A sixth grade class in Sweden filed a complaint against Toys R Us for having a catalog that featured ?outdated gender roles because boys and girls were shown playing with different types of toys, whereby the boys were portrayed as active and the girls as passive?.Whenever the gender behavior of children comes up, people are always quick to jump to anecdotes which always sound something like "well, when I was a kid I had trucks and dolls but I always just chose the dolls and I'm a girl so...".οΏ½ These stories seem to prove that there's something inherent in gender, and that assumption is certainly supported by pretty much everything in our culture from sports to clothing to advertisements to how we all treat the boys and girls in our lives. However, I think the Nature vs Nurture debate is still strong here, and we can't necessarily jump to those conclusions.Given the prevalence of these stereotypes, is it even worth trying to fight against them, as these children did? Yes, because those stereotypes follow us into adulthood. At Babeland, I have conversations every day with men who've been taught that they shouldn't have to ask questions about sex and women who don't know how to ask for what they want; men who don't know how to let their female partners have control and women who believe that they don't deserve pleasure. To me, these ideas didn't just appear in adulthood, they have roots in the messages that surround children every day.These messages even make their way into toys for adults. The vibrators designed for women tend to be pink or purple while toys for men are often darker blues with the occasional maroon (but certainly not pink). Toy designers are working in a binary and thus, design toys for the binary. Where are the green toys? Why aren't there more black toys? Red? White? Toy makers seem to be assuming that a woman will be more likely to buy a toy for the color than the function which is just insulting.I hope that, like these 6th graders, we can take our own steps to reduce gender stereotypesοΏ½ - they're certainly not helping us out.
