'Come on fellas, it's a proper boys job, no girls allowed!'

[slouchingtowardswaitrose]

This is what my husband just said to my two young male children to get them excited about going with him to the RAF museum.

Apparently, enticing them with the promise of sexist exclusiveness is a good way to motivate them to put their shoes on.

Much better than, simply, 'Put your shoes on so we can go to the RAF Museum, it's going to be so exciting, lots of aeroplanes and rockets!'

Or even, 'I'm so excited to be spending the day with my boys!'

Or even, 'Boys' day out!' Well, no that's not quite ideal although accurate...

But you know what I mean. Why did he have to impose a sexist narrative on a lovely day out with our boys?

I'm afraid I was not able to let it go unchallenged, so my children were then exposed to a minor shouting match. Great. Even better for their development. But should I NOT challenge that kind of talk, they might think it's OK.

DH's mother never challenged it. She had no daughters, a quietly sexist husband, cultural and religious oppression to boot. She told me herself that she realized when she was in her 50s her DH is a 'chauvenist' - so she stopped making his sandwiches for work. I am, let us say, more challenging. More loudly.

He says this kind of thing a lot.

Despair. My oldest son has picked up some very sexist attitudes. Not all of them are coming from home, but some are.

Please help me explain to my husband, who claims to be a liberal champion of human rights etc, why such statements to our children are unnecessary and hurtful. To them, to me, to society, even to him.

I'll start by telling him that his message implies rejection of me, which does not help them feel they are held by a safe and loving marriage.

Help me with the feministy stuff, and why it's important for ALL of us. Men, women, children, the universe.

Sigh. Remember the other thread, participating in one's own oppression, having a constant low level of despair? I can tell you, right now it's not so low, because the idea of my boys becoming future sexist assholes makes me want to die.

Is it also wrong for mothers and daughters to have a 'girly day out' eating cupcakes or shopping or going to look at ponies? (no idea what little girls like, just guessing here)

I suppose it is, or it's fine for them to do it but not to suggest that it is a female-only activity.

I think it is wrong to cite the exclusion of one sex as the primary reason for doing anything.

I was dragged round RAF museums from a young age as my dad loved planes and so I know lots about them cos he did. My dad would say "lets go see the aeroplanes" and would never once have suggested me and mum were excluded.

As to female only days, yes we are allowed those, so men can sneer at us for being so petty to like shoes (although I don't).

I don't think either sex should seek to exclude the other on sweeping generalisations of what a gender should like to do, and that somehow someone of the opposite gender would ruin the day out.

Trillian, no, it's not wrong. Which is why I included 'Boys' day!' in my list of optional messages. My problem is with the facts that a) RAF Museumy type things are 'proper boys' things, male things, not for everyone and b) exclusion - 'no girls allowed.'

Sometimes when I do special things on my own with my boys, we call it the 'love club.' LOL. Made up by my oldest, an entirely non-gendered description of togetherness without DH.

To make it even more sexist, I am now going to clean the entire house :)

This was, however, my choice. I especially like scrubbing things when I am quite cross.

Haha Proles. Thanks. But I am constantly cringing at my own style of 'wordy, and run-on sentences, and sentences beginning with and.'

I have to add this to my rant.

I should not have shouted at him in front of the children which is equally damaging, perhaps more. Probably more.

I should challenge firmly but calmly and in fact kindly, to model correctly.

Off to sweep.

Aw, come on, it's just him wanting to make it special that it's something they just do with him.

I know what you mean, but in this day and age boys spend so much more of their time with women than men (as the vast majority of childcarers are female) that it's not so awful that they balance it out a bit, is it?

Boys do need to affirm their gender identity and there are more damaging ways to do it than that.

Ib, I hear you, and I agree with you about the super importance of boys having male carers, affirming their gender identity, being allowed to express their interests and need for 'action' without condescension, suppression and quashing.

In fact I think it's pretty funny that after all those years of feminist study etc, I am now spending much time researching and championing boys' issues especially with regard to education.

However, my husband holds other sexists views - a few are overt, most are unconscious. He disguises some of them as humour, thinks it's hilarious. In the workplace, socially, and in our family.

It is very special to him to spend time with his boys, especially as his father spent little time with him. I think he is almost entirely a GREAT dad, and I am extremely grateful. As I said, I don't have a problem really with identifying it as a boys day, doing stuff that (most) boys like. It's the exclusion, the language.

But he does have a problem at times using sexist language when there is an alternative, which I believe reflects underlying beliefs he has never been asked to reflect upon or challenge.

He does have an open mind and (eventually) listens.

Except about how to properly load a dishwasher.

Fair enough. I'm probably coloured by my dh, who is the most bizarre mix you can probably imagine wrt feminism. He is a total intellectual feminist (has read all the books - I haven't) and at the same time is the most incredibly stereotypical 'manly' man.

Ds1 latches onto the 'manly' things and does come out with things which sound alarmingly sexist , but if I manage to stave off the knee jerk negative reaction I can see that it's him trying to define his gender identity rather than anything sinister.

The funniest one recently was when ds1 came up to me and said 'Mummies have bigger brains but daddies are stronger.' I flipped out and had a huge rant at dh. Turns out they had been talking about animals, and about how those species that display for mates by fighting but the female does all the child rearing show particular kinds of gender dimorphism

Can you subtly subvert his message? He's just plain wrongvabout the RAF -plenty of females in all roles.

It is a dodgy message to give them. Trip with Daddy - fine but pretending only boys should be interested in the RAF - not fine.

When we took ds and my niece round Hendon, we found a display on MIL's work (Martin Baker ejector seats) and we were all very excited. Sadly they didn't include the information about helicopter ejector seats which personally I think is the oddest thing - years ago when MIL told me what she was working on I thought she was pulling my leg.

How about talking to your DH about it again when the boys are not there. It's important for all to not have this thing simmering on. As for feeling guilty about the shouting match -- it takes two to shout, and seemingly your DH gave as good as he got, so relax about that.

Some men try to make their sons more 'masculine' by taking them away from their mothers emotionally (hence the 'no girls allowed' comment), or seeming to denigrate the mother along with all women/girls -- at the base of this is a fear of the feminine in their sons and in themselves, and close to the surface is a fear of 'turning out gay' or into some sort of effeminate and less than macho adult. Your DH needs to examine what it is in himself that gives rise to this kind of language, which is not one bit funny, and reveals much more about his inner fears than he might care to admit openly in so many words.

How would your DH feel if he had DDs instead of DSs, and wanted to take them both to the RAF museum or fishing or something girls might equally enjoy (I would have loved it as a child) -- plenty of girls enjoy this kind of trip with dad after all. Ask him to imagine life with daughters instead of sons, and how he would feel for their sakes if someone conveyed the attitude to them that he conveyed to your boys.

Has he ever read any child-raising books. I'm thinking of Raising Cain, and Reviving Ophelia in particular (even though there seem to be no girls in your home, the latter might be an eye-opener for him).

slouching - sorry it turned into a shouting match. Next time you could make a comment that shows how your husband is wrong. In the example of the RAF you could of mentioned female pilots such as Amy Johnson who flew for the ATA, fifth of which was 'manned' by women.

If the air museum is worth anything then your children would have learnt about women in the RAF anyways and your husband is going to look pretty stupid for his comment anyways.

Counter crap comments with positive comments.

You could helpfully mention that there are plenty of women in the RAF - the best boss my DH ever had in the RAF is a woman, she was in charge of a gaggle of Armourers ( just about the most male enviroment you could think of) and this was over 20 years ago - she was very highly respected .

Edam - it's ejection seat - there is no such thing as an ejector seat.

Thing is it's demonstably untrue that the RAF/RAF museum is "no girls allowed" - as they will find out when they get there and the place is swarming with girls. We took our 2 at the beginning of the holidays and it was great.

So if he meant it like that then he's just being silly really.

If he meant it as in "come on boys we'll go off without mum" then that's not very nice. What if you had wanted to go? Are you "not allowed"?

I can see it was an off the cuff remark presumably to build a feeling of camaraderie, but the bottom line is that it was a "boys are like this and girls are like that" stereotype, which is not great, and "isn't it great to exclude girls/women" which is not great either.

Mali - my MIL probably knows that but I hear ejector seat as that's what us civvies always call them. MIL was a draughtswoman which I think shows quite some determination in the days when women were only allowed to be wives and mothers and maybe, if they INSISTED on working, teachers or nurses. She lives very near the Martin Baker factory and you could hear them testing the explosive every day - think it was at noon IIRC. Also showed us the totaliser on the wall counting how many lives have been saved - I saw it go up during Gulf War 1 when those two RAF guys ejected safely but were captured by the Iranians.

My DH worked on ejection seats in the Gulf in 1990, he also did Airfield bomb disposal and yes, I am inordinately proud of him .

My mum worked in a munitions factory during the second world war, so many women lost limbs and were horrifically disfigured due to it.

I think he was wrong to tell them that that was the reason they should go, but the reason for telling them "no girls allowed" may not have been an attempt at mysogyny or sexism, but an attempt to remind them of the camaraderie and fun little boys have with their fathers, (when their mothers aren't present.) Also, most little boys/girls won't like the opposite sex much...

Most of them don't like broccoli or other cruciferous veggies either but does a responsible parent say 'Yuck, green veggies, let's have ice cream for dinner instead' -- parents are teaching every time they open their mouths and this DH needs to be a bit more careful imo about what he is imparting to the boys.

I know many small children go through a 'boys/girls are yuck' phase but oddly enough ds hasn't, really. Since going to school he's become convinced that pink is horrid and blue is his favourite colour, but nowt else.

Several of his best friends are girls and he's happy to play with them, and to play with traditionally 'girl's' toys as well as traditionally male stuff. Dunno whether this is because dh and I are careful not to pass on gender stereotypes or whether it's just his personality anyway. We'd have to have a second boy and raise him in very manly style to test out the theory, which seems like an awful lot of trouble to go to...

All of DDs friends are boys. Is that peculiar then? She is 3.

nah, not for a 3yo. It's when they go to school they get it drummed into them by the other kids. Ds is a bit non-plussed by it and just carries on playing with his friends, girls and boys.

Things went down the sparkly route a bit when she started nursery and so I understand that peer pressure is huge for children.

Will just be a shame if she eschews male company as my neighbours and best friend all have boys the same age as her and at the moment that's working out really nicely for everyone.