Entries by tag: gender
Christmas is a hard time to be generous and a feminist. We all like to think that we shun the consumerism of chain-store-sanctioned gift sections, but it is becoming ever more difficult in shops to dig out anything that a real person might like among all the "gifts for him" (golf balls) and "gifts for her" (soap). And then you come to the children's presents...
Now let's get one thing straight. I don't think pink intrinsically 'stinks'. It's on the same part of the colour spectrum as red and purple, so it has to have something going for it. My Escher gang in Necromunda wear pink*, because I like the idea of pink-clad ladies with large weapons beating the shite out of a range of Enforcers, Scavvies, Van Saars and whatever else Ducki acquires. Some of the aforementioned weapons are pink and one is getting a pink sparkly heart-shaped nail art sticker when I can be bothered. My study in the new house will be pink until that (preexisting) paint gets tatty enough to replace - it'll have my usual books, desk and various accessories in rather than Disney Princess pictures, but it does nonetheless have pink walls and curtains. Not what I'd choose, but not bad enough to repaint on entry. I own various pink items of clothing, some of which are even appropriate to teach class in. I don't feel that wearing a pink t-shirt or nail varnish weakens my brain** or makes me less good at my job. I prefer purple, red and quite a lot of black, but it's nice to have a change sometimes.
What does stink like dog poo before it goes white is the idea that everything for girls - and to an extent grown women - MUST be pink. And that girls can't like anything that isn't girly, and that women have to have a pink version of everything (none of my household tools are pink, not because I didn't think the pink sparkly ones looked nice but because I'd already heard that they were considerably flimsier than plain ones of a similar price) in order to be able to use it - and that men and boys CANNOT touch any of this stuff or their willies (which in the case of white guys are ironically pink) might fall off.
It also stinks that people make sweeping assumptions about what a boy or a girl might want, right from the moment the child sticks its head out from you-know-where*** with no knowledge of that child's preferences. It's a baby. It wants lots of things to look at and make noises with and chew, Genuine preferences come later, and involve CHOICE at some stage. Don't say that outside influences don't have an impact. I hate Emu to this day because there was a replica at the preschool I went to and one of the teachers used to attack kids with it if we were naughty, and it totally stank. I have a residual impression of being chronically thick because that was what my classmates called me, even though any low marks I got were down to being too busy crying or beating them up to do the work. So if girls are directed towards the frilly pink stuff and boys away from it, then yes that is going to stay with them, regardless of what goes on at home. Even if the family avoid stereotyping at home, the time kids spend out of the house will influence them.
And now more than when I was young - as in when it is my friends having babies rather than my friends' mothers, the linked article having been posted on facebook by a colleague who has just given birth to a baby girl - everything seems more firmly divided into pink and blue, even nappies. (I can incidentally see the point in different boy and girl nappies, because lets face it the pee comes out of different places. But why do girls' ones need princesses on? I would love to let a child of mine shit on Disney, but sadly the illustrations seem to be on the wrong side.
Let's face it - tiny babies don't care what colour they wear, just how the fabric feels against their skin and in their mouth. Ducks, trains, cars, dinosaurs and other imagery popular on kidwear isn't gendered - or shouldn't be. Pink and blue are not the only parts of the colour spectrum. I came to my liking for pink (and purple, red, black, green, etc and ducks, trains, flowers, spiders, murder stories, Canaries and all things goffik) after a childhood which, while far from perfect, at least contained a full colour spectrum.
Luckily Ducki tends to agree with me on this point (although not every gender or childrearing issue) - luckily for him or I might have to do something regretful with a certain pink sparkly item that has been in where babies come out.****
*The Amazon Blood Bowl team, however, will be in yellow and green and have the provisional name of the Birds of Paradise. I may even come up with the Lustrian pronounciation of Delia Smith if necessary.
**Except insofar as inhaling any nail varnish is a bad idea - that's why I don't breathe it in directly... :P
***Because directly mentioning ladyparts would clearly be the last straw in a gender rant post - whoops...
**** And again ;)
Now let's get one thing straight. I don't think pink intrinsically 'stinks'. It's on the same part of the colour spectrum as red and purple, so it has to have something going for it. My Escher gang in Necromunda wear pink*, because I like the idea of pink-clad ladies with large weapons beating the shite out of a range of Enforcers, Scavvies, Van Saars and whatever else Ducki acquires. Some of the aforementioned weapons are pink and one is getting a pink sparkly heart-shaped nail art sticker when I can be bothered. My study in the new house will be pink until that (preexisting) paint gets tatty enough to replace - it'll have my usual books, desk and various accessories in rather than Disney Princess pictures, but it does nonetheless have pink walls and curtains. Not what I'd choose, but not bad enough to repaint on entry. I own various pink items of clothing, some of which are even appropriate to teach class in. I don't feel that wearing a pink t-shirt or nail varnish weakens my brain** or makes me less good at my job. I prefer purple, red and quite a lot of black, but it's nice to have a change sometimes.
What does stink like dog poo before it goes white is the idea that everything for girls - and to an extent grown women - MUST be pink. And that girls can't like anything that isn't girly, and that women have to have a pink version of everything (none of my household tools are pink, not because I didn't think the pink sparkly ones looked nice but because I'd already heard that they were considerably flimsier than plain ones of a similar price) in order to be able to use it - and that men and boys CANNOT touch any of this stuff or their willies (which in the case of white guys are ironically pink) might fall off.
It also stinks that people make sweeping assumptions about what a boy or a girl might want, right from the moment the child sticks its head out from you-know-where*** with no knowledge of that child's preferences. It's a baby. It wants lots of things to look at and make noises with and chew, Genuine preferences come later, and involve CHOICE at some stage. Don't say that outside influences don't have an impact. I hate Emu to this day because there was a replica at the preschool I went to and one of the teachers used to attack kids with it if we were naughty, and it totally stank. I have a residual impression of being chronically thick because that was what my classmates called me, even though any low marks I got were down to being too busy crying or beating them up to do the work. So if girls are directed towards the frilly pink stuff and boys away from it, then yes that is going to stay with them, regardless of what goes on at home. Even if the family avoid stereotyping at home, the time kids spend out of the house will influence them.
And now more than when I was young - as in when it is my friends having babies rather than my friends' mothers, the linked article having been posted on facebook by a colleague who has just given birth to a baby girl - everything seems more firmly divided into pink and blue, even nappies. (I can incidentally see the point in different boy and girl nappies, because lets face it the pee comes out of different places. But why do girls' ones need princesses on? I would love to let a child of mine shit on Disney, but sadly the illustrations seem to be on the wrong side.
Let's face it - tiny babies don't care what colour they wear, just how the fabric feels against their skin and in their mouth. Ducks, trains, cars, dinosaurs and other imagery popular on kidwear isn't gendered - or shouldn't be. Pink and blue are not the only parts of the colour spectrum. I came to my liking for pink (and purple, red, black, green, etc and ducks, trains, flowers, spiders, murder stories, Canaries and all things goffik) after a childhood which, while far from perfect, at least contained a full colour spectrum.
Luckily Ducki tends to agree with me on this point (although not every gender or childrearing issue) - luckily for him or I might have to do something regretful with a certain pink sparkly item that has been in where babies come out.****
*The Amazon Blood Bowl team, however, will be in yellow and green and have the provisional name of the Birds of Paradise. I may even come up with the Lustrian pronounciation of Delia Smith if necessary.
**Except insofar as inhaling any nail varnish is a bad idea - that's why I don't breathe it in directly... :P
***Because directly mentioning ladyparts would clearly be the last straw in a gender rant post - whoops...
**** And again ;)
Breaking the no blogging at work rule. I guess this involves work in a peripheral sense, though.
I entered the following passage from the paper i'm writing into a website called 'gender genie', which claims to be able to identify whether a piece of writing was written by a man or a woman.
( Cut for lengthCollapse )
Apparently, this makes me male. Or a plagiarist. Who knew?
Exact stats:
Words: 625
(NOTE: The genie works best on texts of more than 500 words.)
Female Score: 617
Male Score: 1014
The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: male!
( Feminine and Masculine keywords behind cutCollapse )
Rather an odd selection there. The gist seems to be that men are more into expressing definite opinions, creating structures etc, while women are more likely to write about connections between people. I guess at least i'm not being declared male on the basis of writing about 'hard' politics or anything.
Strangely, a conference paper on the subject of affinity also came out as allegedly written by a male. Which is strange, because i clearly remember having a period when i wrote it.
I entered the following passage from the paper i'm writing into a website called 'gender genie', which claims to be able to identify whether a piece of writing was written by a man or a woman.
( Cut for lengthCollapse )
Apparently, this makes me male. Or a plagiarist. Who knew?
Exact stats:
Words: 625
(NOTE: The genie works best on texts of more than 500 words.)
Female Score: 617
Male Score: 1014
The Gender Genie thinks the author of this passage is: male!
( Feminine and Masculine keywords behind cutCollapse )
Rather an odd selection there. The gist seems to be that men are more into expressing definite opinions, creating structures etc, while women are more likely to write about connections between people. I guess at least i'm not being declared male on the basis of writing about 'hard' politics or anything.
Strangely, a conference paper on the subject of affinity also came out as allegedly written by a male. Which is strange, because i clearly remember having a period when i wrote it.
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