically pride themed. I always assumed that the rainbow is squishmellows was a generic child sky rainbow, not an LGBT rainbow. Maybe someone in design team got confused! Or maybe the flag is so normalised and de-politicised that it's the equivalent of animals with the peace symbol in the 90s.

To the people saying "it's just a cat and a rainbow FFS" - the cat's tummy is clearly displaying the intersectionality part of the new "progressive" pride flag (the white, pink and blue trans flag, and the browns and black for different races) in a triangle that cuts into the rainbow on the left. Unless you think that the rainbow in the sky is white, pink and brown, and unless you think that your kids wouldn't notice (mine would), it's not "just a rainbow". Obviously there will be many people who are happy to explain to their kids what it actually is, just as I am happy to explain to my child what the german and italian flags stand for. But it's disingenuous to pretend that there is NOTHING TO SEE HERE. There is something to see, it's not just a cat and a rainbow.

I don’t think it’s appropriate for political symbols of any kind to be on things aimed at children. Because children should be able to make their own minds up about political and social issues as they grow up and not have particular ideologies pushed on them however subtle. Children should however be taught to be kind and tolerant to others, and that it’s ok to disagree on things and have their own opinion, without being hateful but also without compromising their own well-being and safety.

OP where did you get the stickers? Because I just found the same one in a multipack of random ones on Temu. They just give you a certain amount at a random selection. Being mass produced cheap tat from China I can assume they probably aren’t paying attention to any sort of political affiliation and purely the profit.

and looking it up, squishmallows seem to do a lot in the way of supporting the LGBT community with special characters/editions of things… so perhaps if you feel that strongly this is a brand you might not want to affiliate with any longer.

@Manadou Ah so women should just shut up when they aren't bowing down to their male superiors wishes should they, we should just be good little handmaidens and let adult men do what they like to women and children? I think not and so do most other women with half a brain.

The rainbow in the background is just a rainbow. The one in the cats mouth is however the Pride LGBTQIA+ flag.

Kids won't even know what they mean.

You can't brainwash a child into being gay. Especially, I would argue, with stickers 😂