7.Genderization

Children don't want sexist pink and blue toysBy Laura BatesLego boy toys have all the fun, pointed out an exasperated seven-year-old in a letter to thecompany this week. Isn't it time manufacturers acted on children's growing displeasure atgender-stereotyped toys?This week, a seven-year-old girl called Charlotte Benjamin wrote a heartfelt, straight-to-the-point letter toLego asking it to rectify the fact that there are "more Lego boy people and barely any Lego girls". She alsopointed out that "all the girls did was sit at home, go to the beach, and shop, and they had no jobs, but theboys went on adventures, worked, saved people … even swam with sharks". She also swiftly and succinctlyexpressed her displeasure at the illogical and old-fashioned use of pink and blue marketing to separateLego into boys' and girls' sections. In brief, she nailed it.In a week when toy companies were called into Westminster to justify their marketing decisions, andministers suggested that the pinkification of girls' toys could be playing a part in preventing them fromachieving their full potential, we could do a lot worse than start listening to the smart, savvy voicesof children such as Charlotte.She is not the first child to point out the painfully obvious to the toy giants – in 2012, a six-year-old girl tookHasbro firmly to task in a letter highlighting the fact that when you play Guess Who?, the small ratio offemale to male characters means that if you choose to play as a woman you are much more likely to lose.It's a sad day when a child of six feels the need to write to a toy company to point out: "It is not only boyswho are important, girls are important too."And she was smart about it, taking care to emphasise theimpact she could have on the company's bottom line: "I am cross about that and if you don't fix it soon, mymum could throw Guess Who? out."This is by no means an issue that affects only girls – for every girl yearning for a chemistry set, dinosaurexcavation kit or fire truck in the forbidden boys' section, there's a baffled boy being told off for wanting toplay with a doll, or even (heaven forbid) pick up something in a shade other than blue. When 13-year-oldMcKenna Pope realised her cookery-loving four-year-old brother would feel unable to play with an EasyBake Oven because it was so aggressively marketed to girls, she started a Change.org petition that amassedmore than 40,000 signatures, asking makers Hasbro to explain why they "made going against the societalnorm that girls are the ones in the kitchen even more difficult". As she neatly pointed out, the pastelcolours and gendered advertising sent a clear and unhelpful message to kids: "Women cook, men work."Nobody can forget the viral video of four-year-old Riley Maida exasperatedly pointing out that "girls wantsuperheroes and boys want superheroes" back in 2011, in which she skewered painfully transparent toymarketing tactics: "The companies that make these try to trick the girls into buying the pink stuff." But fastforward two years and it's pretty sad that in her latest video about the relative invisibility of the femalecharacters in the Avengers merchandise ("it's like Black Widow doesn't even exist"), Riley, now six, showsmore than a hint of exasperation at having to repeat herself all over again. "They think that boys wouldn'twant to play with a girl action figure and girls wouldn't want to play with boy action figures." Her tonebasically demands: "Seriously, haven't they sorted this stuff out yet?" Or, as she puts it: "I mean, duh."The funny thing is that these kids exhibit far more sensible, down-to-earth attitudes than many of theadults wringing their hands over the issue. In one particularly hysterical Express column, James Delingpoleeven compared the removal of gendered toy signs to a "sinister and Brave-New-World-ish … attempt at297 She Culture CRT: Genderization