written by Love Isn’t Enough contributor Renee; originally published at Womanist Musings
Isn’t it wonderful everyone? Now girls can be into science too and we know this because everything is a wonderful shade of pink. Yep, pink just screams girl. I suppose I should see this as a leap forward because these sorts of toys are usually aimed at boys, but it irritates me that the creators felt that simply having girls on the package was enough to signify femininity.
I would remiss if I did not point out that not only are these two little girls are cute, they are white and blonde. It seems that it is okay to encourage girls to succeed, only if they fall within certain criteria. White women are oppressed due to sexism but their race privilege often opens doors that are closed to little girls of colour. No matter how much we claim to value children, socially not all children are equal.
When we talk about toy departments as womanists/feminists, we always take note of the gender differences. Boys aisles are always blue and girls aisles are always pink. In the girls aisle, you will find baby dolls and toys that generally reinforce the idea that girls are to nurture or be concerned about their appearance. Very seldom will you see commentary about the races on the boxes because whiteness subsumes all other races, thereby creating POC as invisible.
Toys that denote a lower class status are targeted at children of colour, thereby teaching them what role society expects of them in the future. Race and class play very distinct roles in how we socialize children and yet we see this as naturally occurring forces. We don’t equip children for excellence and then reinforce this idea by never encouraging them to dream about making positive gains in their social status.
There is more at stake then simply seeing gender disparity and the pinkification of everything female. Even the lack of pink and its association with girls of colour teaches them at a very early age that they will eventually grow into the ultimate “unwoman” that has come to signify black femininity. When we talk about issues facing girls and children, what we really mean are white girls and white children. When we consider the poverty that many children of colour are growing in, the social myth about respecting childhood is revealed to be mendacious and truly scurrilous.
Unless a parent of colour has enough class privilege to force integration, a child will forever be excluded from opportunities that will enrich the mind. In my sons dojo, there are three children of colour and two of them are my kids. On [my son] “Destruction’s” hockey team last season, there were 10 kids and two of them were of colour. I am sure when the boys start music classes this fall, the ratio will be the same. The absence of children of colour in his activities is not indicative of population, it is directly related to class position.
Class and race constantly intersect in the life of a child of colour and therefore; focusing the conversation solely on the basis of nurture vs nature, serves to erase their experiences and their struggles. Gender can never be the sole site of integration because it privileges Whiteness and leads to a myopic understanding of social phenomenon. It is not enough to fight for the inclusion of girls in areas that have been historically considered masculine, unless that inclusion is for ALL girls. White girls succeeding, while black girls flounder is not a positive step for womanhood unless one believes that children of colour do not matter.
amen
Personally, I think the pink thing does a disservice to ALL girls! I would not have been caught dead as a child using anything pink, much less a scientific instrument. I think a pink microscope is not inclusive. I think it trivializes girls’ participation in science – they won’t like it unless it’s “cute” because girls aren’t serious about things. It’s just one more subtle reinforcement of society’s lack of respect for female intelligence – regardless of the color of her skin. That being said, it must be exponentially more obnoxious for women in minority groups.
I do have one question: You state that “[t]oys that denote a lower class status are targeted at children of colour, thereby teaching them what role society expects of them in the future.” Could you specify what toys you feel fall into this category?
Finally, while higher percentages of minority children live in poverty, let us not forget that, at a minimum, 1/3 of the 13 million children living in poverty are white. There are far, far too many children in this country deprived of opportunity, regardless of skin color.
Similarly, check out this:
http://www.smartlabtoys.com/
They recently pitched us their new line for girls. From a company that creates all sorts of cool learning toys for boys, the girls get spa sets and fashion sketches. Boo.
You write a good, vivid argument with a great deal of verve. You may have already read this:
http://www.jstor.org/pss/2967237
Social context must change. POC, especially Blacks have not found a strong nationwide workers movement since the great union era dissolved (due largely in part to white supremacy within many union ranks).
Until anti-racists and/or POC start going back to organized union/labour activism and demanding that companies like House of Dereon and FUBU stop outsourcing to sweatshops and instead put people to work in the US little will change.
It means not being afraid of words like “socialism” “strike” and “boycott.”
Until there is a movement, the wealthy elite will keep gutting school arts and science programmes and lower income students will continue to suffer.
I don’t feel Beyonce and other wealthy artists of colour are exempt from being part of this elite. She’s “breaking down barriers” onstage while POC in poverty help fill her coffers by sewing her clothing lines. She smiles and acts like such a trailblazer but she isn’t. Daymond John (FUBU) on ‘Shark Tank” sees cheap labour in China like you and I breath; part of the process of living each day.
True pink and red look good on any anti-racist which is why there have been three red scares and zero round up of Neonazis, KKK types and John Birchers etc.
http://depts.washington.edu/civilr/revels_cayton.htm
And for now, many parents of all colours need to step up and turn off the television and go back to reading. Lower middle class/working class/low income people, of which I’m one, need to not fall prey as parents to the instant gratification of the tube and DVD player to bring art and science into their children’s life. We need to providing it ourselves. Even if it’s growing a plant on the window sill or learning about different types of musical traditions from tapes from the library.
It gets worse: I first saw the ad a month or two ago in a catalogue. There’s a boys and a girl’s version at the same price. Not only is the girl’s model pink, it’s less powerful.
When I see the toys marketed for girls these days, I’m glad that my child is a boy. I’m in my mid-forties and I never remember make-up kits sold for girls, princess clothes and sexualized dolls (like Bratz products). There just seems to be a huge emphasis on GIRLS as sex objects. I feel like the dominant culture is getting worse–coarser, more vulgar. When I was a girl, I had a “standard black” kid-sized microscope and a chemistry set. I wouldn’t have known what a spa set was! All parents, white and POC, should make a serious effort not to let the mainstream commercial culture send our children messages about who they are or who they should be.
Dersk – if we’re talking about the same microscope (and we may not be – I saw a “pink” one years ago on Discovery’s online store), it is not only less powerful, it has pre-designed slides to compare SALT CRYSTALS and DIAMOND DUST. *puke* and comes w/ hardly any equipment ot make your own slides, unlike the boy’s/neutral version.
@Christina: I’m guessing “low income” toys would include sports equipment (esp. basketball, football, and baseball – as if that’s the ONLY way to succeed), a McDonald’s Playset/cashier set, homemaker and jewelry crap for the girls (I’ve seen plastic “bling” that made me want to cry).
Or since those toys are also available in wealthier areas, we may be talking about what ISN’T on the shelves of Walmart in a poor neighborhood: creative play toys w/out a merchandising tie-in, a diversity of children’s books also w/out a marketing tie-in, etc.
@dersk, pleeeease tell me it’s not true.
@dersk – I wish I thought you were kidding.
Dersk: that’s terrible. I noticed that its was advertised on Australian Ebay as well. Great people come from that country but it’s white supremacist history made the item description and images very scary. A definite “Don’t buy it now.”
Really pisses me off, because my 6 year old daughter loves everything pink and princessy and I’ve been keeping my eyes open for a decent chemistry or science set for her. It pains me to think my kid might not be a geek…
Let me see if I can find the original link…yep. http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/12/the_powerlessness_of_pink.php
Well said, Christina!
I wouldn’t have wanted a pink chem set or science kit either. And I had both. I had Barbies, but I also had my cap gun set (black, not pink – I don’t think they made pink cap guns). I loved girly things too, but I could catch lizards and frogs better most of the boys in the neighborhood, and I loved science. Still do.
I have a son, no daughter, but am very close to a relative’s daughter. She wanted a Brittany Spears doll a few years ago for Christmas and I refused to buy one. And Bratz???? Just call them what they are – child prostitutes. Clothing for girls is ridiculously tight, short, and slutty. I remember when Abercrombie & Fitch came out with THONG underwear for elementary-school-age girls, with phrases like “hot stuff” on them!!! Friends with daughters are constantly searching for modest clothing for them. Don’t get me started on the sexy pirate, vampire and French maid Halloween costumes I saw this year for little girls!!!!!
E’s post made me wonder… should one explicitly encourage children to use toys that are targeted at the opposite gender in a stereotypical way? Or should those toys be discouraged in general? Or does it matter?
For example, I had a 4-year-old foster son whose favorite color was pink. I can guarantee he would have picked the pink microscope over any other available color. Would it be preferable for him to have it but not for my daughter (who also loves pink)? Or what about my 4-year-old nephew, who is a huge Britney Spears fan? (I admit to feeling kind of proud of his parents, who allow him to dress up as Britney, including wearing a blond wig and skirt.)
I guess I’m asking whether it’s good to allow kids to cross gender-stereotyping boundaries in this way, or whether doing so with these particular examples would be bad b/c they were specifically designed/marketed with a limited view of what’s appropriate/ideal for females?
Sharon: I nannied a wonderful boy who apart from being intelligent and gorgeous (like a combo of Ru Paul and Audrey Hepburn) was a cross dresser and I think you raise a great question. At first look he seemed to just enjoy the limitless possibility of dramatic costume play without a lot of subtext. Comically enough though, he knew in his mind even at age ten that I was potentially losing my lean “swan Princess thighs” and getting too “big” from weight lifting! Lamenting that I was starting to no longer look like a “Disney character” in his eyes reminded me of a pre-op transsexual friend I have who keeps complaining rather rudely that I need to lose that baby weight and “how you had the best figure once, when will you get it back…”
So to a certain extent yes, encouraging all children to not buy into the sexist views of women that proliferate like lava everywhere we turn , even to those children who are gender alternative, is a complex road. I think they equate, as millions do, the adulation of the famous and beautiful castes with being loved and cherished.
@Sharon – For myself, I have always chosen gender-neutral toys for my nieces and nephews. That being said, I have always been happy to accommodate cross-gender requests. My own boys have Dora dolls and a play kitchen in addition to the usual race cars, trucks, etc. toys of boyhood. I would really have to research this before making a final determination, but in some ways I feel that allowing boys to explore the feminine might actually expand the parameters of the currently accepted female paradigm. I welcome the thoughts of other posters here.