If you're tempted to buy a Hello Kitty set for a little girl, or a Transformer
for a young boy, the White House wants you to reconsider. The administration
recently hosted a day-long summit on the hazards of gender-specific toys, which
apparently limit a child's life prospects, and may even endanger our
economy. Well could they be right? That's coming up next on The Factual Feminist.
Though it began as a kind of fringe Internet movement, the crusade to abolish
the pink/blue divide in children's toys is gaining power. Last year, Target
announced that it would remove gender labeling in toy aisles, and now the
Obama administration has joined the bandwagon. Valerie Jarrett, Senior Advisor
to President Obama, opened the White House gathering by saying, "Changing culture is
not necessarily easy and doesn't happen overnight, but we can do it if we work
together." Well, gender scholars and activists discussed the need to redefine
boyhood and weaken gender norms. Representatives from companies like
Mattel, Disney, and Lego were there.
Their job was to absorb the lessons on gender neutrality, and explain how their
companies plan to meet the new demands. Now, this summit was not a response to
widespread public outcry. A 2015 market research survey found that about
twenty-eight percent of americans agree that quote, "The toy industry perpetuates
gender stereotypes and should be marketing every toy to both boys and girls."
Well, public opinion may be changing. Among millennials, 40-percent agreed with
the proposition. Many in the media are excited by the gender revolution they
believe is afoot, and a recent article in Time declared that, "The next generation
of kids will play with gender neutral toys."
Well, The Factual Feminist is skeptical.
Now I agree that parents should expose their kids to a wide range of toys and
play activities, and of course they should teach them to be accepting of
kids who enjoy gender non-conforming toys. But the activists are less
interested in tolerance than they are in changing boys and girls elemental preferences.
Not many boys want doll houses and not many girls want dump trucks. When my
granddaughter Eliza was given
a toy train, she placed in a baby carriage and tucked in with a blanket so
it could get some sleep.
Children are not gender neutral. And if 40 percent of millennials believe otherwise,
that's probably because most of them have not yet had kids. The White House
summit was heavy on activists and motivational speakers and thought
leaders, but light on evidence.
Thanks to toy manufacturers themselves, whose survival depends on understanding
their customers, solid research exists, but its conclusions don't fit the
movement's narrative. Consider what Lego discovered after four years of
investigating and interviewing thousands of children to figure out what it would
take to get girls to buy construction blocks. In one experiment, boys and girls
were asked to build a castle. Now for the boys,
the castle was just the hastily constructed scene in which the main
event – the battle between the Lego figures – took place. For girls, the castle was central, and
they wanted to know what was going on inside!
Unlike the boys, the girls wanted detailed and personalized characters so
that they could imagine them as friends.
Trigger warning! Here is a toy that captures the imagination of vast numbers
of little boys. And here is what works for little girls. And girls and their
parents, they rewarded Lego for figuring out what they wanted! And they purchased
millions of sets! But the gender-neutralists were very unhappy. Elizabeth Sweet,
a feminist sociologist and presenter at the White House summit, told the Wall
Street Journal that quote, "Pinkified building sets send a clear message that
girls are fundamentally less capable than boys when it comes to building."
Major protests ensued, including an online petition with nearly seventy
thousand signatures, accusing Lego of selling out girls. In my view,
Lego isn't selling out girls, but the advocates and petitioners and the White
House are under estimating them. More than 30 years ago,
Vivian Gussin Paley, a beloved kindergarten teacher at the Chicago Lab
School, worried that girls might be missing out on the benefits of the boys'
superhero play. But her observations of the doll corner assuaged her fears. Though on the
surface, typical girl play seemed relatively calm and passive, Paley
learned that girls are as interested in domination as boys. Their play is full of
conflict and imaginary power struggles. Their fantasies are just as complex and
inventive as the boys', though manifestly different. As Paley explained, "Mothers and
princesses are as powerful as any superheroes the boys devise." Now, these
choices weren't foisted on the girls – they were self-imposed. And as Paley said,
"No amount of adult subterfuge or propaganda deflects the five-year-old's
passion for segregation by sex." Paley grasped a simple truth that many today are
forgetting: ignoring genuine differences between boys and girls is just as
misguided as creating them where none exist. And a final point:
Lego did test-market a set featuring female scientists, and I have to say I
found it quite affirming to see middle-aged, responsibly proportioned,
professional women finally given their due. But it remains to be seen if this
will capture the imagination of little girls. Of course, the activists were still not satisfied.
"Why are they wearing lipstick!?" they asked. Do you think the White House should be
promoting toy neutrality? Let me know in the comments section. And if you found
this video valuable, please subscribe to the series, follow me on Twitter and Facebook.
And one more thing:
this is the last time we will be filming in this set.
We're moving to state-of-the-art facility!
Stay tuned, and thank you for watching The Factual Feminist.