Small children and gender roles

In My Humble Opinion
1

So my son starts at a new daycare on Monday. One of the things they have asked us to provide is a blanket for his cot.

So last night, we went out to find him a blanket.

Now, he is obsessed with Dora the Explorer. I can’t stand the little bitch, but hey, she’s taught him how to speak in full Spanish phrases at 2 1/2, and to count to ten in Spanish, so she’s not all that bad. Granted, I will do anything humanly possible to avoid watching the little wide-eyed brat, but it’s difficult when every other kid around you is a Dora or Diego freak.

He has already requested Dora underwear, as we are getting ready to potty-train. However, I’ve gotten around that by explaining that boys and girls wear different underwear and talked him into Diego underwear. If I have to, I’ll buy some plain white underwear with Dora iron-ons. It doesn’t bother me.

However, the blanket he chose for daycare is a pink-and-purple, obviously girly Dora blanket. I tried to steer him towards a typical boy blanket - just a blanket with trucks or polka dots (blue and brown) or even the movie Cars (we try not to do characters much, but we’re losing that battle, big time). Nope, he wanted Dora.

Neither my husband nor I have an issue with it. Honestly - we just don’t care. He likes Dora, and I did promise he could pick out his own blanket. He has other girly things that are simply because he liked them, and I’m not going to force him into something blue or green or red just because it’s the ‘right color’.

I’m not worried about ‘turning him gay’ (although we also don’t care - if he grows up and tells us he’s gay, I honestly think our response will be along the lines of “Okay, honey. That’s great. If you need us to do anything differently, just tell us. So, what do you want for dinner?” because it’s such a NON-ISSUE for us.) I’m more worried about the other kids picking on him. Granted, they are all only 2 years old, so is this really something to worry about?

Anyone have a boy who preferred girly things as a toddler, or vice-versa with a little girl? For some reason, it seems like it’s more acceptable for a little girl to prefer boyish stuff than it is for little boys to want the girly stuff - why is that?

2

I’ve never encountered an issue. the neighbor boy used to come over to play with my daughter’s barbie’s because his parents wouldn’t get him any.

my daughter had a big dinosaur phase. i got her some boys dinosaur thermal underwear at age 5. we had so sew up the pee pee hole because some kids teased her about that but not 'cause of the dinos or colors

3

At this age, the other kids won’t care. I have a client who is a three-year-old boy whose favorite color is pink and favorite character is Uniqua from the Backyardigans. Another boy likes to pretend to be the female character Stephanie from the show Lazytown. Nary a peep from their peers.

Adults, however, sometimes have difficulty repressing their urges to “masculinize” little boys. The second boy was told by his mother that he couldn’t pretend to be Stephanie, and he should pick a male character instead. Older children (starting at around age 6 or 7), will also try to start enforcing gender roles. I taught a little girl (age 5), who liked Spiderman and always wore boy’s clothing. She was frequently asked by older children if she was a boy or a girl, although she had a girl’s hairstyle.

4

At preschool age no one cares. A boy used to show up at my daughters preschool in a dress over jeans and none of the kids blinked - none of the parents did either at our little crunchy/hippy preschool.

In my experience the gender stuff doesn’t show up until K or first grade and if the teachers don’t care the kids won’t either.

5

When I was a kid, I would carry all my Hot Wheels around in pink purses. How’s that for mixed signals on a child.

6

When I was a little girl, I was quite a tomboy, and got teased about it. Well, teasing implies that there was good humor about it. Let’s say, rather, that I got hassled about it. I’m 51, for the record. In elementary school, girls were NOT allowed to wear pants/slacks, although we were allowed and even encouraged to wear shorts under our dresses on PE day. We had PE a few times a week, either two or three times, and of course we wore our normal classroom attire. We were allowed to wear culottes or skorts. I usually changed clothes as soon as I came home, into shirts and jeans. Then I’d go out and play tackle football with the neighborhood boys. I had very few female friends. In middle school, we were first allowed to wear pants under dresses, and then pants and tops in later years. In high school, times had changed enough that most girls wore pants (mostly jeans) and Tshirts.

Any boy, at any time when I was a kid, who expressed an interest in anything feminine would have been…reprogramed. In fact, some of my friends were teased because they played with ME, because I was a girl, even though it was widely known that I was a tomboy. GI Joe toys and the like were NOT dolls, they were “action figures” and nobody had better call them anything different. Even if the parents were able to accept non-traditional gender roles for their sons, society at large would have made the kid miserable.

Because traditionally it’s been better to be a boy than a girl. In my case, I didn’t just want the boyish stuff, I wanted the boyish freedom, too. I wanted to be able to run around and dig in the dirt and play rough games. I didn’t want to host tea parties. I didn’t want to sit still and be quiet and generally behave like a little lady. Fortunately, most people no longer try to fit children into such strict behaviors. Girls are allowed to run around and get dirty. Boys are allowed to pretend to cook. And I think society is better for it.

7

I’m a preschool teacher. Our dress-up area has fairy, princess, fireman, policeman costumes etc. Guess who wears the fluffy frilly dresses? Boys! Mostly in the 3 and a half to 4 yr old age range.

Girls have the frilly dresses at home, boys don’t. They like to “test” them out. No child of either gender even raises an eyebrow at a “princess boy”…it’s a daily occurence.

There is not a 2 yr old alive on the planet that would judge your son for having a Dora (I hate the bitch too!) blankie.

8

My son went to daycare pretty regularly at that age with nail polish and occasionally lipstick. The only comment I ever heard was when he was approaching kindergarten age and one of the girls gave him a funny look and said, “Nail polish is for girls!” He explained that pink polish was for girls, but green polish like he had was for boys.

He’ll definitely be OK with a Dora blanket. If there are any issues, they’d come from the teachers rather than the kids.

9

For now he’ll be ok.

Eventually, the kids at school will sort him out and he’ll start behaving according to the male gender rules.

10

I really hate that boys are forced more into gender roles than girls are. My 9YO mudgirl loves getting dirty (hence the username :wink: ), has a pet snake, a pet tarantula, no Barbie dolls, and loves Matchbox cars. She does occasionally love dressing up, wearing ‘makeup’ and nail polish, because it’s what her idolized 17YO sister does. But she doesn’t get grief for being a “tomboy” like a boy would for liking ‘girl’ things.

Having said all that, at the age of 2, no one in the daycare is going to care if your son has a Dora blanket. If there’s resistance from anywhere, as has been said upthread, it’ll be the teachers, not the other kids.

11

Ahh, good…(both that you hate the little wide-eyed brat, and that’s what you see in your preschool).

We’ve never limited him on toys - in fact, he got a toy kitchen for Christmas, and LOVES it, and he kept asking for a baby doll for his second birthday (which he didn’t get, but that’s because my parents were going to get him one, and they decided to get him some Wiggles-related stuff instead). We honestly don’t care, and I think it’s good for him to have exposure to all of it.

Good to know. I have a feeling it’ll be fine - we adore the new teachers, and I doubt they will bat an eyelash.

Awesome - yet another reason to look forward to the public school years. :wink: Luckily, he’s bigger than most kids his age, so I guess we’ll just tell him to sit on them or something :stuck_out_tongue: .

And it’s been less than 24 hours, and he’s as attached to his Dora blankie as he is to his bear (which he’s had since he was born). I’m thinking there may need to be a home Dora blankie and a school Dora blankie, just like there’s a home bear and a school bear.

12

I doubt the other kids will notice, and even if they do, all they’ll probably notice is that it’s Dora, and not associate any sort of gender connotations with it.

Hell, I’ve got pictures of my son as a toddler playing with my breast pump. He’s just imitating Mommy, no big deal.

13

:smiley:

That’s awesome. I am laughing because we were looking at pictures of my son as a baby last night (he’s at the point where he likes to look at himself as a little baby, and say how cute he was :dubious::)), and we came across a picture of him breastfeeding (nothing explicit, and it’s not shared with anyone, but it’s a testament to how difficult it was for me, and is one of my favorite pictures). Needless to say, it set off a conversation about how babies eat, and ended with me saying “No, that’s how you ate as a baby. You don’t need to eat that way now. Let go of my shirt.” :smack:

14

That’s my daughter. For the record, I would like to put a pox on whoever decided that girls should have underwear with Dora or Barbie or Princesses or Bratz and that boys get the Superheroes. I tried buying plain white undies and ironing on Spiderman patches, but they just weren’t the same. Boys’ underwear is made of thicker cotton and is more comfortable. Now that someone has mentioned it, maybe I will just buy her some and sew up the flap. I have to admit, though, I, too, am worried that her peers will give her crap.

15

I agree that the other kids won’t probably even notice. Kids that age are still in the “world revolves around me” stage so they don’t really care about other kids to the extent that older children do. I do find it wrong though, the parents who try to force their children to act in ways they feel is appropriate for the child’s gender.
When I used to work daycare years ago, there was the sweetest little boy. He was about three years old and LOVED playing dress up and would usually be in a dress or skirt by days end. His mother would make sure every morning to let us know whether or not his father would be picking him up. Because if his son was in a dress when he came to get him, all hell would break loose. It was ridiculous really.
My brother is doing the same thing with my five year old nephew. He only has girl cousins and so when they’re playing dress up or putting on ‘make up’, he wants to join in. My brother absolutely refuses to let him do it. Poor little guy gets so upset when he’s not allowed to do what the other kids are doing and he just doesn’t understand. I feel it definitely does more harm than good to force gender stereotypes on a child. Let them just be kids. They’ll have enough to worry about when they grow up.

16

It really irritates me that all the “stuff” there is for kids is so gender-specific. We went to get a play tent for my daughter, and our choices were Camo print and pink with butterflies. :rolleyes: In preschool, the kids really won’t notice or care…a lot of kids get attached to things that belong to an older sibling, so it’s not unusual to see kids with the wrong-gendered backpack, blankie, or whatever.

My son is 2, and he’s always carrying around his big sister’s purses…that’s the age where they like to start carrying their stuff around with them, and they really don’t care what color the bag is!

17

Although it gets better, it doesn’t end with childhood. When I was in the hospital in 2007 we have two episodes of “gender expectations”:

  1. My husband bought me a couple magazines related to airplanes. The nurses would come in while I was asleep, assume my husband had left them, then when he came back to visit they’d hand him the magazines saying “you left your magazines in your wife’s room”. Um, no, they are the wife’s magazines…(yes, after a couple of days the nurses figured that one out).

  2. He wanted to get me a warm robe, because, due to significant weight loss and illness, I was cold all the damn time. The only ones he could find at Target, K-Mart, Meijers, Wal-Mart, etc. in the women’s section were in pastels. I am not a pastel person. Worse yet, most of them were thin cotton with no warmth. So he wised up, went to the men’s section, and bought me a nice, warm, comfy robe in a shade of red-brown that looked great on me.

18

Two of my three sons have a definite preference for flowery pink things; one wanted me to wallpaper his bedroom in pink roses. (As if I want to bother with wallpaper!) They all like wearing my high heeled shoes, and putting on my makeup and nail polish. They do more than I do, actually! :stuck_out_tongue:

It does seem to me that cartoon characters are more gender specific than they used to be, though. Bugs Bunny, Mickey Mouse, Casper the Friendly Ghost, and the other ancient ones that were in vogue back in the dark ages when I was a child, all seemed fairly neutral. Now Bob the Builder is a boy thing, and Dora is a girl thing, and Diego is a boy thing, and everything is so defined along gender lines.

19

Hee. Ivylad has two sisters. When they went shopping for his mom’s birthday when they were teenagers they used to make him model the clothes they wanted to buy for her. And his older sister forced him to play Barbies with her. I must say, he still turned out to be a manly man. :smiley:

20

As not an actual parent, this is what drove me bonkers working in retail with children’s clothes. Even Harry Potter-type t-shirts–where the characters have appeal across gender lines–were made either in super duper girly or incredibly macho.

Look, I’m not mad about the Pink Glitter clothes with Princess on them–although I won’t buy them, I can respect that there is a market for them. And likewise for the camo stuff for boys. But can’t the gender neutral stuff exist too?

A group of ADULTS of which I am a member agreed to wear purple to church one Sunday. Of the 3 guys, only one wore anything which resembled purple. OK, it wasn’t that big a deal, and if you didn’t already own anything purple, it’s ok if you didn’t want to spend money on something you won’t wear again–but to suggest that there is something wrong with the manhood of anyone who would wear purple bugs me. (In fairness, the guy who suggested that is sixteen and was aiming for a reaction from his mother more than from the guy who was co-operative enough to wear purple).