Why I think No Gender December is a crock of shit

Greens senator Larissa Waters is endorsing a project linking gender-marketed children’s toys to serious social issues in later life, such as domestic violence and poor self-esteem.  She is backing Play Unlimited’s “No Gender December” campaign, which calls on parents to boycott Christmas presents that reinforce gender stereotypes.

9news reports

“In the firing line are Barbie dolls for girls and toy trucks for boys, products Senator Waters said perpetuated negative social constructions.

“While the starkly separate aisles of pink and blue might seem harmless, especially to well-meaning rellies and friends, setting such strong gender stereotypes at early ages can have long-term impacts, including influencing self-perception and career aspirations,” she said.

The whole idea of Barbie being a bad role model for girls is quite ridiculous to me. You know how little girls see Barbie? As a doll – not a role model. They no more want to grow up to be Barbie than they want to grow up to be a pony with a rainbow coloured tail.  And if they do, it’s because they are under 10 and they believe you can be a pony when you grow up.  Not many children of 13 or 14 are even interested in Barbie let alone aspiring to be her.

The truth is that we stop playing with toys many years before we start to find our place in the world, years before the onslaught of hormones that sweep through the body deleting all signs of teenage mutant ninja turtles or  Polly Pockets.  But when do play with toys we instinctively play with toys that make up feel happy and connected.  Kids in third world countries do the same thing with no plastic toys in super mega toy stores.  The little boys fashion wheels and play with sticks that they “drive” through the sand.  They play ball games.  The little girls nurture and baby the rags that they pretend to be their babies. They create and they nurture.
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There are no catalogues or gender labeled toy aisles in the some of the third nation African countries where the little boys fashion cars and the little girls carry their “babies” on their back.

Creating a “no Gender December” is like trying to pretend that our children have no gender. It’s a ridiculous idea that gender is “bad” –  I think we are all safe in saying that there are differences in males and females. It doesn’t make one gender better or the other worse but trying to pretend gender doesn’t exist is farcical.

To make the leap from playing with gendered toys to domestic violence is a harsh and cruel arrow to fire and points to a victim blaming mentality that should have no place in our society.  To think that the toys that you play with as a kid dictates how you act and feel as an adult gives no credit to our children’s capacity for critical thought and maturation.

It feels unnecessary to force our kids to think about toys with the cynicism and political bent that 2014 seems to demand.  Why is it that we laud and fawn over the mum who allows her son to dress up as a fairy but we balk when she does it with her daughter? Why do we raise the mum who gives her daughters cars to play with but try to direct our boy’s attention elsewhere.

Let’s not politicise toys, childhood is too short.