Boys Will Be Boys. Got A Problem With That?
There's an article in The Atlantic by Christina Hoff Sommers on those who stick kids with gender-neutral toys and then have a hard time getting them to play with them:
Twenty years ago, Hasbro, a major American toy manufacturing company, tested a playhouse it hoped to market to both boys and girls. It soon emerged that girls and boys did not interact with the structure in the same way. The girls dressed the dolls, kissed them, and played house. The boys catapulted the toy baby carriage from the roof. A Hasbro manager came up with a novel explanation: "Boys and girls are different."They are different, and nothing short of radical and sustained behavior modification could significantly change their elemental play preferences. Children, with few exceptions, are powerfully drawn to sex-stereotyped play. David Geary, a developmental psychologist at the University of Missouri, told me in an email this week, "One of the largest and most persistent differences between the sexes are children's play preferences." The female preference for nurturing play and the male propensity for rough-and-tumble hold cross-culturally and even cross-species (with a few exceptions--female spotted hyenas seem to be at least as aggressive as males). Among our close relatives such as vervet and rhesus monkeys, researchers have found that females play with dolls far more than their brothers, who prefer balls and toy cars. It seems unlikely that the monkeys were indoctrinated by stereotypes in a Top-Toy catalog. Something else is going on.
Biology appears to play a role. Several animal studies have shown that hormonal manipulation can reverse sex-typed behavior. When researchers exposed female rhesus monkeys to male hormones prenatally, these females later displayed male-like levels of rough-and-tumble play. Similar results are found in human beings. Congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) is a genetic condition that results when the female fetus is subjected to unusually large quantities of male hormones--adrenal androgens. Girls with CAH tend to prefer trucks, cars, and construction sets over dolls and play tea sets. As psychologist Doreen Kimura reported in Scientific American, "These findings suggest that these preferences were actually altered in some way by the early hormonal environment." They also cast doubt on the view that gender-specific play is primarily shaped by socialization.
Professor Geary does not have much hope for the new gender-blind toy catalogue: "The catalog will almost certainly disappear in a few years, once parents who buy from it realize their kids don't want these toys." Most little girls don't want to play with dump trucks, as almost any parent can attest. Including me: When my granddaughter Eliza was given a toy train, she placed it in a baby carriage and covered it with a blanket so it could get some sleep.
Androgyny advocates like our Swedish friends have heard such stories many times, and they have an answer. They acknowledge that sex differences have at least some foundation in biology, but they insist that culture can intensify or diminish their power and effect. Even if Eliza is prompted by nature to interact with a train in a stereotypical female way, that is no reason for her parents not to energetically correct her. Hunter College psychologist Virginia Valian, a strong proponent of Swedish-style re-genderization, wrote in the book Why So Slow? The Advancement of Women, "We do not accept biology as destiny ... We vaccinate, we inoculate, we medicate... I propose we adopt the same attitude toward biological sex differences."
Valian is absolutely right that we do not have to accept biology as destiny. But the analogy is ludicrous: We vaccinate, inoculate, and medicate children against disease. Is being a gender-typical little boy or girl a pathology in need of a cure?
"The boys catapulted the toy baby carriage from the roof. "
LOL.
Robert at December 17, 2012 10:18 PM
My favorite toys as a little girl were trucks and Legos. I had no use for dolls. But then I'm an engineer now.
My daughter is almost 3 and loves dolls as well as trucks and planes. I take this to mean that I'm more nurturing than my mother was.
But as for girls and boys being different? No shit.
Sosij at December 18, 2012 12:54 AM
I have always disliked dolls. They're sort of... weird. I did try to play with them a few times, but just like playing dressup, it wasn't nearly as much fun as whatever else I found entertaining.
I ended up with a degree in biostatistics.
My daughter likes stuffed animals and things that sparkle, but she also plays with the train set, the marble-run, legos, etc.
There are some good gender-neutral toys, but they are time-honored classics that most people scoff at: the stick, the box, and blocks.
A girl might make the stick a magic wand, and the boy a gun. The box might be a castle or a race car. The blocks might build a tower that is under siege, or a castle where the princess lives.
The problem with lots of modern toys, in my mind, is they the toys (almost universally) dictate the play instead of the kids dictating the play. There's almost no room for imagination.
Shannon M. Howell at December 18, 2012 5:45 AM
I'm the eldest of my siblings. When I was about 4, toy cars, starting to read, and lego were all I was interested in. My poor mother got told by a well-meaning friend she should encourage my creative side, so she bought paper, crayons, etc for me.
I drew roads for the cars to drive on. She quotes this (laughing) as the moment she gave up on trying to stop boys from being boys.
And yes, Sosij, I turned out to be an engineer too.
Ltw at December 18, 2012 6:33 AM
A few thoughts
1. Vaccinate and innoculate are practically the same word
2. As Amy said, is maleness a disease that needs correcting?
3. Ever notice that gender nuetral folks are only ever interested in making boys more like girls, never making girls like boys?
lujlp at December 18, 2012 7:02 AM
I have 3 brothers, 1 older, 2 younger. I was a tomboy for the most part, but I did girly pretty well, too. I do girly better now!
Both my daughters are girly, but not too girly, although #1 has now expressed an interest in the violin. I think she wants to be the next Lindsey Stirling! (Her BF bought her a purple violin for her birthday, it's gorgeous!)
Flynne at December 18, 2012 7:12 AM
As someone who spent years studying anthropology, sociology, & psychology, I think we'll all be much better off accepting that almost all things to do with gender and behavior exist on a spectrum. And each kid falls somewhere on that spectrum, and sometimes they vacillate AND that's FINE.
Most girls will want want to play with dolls, others will want to play with trucks. Some will play primarily with dolls and occasionally like to play with Legos.
Most boys will want to play with cars, but others will like to play with dolls. Some boys will rarely or occasionally play nice with those dolls, while others will turn them into super heroes.
That's it! If you love and support your kids, pay attention to their particular interests (and not some weird expectation about their gender norm), and try not to worry about it, THEY WILL BE FINE!
Andrew at December 18, 2012 7:36 AM
Great point by Flynne. There are gender differences but we need to pay attention to and respect the much more important individual differences.
Scott at December 18, 2012 8:51 AM
That wasn't me, Scott, it was Andrew, but I so totally agree! (Our names appear under our posts, not above them)
Flynne at December 18, 2012 9:06 AM
Ever notice that gender nuetral folks are only ever interested in making boys more like girls, never making girls like boys?
Nope. This goes both ways. I've heard lots of people insist that girls play with "boy" toys so they aren't unduly socialized into nurturing roles.
MonicaP at December 18, 2012 9:15 AM
RObert: "The boys catapulted the toy baby carriage from the roof. " LOL.
Me too.
I liked barbie growing up, but I preferred adventures and superheroes to the dream house. So my girlfriends and I would wrap our dolls in the craziest, most visually appealing loin clothes we could dream up (think She-Ra, Red Sonja, Sheena, and whatever else was floating around the television back then) and send them on adventures to save the world and kiss the boy.
Anybody remember underoos? I had Bat Girl, Super Girl, and Wonder Woman. I fucking loved those things.
Meloni at December 18, 2012 11:08 AM
"Ever notice that gender nuetral folks are only ever interested in making boys more like girls, never making girls like boys?"
I don't know about the pundits and sages, but I do know that among my parent friends there's more than a few who are wailing and gnashing their teeth that they ended up with "girly girls." Weirdly, it's mostly the moms. They wanted their little girls to climb trees, know why Wolverine is cooler than the Hulk, and play Zorro. Instead they ended up with a five year old who wants to wear only purple and pink, goes nuts over glittery nail polish, and has watched Beauty and the Beast 17 gazillion times.
Elle at December 18, 2012 1:05 PM
We avoided buying our boys toy weapons, outside of a few super-soakers. It wasn't really a conscious decision, we're just more engineering/mechanics oriented and bought more vehicles, legos and construction toys. They also has large collections of stuffed animals.
They built structures in order to destroy them. They used every stick or projectile they could find to create their own guns and swords. They did like to snuggle with stuffed animals at bedtime, but during daylight hours the creatures were either friend or foe in their imaginary battles.
For goodness sake, they played tackle golf and spent an inordinate amount of time discussing their primary sexual characteristics.
This is not behavior that I've observed in any of my female friends, nieces or daughters of friends, even the many engineers, athletes, or gun enthusiasts.
obladioblada at December 18, 2012 3:56 PM
We have a playroom full of toys...both boy toys and girl toys. We also have boy/girl twins. We just turned them loose in that room when they got old enough. And almost every time all the time both of them engaged in gender stereotyped play. This extended from the toys they chose to play with to the way they interacted with them.
(And, for those of you biologically challenged, they are not identical. There are basic physiological differences between boys and girls. For the rest of you, you would be amazed at how often we get that question.)
Yes, boys and girls are different. And you do a disservice to a person to mold or bend them into a person they are not. Teaching a child who shows gender stereotyped play preferences to be gender neutral in their play is no less cruel than trying to make a child exhibiting homosexual behavioral tendencies to act heterosexual.
Ankylus at December 18, 2012 4:00 PM
"Is being a gender-typical little boy or girl a pathology in need of a cure?"
To some Politically Correct Swedes, clearly it is. Time and Darwin will deal with those mutant retards, the question is what will be left of the human race by that point.
OffendedMan at December 18, 2012 4:25 PM
When my neice outgrew her doll playhouse (a new larger one appeared at xmas), my sister gave the older house to my younger nephew. My sister said "They were playing along peacefully, then I heard 'Mom, there's velociraptors in the attic!'".
Hal at December 18, 2012 4:27 PM
What upsets me about this, and a few other incidents, is this: I was a boy growing up in the early 70s. I didn't play with baby dolls, but I did dress up my stuffed animals, and would play Barbies with my girl friends (and not just to be nice). My Mom played the song "William's Doll" for me when I was little and explained that it was okay for me to like something different than what other boys liked. Later, I moved from Barbies to Star Wars and then to D&D, but I still learned that I didn't have to justify myself... which is why as a 41-year-old retired combat veteran from the US Navy, I had no problem knitting in uniform while my wife did carpentry. My Mom (and the people behind "Free to Be You and Me") definitely got at least one thing right.
Seeing companies push gender-neutral toys or gender-crossing toys (and not just make them available) to boys and girls both), or hearing of "William's Doll" being taught to boys as proof that it's RIGHT for them to play with baby dolls and wrong for them not to, particularly bugs me because I feel like it's a good lesson or concept being twisted to fit an agenda in unnatural ways. There are going to be boys who want to change doll clothing or sew a shirt for their teddy bear. (And there is still work to be done on this front... my wife got a lot less crap for being a boat mechanic than I got for taking up knitting.) Mandating it or convincing boys that it's normal to do that and NOT normal to want to play with cars or guns or tools is just another part of the multi-faceted war on boys.
CJ Casey at December 18, 2012 4:35 PM
So Valian's solution is to abuse children until they pretend to be androgynous? Does she also torture gays to make them straight? What a dangerous loon.
The hormone study does give us some clues as to the causes of homosexuality and transgenderism. Something intervened to alter the wiring of the brain.
Mannie at December 18, 2012 4:54 PM
My biggest problem with raising my son was teaching the rest of the world that boys are not defective girls. Boys are boys. People who think that boys and girls are the same are the same sort of unthinking morons who live in small Manhattan apartments with very large dogs and then spend thousands trying to figure out why their Russian Wolfhound is "Psychotic".
My second biggest problem was teaching my son how important it is that he transition from being a boy into his role of being a man. Our modern society leaves young men in an arrested state of childhood unsure and unclear where they fit into the larger world. Cultures throughout the world work to transition their boys into men. Modern Western societies work hard to keep their boys in a 'peter pan' like state as long as possible.
My third biggest problem was dealing with a culture that instinctively winces when the word "man" is used to describe someone. Watch TV for just 30 minutes and count the number of commercials where men are treated as fully functioning and capable creatures. Ok, 30 minutes is a small sample but you could go for days without seeing men( and in particular husbands) portrayed in any way positive.
Adults filter but kids see this. They learn from us. We teach them that men are just contemptuous little children. This is bad for all of us,
I also have a young daughter. I find these things as dangerous and damaging for her as they were for my son.
Frank Martin at December 18, 2012 5:31 PM
Androgyny advocates like our Swedish friends have heard such stories many times, and they have an answer. They acknowledge that sex differences have at least some foundation in biology, but they insist that culture can intensify or diminish their power and effect. . . . Valian is absolutely right that we do not have to accept biology as destiny. But the analogy is ludicrous: We vaccinate, inoculate, and medicate children against disease. Is being a gender-typical little boy or girl a pathology in need of a cure?
Sommers is correct about the analogy being ludicrous, but she's also correct in that we don't have to accept biology as destiny (and biology, while significant, is not destiny.)
JD at December 18, 2012 6:06 PM
Well, I guess you could get boys to play with dolls. Just try not to get too upset when they "play" in a way that would make Josef Mengele woozy.
msr at December 18, 2012 6:17 PM
You all make excellent points but I was really hoping to find things in comments as funny as the boys flinging the baby carriage and the girl putting the train in the baby carriage. Bless their little hearts.
The whole time I read through your comments I was thinking, there was this one time I played dolls with girls, and I did like that one time, and also one time with g i joe and did like that one time too. But the most fun was crazy shit that got us in trouble. "WHY did you do that? WHY? Just tell me WHY" That was the phrase I grew up with and I could never answer it. I'd stand there stupid without the vocabulary to explain, "well, you see, there is no why to it, I was following along and one thing led to another and I was with my mates and we did this, then that and this other thing, and that led to this next thing, and we explored and tried various things we found along the way, went through the sewer, and threw things, and shot the arrows, spent some money, and broke things, rode our bikes, killed something, and netted live creatures and best of all made explosives and exploded things, and then this cop came and here we are. A victim of circumstance, a sequence of unpredictable events, unpredictable because I am a stupid little boy after all. We were weren't looking for trouble nor making it, just exploring, that's all." So I just shrugged and went, "I dunno."
I'm going spread that baby carriage/dollhouse roof, train/babycarriage thing, those are still funny.
bour3 at December 18, 2012 6:24 PM
"We have WAYS of MAKING YOU TALK!"
"NO! NOT THE EASY-BAKE OVEN!"
"I've got the dial set to 'Strawberry Shortcake'. Tell me where the rebel base is or I'll turn it up to 'Chocolate Brownie'!"
Girl toys ALWAYS have "boy potential". It's all in how you use them ...
Hey, I just realized it takes imagination and resourcefulness to turn an EZ-Bake Oven into a torture chamber ... giving boys girl toys really does encourage their creativity!
Anonymous at December 18, 2012 6:41 PM
It's fun reading about everyone's childhood/parenthood toy adventures, and it brought back the memories: I had a truly magnificent stuffed-animal collection, for which the prime criterion was "Does it look real enough that it might bite?" Naturally, I favored Steiffs ... which I used to outfit in garments, weapons, & accessories borrowed from my brother's 12" GI Joes. (The great cats all served in the Space Patrol under Capt. Okapi.) The only time I ever played with a doll was when I borrowed GI Joe himself, stripped it naked, and used it as Mowgli or Tarzan. Predictably, my daughter spent her single-digits with Barbie and the Disney Princesses in multiple sizes/formats. At least she wasn't above having a couple of Princess Leia action figures so as to play Star Wars with her brother. And Lego answereth all things...
werewife at December 18, 2012 6:52 PM
The real problem here is that the gender-neutral police are using our children as experimental subjects. We need not foist our adult battles, e.g., gender issues, upon our children.
It's simple (but certainly not easy); love them unconditionally, set the rules (so they don't act badly toward others), and let them be themselves. Guide with a strong but gentle hand so they find themselves.
I have a girl and a boy. They have been different from birth. The differences are almost completely gender stereotypical. And, I'll be damned if I'll make either one feel wrong for being who he is.
Steve at December 18, 2012 6:58 PM
"Boys and girls are different."
And, I might add, "Men and women are different."
As was said long ago - "The child is the father of man."
AnotherProf at December 18, 2012 7:19 PM
Of COURSE it's sick and twisted to treat boyhood or girlhood as a disease in need of being prevented or treated.
Come to think of it, it's sick and twisted to treat pregnancy or parenthood as diseases in need of being prevented or treated, and for much the same reasons.
Sufficient familiarity with any species should always produce an awareness of the difference between "this member of the species is healthy" and "this member of the species is sick." We can tell the difference between a dog with a tumor and a dog with a tail, and we can discern that the former is abnormal but the latter is healthy and normal and the dog would be injured without it. Likewise when a frog population in polluted water becomes androgynized and can no longer reproduce, we say, "something is wrong with them" and look for a cause. This judgment is obvious; but why then don't we apply the same logic to ourselves?
The core of the issue is to be able to distinguish objectively between what is the healthy functioning of the organism, and the injured or diseased functioning of that organism, even if the organism is a human being. It is NOT healthy for the species, or individuals of the species, to be androgynized by external forces. I don't mean if a woman is born square jawed and fond of power tools, or a man slight-of-build and prone to hairdressing, that they need curing: One must allow for natural variation. But the Swedish view seems intent on purging the natural variation. Which is clearly mistaking health for illness and then removing the health!
We ought instead to acknowledge health as health. And after that, Hippocrates rules: "First, DO NO HARM."
Girlhood is both normal and healthy and good. So is boyhood. "Treating" them or "preventing" them is Orwellian doublespeak for injuring the child: Depriving them of a natural and healthy good. The Swedish approach is misguided: Institutionalized child abuse undertaken with those same good intentions that pave the road to hell.
R.C. at December 18, 2012 8:27 PM
Gotta give props to the tackle-golf idea. That's one we never thought of.
Cousin Dave at December 19, 2012 7:23 AM
My Mom gave me some of her dolls she played with when she was a girl. Then, I found some scissors and gave them all a hair cut. She didn't seem as happy with my barbershop skills as I was.
Josh Reiter at December 19, 2012 1:50 PM
"Ever notice that gender nuetral folks are only ever interested in making boys more like girls, never making girls like boys?"
I don't know about the pundits and sages, but I do know that among my parent friends there's more than a few who are wailing and gnashing their teeth that they ended up with "girly girls." Weirdly, it's mostly the moms. They wanted their little girls to climb trees, know why Wolverine is cooler than the Hulk, and play Zorro. Instead they ended up with a five year old who wants to wear only purple and pink, goes nuts over glittery nail polish, and has watched Beauty and the Beast 17 gazillion times.
Posted by: Elle at December 18, 2012 1:05 PM
________________________________
Exactly. See the best-selling nonfiction book, "Cinderella Ate My Daughter."
There IS a lot more commercial pressure on girls to be "princesses." (Of course, this can be bad for boys too, in the sense that girls can become more arrogant and entitled in their attitudes - like royalty.)
Makes me glad I lived in the more relaxed 1970s - but yes, I could have done without "William's Doll," though the other songs on that Marlo Thomas album were OK.
lenona at December 19, 2012 2:59 PM
I was 30 when my niece was born and my brother told me that our father, when told said "I share your disappointment." My brother said he wasn't disappointed in having a girl. But then I knew - my father didn't want a girl, he wanted a boy. Fortunately I didn't know - so my books, toys, etc. were usually my own choice (mom had no opinions only expectations that her house look perfect). I feel sorry for these children who are being molded to conform to their parents ideals.
And I feel a bit sorry for myself in some ways because I know that I'm not married because my mother wanted a permanent companion and my father didn't like me - so I retreated into books, got a Ph.D. and thank God daily that I got the hell away from these two loons. Unfortunately there are too many people who are exploited in one way or another to fit their parents ideology. That's the real abuse.
Susan at December 20, 2012 2:05 AM
I think what a lot of parents and pundits are forgetting is that what really matters is life SKILLS, not to mention a decent work ethic that does not include always paying someone else to do x, y, or z.
Oh yes, and being able to sympathize - if not empathize - with people who are different. (This can often be done by reading certain books to kids, but one often still has to be careful not to turn boys off completely when choosing certain titles.)
From a fictional character written by the late Lloyd Alexander:
"I've heard men complain of doing woman's work, and women complain of doing man's work, but I've never heard the work complain of who did it, so long as it got done!"
And from Planned Parenthood executive-turned-novelist Sheri Tepper (1970s):
"If you have a son, he should know how to cook, mend, wash and iron his clothes, shop for groceries and plan decent meals. If you have a daughter, she should know how to maintain a car, change a tire, make household repairs, and manage a budget."
(She went on to say that we all have the same needs and no able-bodied person should have to lean on someone else to fulfill those needs.)
lenona at December 20, 2012 3:04 PM
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