Inane comments about how girl and boy toddlers are so 'different'

[porpoisefull]

Recently said to me:
"Ooh look at him pushing that tricycle round - that's just like a boy, he likes anything with wheels."
Re DS trying to step off a low wall while small female friend walked along it "Oh, that's the difference between boys and girls."
DS shoving whole sandwich in his mouth at once. "Oh, just like a boy." (on that occasion another friend walked in just afterwards and mentioned that her DD has the same greedy habit).

Why are some people determined to fit every insignificant little thing into a grand pattern of gender difference? Anyone else have any good examples?

My dd1 fits the whole 'female' gender personna dd2 doesn't she outshines ds in everything 'male'

Oh I have a friend who does this about her DCs. Wow, it is so boring! No kidding in a sample of two children, you have two different personalities

tedious, isn't it? People who are so desperate for children to fit exactly into the stereotypical boy and girl boxes must be insecure on some level.

Remember that experiment where they showed adults treating the same baby entirely differently when it was dressed in blue or pink, and describing the baby in completely different ways?

DD (3) is built like a tank, bless her, and is the most confident, assertive and robust little thing you'd ever come across. I get plenty comments about her being a tom-boy, and I ignore all of them, saying, she will be what she will be, leave her be, she does not have to be pink and frilly to be a girl. Ridiculous.

It is annoying. However, much as try and encourage ds to play with all toys at play group, he hates the dolls and loves the cars. He also likes the kitchen though.

I get it loads as my friend's dd is very quiet and calm and ds is like a tornado. Cue lots of old lady comments about how typically boy and girl they are.

ds (6) quiet, gentle, task oriented, thoughtful. dd an utter thug, (at 19mo) never happier than with a ball and someone to kick it at. Am very proud of both of them

People are always telling me how pretty and girly my ds2 is and what lovely delicate features she has. Then they backpedal furiously when I tell them he's a boy. It's v funny.

It irks, but I have to say DS is genuinely wheel-obsessed in a way the dds just weren't

And he is a baby

it doesn't have to irk, sometimes they will randomly fit the stereotypes. About 50% of the time in fact!

The general gender-stereotyping irks (and the pink/blue rubbish particularly)

sorry, was being dozy

My DS is really cautious and not a 'boys' boy at al, whereas DD has to be watched like a hawk as she is fearless!!

Also irked all my friends with girls telling me how lucky I was to be having a girl (with my lovely DS sitting next to me!)

It isn't just that the actions randomly fit. It's that people talk about the same action in a completely different way if they think a boy is doing it compared to when they think a girl is doing it. I don't dress my girls in pink and they are quite young so most adults think they are boys when they first see them. And it is noticeable that many people change the way they talk about them once I've made it clear my kids are girls.

We see what we want to much of the time. Although I also think most of the time people are making inane, biased, small talk comments about kids because they are just trying to be sociable rather than because they actively think these things. But it all seeps into the culture.

Ive always said personality wise DS should have been a girl and DD should have been a boy. DS is gentle, daydreamer and moody DD is fearless bolshy and adventurous.

on the flipside though DS loves cars and DD love everything pink and girly. so they each have a balance and they are just who they are.

When my friends with just boys say im lucky to have a girl, i tell them there the lucky ones not have one boys are easy!

well, my dd never ever took so much as a glance at cars, buses & trains... my ds is so excited when these pass, they are truly different in this and other ways, there is deffinately some inate wheel thing going on!

Yes, it is very silly to describe behaviour differently when it is being done by a boy than when it is done by a boy.

serant - no, there are two different people going on. You don't have enough children in your sample to make a judgment about whether wheels are something that appeal only to males and not at all to females. In fact, that kind of study has been done, on lots of children, and it's not true. Girls are just as likely to play with traditionally 'boy's' toys right up to the point where they are conditioned out of it.

well, I only have 1 DS, so can't really judge, but am 1 of 4 kids - mum had 3 girls then 1 boy. She said in most ways we were all very alike - except when we found a stick. My sister and I would always pretend it was a horse, other sis would put it down, saying 'dirty', and my brother would use the stick to destroy nearby plants. My DS is the same with sticks :o

I've been a bit annoyed by comments when he's playing with Dolly (my old rag doll), and friends say 'oh, isn't that a little girly for him?'. But I plan to carry on letting him play with Dolly, and 'helping' around the house, despite the fact he only has 1 X chromosome. I think he'll survive.

i took my boys to a dance lesson yesterday - mainly ballet. dh only realised about the ballet aspect after we'd been. i have 3 boys and they are very typical boys but we do have a dolls buggy and they took a fancy to their cousin's pink fairy wand. got to get my pink fix somehow/somewhere!

i have a miriam stoppard babcare book and is has a section on each page specific to girls/boys on that topic. i find it really interesting to see natural differences between gender. by ds1's 2nd birthday we had a house full of boys toys - i was buying things that i noticed appealed to him in toddler groups. he did go through a phase of playing with baby dolls but that was around the time when he got his first baby brother. if people want to stereotype my boys i'll gladly tell them they'll be going to ballet class after the football session.

serant/edam - i've only got a sample of 3, so also not statistically relevant.

but having a girl after 2 boys, it has been really interesting to me that dd at 16 months old does in many ways seem very 'girly' in comparison to her brothers who were interested in wheels and mechanics early on. she came into a house full of diggers and tools and has no interest in them at all, but spends ages changing the hats and accessories on the playpeople building site workers. she collects up fluffy toys and cuddles them and tucks them up in bed rather than flinging them around like her brothers did. she is obsessed with shoes and is always trying to put them on herself and other people.

however, she is physically FAR more adventurous than the boys were, a complete daredevil, and asserts herself in all situations much more forcefully than they ever did/do so i will certainly try to avoid jamming her into any sort of 'delicate' stereotypical box as she gets older.

I always tell people that they are just very different personalities probably nothing to do with gender. If anything dd is more independent and 'rough and tumble' than ds at the same age.

I confirmed our house is relatively free of gender stereotyping a while back when I realised one morning that DS was cuddling and feeding a little doll, and DD was running around madly with some trains :)

What's really annoying is when people assign labels of Good or Naughty according to gender expectations. Both my DCs have always been very curious and 'into everything' - opening cupboards, trying to escape toddler groups etc. NOT destructive. With DD, everyone always praised her for being so adventurous. With DS even when he does exactly the same he gets called trouble maker and disaster zone :( what if these presumptions continue at school?

Children don't see the difference between 'boy' toys and 'girl' toys until they are pointed out to them. It's those little comments like in the OP, that seem throw-away at the time, that actually do the damage. The child hears it over and over until the child believes it and begins to fit the stereotype.
I work in a nursery and find it really sad when a child says they can't play with a certain toy because it's a girl/boy toy because I know they are being conditioned.

my boys may be going to a boys only school from 7yrs. when i mentioned it to a dad of an older boy the other week he said it was a good thing cause 'boys get so distracted!'. i went to an all girls school and hated it but not sure if my bad experience should put me off choosing the right school for my kids.

"People talk about the same action in a completely different way if they think a boy is doing it compared to when they think a girl is doing it." Exactly - before pushing the aforementioned tricycle around, DS was playing with the purple sparkly streamers hanging off it, and if he'd been a girl, I expect someone would have commented on that, or said that he liked the tricycle because it was pink."

I think if you expect all boys to be very similar and all girls to be very similar then you must lose some of the pleasure in toddlers, which is their glorious eccentricity and individualism.