A lot of things annoyed me yesterday. Here is my list.

[EllieG]

1. DD got given a barbie for her birthday. It was a doctor (as a nod to me as I often rail against them). She was a paediatrician with lolipops in her pocket, pink high heels and a sparkly white coat. DD complained that she doesn't stand up because her feet are too small.

1. Went out for tea with female friends. Got mocked for about 15 mins as I said 'oh, I joined this thing called UK feminista today'. Best mate told me in so many words that I was boring and worthy and blah blah for my 'new obsession' about feminism and that it was just my latest cause and it was stupid. She asked how I personally felt oppressed - I said I didn't much but other women do and that is why I am a feminist. She asked me to state how and I said well um, how about the tiny percentage for conviction for rape cases, I was laughed at for being boring (in so many words)

1. Best mate went on to say that she thinks about '70 per cent of women are stupid and boring' and that she thinks she gets on better with men.

1. Friends moved on to talk about other friend's job as zoo keeper and managed to have long and serious discussion about issues to do with dogs. Dogs, ffs.

1. Now I was laughing throughout this, I know I was being ribbed and my friends are all very empowered and strong women who laugh at many taboo subjects and are actually very feminist, but I am getting slightly pissed off about having to pretend I don't care. I need some feminists where I live......

Can I join in? I had a conversation with DD (3.5) last night which was prompted by me saying she's back at nursery today and she obviously started running it all through in her head and all this stuff came out. Some of it is normal tribal behaviour I guess and normal childhood stuff but taken all in one go it made me really

It was stuff like this

She likes Boy X but he doesn't like her as he says "boys play with boys" and when she tries to play with him he says go away or tells her to hit someone
Girl A saw her knickers and said they were horrible because they were plain (this came up a while ago as well so I bought her some with characters on)
Girl B says she is a boy as she doesn't have a dress with butterflies or flowers. Girl B says girls must have whatever clothes they like and they have to be butterflies and flowers (DD has been going on at me recently, wanting wear a dress every day and going on about how everything has to have flowers on it)
Girl B also won't play with her because she is a boy not a girl

And so it went on and on and on and I was just so

Girl B is the one whose mother famously told me that I had to buy some Barbies for DD "before it's too late" when she was 2
Don't get me started on Boy X and his mother...

I know this is all normal childhood stuff but the pressure to conform, to like the "right" things, to have the right clothes, to be segregated along gender lines... For it all to come out in oner conversation made me so Especially teh bit about Girl A taking the piss out of her knickers

Anyway there you go. Sorry for rant

Oh that's a bit sad - I would be feeling too. It's amazing how quickly it starts isn't it? I read this book which talked about sexism in education and how even in nursery children are consciously and unconsciously encouraged along trad gender lines e.g. rough and tumble agressive play for boys, arty/verbal/pretty things for girls and how they start to segregate even at this age. Is rubbish.

DD likes dresses and pretty flowers. She has a fairy costume. She also has a frefighters outfit. There is nothing wrong with liking flowers and stuff, but it does perturb me how she has suddenly started wanting all of this pink nonsense. Where does it come from? I think Flisspaps has it on the money re girls being told they are gorgeous all the time. I have started telling DD how clever/funny/brave etc she is because I realised even I was doing the 'oo aren't you pretty' thing.

DD used to wear a mix of clothes. Now it has to be a dress with flowers on every single day. Now I know why. It's come from this bloody girl, or rather from her barbie obsessed mother

And as for being told to go away from the boys because she's a girl, and from the girls because she's a boy...

I know the nursery though and I'm sure that if they see children being mean they sort it out (DD has told me some stories) and DD has friends some of whom are boys, so all is fine really. It just seems that the loudest/most popular children are using their powers for bad when they could be using them for good IYSWIM. It's always the way isn't it. Who said the bloody meek would inherit the earth? It's cobblers isn't it.

oh that sounds SHIT, SardineQueen. I'd be trying out "Girls can wear whatever they LIKE, including things without flowers, or shorts, or anything!" in a 'yay girls are awesome!" kind of voice. But I imagine your DD is pretty clever, in that she'd say "ok well if I can wear whatever I like then I want a dress" to you.

I dunno. I hope to sort of 'weatherproof" DS from peer pressure but I know it's not going to be easy and really all I can do is try to give him enough confidence to sometimes push back. I doubt he'll be able to do that so young. Children are VERY conformist, and I certainly was. Have you read "reviving Ophelia" ? _ I haven't but I've been told it's great if you have a DD. I've just ordered "raising Cain" which is about raising boys who feel they're allowed to have emotions. I might read the one for girls too, it sounds so interesting.

Sorry, rambly. More needed!

I think it will be OK. She is a very thoughtful child though, with a memory like an elephant. When people say things to her she listens carefully and mulls it over and a week or two later will come out with her interpretation of it. You have to be quite careful what you say around her.

I gave her the "oh they are silly meanies! your best friend is a boy and that's fine, the ones who say boys play with boys are being very silly sausages. If you like someone but they won't let you play then that's just how it is - we don't all like everyone - but you have lots of friends at nursery who like you so when X, A or B are mean why don't you go and play with them instead" etc etc. I didn't know what to say about the clothes. She has very much got it into her head that girls wear X and she is a girl and so that's what she is going to wear. Sigh.

I will add that book to my amazon list!

The daughter of a friend of mine won a tiny plastic toy and was HORRIFIED to discover it was a car she had got (lucky dip type thing). She was wailing about how it was a toy for boys, until every single woman present reassured her that we all have cars, her mum has a car and drives to work in it, and how much we enjoy driving our cars around. It was quite funny to hear us all pile in to correct her :)

Why the hell do boys "get" vehicles in the great gender divide anyway? Lord knows there are plenty of men and women out there on the roads/in the skies/on the rails.

Your DD will be fine sardinequeen - she has a great Mum to give her better messages than the meanies

DD told me she didn't want a particular toy the other day because it was for boys! She only turned 3 last week! I think all you can do is just keep plugging away with the positive stuff at home and hope some of it gets in....

The thing that pleased me today is that I have a new client at work and he is a nasty, violent thug, and I got to meet him and be firm and strong at him in a way none of his female relatives are cos they are scared. And he HATED me. And had NO idea how to deal with a woman who wasn't scared. I took no prisoners. Ha!

Yes, keep plugging away.

I don't think your friend meant to say that. She may have meant that some women are shallow, vain, fashion victims and men are a bit less complicated. ? Maybe?!

I've had the same thing as your no.1 for being too serious. Sometimes, you just want to forget about the world's problems and relax. This is how a good friend calmed me down once after a hideous sexist incident that I couldn't just shake off like they could.

Glad you've had some good news too!

Not read all of the posts but first of all I want to say that dogs are great!!! I am sat on the sofa with my gorgeous dog snoozing next to me and I've just watched a programme about Extraordinary Dogs. So I agree with your friends on that.

But......as HerBeggs has said, it's denial. I get it from my female friends too. They got married, call themselves Mrs, change their surnames, make a pretence of deferring to their husbands even though in one peer group we are all professionals and most of them are earning more than their husbands. I was quite surprised at the whole marriage thing as I thought that at our age (early 30s) wouldn't do the whole white wedding, Mrs Hisname thing but most of my friends couldn't wait to do it.

They don't get it either and most roll their eyes and make a point of saying that they don't think feminism is needed anymore. I had a 30 year old woman in work a few months ago tell me that she thinks it's right that women are generally paid less than men because men tend to work longer hours!

I think most women don't want to think that there's a problem. If they think there's a problem, they might actually have to do something about it.

The only way I managed to keep my sanity was by finding some great feminist friends. Luckily I'm in Bristol where there's a big feminist contingent.

I'm moving back down your way soon, Jess. Think I'll have to get in touch...

"What? It appears that no-one ever bothered to find out what Noah's wife was called, so she's just been known as Mrs Noah forever (and the same for the son's wives) Way to go to teach DD and DN from a very early that having their own identities isn't important."

DD has a Noah's ark, DP did some googling as we also faced the same problem of what to call Mrs Noah. Apparently it's Emzara so that's what she's called in this house.

Hi Immaculada
Yes do! You could join one of our feminist groups. We've got a lot going on.

I'd love to, Jess!

Has this become Feminist Chat Thread - The Other One?!! I'm enjoying it, anyway.

I'm sad to hear about the effects of gender stereotyping on nursery-age children. My DD is only 15 months and it upsets me to think she will soon have her innocently unprejudiced views on toys and clothes turned inside out.

My MIL runs a Montessori nursery and AFAIK the activities are strictly "non-gendered" with girls and boys encouraged to participate equally in all of them. (I wonder if she'll give me family discount...??!)

SardineQueen, my DD who is 3 loves dinosaurs so Father Christmas delivered dinosaur pants and socks this year. Only of course the labels all say 'Boys'; annoying enough in itself but I am dreading her starting nursery and the social pressures she will come under. She is already constantly referred to as a boy by strangers (presumably because she's not wearing pink/butterflies/flowers - she has some of these things, on some of her stuff, just not everywhere, and almost always wears boys' trousers because she says jeans are uncomfortable and I find it almost impossible to find girls' stuff that she can climb or run in. Oh, don't get me started, in fact, this is so depressing.

I heartily recommend the book 'Packaging Girlhood' to anyone else struggling to find a way through it all, and 'Delusions of Gender' by Cordelia Fine for those seeking arguments in the face of all the idiocy.

I noticed it almost as soon as she started nursery. She quickly began rejecting blue things on the basis that they were "for boys". She went a little after 2.

The thing with the dresses is that she is always running about and bombing around on her scooter and her poor knees are exposed and waiting to be skinned. We have compromised on dresses with pink or floral leggings underneath...

Can I join in? It's amazing how many things you notice when you start looking so today my list is...

the invite to DD's Y2 street party says 'come dressed as a prince or princess'. It would be nice if for once it could reverse the order, as in 'come dressed as a princess or prince'

getting called 'aggressive' in my appraisal, when I can't help but wonder if the same behaviours in a male colleague would earn a pat on back for being a mover and shaker. That made me feel v sad.

Please do!

oooh we had a pirates and princesses party. I posted a thread on here at the time. In the end DD thought that a pirate princess was a good idea and so she went in a summer type dress with a pirate hat and tunic. She looked great.

Every single other girl there was dressed in a proper bought Disney princess costume. Every single one, no word of a lie. After we left DD asked me why she was the only girl who wasn't a princess

Two other things from that - two little girls in floor length gowns were trying to run around and couldn't so it properly as they kept tripping over. And the organiser at one point said "pirate boys on this side and girl princesses on that side" so we could be left in no doubt what everyone was supposed to be.

Poor old DD I felt awful actually. I wasn't expecting that she would be the odd one out like that

tougholdbird I think you will find your aggressive male colleagues are described as assertive and promoted quickly. One of my collegaues was like that - he regularly made people cry - management (male) thought he was fab

Sardine I wonder if, my DD, like yours, might feel different if she's not the only one not decked out in Full Disney. Might have a chat in advance just to check - thanks for the warning.

Was going to dress her in normal wear with small crown - modern day princess, an idea I think may have got from the original thread.

I was quite amazed TBH. I was expecting princesses, but not for every single girl bar mine to be in a full-on bought Disney branded costume (you know the ones I mean).

I don't want DD to be the odd one out obviously, it honestly hadn't occurred to me that every single little girl at nursery owned one of these dresses. I genuinely thought that what she had on - pretty summer dress + wand would be "princessy" enough. Apparently not. And if that's the case then it gives so much less "wriggle room" - room to do it but with a twist IYSWIM.

PLus all teh invites and xmas cards we get from nursery friends are disney princess branded. It's the parents doing it - it started at 2 and that is definitely before children get strong views of their own about this stuff. This is a nursery in a v middle class north london type place - the mums are all doctors and accountants and things. The sort of people you might think would be less inclined to go overboard with this stuff. I don't get it. It makes you realise just how different the ideas that I consider to be quite normal, actually are

Yes - it makes me quite queasy to see various of my well-qualified, professional friends make a really special effort to constantly reassure their partner that he is the big man. For instance if we are talking about politics or work or anything, and partner wanders over and starts talking about something completely unrelated (usually interrupting) they will give him a couple of minutes of attention until he is happy to go off again, like some kind of toddler, rather than treating him as an adult who can either join in a conversation or be left to fend for himself.

Sardine "She is a very thoughtful child though, with a memory like an elephant. When people say things to her she listens carefully and mulls it over and a week or two later will come out with her interpretation of it."

I think you can use this to implant feminist attitudes your advantage!