Monday, December 26, 2011

A three-year-old gets it right



"Some girls like superheroes; some girls like princesses. Some boys like superheroes; some boys like princesses. So why do all the girls have to buy pink stuff and all the boys have to buy different color stuff?"

Good question, huh?

3 comments:

m1nks said...

I agree but I do feel like this little girl was being coached...

Bill Garthright said...

Well, not necessarily "coached" - although that's certainly possible - but I'm sure she heard such things at home. That's what children do, repeat what they hear their parents say - for good and bad.

m1nks said...

It's the questions the person with the camera was asking; he was saying 'but boys can want x and girls can want x too, right?' and then waits as she agrees and says things that are definitely not spoken in a 3 year old voice.

I totally agree with the concept, just maybe not the delivery of the lesson in this particular case. The chances are good though that just by hearing these opposing views (from the social 'norm') that this little girl will grow up far more aware and therefore hopefully questioning of sexual stereotypes and gender focused marketing. Until she is able to truly make up her own mind. I for instance have never been a girly girl, didn't like playing with dolls and pretending to take care of them (I seem to have been behind the door when the maternal instinct gene was being handed out) and had two older brothers so learnt to toughen up and not to squeal dammit! But I also never liked toy cars and trucks and loved dressing up my barbie doll equivalents because my passion for clothes started at a very early age.

My favourite book as a girl was 'An Ordinary Princess' and I simply cannot bring myself to read overly girly pink princess and floaty fairy stories to my three nieces. Fortunately none of them seem to mind. They get Roald Dhal, Hairy MacClary and Winnie the Pooh instead.