Listen I have no scientific evidence but I think you’re spot on that the only “concern” stems from homo/transphobia. What could possibly be harmful in letting kids dress in a variety of colors???
thank you it seems so strange to me because its almost as if the fear is that he may grow up and not be a straight cis man which 1 wouldn’t be anything to do with how i dressed him and 2 wouldn’t be an issue at all but i just seize up in the moment and don’t know what to say because i have no study to refer to. Having said that i doubt any homophobes or transphobes would respect a study
"Wow! I've never heard that letting him wear pink would cause that. Where did you hear that? Can you send me the study?"
If they're making the assertion, they need to provide the proof. Because you're just dressing your child in clothing.
Correct, but OP is implying they’re not just “letting” their kid dress in a variety of colors but in fact making these decisions for him and dressing him in clothes that are traditionally feminine. Those are entirely different things and it’s never correct to use your kid as an outlet for your political beliefs.
Sorry but how is this any different than only buying “boys” clothes and making him wear that? That’s making a decision as well. This is such a stupid argument.
There is no "norm" it's all based on very specific cultural markers that are frequently changing. Pink used to be for boys and blue for girls. Young boys used to wear dresses. Other cultures still have men wearing dresses and having long hair without being precieved as feminine.
Not wearing dresses and specific colors for genders are a relatively recent phenomenon in human history.
https://medium.com/@NewAgeNews/why-is-president-franklin-d-roosevelt-wearing-a-dress-83fba35495
So recent that the recently departed Philip has baby photos in dresses.
I’m the youngest in my family and an elder millennial at that. All of my clothes were hand-me-downs and almost none were gendered. Perhaps for a special occasion like a wedding then we might wear a dress (afab) or a shirt and tie (amab) but every other occasion was gender neutral up until around age 5 or so. It truly is VERY recent and seems to be a symptom of commercialism.
This is typically what I cite when folks ask why I don’t want to know the “gender” (they mean sex) of my unborn child until birth or why I don’t have a nursery theme. It wasn’t until the 50s that gender identity in babies was even a thing in the US. Previous to that, for centuries, babies were essentially genderless until they served an actual purpose in society.
It seems so silly to me that we would try to instill identities and roles based on the genitals of a squirmy potato person. I’ll keep things gender neutral and open until a personality and preferences start forming, and only then will I decorate the baby/toddler’s room and let them pick out clothes they like.
I’ve thought about this a lot (36w FTP) and I think when people ask they are in fact not asking about the sex, but about the gender, they just don’t know the difference! Like people are for the most part not asking do you know know if your baby will have a penis or vagina, or what the chromosomes are, but “what is the gendered image I should hold in my mind of this child.” But yeah, it’s a strange question as someone who really doesn’t put much stock in that kind of thing and doesn’t want to foreclose on the possibility that their kids might be trans or nonbinary.
Gender roles are a social construct. Gender is not the same as biological sex. Babies having an assigned gender serves absolutely zero purpose to society until young childhood *earliest*, and I’d argue that gender roles in childhood are also unnecessary in society.
And you’ve got it backwards. Only recently (barely within last 100 years) have babies been raised with strong gender assignments.
Yeah, no. Think what you like but this is just not true. Where did you read or hear this? You think parents from 100+ years ago felt no need to “assign” a gender to their son or daughter? You don’t think girls were encouraged to be girly and play with dolls and that boys weren’t encouraged to do “boy things?” I’m not saying that a child will always be interested in what they’re encouraged to play with or do (It doesn’t determine your gender anyway), but saying that parents didn’t treat their children based on their gender is untrue. First you said this didn’t happen until the 1950’s, then 100+ years ago. The idea of gender not matching biological sex is a recent idea and one that’s only believed by a very tiny percentage of the population, even in blue states and cities, opposed to what you might see and read in social media and online.
Why are you so obsessed with the binary?
You are very much conflating babies/toddlers and children with your take. Babies, toddlers, and children are all different life stages, and as such, gender roles historically had become prominent in the oldest of the three stages (hint: childhood).
Also, gender assignment and gender roles are different in this context. In the vast history of human history and across most cultures, gender has been assigned correlating with biological sex. I never argued against that. Gender ROLES, on the other hand, would not be imposed onto babies/toddlers until more recently, though. Assigning the role of being a macho football-playin’, construction crew workin’, all blue wearin’ baby boy was not a thing until more recently. And it’s completely unnecessary for a baby, because they cannot practice for or fulfill any of those roles to benefit society until at least early childhood. So binary gender and its roles are useless during the first couple stages of a human’s life. Dolls and basic toys (blocks, books, art) were typical for ALL babies and toddlers prior to the 50s, because they helped develop thinking and skills that helped society, regardless of gender; dolls mostly to teach how to be a nurturing parent (not just mom).
And I never said 100+ years, rather I said *barely within* 100 years. Which the 1950s falls into.
The “forcing him into a box” comment is so ironic. I teach psychology of gender and I literally have an exercise called The Box where students describe what our society tells us belongs in the “man” box and the “woman” box. Then outside the boxes we write what people are called if they don’t fit in those boxes. The exercise demonstrates how we are often punished for deviating from assigned gender role norms, and how pretty much everyone has clear ideas of what goes inside each box because it’s been taught and enforced our whole lives.
So basically, it’s not you who is putting your child into a box, it’s them.
This! I have no scientific/academic background so thank you for having the credentials. As soon as I read the comment about 'the box' you could hear my eyes roll for OP.
My son's daycare plays dress up frequently and his favorite outfit piece is a beautiful, shimmery skirt! He'd be so upset if he could only choose from a 'boy box'.
Out of curiosity, the names that those who deviate from being in a box — are they more gendered towards feminine insults, by chance? For example, if a man does not fit in a man box, is he insulted as being a pussy, which is then an insult towards women being “weak?”
THIS THIS THIS! I was thinking the exact same thing about this "box" they are claiming. Such a foolish phenomenon. I love that you teach the psychology of gender, as current generations are wiping the floor with "traditional" dress codes and roles... I absolutely love it. It gives me a good amount of hope that ONE DAY we can just exist as humans and get shit done versus pouring so much energy, time and money into "fitting in" before we can lift a finger. It is tiresome, outdated nonsense.
Nothing innately harmful about it! For most of history, babies wore dresses because of their growth and peeing/pooping, and colors just depend on cultural heritage (for most of western Christian history, blue was a girl's color because it represented Mary's virginity; most babies wore white to represent their innocence, other cultures might dress a baby in red to represeng luck, etc).
The only harmful thing is people who treat them poorly based on what they are wearing, but that usually doesn't become an issue until they're old enough to understand language
Agree about letting him embrace all aspects of his personality although I doubt he has much preference for clothing yet. It annoyed me to no end when people assumed the gender of my child based on the colours I dressed her in. I dress her in colours that suited her colouring and eyes. I will say though that I think as children until they can say what they want to wear, that clothing that is functional is best for allowing them to develop physically. To be able to walk, run, climb, roll, etc. I found that dresses did not allow my child to do that so we stopped putting them on her. She certainly has not expressed any desire to wear them yet though we have plenty she can pick from. I'm sure she will when she is older.
I’m sure I’ll get shouted down here, but here goes nothing. Parents generally want to prepare their kids as best they can for the future and give them a chance for a happy life. At 16 months, I seriously doubt any kid has a true preference for clothes. Seems like it would be kinder to default to setting your kid up to be comfortable conforming to gender norms rather than subjecting them to the harder life that trans people face. Especially since the kid hasn’t voiced a preference.
Having been through this with my own son (not trans, just liked flair as a young child), you get to choose between being the one to tell your child their preferences aren't ok, or telling them you think they are ok even if the world may not. I cannot imagine a solid argument for being the very first person to tell my child they should change their choices because of someone else's judgement of them. What may seem as an act of protection can be itself the first and most impactful judgement.
I kind of agree with this. Obviously support whatever your child decides in the future but it’s a cruel world out there. My oldest is 4.5 and kids at that age already bully. At 16 months you won’t get that, but as they get older I would dress them along gender norms unless they express otherwise. I wouldn’t want to purposely subject my child to stress and bullying if it were avoidable.
That's kind of tangentially related to my thinking for why I **do** have my kids wear clothes outside of their gender norm sometimes.
If they grow up and turn out to be trans, I want them to have baby and toddler photos to share that make them feel comfortable and don't out them.
My experience is that my kids have hand me down clothes and toys (from both girls and boys, but predominantly girls). My eldest (AFAB, 6.5 years old) was and still is called "boy" by others based on her hair (she was basically bald until 3 years old and despite growing her hair relatively long she was/is still assumed male because she often keeps her bike helmet on at the playground and wears neutral coloured pants). My youngest (AMAB, 3 years old) wears pink clothing and sparkly shoes (during those few months when those were the shoes that fit) and is often assumed to be a girl but obviously creates more confusion because I notice some parents hesitating to refer to him as any gender! Neither kid wears dresses outside (because it's just not part of our lifestyle) but both have "dress up" dresses that they wear in our home.
I live in a liberal city and have personally seen men dressed in skirts/dresses walking down the street. I am white so our family has privilege to stand out and be different without fear of much harm coming to us. I don't believe there is innate issues with people dressing in whatever clothes they choose. However, i cannot deny that many people in many places may be put in harmful situations if they are not dressing to conform. You know your own situation and how safe it is for your child to appear atypical in public.
The practice of dressing young children in gendered clothing is fairly new. Look up baby pictures of Theodore Roosevelt (one of the manliest men in American history) and you'll see what I mean.
Yep, Franklin Roosevelt, and all those other little baby boys who were wearing dresses were totally damaged by it.
https://babyology.com.au/lifestyle/beauty-and-fashion/dont-freak-out-but-all-little-boys-used-to-wear-dresses-and-nobody-cared/
Yeah, my brother is the most stereotypical dude bro you could imagine, and he used to play dress up with our sister and paint his nails and play with barbies.
I'm not saying that if he wasn't a stereotypical dude bro, it would be bad. I'm just saying that a kids exploration of the world around them isn't going to have any impact on their gender or sexuality. If your kid is gonna be gay, they're gonna be gay. If they're gonna be trans, they're gonna be trans. They don't just.... catch those things from touching the color pink. Lol.
Besides, a literal baby is not going to notice or remember their outfits to even care.
on the opposite spectrum to this too my mum was very rigid about gender norms as a child we had to dress within ‘the box’ and never draw attention to ourselves. the ‘girliest’ activity i ever saw either of them do was watch barbie movies with me and yet one of my brothers is lgbtq+.
i think my thought process is sort of as my baby gets older i will 100% have him make his clothing decisions but right now as his brain develops i want him to see its ok to wear whatever he feels comfortable in. i remember watching my brother struggle to accept himself and even now he struggles to dress the way he wants to because he is so caught up in how a guy ‘should’ dress.
What I find interesting is that if the OP said her daughter was shamed for wearing firefighter gear or a construction hat or something… we would yell sexism! But the fact that it’s her son wearing “feminine” things… ooo big scary! I assure you… it’s homo/transphobia and not even an undertone, it’s overt!
My son is almost four and routinely rocks painted nails with sparkles, has taken dance and gymnastics, and asks me if he can put on makeup sometimes
The kid is also obsessed with dinosaurs, monster trucks, is a fearless (and terrifyingly good) climber, just mastered riding a bike without training wheels, and is an unapologetic trash monster.
If it's harmful to him I haven't noticed, because he is absolutely thriving.
Up until the mid 20th century, pink was considered to be a boy's color and blue was considered to be a girl's color. Put your kid in whatever you want to as long as it is temperature appropriate and safe.
ECE teacher for 20+ years here, imaginative play is key for helping children learn & process their theories of the world. One day they might pretend to be a monster or a scary dragon, or their Mum heading towork. Maybe another day a Doctor or bus driver. They try being 'in charge' or being a helpless baby. They get to see what happens when they interact with others in this way. Its fun, but they're also learning so much.
None of the students i have taught grew up to be scary dragons. A few might be doctors now. Maybe a few bus drivers too. For those boys who wore the handbags & skirts, vast majority did not carry on beyond their early years!
Harm would come in repressing natural exploration & making a child feel shame for wanting to play & explore.
Hello there! I work in Early Childhood Education, specifically with a quality rating system for daycares & preschools in the US. In this system, daycares are encouraged to have dramatic play (dress up) areas featuring traditional clothing of both genders, AND teachers must let all children access and play with any and all of the clothing.
The reason for this is simple: it’s developmentally appropriate for children to act out the roles and behaviors they see in the world around them. It’s all part of exploratory play and learning, and is NOT necessarily indicative of gender identity or sexual orientation up to (and even beyond) preschool age. There is no confusion or harm being done here: they’re playing! And certainly for people who do grow up to challenge heteronormative gender roles, playing in a princess dress at preschool was not a likely root cause.
I think you’re doing well by your son; as he grows, let him choose what he likes as often as safety and practicality permit, and watch him thrive!
it is not harmful and infact I would say is doing LESS harm in general, but *especially* if your child indeed does not identify with the sex and gender they were assigned (which is very unlikely, most people are not transgender no matter what the right wing and radical feminists in the UK especially are saying). they have convinced the general population that being trans is a communicable disease that is growing larger and larger when surveys show at BEST we make up 5% of the general population but I bet it's lower honestly.
research has shown kids as young as 5/6 years old have a good idea of their own gender identity already. so by keeping his options open even before then you are giving him room to explore and have fun ultimately. don't stop what you're doing.
Ah mate, you’re doing nothing wrong. Unfortunately we live on TERF Island, don’t let ignorant people’s bullshit get to you. My son is always being mistaken for a girl because even though he wears boylike clothes (trousers, t shirts, jumpers), I buy stuff that’s colourful and has cool prints on it, and so instantly people read him as female, even when he’s dressed head to toe in blue.
Right now I’m really angry about these nonsense gender roles because he’s going to be starting school this year, and he really wants some shiny patent school shoes with a Frozen motif (basically Elsa in one shoe, Anna in the other, and a tiny diamanté snowflake on one toe). But I’m worried about buying them because I don’t want him to be teased at school for wearing “girls” shoes. I hate that I have to consider this instead of just getting him the otherwise perfectly suitable shoes that he likes best, and still haven’t decided what I’m going to do. So please, for me, absolutely make the most of this time where your son can just enjoy the colourful clothes he loves!!
TERF Island is literally the best description of the uk ive heard 🤣 he went out in a dress for the first time ever the other day when the weather was nice and it was so lovely watching him be excited that he could swish it around. an old man did approach us to chat but made no comment on him wearing a dress so i was pleasantly surprised! i find myself dressing him like a roadman if we go to baby groups for fear of being judged!
i’m sorry your little guy is going through this! i really do hope that our kids generation are more tolerant and understanding than ours was. also those shoes sound amazing and i totally understand why he wants them i mean who didn’t want patent leather school shoes as a kid! i don’t know if they are still around but you should show him lelly kellys from back in the 90s/2000s!!
Our son at 13 months has a clear preference. He points and chooses. Half of his wardrobe had trucks or tractors on them because right now, that is what he loves.
He has dinosaurs and strips and others as I think they are cute. At the end of the day, he really doesn't care what he wears. It is me buying them, and I'm choosing what I want. He gets a choice between 2 or 3 items.
With that,
He currently has a baby doll that he plays with. He is gentle and tries sharing toys with it. Do I think this will make him confused or change his sexual orientation, not one bit. He will be who he will be.
He will be raised the same way we were (i was an 80s baby so it went against the norm at that time). This is your sex but you are not limited. There are no set jobs or roles. If he wants to do something, he is capable of that. He will be raised to be respectful, and whoever he ends up being, we want that person to be a contributing member of society regardless of who they love or how they identify.
So historically both boys and girls wore dresses until boys reached somewhere between 4 and 6 since it was easier to change their diapers. I would look up photos of men like Churchill or even some late kings and when they were babies and toddlers they were all in dresses. Hell men wore what would be called dresses and skirts for hundreds of years before they started wearing pants. So no your child is fine as long as they are comfortable.
Personally I don’t put my small child in dresses because she’s learning to walk and climb and develop other gross motor skills that are easier without fabric flowing around your knees. That’s the only reasonable argument against dresses for either gender I can see.
No, colours are colours. We don't have to assign colours to genders. Is it wrong if my girl wears blue, grey, or green, then? Why are they so hypocritical?
I'm no expert but i dont think your 16 month old understands the intricacies of colour coded gender assuming clothes. If he's happy and you're happy, go at it! Not long ago boys were in pink and girls in blue, men across the world wear kilts, muumuus, gowns, capes, smocks, robes, and other forms of open clothes, they're not made for girls they're made for people. Genderising clothes for anyone under the age of 7 (because growth spurts happen differently between the sexes at that stage in my opinion) is purely a fashion and moneymaking thing, and I think it's totally unnecessary.
Has anyone said anything to you or are you just pre-emtively planning a response in case of haters?
unfortunately its been talked about a lot. at first when my son was very little i didn’t realise it was such a big thing because the baby clothing section in my local store wasn’t gender divided so i would pick whatever sleepsuit etc felt nice and looked cute/fun/visually stimulating for him. then when i started going to baby groups people made a point of mentioning it and some would imply i should stop dressing him that way as he became more conscious.
one outfit that i remember i received humongous amounts of crap for was a ‘thats not my cat’ book outfit. it was literally a light purple jumper with a page from the book on it it had these textured ears and nose which i thought he would like feeling and then grey leggings with the same cat face printed on it. i even asked my partner if he thought it would be ok for baby group before we left as i had started to get self conscious. it was all anyone who spoke to us as at baby group talked about :/
it got to the point that if we were going to a baby group, meeting anyone new or seeing my in laws i would dress him as stereotypically male as possible since i didn’t know how to respond.
i probably should have realised it was going to cause a bit of a stir but it didn’t really occur to me and since he still wears a good mix of either and is always in a practical weather appropriate comfortable outfit i didn’t think it would be an issue but it definitely seems as he gets older it becomes more of a topic. Thank you for the reassurance and kind words!
I understand, I get the same comments when I send my kid to crèche in Xmas trackies in May but fuck it, it's weather and play appropriate and it fits her, thats all I ask of a 2.5year olds clothing lol.
Look it's not gonna affect him, its just that people don't know how to think something and not say it out loud.
What I'd do next time someone says anything about it confusing him would be reply "he'd never be confused unless someone mentioned it for absolutely no reason... But why would anyone do that" And just stare them down... But I'm petty and passive aggressive AF so make of that what you will lol
i’m right there with you on that my toddler was wearing his halloween stuff until February! got to get your moneys worth
i’ll try that response! ive got to get a spine one of these days lol
you have a lot here, but as a retort. Since your in the UK, I would say something like, oh I don't let a US presidents wife's color choices dictate my sons clothing. Also I am not into the traditional all white clothing like King Henry (or whatever royal of your choice) wore. [https://www.vox.com/2015/4/14/8405889/pink-color-gender](https://www.vox.com/2015/4/14/8405889/pink-color-gender)
Your 16 month old has no real preferences. Why make his life harder than it has to be? My advice would be to follow the societal norms and deviate **only if** he expresses a desire.
It's just ironic. People tell someone who dresses their son indiscriminately that they're "putting him in a box", yet say that he should only wear _one_ type of clothing- aka a box- unless he specifically says he doesn't want to be in that box.
I know society has a certain way of doing things atm and it's hard to break away from that, but what's wrong with wanting to get rid of the boxes altogether?
Nothing. Nothing wrong with wanting to get rid of boxes - for yourself.
Using children as ideological pawns is questionable though, to say the least. And I'm holding my tongue on what I'd like to say.
Experiment with bucking norms on yourself. But I don't think it's right to enforce that the kid should shoulder the social stigma of *your* decisions.
It’s just that you can’t reasonably make the argument that doing it one way is ideological but the reverse isn’t ideological. And as far as the ideology, on one hand it’s restrictive and on the other it’s not.
When I was a sophomore in high school in the US South in the early 2000s, we were talking about gay couples being able to legally adopt children in class one day. One of my classmates said “those children will never be accepted.” I pointed out that the only reason that was true is because of people like him refusing to be accepting. Maybe the important consideration is why grown adults would cultivate and promote social stigma around the specific colors toddlers wear??
Your argument might make sense if OP was the one crossdressing and wearing every color of clothing, since the classmate was worried about children being made fun of for the way their adopted parents chose to live their own lives.
If you want to use that analogy, the appropriate parallel for defaulting your child to crossdressing at the age of 16 months would be raising your son under the assumption that he's gay.
No, it’s like raising your son under the assumption that he may be gay or straight and that either is fine? OP did not say that they were dressing their son in pink frilly dresses and sparkle headbands. There have been enough posts here already to indicate why the concept of “crossdressing” is a fleeting and culturally informed one, and also why it has zero relevance in the life and psyche of a toddler.
I consider making a little boy wear dresses to be crossdressing. And I'm fairly certain we can assume they are being forced to wear neon pink and the like, based on the concern OP reported.
Making little boys wear neon pink dresses. *That's* what you're defending?
I read the OP as giving their kid a lot of choice in the full range of available clothing options, and yeah, I think that's fine. You're definitely the one coming from a place of force/restriction/inflexibility and drilling arbitrary rules about clothing into the mind of a toddler. Do you get this worked up about girls in pants, or wearing the color blue??
They are 16 months.... They don't have preferences yet. The kid isn't "choosing" anything. They're being dressed up.
You and I both know that in this day and age, it's more acceptable for women to wear pants than for men to wear a pink dress. Right or wrong, it is what it is.
So I say, leave the trailblazing to the adults and don't enforce that your child should be made fun of for the sake of dying on an ideological hill and fashioning yourself enlightened..
That's my 2 cents. My goal as a parent is singular: i.e. maximize the probability of flourishing.
I have a hard time believing you've ever met a 16 month old if you truly believe they don't have preferences. Maybe we should "enforce" kindness and not teasing as a matter of course instead? There are plenty of gender-nonconforming people out here in the world flourishing, in spite of the closed-mindedness of, well, folks like you. "This day and age" is a constantly shifting reality and some of us are choosing to remain open to that fact. Would you discourage a boy from playing with a doll? Or picking flowers in a field? Or growing long hair? Your line is arbitrary, not science or evidence based, and ultimately about your own discomfort. It's really just not fair to project that onto a child.
You're advocating for it to be one way and not the other. No one is saying to dress boys as girls on the assumption that they will be gay. It's getting rid of the boxes- not pushing the kid in either direction and leaving all options open.
You're saying that, well, he's too young to pick, so he should only have boy clothes and boy toys because that what's expected.
How is that letting him pick? How is that not putting him a box?
They should at least have the knowledge that they _have_ a choice. Most kids don't, because at some point they notice that adults have chosen for them, and that's just the way things are.
There's no way to know that your son wouldn't like to play with a kitchen set or a doll or whatever, if you never let him play with one to begin with. There's no way to know that he wouldn't like bright colors if you only give him dark ones.
These things have nothing to do with sexuality.
Not pushing ***is*** pushing though.
My child might also want to wear pants on their head. They might *cry* and *wail* if I don't let them. They might want to chew on crayons and throw a tantrum when I thwart them. And what's the harm? Crayons are non-toxic. Or they might want to roll around the floor pretending to be an inch worm in public.
And yet, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and imagine that you'd curtail such behaviors. *Why* would you curtail such behaviors? After all, there's nothing inherently dangerous or wrong with them. It's because your child would be ostracized by their peers, and worse, even other adults. But... aren't you putting them in a box? Yes, you are. Do you lose sleep over them resenting you, or feeling oppressed because you wouldn't let them live out their inch worm fantasies in Costco? No, and neither do they.
Our society has different social norms for males and females. This is a *descriptive* claim, not prescriptive. It is *inarguably the case* that straight males wearing neon pink dresses are going to ostracized by their peers AND adults. By OP's own admission, this is *already occurring.* Again, I'm not making any value judgement. I'm simply straightforwardly describing the world we inhabit.
**Your prime directive as a parent,** is to at all costs, ensure that your child flourishes in this world. Emphasis on **this** world. The one we live in, not the one you *wish we inhabited.* Your job is to ensure they are happy, healthy, accepted, and successful in their endeavors. Period, no asterisk. Everything else is secondary to that.
The behaviors you described _are_ harmful in some capacity though- or not exactly _harmful,_ but they have negative consequences other than being judged.
First of all, wearing pants on your head and acting like a worm is silly toddler behavior, and a toddler isn't going to be ostracized for these behaviors. A teenager? Absolutely, but they have the capacity to understand that. A four year old? Likely not.
Second, these have consequences other than being ostracized.
>>> You're wearing pants on your head, aren't your legs cold? What if you run into something because you can't see?
>>> You're acting silly in public? We're going to be late for [insert appointment]!
These things aren't comparable. One has real consequences, the other perceived consequences based arbitrary rules _we_ made up. If you take away these rules there's no reason why a boy can't have any toy he wants, especially when the reverse is already somewhat true for girls as you previously mentioned.
If a little girl takes good care of a baby doll, people say she's going to be a great mother one day. If a little boy does same, wouldn't that mean he's going to be a great father one day?
Oh no, it means he's gay- 🧐??
The thing is, "girl toys" mimic things they will have to do as adults such as cooking, cleaning, and taking care of children. In today's society men are also expected to do those things. It's no longer "women's work" to know how to do basic things like feed and clean up after yourself.
If straight men are expected to cook, clean, and take care of their children how is it gay or feminine for little boys to do it? Things don't add up.
Also, weird kids are going to be weird. Your kid could be an outsider no matter how you dress them or what toys you give them, but if you shoot down their interests because "that's not the society we live in" you're telling them that the only way to succeed is to do what everyone else is doing. Which is simply not true.
Listen I have no scientific evidence but I think you’re spot on that the only “concern” stems from homo/transphobia. What could possibly be harmful in letting kids dress in a variety of colors???
thank you it seems so strange to me because its almost as if the fear is that he may grow up and not be a straight cis man which 1 wouldn’t be anything to do with how i dressed him and 2 wouldn’t be an issue at all but i just seize up in the moment and don’t know what to say because i have no study to refer to. Having said that i doubt any homophobes or transphobes would respect a study
"Wow! I've never heard that letting him wear pink would cause that. Where did you hear that? Can you send me the study?" If they're making the assertion, they need to provide the proof. Because you're just dressing your child in clothing.
I love this response!!!
No they would dismiss it as “liberal bullshit.”
Correct, but OP is implying they’re not just “letting” their kid dress in a variety of colors but in fact making these decisions for him and dressing him in clothes that are traditionally feminine. Those are entirely different things and it’s never correct to use your kid as an outlet for your political beliefs.
Sorry but how is this any different than only buying “boys” clothes and making him wear that? That’s making a decision as well. This is such a stupid argument.
Babies have no concept of gender or care what clothing they're in
Exactly.... So, why make life harder for them? Default to the norm, and let the child express any preferences to do otherwise later on.
There is no "norm" it's all based on very specific cultural markers that are frequently changing. Pink used to be for boys and blue for girls. Young boys used to wear dresses. Other cultures still have men wearing dresses and having long hair without being precieved as feminine.
Ok, but norms varying across time and space isn't an argument that norms don't exist....
Not wearing dresses and specific colors for genders are a relatively recent phenomenon in human history. https://medium.com/@NewAgeNews/why-is-president-franklin-d-roosevelt-wearing-a-dress-83fba35495 So recent that the recently departed Philip has baby photos in dresses.
I’m the youngest in my family and an elder millennial at that. All of my clothes were hand-me-downs and almost none were gendered. Perhaps for a special occasion like a wedding then we might wear a dress (afab) or a shirt and tie (amab) but every other occasion was gender neutral up until around age 5 or so. It truly is VERY recent and seems to be a symptom of commercialism.
This is typically what I cite when folks ask why I don’t want to know the “gender” (they mean sex) of my unborn child until birth or why I don’t have a nursery theme. It wasn’t until the 50s that gender identity in babies was even a thing in the US. Previous to that, for centuries, babies were essentially genderless until they served an actual purpose in society. It seems so silly to me that we would try to instill identities and roles based on the genitals of a squirmy potato person. I’ll keep things gender neutral and open until a personality and preferences start forming, and only then will I decorate the baby/toddler’s room and let them pick out clothes they like.
I’ve thought about this a lot (36w FTP) and I think when people ask they are in fact not asking about the sex, but about the gender, they just don’t know the difference! Like people are for the most part not asking do you know know if your baby will have a penis or vagina, or what the chromosomes are, but “what is the gendered image I should hold in my mind of this child.” But yeah, it’s a strange question as someone who really doesn’t put much stock in that kind of thing and doesn’t want to foreclose on the possibility that their kids might be trans or nonbinary.
In what way were babies genderless? This is just not true at all. Boys were raised as boys and girls as girls. Only recently has this changed at all.
Gender roles are a social construct. Gender is not the same as biological sex. Babies having an assigned gender serves absolutely zero purpose to society until young childhood *earliest*, and I’d argue that gender roles in childhood are also unnecessary in society. And you’ve got it backwards. Only recently (barely within last 100 years) have babies been raised with strong gender assignments.
Yeah, no. Think what you like but this is just not true. Where did you read or hear this? You think parents from 100+ years ago felt no need to “assign” a gender to their son or daughter? You don’t think girls were encouraged to be girly and play with dolls and that boys weren’t encouraged to do “boy things?” I’m not saying that a child will always be interested in what they’re encouraged to play with or do (It doesn’t determine your gender anyway), but saying that parents didn’t treat their children based on their gender is untrue. First you said this didn’t happen until the 1950’s, then 100+ years ago. The idea of gender not matching biological sex is a recent idea and one that’s only believed by a very tiny percentage of the population, even in blue states and cities, opposed to what you might see and read in social media and online.
Why are you so obsessed with the binary? You are very much conflating babies/toddlers and children with your take. Babies, toddlers, and children are all different life stages, and as such, gender roles historically had become prominent in the oldest of the three stages (hint: childhood). Also, gender assignment and gender roles are different in this context. In the vast history of human history and across most cultures, gender has been assigned correlating with biological sex. I never argued against that. Gender ROLES, on the other hand, would not be imposed onto babies/toddlers until more recently, though. Assigning the role of being a macho football-playin’, construction crew workin’, all blue wearin’ baby boy was not a thing until more recently. And it’s completely unnecessary for a baby, because they cannot practice for or fulfill any of those roles to benefit society until at least early childhood. So binary gender and its roles are useless during the first couple stages of a human’s life. Dolls and basic toys (blocks, books, art) were typical for ALL babies and toddlers prior to the 50s, because they helped develop thinking and skills that helped society, regardless of gender; dolls mostly to teach how to be a nurturing parent (not just mom). And I never said 100+ years, rather I said *barely within* 100 years. Which the 1950s falls into.
Your link didn’t work for me.
[LINK Repost](https://medium.com/@NewAgeNews/why-is-president-franklin-d-roosevelt-wearing-a-dress-83fba3549523)
The “forcing him into a box” comment is so ironic. I teach psychology of gender and I literally have an exercise called The Box where students describe what our society tells us belongs in the “man” box and the “woman” box. Then outside the boxes we write what people are called if they don’t fit in those boxes. The exercise demonstrates how we are often punished for deviating from assigned gender role norms, and how pretty much everyone has clear ideas of what goes inside each box because it’s been taught and enforced our whole lives. So basically, it’s not you who is putting your child into a box, it’s them.
This! I have no scientific/academic background so thank you for having the credentials. As soon as I read the comment about 'the box' you could hear my eyes roll for OP. My son's daycare plays dress up frequently and his favorite outfit piece is a beautiful, shimmery skirt! He'd be so upset if he could only choose from a 'boy box'.
Out of curiosity, the names that those who deviate from being in a box — are they more gendered towards feminine insults, by chance? For example, if a man does not fit in a man box, is he insulted as being a pussy, which is then an insult towards women being “weak?”
Yep! As well as homophobic slurs (because homophobia and misogyny are connected).
THIS THIS THIS! I was thinking the exact same thing about this "box" they are claiming. Such a foolish phenomenon. I love that you teach the psychology of gender, as current generations are wiping the floor with "traditional" dress codes and roles... I absolutely love it. It gives me a good amount of hope that ONE DAY we can just exist as humans and get shit done versus pouring so much energy, time and money into "fitting in" before we can lift a finger. It is tiresome, outdated nonsense.
Nothing innately harmful about it! For most of history, babies wore dresses because of their growth and peeing/pooping, and colors just depend on cultural heritage (for most of western Christian history, blue was a girl's color because it represented Mary's virginity; most babies wore white to represent their innocence, other cultures might dress a baby in red to represeng luck, etc). The only harmful thing is people who treat them poorly based on what they are wearing, but that usually doesn't become an issue until they're old enough to understand language
Agree about letting him embrace all aspects of his personality although I doubt he has much preference for clothing yet. It annoyed me to no end when people assumed the gender of my child based on the colours I dressed her in. I dress her in colours that suited her colouring and eyes. I will say though that I think as children until they can say what they want to wear, that clothing that is functional is best for allowing them to develop physically. To be able to walk, run, climb, roll, etc. I found that dresses did not allow my child to do that so we stopped putting them on her. She certainly has not expressed any desire to wear them yet though we have plenty she can pick from. I'm sure she will when she is older.
People assume my baby is a girl because he's small for his age. As if babies aren't all different sizes regardless of sex. Bizarre.
I dressed my daughter in a blue outfit one day, and everyone we saw called her a “he”
Same! Really anything that wasn't pink or purple got "he". Apparently white, black, and orange are also not girl colors.
Right. Our daughter is an extremely active one year old. Clothing serves a purpose at this age. It’s not an outlet for expression yet.
I’m sure I’ll get shouted down here, but here goes nothing. Parents generally want to prepare their kids as best they can for the future and give them a chance for a happy life. At 16 months, I seriously doubt any kid has a true preference for clothes. Seems like it would be kinder to default to setting your kid up to be comfortable conforming to gender norms rather than subjecting them to the harder life that trans people face. Especially since the kid hasn’t voiced a preference.
Having been through this with my own son (not trans, just liked flair as a young child), you get to choose between being the one to tell your child their preferences aren't ok, or telling them you think they are ok even if the world may not. I cannot imagine a solid argument for being the very first person to tell my child they should change their choices because of someone else's judgement of them. What may seem as an act of protection can be itself the first and most impactful judgement.
I don’t disagree with what you’re saying, but at 16 months I don’t think this kid is making very many choices yet.
Perfectly stated.
I kind of agree with this. Obviously support whatever your child decides in the future but it’s a cruel world out there. My oldest is 4.5 and kids at that age already bully. At 16 months you won’t get that, but as they get older I would dress them along gender norms unless they express otherwise. I wouldn’t want to purposely subject my child to stress and bullying if it were avoidable.
Thats...not how being trans works.
This.
That's kind of tangentially related to my thinking for why I **do** have my kids wear clothes outside of their gender norm sometimes. If they grow up and turn out to be trans, I want them to have baby and toddler photos to share that make them feel comfortable and don't out them.
I am sorry but when those girl's baby one piece is on sale at Walmart at 2 for a dollar, my boy will be wearing pink rainbow butterflies.
Gender is a social construct. Nothing about wearing different clothes can harm a child.
My experience is that my kids have hand me down clothes and toys (from both girls and boys, but predominantly girls). My eldest (AFAB, 6.5 years old) was and still is called "boy" by others based on her hair (she was basically bald until 3 years old and despite growing her hair relatively long she was/is still assumed male because she often keeps her bike helmet on at the playground and wears neutral coloured pants). My youngest (AMAB, 3 years old) wears pink clothing and sparkly shoes (during those few months when those were the shoes that fit) and is often assumed to be a girl but obviously creates more confusion because I notice some parents hesitating to refer to him as any gender! Neither kid wears dresses outside (because it's just not part of our lifestyle) but both have "dress up" dresses that they wear in our home. I live in a liberal city and have personally seen men dressed in skirts/dresses walking down the street. I am white so our family has privilege to stand out and be different without fear of much harm coming to us. I don't believe there is innate issues with people dressing in whatever clothes they choose. However, i cannot deny that many people in many places may be put in harmful situations if they are not dressing to conform. You know your own situation and how safe it is for your child to appear atypical in public.
The practice of dressing young children in gendered clothing is fairly new. Look up baby pictures of Theodore Roosevelt (one of the manliest men in American history) and you'll see what I mean.
Yep, Franklin Roosevelt, and all those other little baby boys who were wearing dresses were totally damaged by it. https://babyology.com.au/lifestyle/beauty-and-fashion/dont-freak-out-but-all-little-boys-used-to-wear-dresses-and-nobody-cared/
Yeah, my brother is the most stereotypical dude bro you could imagine, and he used to play dress up with our sister and paint his nails and play with barbies. I'm not saying that if he wasn't a stereotypical dude bro, it would be bad. I'm just saying that a kids exploration of the world around them isn't going to have any impact on their gender or sexuality. If your kid is gonna be gay, they're gonna be gay. If they're gonna be trans, they're gonna be trans. They don't just.... catch those things from touching the color pink. Lol. Besides, a literal baby is not going to notice or remember their outfits to even care.
on the opposite spectrum to this too my mum was very rigid about gender norms as a child we had to dress within ‘the box’ and never draw attention to ourselves. the ‘girliest’ activity i ever saw either of them do was watch barbie movies with me and yet one of my brothers is lgbtq+. i think my thought process is sort of as my baby gets older i will 100% have him make his clothing decisions but right now as his brain develops i want him to see its ok to wear whatever he feels comfortable in. i remember watching my brother struggle to accept himself and even now he struggles to dress the way he wants to because he is so caught up in how a guy ‘should’ dress.
What I find interesting is that if the OP said her daughter was shamed for wearing firefighter gear or a construction hat or something… we would yell sexism! But the fact that it’s her son wearing “feminine” things… ooo big scary! I assure you… it’s homo/transphobia and not even an undertone, it’s overt!
My son is almost four and routinely rocks painted nails with sparkles, has taken dance and gymnastics, and asks me if he can put on makeup sometimes The kid is also obsessed with dinosaurs, monster trucks, is a fearless (and terrifyingly good) climber, just mastered riding a bike without training wheels, and is an unapologetic trash monster. If it's harmful to him I haven't noticed, because he is absolutely thriving.
Up until the mid 20th century, pink was considered to be a boy's color and blue was considered to be a girl's color. Put your kid in whatever you want to as long as it is temperature appropriate and safe.
ECE teacher for 20+ years here, imaginative play is key for helping children learn & process their theories of the world. One day they might pretend to be a monster or a scary dragon, or their Mum heading towork. Maybe another day a Doctor or bus driver. They try being 'in charge' or being a helpless baby. They get to see what happens when they interact with others in this way. Its fun, but they're also learning so much. None of the students i have taught grew up to be scary dragons. A few might be doctors now. Maybe a few bus drivers too. For those boys who wore the handbags & skirts, vast majority did not carry on beyond their early years! Harm would come in repressing natural exploration & making a child feel shame for wanting to play & explore.
Hello there! I work in Early Childhood Education, specifically with a quality rating system for daycares & preschools in the US. In this system, daycares are encouraged to have dramatic play (dress up) areas featuring traditional clothing of both genders, AND teachers must let all children access and play with any and all of the clothing. The reason for this is simple: it’s developmentally appropriate for children to act out the roles and behaviors they see in the world around them. It’s all part of exploratory play and learning, and is NOT necessarily indicative of gender identity or sexual orientation up to (and even beyond) preschool age. There is no confusion or harm being done here: they’re playing! And certainly for people who do grow up to challenge heteronormative gender roles, playing in a princess dress at preschool was not a likely root cause. I think you’re doing well by your son; as he grows, let him choose what he likes as often as safety and practicality permit, and watch him thrive!
it is not harmful and infact I would say is doing LESS harm in general, but *especially* if your child indeed does not identify with the sex and gender they were assigned (which is very unlikely, most people are not transgender no matter what the right wing and radical feminists in the UK especially are saying). they have convinced the general population that being trans is a communicable disease that is growing larger and larger when surveys show at BEST we make up 5% of the general population but I bet it's lower honestly. research has shown kids as young as 5/6 years old have a good idea of their own gender identity already. so by keeping his options open even before then you are giving him room to explore and have fun ultimately. don't stop what you're doing.
Ah mate, you’re doing nothing wrong. Unfortunately we live on TERF Island, don’t let ignorant people’s bullshit get to you. My son is always being mistaken for a girl because even though he wears boylike clothes (trousers, t shirts, jumpers), I buy stuff that’s colourful and has cool prints on it, and so instantly people read him as female, even when he’s dressed head to toe in blue. Right now I’m really angry about these nonsense gender roles because he’s going to be starting school this year, and he really wants some shiny patent school shoes with a Frozen motif (basically Elsa in one shoe, Anna in the other, and a tiny diamanté snowflake on one toe). But I’m worried about buying them because I don’t want him to be teased at school for wearing “girls” shoes. I hate that I have to consider this instead of just getting him the otherwise perfectly suitable shoes that he likes best, and still haven’t decided what I’m going to do. So please, for me, absolutely make the most of this time where your son can just enjoy the colourful clothes he loves!!
TERF Island is literally the best description of the uk ive heard 🤣 he went out in a dress for the first time ever the other day when the weather was nice and it was so lovely watching him be excited that he could swish it around. an old man did approach us to chat but made no comment on him wearing a dress so i was pleasantly surprised! i find myself dressing him like a roadman if we go to baby groups for fear of being judged! i’m sorry your little guy is going through this! i really do hope that our kids generation are more tolerant and understanding than ours was. also those shoes sound amazing and i totally understand why he wants them i mean who didn’t want patent leather school shoes as a kid! i don’t know if they are still around but you should show him lelly kellys from back in the 90s/2000s!!
Our son at 13 months has a clear preference. He points and chooses. Half of his wardrobe had trucks or tractors on them because right now, that is what he loves. He has dinosaurs and strips and others as I think they are cute. At the end of the day, he really doesn't care what he wears. It is me buying them, and I'm choosing what I want. He gets a choice between 2 or 3 items. With that, He currently has a baby doll that he plays with. He is gentle and tries sharing toys with it. Do I think this will make him confused or change his sexual orientation, not one bit. He will be who he will be. He will be raised the same way we were (i was an 80s baby so it went against the norm at that time). This is your sex but you are not limited. There are no set jobs or roles. If he wants to do something, he is capable of that. He will be raised to be respectful, and whoever he ends up being, we want that person to be a contributing member of society regardless of who they love or how they identify.
How would other parents know what the impact is on your child when they don’t even know him?
So historically both boys and girls wore dresses until boys reached somewhere between 4 and 6 since it was easier to change their diapers. I would look up photos of men like Churchill or even some late kings and when they were babies and toddlers they were all in dresses. Hell men wore what would be called dresses and skirts for hundreds of years before they started wearing pants. So no your child is fine as long as they are comfortable.
Personally I don’t put my small child in dresses because she’s learning to walk and climb and develop other gross motor skills that are easier without fabric flowing around your knees. That’s the only reasonable argument against dresses for either gender I can see.
No, colours are colours. We don't have to assign colours to genders. Is it wrong if my girl wears blue, grey, or green, then? Why are they so hypocritical?
I'm no expert but i dont think your 16 month old understands the intricacies of colour coded gender assuming clothes. If he's happy and you're happy, go at it! Not long ago boys were in pink and girls in blue, men across the world wear kilts, muumuus, gowns, capes, smocks, robes, and other forms of open clothes, they're not made for girls they're made for people. Genderising clothes for anyone under the age of 7 (because growth spurts happen differently between the sexes at that stage in my opinion) is purely a fashion and moneymaking thing, and I think it's totally unnecessary. Has anyone said anything to you or are you just pre-emtively planning a response in case of haters?
unfortunately its been talked about a lot. at first when my son was very little i didn’t realise it was such a big thing because the baby clothing section in my local store wasn’t gender divided so i would pick whatever sleepsuit etc felt nice and looked cute/fun/visually stimulating for him. then when i started going to baby groups people made a point of mentioning it and some would imply i should stop dressing him that way as he became more conscious. one outfit that i remember i received humongous amounts of crap for was a ‘thats not my cat’ book outfit. it was literally a light purple jumper with a page from the book on it it had these textured ears and nose which i thought he would like feeling and then grey leggings with the same cat face printed on it. i even asked my partner if he thought it would be ok for baby group before we left as i had started to get self conscious. it was all anyone who spoke to us as at baby group talked about :/ it got to the point that if we were going to a baby group, meeting anyone new or seeing my in laws i would dress him as stereotypically male as possible since i didn’t know how to respond. i probably should have realised it was going to cause a bit of a stir but it didn’t really occur to me and since he still wears a good mix of either and is always in a practical weather appropriate comfortable outfit i didn’t think it would be an issue but it definitely seems as he gets older it becomes more of a topic. Thank you for the reassurance and kind words!
I understand, I get the same comments when I send my kid to crèche in Xmas trackies in May but fuck it, it's weather and play appropriate and it fits her, thats all I ask of a 2.5year olds clothing lol. Look it's not gonna affect him, its just that people don't know how to think something and not say it out loud. What I'd do next time someone says anything about it confusing him would be reply "he'd never be confused unless someone mentioned it for absolutely no reason... But why would anyone do that" And just stare them down... But I'm petty and passive aggressive AF so make of that what you will lol
i’m right there with you on that my toddler was wearing his halloween stuff until February! got to get your moneys worth i’ll try that response! ive got to get a spine one of these days lol
you have a lot here, but as a retort. Since your in the UK, I would say something like, oh I don't let a US presidents wife's color choices dictate my sons clothing. Also I am not into the traditional all white clothing like King Henry (or whatever royal of your choice) wore. [https://www.vox.com/2015/4/14/8405889/pink-color-gender](https://www.vox.com/2015/4/14/8405889/pink-color-gender)
Your 16 month old has no real preferences. Why make his life harder than it has to be? My advice would be to follow the societal norms and deviate **only if** he expresses a desire.
It's just ironic. People tell someone who dresses their son indiscriminately that they're "putting him in a box", yet say that he should only wear _one_ type of clothing- aka a box- unless he specifically says he doesn't want to be in that box. I know society has a certain way of doing things atm and it's hard to break away from that, but what's wrong with wanting to get rid of the boxes altogether?
Nothing. Nothing wrong with wanting to get rid of boxes - for yourself. Using children as ideological pawns is questionable though, to say the least. And I'm holding my tongue on what I'd like to say. Experiment with bucking norms on yourself. But I don't think it's right to enforce that the kid should shoulder the social stigma of *your* decisions.
It’s just that you can’t reasonably make the argument that doing it one way is ideological but the reverse isn’t ideological. And as far as the ideology, on one hand it’s restrictive and on the other it’s not. When I was a sophomore in high school in the US South in the early 2000s, we were talking about gay couples being able to legally adopt children in class one day. One of my classmates said “those children will never be accepted.” I pointed out that the only reason that was true is because of people like him refusing to be accepting. Maybe the important consideration is why grown adults would cultivate and promote social stigma around the specific colors toddlers wear??
Your argument might make sense if OP was the one crossdressing and wearing every color of clothing, since the classmate was worried about children being made fun of for the way their adopted parents chose to live their own lives. If you want to use that analogy, the appropriate parallel for defaulting your child to crossdressing at the age of 16 months would be raising your son under the assumption that he's gay.
No, it’s like raising your son under the assumption that he may be gay or straight and that either is fine? OP did not say that they were dressing their son in pink frilly dresses and sparkle headbands. There have been enough posts here already to indicate why the concept of “crossdressing” is a fleeting and culturally informed one, and also why it has zero relevance in the life and psyche of a toddler.
It’s honestly just wild to refer to a toddler wearing colorful clothing as “crossdressing.” What is the list of acceptable colors by gender, Grandpa?
I consider making a little boy wear dresses to be crossdressing. And I'm fairly certain we can assume they are being forced to wear neon pink and the like, based on the concern OP reported. Making little boys wear neon pink dresses. *That's* what you're defending?
I read the OP as giving their kid a lot of choice in the full range of available clothing options, and yeah, I think that's fine. You're definitely the one coming from a place of force/restriction/inflexibility and drilling arbitrary rules about clothing into the mind of a toddler. Do you get this worked up about girls in pants, or wearing the color blue??
They are 16 months.... They don't have preferences yet. The kid isn't "choosing" anything. They're being dressed up. You and I both know that in this day and age, it's more acceptable for women to wear pants than for men to wear a pink dress. Right or wrong, it is what it is. So I say, leave the trailblazing to the adults and don't enforce that your child should be made fun of for the sake of dying on an ideological hill and fashioning yourself enlightened.. That's my 2 cents. My goal as a parent is singular: i.e. maximize the probability of flourishing.
I have a hard time believing you've ever met a 16 month old if you truly believe they don't have preferences. Maybe we should "enforce" kindness and not teasing as a matter of course instead? There are plenty of gender-nonconforming people out here in the world flourishing, in spite of the closed-mindedness of, well, folks like you. "This day and age" is a constantly shifting reality and some of us are choosing to remain open to that fact. Would you discourage a boy from playing with a doll? Or picking flowers in a field? Or growing long hair? Your line is arbitrary, not science or evidence based, and ultimately about your own discomfort. It's really just not fair to project that onto a child.
You're advocating for it to be one way and not the other. No one is saying to dress boys as girls on the assumption that they will be gay. It's getting rid of the boxes- not pushing the kid in either direction and leaving all options open. You're saying that, well, he's too young to pick, so he should only have boy clothes and boy toys because that what's expected. How is that letting him pick? How is that not putting him a box? They should at least have the knowledge that they _have_ a choice. Most kids don't, because at some point they notice that adults have chosen for them, and that's just the way things are. There's no way to know that your son wouldn't like to play with a kitchen set or a doll or whatever, if you never let him play with one to begin with. There's no way to know that he wouldn't like bright colors if you only give him dark ones. These things have nothing to do with sexuality.
Not pushing ***is*** pushing though. My child might also want to wear pants on their head. They might *cry* and *wail* if I don't let them. They might want to chew on crayons and throw a tantrum when I thwart them. And what's the harm? Crayons are non-toxic. Or they might want to roll around the floor pretending to be an inch worm in public. And yet, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and imagine that you'd curtail such behaviors. *Why* would you curtail such behaviors? After all, there's nothing inherently dangerous or wrong with them. It's because your child would be ostracized by their peers, and worse, even other adults. But... aren't you putting them in a box? Yes, you are. Do you lose sleep over them resenting you, or feeling oppressed because you wouldn't let them live out their inch worm fantasies in Costco? No, and neither do they. Our society has different social norms for males and females. This is a *descriptive* claim, not prescriptive. It is *inarguably the case* that straight males wearing neon pink dresses are going to ostracized by their peers AND adults. By OP's own admission, this is *already occurring.* Again, I'm not making any value judgement. I'm simply straightforwardly describing the world we inhabit. **Your prime directive as a parent,** is to at all costs, ensure that your child flourishes in this world. Emphasis on **this** world. The one we live in, not the one you *wish we inhabited.* Your job is to ensure they are happy, healthy, accepted, and successful in their endeavors. Period, no asterisk. Everything else is secondary to that.
The behaviors you described _are_ harmful in some capacity though- or not exactly _harmful,_ but they have negative consequences other than being judged. First of all, wearing pants on your head and acting like a worm is silly toddler behavior, and a toddler isn't going to be ostracized for these behaviors. A teenager? Absolutely, but they have the capacity to understand that. A four year old? Likely not. Second, these have consequences other than being ostracized. >>> You're wearing pants on your head, aren't your legs cold? What if you run into something because you can't see? >>> You're acting silly in public? We're going to be late for [insert appointment]! These things aren't comparable. One has real consequences, the other perceived consequences based arbitrary rules _we_ made up. If you take away these rules there's no reason why a boy can't have any toy he wants, especially when the reverse is already somewhat true for girls as you previously mentioned. If a little girl takes good care of a baby doll, people say she's going to be a great mother one day. If a little boy does same, wouldn't that mean he's going to be a great father one day? Oh no, it means he's gay- 🧐?? The thing is, "girl toys" mimic things they will have to do as adults such as cooking, cleaning, and taking care of children. In today's society men are also expected to do those things. It's no longer "women's work" to know how to do basic things like feed and clean up after yourself. If straight men are expected to cook, clean, and take care of their children how is it gay or feminine for little boys to do it? Things don't add up.
Also, weird kids are going to be weird. Your kid could be an outsider no matter how you dress them or what toys you give them, but if you shoot down their interests because "that's not the society we live in" you're telling them that the only way to succeed is to do what everyone else is doing. Which is simply not true.
NO.
Just tell these crappy people that he's colourblind and chooses the patterns and styles he likes best since he can't see the colours.