(no subject)

[rivka]

Not a fresh or original rant, I know. But:

I went to the mall today because Alex needed pajamas, and we had a gift card for the Carter's outlet. They had racks and racks of toddler girls' pajamas: pajamas that said "Princess" across the chest. Pajamas that said "Mermaid." Pajamas that said "Hula girl." Pajamas that said "Sun kissed." The handful of pajamas that didn't outright label the wearer as a purely decorative object were covered with flowers, except for one pair with an extremely feminine cat. (And flowers on the pants.)

I spent a few minutes trying to find the least objectionable pair, and then mentally smacked my forehead and went across to the boys' aisle. There I found pajama sets with fish, jungle animals, brightly colored tree frogs, dogs, dinosaurs, rocket ships, sports equipment, sharks, and so on.

It's not that I object to dressing Alex in gendered clothes. I don't have strong feelings in any direction, when it comes to her future gender expression. She wears a lot of girly clothes, actually, because her fair complexion, blonde hair, and blue eyes look particularly good in shades of pink, pastel orange, and pastel yellow. (Dark colors often make her look pale and washed out.) I don't object to hearts and flowers and butterflies, per se.

But if we're going to divide up the world by gender, does it have to be so lopsided? Does every single thing other than "looking pretty" have to belong in the boys' category? Don't little girls get to have any topics to be interested in at all?

We left the store with the cat pajamas, because Alex liked them. But also stegosaurus pajamas, rocket ship pajamas, and, also at Alex's request, dogs playing baseball. I like all four pairs just fine.

But sheesh.

Comments

[chargirlgenius.livejournal.com]

Are those the white glow in the dark stegosaurus jammies? I love those!

It often seems to me that a boy can't be a boy without liking sports or race cars. I just want cute clothes without sports or racecars on them, and I can never seem to find any.

It does seem really moronic that the nature stuff gets thrown into the boys dept.

It's kind of expensive, but one of those catalogues that I always get and drool over and never buy anything in has gorgeous printed little girl clothes. I sigh at how colorful the girls' clothes are, and how relatively boring the boy toddler stuff is.
http://www.hannahandersen.com/

[rivka.livejournal.com]

Are those the white glow in the dark stegosaurus jammies? I love those!

They are lime green with thin horizontal navy stripes. But the stegosaurus applique on the front does glow in the dark! I didn't realize until I was cutting the tags off.

[casperflea.livejournal.com]

For Hanna Andersson, ebay is great. Stuff is still relatively expensive, but it wears like iron.