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I have no idea why anyone would be upset about Target removing signs that indicate whether a toy is marketed to girls or to boys. Why was this needed to begin with? Toys are toys. A child is interested in them...or not. Buy what your child is interested in. Pretty easy. You shouldn't need a gender indicator to help with that decision.
Because we have come so damn PC correct, whatever the Hell that is
I never noticed boy or girl signs. I just look for the toys and a quick glance down each aisle let me know what was there. These people playing the anti pc card card saying they wont shop Target need to go eat a bran muffin.
This makes sense to me. Not all girls like pink. I didn't. I never wanted to be a princess, Queen maybe but not some simpy little princess. I also didn't like girl toys that copied housework like Easy-Bake Ovens or miniature mops and brooms. Doll houses were okay. So were older appearing dolls.
I never liked baby dolls. If Barbie had been around when I was a little girl I would have liked her. My parents got my sisters and me toy trucks if we wanted them or story-book dolls or paper dolls or cowboys and horses sets. Our favorite toy was our Lionel electric trains. My dad and my sisters and I built all kinds of scenery around our trains. I liked making models like Queen Elizabeth's coach and horses. We all liked coloring books and puzzles. I believe at one time my older sister had her own baseball glove. We played baseball in the alley with the neighborhood kids. Boys and girls. My sisters and I even had cap guns.
There was jump rope and marbles and jacks and all sorts of toys everyone played with. About the only stigma on toys was that boys didn't play with dolls but I know one or two who would play with my paper dolls with me if I bribed them with enough candy.
Toy segregation is more of a parent thing than a kid thing. A kid doesn't know the difference until he or she gets older and learns what he or she is supposed to play with. This is just one more thing for people to be uptight about with lists and statistics and boring polls. Poor kids today. Even their toys have to be PC.
My parents never gave a rap if something was labeled "boys toys" or "girls toys." Toys were toys.
As awesome as it is to reminisce about growing up in the 1950's (in the UK?), just about every bit of culture was changed since then. In the 1950's there were a few hours a week of black & white television programming aimed towards children, if you even had a TV set. In the 1960s there were Saturday morning cartoons, Davey & Goliath on Sunday, and a few shows between 3 & 5 PM. Today there are 24 hour color networks dedicated to preschoolers, networks dedicated to cartoons for kids of all ages, and the availability of 'princess' DVD's to watch every waking hour.
You probably rarely even saw anything pink for girls back when you were pre-school age.
The types of toys that you (& I) were playing with were the selection you could find in the local 5 & 10 cent shop, mostly classics from the first half of the 20th century, out of copyright and out of license.
The exception would be the Lionel trains, but we all know that those REALLY belonged to Dad!
Anyway, today's families cater much more to the pre-school children's market than they ever did back then. Give a two or three year old girl a rag doll back then and she would be happy for months. Nowadays, they are bombarded with toys, many of them replacing that personal time that you spent interacting with your family huddled around the oil lamps.
But there was never any reason was to why anything needed labeling as "gender specific" either. Who thought of that? Just put the toy on the shelf and let the kid decide for him or herself if he or she wants it for Pete's sake.
yes you're right.
i guess i'm talking more about the people who are saying things like barbies are not for girls. (that is not necessarily something that someone has said outright, but that's the gist of it all) they are just "toys". i disagree with that. barbies are for girls. that's how they started out, who they were intended for and that's who the majority of kids plays with them, girls, and that's who they are marketed to. can boys play with them too? of course! can boys want them too? absolutely. should they be able to buy them too? yes. they should buy as many barbies and dream houses as they want. but the fact is, barbies are for girls and they always have been. people want to change things like that. take all the pink and frills away and make it so boys are also comfortable wanting and buying a barbie doll. i think that is ridiculous. that's the sort of "PC" thing i am talking about. we can't even have toys that are meant for girls anymore or toys that are meant for boys. horror!!! can't have that!!! can't have any kids feeling uncomfortable about what toys they like. it's becoming really silly.
honestly, i haven't ever noticed any signs at target that say "girls toys" or "boys toys". can't miss the blue and pink painted walls! especially that picture posted with all the barbie pink! but it has never crossed my mind that someone would be upset because the girls aisle have pink walls and the boys have blue and there are signs to help to direct people to certain toys. it's just silly.
Last edited by beachie123; 08-11-2015 at 10:08 PM..
For the record, I'm a woman and I've always hated pink. It's a shame it seems to be the favored color for marketing products toward women, even when we're adults.
I hate pink too, same for baby blue, give me Maroon or give me Royal Blue and that's fine.
There's no such thing as a boy's toy or a girl's toy they are toys, only marketing, commercials and ad bs have brainwashed the American sheeple into the mindset that only boys can play with science kits, microscopes and GI Joe "action figures" (technically they are DOLLS) and only girls can play with dolls (GI JOE "action figures" are dolls by the way) EZ bake ovens and kitchen gadgets.
Before WWll the color blue was associated with girls and pink with boys, and young boys were attired in girls' DRESSES- just look at the old photos from back then the children all wore dresses up to a certain age whether they were boys or girls. People are making a mountain over a molehill, Target is simply removing the idiotic signs that formerly said things like "LEGOS FOR BOYS" and replacing it with " LEGOS FOR KIDS" which means girls now can feel more comfortable choosing a previously so called "boys' toy" to explore and experiment with free of fools from the dark ages going on about: THAT'S A BOYS' TOY!!!! and making her feel bad for wanting the toy.
Because underwear for adults isn't as interchangeable as toys for children? Because men and women have different body shapes and sizes and functions, and so panties don't fit men well and men's underwear have openings that are useless to women and for a guy a bra is either useless or that guy desperately needs to lay off the Twinkies and hit the gym? But on the other hand, toys are pretty much interchangeable between genders.
And you need this explained to you? Seriously?
When I was a kid the local drugstore had ALL the toys on one aisle, and I had no problems finding the ones I wanted.
I have to wonder how people like the person you replied to ever find anything in stores that don't have the stuff in separate aisles divided by gender. Costco throws all the undergarments into one aisle (which occasionally changes position inside the store) and I assure you I have never accidentally purchased men's underwear for myself.
How do these people buy stuff like deodorant? There's the deodorant for men like Axe, the deodorant for women like Secret and the gender-neutral brands like Sure. They're all on one aisle right next to each other on the shelf.
What? What made you think that video gaming consoles are stereotypically boy's toys? I've always seen them in the completely gender neutral electronics department.
I don't know how old you are, but when I was playing video games it was considered a "boy toy." Like few of my female friends played video games.
It is not that video games are not potentially gender neutral, but the marketing was very boy centric when i was a kid. And few girls played. With the advent of casual games on mobile phones, they started making more gender neutral games, and now basically everyone plays, especially on their phone.
But the consoles, those were marketed to mostly boys.
One of the "Mama says" I used with my son and daughter as they were growing up was "Colors aren't't sexist, people are...."
Meaning that girls and boys were free to wear any color they wanted -- and that some people are handicapped in choosing to categorize others by the colors they wore...
Having a boy wear a pink or purple Polo shirt in the 70s when my son was born would have drawn thoughts--if not outright comments--about sissy dressing...
Pink was a hot color for men a few years back but you really won't find too many articles of clothing for young boys in pink....still very gender specific for kids under 12 I think...
As awesome as it is to reminisce about growing up in the 1950's (in the UK?), just about every bit of culture was changed since then. In the 1950's there were a few hours a week of black & white television programming aimed towards children, if you even had a TV set. In the 1960s there were Saturday morning cartoons, Davey & Goliath on Sunday, and a few shows between 3 & 5 PM. Today there are 24 hour color networks dedicated to preschoolers, networks dedicated to cartoons for kids of all ages, and the availability of 'princess' DVD's to watch every waking hour.
You probably rarely even saw anything pink for girls back when you were pre-school age.
The types of toys that you (& I) were playing with were the selection you could find in the local 5 & 10 cent shop, mostly classics from the first half of the 20th century, out of copyright and out of license.
The exception would be the Lionel trains, but we all know that those REALLY belonged to Dad!
Anyway, today's families cater much more to the pre-school children's market than they ever did back then. Give a two or three year old girl a rag doll back then and she would be happy for months. Nowadays, they are bombarded with toys, many of them replacing that personal time that you spent interacting with your family huddled around the oil lamps.
There was a study that implicated the television, and parents habits of flopping the kids in front of it for long periods of time as infants and toddlers as causing the spike in autism. Overstimulation of the immature brain.
When I was a kid, we had cartoons on Saturday until Soul Train came on. Then it was time to go outside and build a fort, or dig some holes, or whatever.
There was a study that implicated the television, and parents habits of flopping the kids in front of it for long periods of time as infants and toddlers as causing the spike in autism. Overstimulation of the immature brain.
When I was a kid, we had cartoons on Saturday until Soul Train came on. Then it was time to go outside and build a fort, or dig some holes, or whatever.
Those were the days! My mom's rule was that cartoons went off at 11 am and we had to do about an hour or so of chores and we were cut loose after lunch. We better get outside and not come back in till suppertime!
We had a little neighborhood "gang" of boys and girls between the ages of about seven and eleven - probably about 8 kids total. We spent all summer and most evenings throughout the school year riding bikes, building forts, or playing an elaborate WW2 game that we made up called "Prison Camp." It basically consisted of half of us being Nazis and the other half being Jews or resistance operatives trying to escape from a prison camp by overtaking the guards. It was very intense and we played it for hours. I never liked being assigned the Nazi part but everyone had to pay their dues.
I never once thought of any of this as being either "boyish" or "girlish."
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