(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

[treadpath.livejournal.com]

Heh. We do the same thing--shop from both racks. Tamsin has gotten a few really gross articles of clothing from family members that have gone straight into the donate bag unworn. The cheerleading outfit with "Princess" emblazoned on the top and on the ass, for example. Though, in a similar vein, I was in some store the other day and they had a sweatshirt intended to be worn by toddler boys emblazoned with "Little Bully" with a picture of a bull on it. I get where they were headed, but oy veh. The whole thing was all "here's the line: fragile beauty on this side and aggressive roughhousing on this side." Argh.