Gender stereotyping. It really gets to me.

[ChineapplePunk]

I am currently 20 weeks pregnant with a wee boy nugget. Our family is dominated by girls, in fact, this will be the first boy in 36 years. Already people are starting to make silly comments about what a boy will be like and how it's nice because "he will take the name forward". I know people are just being kind, but jesus!, girls can, and do, take names forward. Not that I give a toss about "preserving the bloodline". There is also all the usual tripe being spouted such as "Ah! Boys are so much easier than girls, or conversely, girls are so much easier than boys". I mean, boys and girls ARE the same species for christs sake! Are they really THAT different?

As far as I'm concerned kids have different personalities and that really is the bottom line. Of course I appreciate there are differences in a physical sense AND, sadly, that boys and girls are unavoidably conditioned to a certain (large) extent. For example, most toy shops make my blood boil. Little pink ironing boards, washing machines, tea sets, etc, for girls, and little trucks, robots, machines, etc, for boys.

My child will play with what he wants to play with, be it trucks, teasets or cardboard boxes. Last year, my nephew from my DH's side wanted a big doll he saw in a magazine for xmas. His mum bought it for him and he was as happy as larry, yet, "the balloon went up" with certain family members because of this. Who cares? It was a toy which he loved to bits.

Grrrrr! I think I need a nice cup of tea and a chocolate biscuit. :)

Likeanadventcandlebutnotquite that babygro sounds gorgeous! (Where's it from?! < cheeky non-thread related question). On the colour issue, my aunt is from Dublin but lives in England and refused to buy green clothes for her children so she wouldn't be labelled stereotypical. I quite like green, myself!

Spanner, I live in the West of Scotland. You can imagine the significance of green up here :). I hasten to add that my love of green has absolutely nothing to do with sectarianism. I hate all that nonsense as much as I hate gender stereotyping. :)

HardCheese, "It's not a footballer, or a fecking fairy princess, it's a baby". Hear,hear!!! :)

i totally agree i have a 2.3 year old ds who has worn girls leggings, all colours including pink, he hasa kitchen, pram and dolls, cradle and also a work bench lots of "boy" things. for xmas we are getting him a garage and a dolls house! i think that teaching him to how to care for dolls, (he can feed, wind, rock and sing a doll to sleeep) has helped him to be more empathetic with people. he is a very active boy and boysterious with it but it is lovely to see him sit down with other girls and have a teddy bears picnic. i am currently pregnant now with dc2 and if its a girl i will be doing exactly the same with her!

Princess, that sounds just like my little nephew (on DH's side) who is a smashing little guy. As well as wanting his big doll for Xmas, he also used to run around wearing his sister's pink fairy dress. He loved it, and used to spin round in it until he fell down. It was hysterical. I mentioned this to one of my friend's and she expressed a sort of "Ugh!" noise, and acted like there had been a riff in the space-time continuum. :/

spanner it's actually a bundler, from John Lewis

which will freak the gender nutters even more...."it's a dress....for a boy" errr...its not

also got this too which is 'boyish' hmmm...

actually, you think people would click im just star-obsessed

wait til the inlaws see me buying tights! "what if it's a boy?"....the he'll have warm toastie legs and feet and I wont have to staple his socks on!

I have 3 DD'S and 2 DS'S and they all couldn't be more different.
DD1 was as pink obsessed as one could be and was so 'girly'. Now aged 15 she hates pink and is taking a keen interest in feminism.
DD2 was and is a more of a tomboy. Happiest when hanging upside down from a tree.
DD3 was and is a bit of both. 'Girly' at times whilst at others a 'tomboy'.
DS1 is the typical stereotype of a boy. He will only talk about football, is constantly on the go and is happiest outside covered in mud. Oh and thinks all girls smell.
DS2 is very much in touch with his feminine side. He used to love dressing up in boys or girls costumes and is just as happy playing with dolls as cars.

They are all from the same family and have had the same input from us as parents yet they couldn't all be more different.
Although at this moment in time I would say that the boys are slightly easier to deal with than the girls but that could just as easily change in the coming years as they get older.

OP- I'm 24 weeks and don't know if it's a boy or girl, have been slightly horrified at how the newborn clothing in almost every clothes shop is rails of pink or blue with a few white & beige bits tucked in. I've also been buying simple stripey things that would suit either. I wanted to know the sex, but at the scan it just wasn't playing along, and we weren't able to find out. Actually, now I'm really happy not to know. I really hope I'll treat it the same and give it the same opportunities- especially as a tiny baby- whatever it turns out to be.

It's really annoying isn't it Kiki? I reckon they do it so they can sell more clothes as if people have a different gender with their second child, they'll buy everything again.

Mind you, if I have a girl (due August) I'm still going to recycle a lot of DS's stuff. Apart from anything else, the boys stuff does seem to be more practical/hard wearing.

OP I have no experience of this as I have a DD but my children's centre do s course called 'parenting boys' for patents of boys aged between (I think) 2 and 5. There is no 'parenting girls' course. Only conclusion I could draw was that parenting boys is different.

Am with you on the annoyance of clothes being either blue or pink though, v frustrating. I don't wear head to toe pink and frills, why should DD??

Advent - I love John Lewis and am definitely going to check that out - thanks!!

I hear you OP - I would be annoyed too. I have two dd's and being a tomboy myself have never seen any need for the baby blue/pink that is endemic in the shops for babies. Wedding tell anyone the gender during the pregnancy specifically to avoid such idiotic comments. Our girls do wear pink, would be hard to never dress them in it and want to use the gifts we were given...but they wear just as much purple, green, white, blue etc etc. When I was expecting dd1 we were buying a carpet for her room and when we said we liked green the man in the carpet shop said oh it must be a boy then! As in like a grass football pitch! We both laughed as I am more into football than dh! I hate seeing people taking dolls away from boys or play tools/cars etc away from girls because they shouldn't be playing with 'that kind of toy' too.

I am 28 weeks with a boy...2 previous girls...this is indeed 1st boy in 55 years in my family so a huge shock for me!! Infact it had'nt even crossed my mind it would be a boy until those fateful words at my 20 week scan..."Oh there is a little penis"!! But more important to me this time was the words "everything seems fine"... (dd2 born severly disabled.)

Thinking back I laugh at how I went straight to mothercare & just stood there looking at the boys clothes section & thinking I don't know where to start!! Now fully embrased how equally cute boys clothes can be!! It might not be the frilly tutu skirt & tights I fell in love in next b4 my 20 week scan but oh my tiny trainers & converse are just as cute!!

I do think I am being a bit stereotypical as I am preparing myself for less sleep as I just expect boys to be hungrier??? (I don't know!!) & I do imagine them to be more active & boistress as they get older!! (my dd1 was a brilliant sleeper & fairly quiet & layed back, so any child might be harder work than her regardless of sex) Whatever personality he has I am going to enjoy every second of this precious gift I have been given!!!

Another funny thing though...he is very active & kicks like mad so I joke with people that he is gonna be like Louis Spence & come out with Jazz hands & shocks me the number of people who say "Oh no, hopefully he will be a good footballer"!! (I wonder if that is opposed to a camp male dancer)!! lol

Children tend to grow into what is expected of them, so if you raise a DD/DS with the expectation that they will conform to rigid gender stereotypes then they will. If you encourage them to find their own path it will help but the power of advertising and the attitudes and behaviour of others who will have an influence on your DC will be almost impossible to overcome.

I have a 5 week old DD, and before I had her, I felt exactly the same about boy/girl clothes as you. I must have been banging on about it too because people always seem to apologise as they hand over a pink gift for her . I have nothing against pink in moderation amongst all the other beautiful colours, it's the idea that 'she's a girl so she has to wear only pink' that is so annoying.

However, now I have her, although for the most part she wears her brother's cast-offs, I find myself putting her in at least one piece of 'girl' clothing (often pink, but not always) each day because quite frankly it's embarrassing to have to correct people when they've just spent a few minutes cooing 'isn't he lovely, oh what a beautiful little boy, oh he looks just like his dad' etc etc. Unfortunately the default when people see a non-pink clad baby is 'boy'. Ironically my son is often referred to as a girl because he shoulder length hair, even when he's wearing obviously boyish clothes.

As for 'taking the name forward', my children both have two surnames - mine and DP's. I hope they both want to keep them for life, and I think I'd be secretly disappointed and a bit pissed off if they changed their surnames, especially if DD blindly followed tradition and took her future DP's name without really thinking about it.