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Gender No Longer Exists
Today I made the mistake of turning to ABC for their morning network news. After being blinded by the pastels of their dollhouse-like set, I watched several bobble-headed women and one extremely handsome fellow discuss Target stores doing away with gender signs. The giddy news “person” reported that there will be no more girls’ toys or boys’ toys — just toys. No more girls’ or boys’ clothes — just clothes. They will remove pink wall paper from the Barbie aisle and remove blue from G.I. Joe’s section. Target wants to do away with any gender signage to create “balance.”
Why? ABC explained that a pierced, hair dyed, tattooed Mother was shocked, SHOCKED!!!, when she saw the evil gender signage. Abi Bechtel is a self referred feminist who doesn’t want her kids playing with toys meant for their own gender. It’s sexist!
Don’t do this, @Target pic.twitter.com/cfh3cp5Nqa
— Abi Bechtel (@abianne) June 1, 2015
Target considers this “social media backlash” against gender signage as justification to, well, ignore gender all together.
By the way, the ABC “news” team had absolutely zero mention of anyone who may disagree with this craziness. Fair and balanced, amirite?
As a father to two sons, one a definite alpha male, and the other, well… he likes hugs, I cringed at this report. One thing I know is that kids gravitate toward what they like. Most kids like toys or clothes designed for their own gender.
What Target is doing is furthering the extremist narrative that gender in itself is exclusionary. It’s better to remove “boys” and “girls” labels as those could make the infinitesimal percentage of kids who feel different, also feel excluded.
The question is, where does this stop? When will the color blue be outlawed? When will Mattel Toys be mandated to have Barbie, Ken and Pat?
You can watch the full ABC report here.
Published in Culture
I like to see my (sporty) daughters tie up each others’ hair and paint each others’ toenails. I’d crack up if I saw my sons doing either. Should I turn myself in?
Each day brings a new insanity.
I was playing Life with my 9 y.o. niece recently. She picked the pink person to start off the game and had it in the driver’s position. When the marriage point came up she picked the blue peg and then switched the blue into the driver’s seat. “You are a traditionalist”, I thought.
Whatever label you put on the shelf, my daughter still wants the princess legos.
I was once visiting a J. Crew with a good friend who had just been appointed director of stores and he was excitedly pointing to the new changes in floor lay-out. “You see?” he crowed; “No signs or delineations between women’s and men’s apparel! The customer has to guess.”
My eloquent response : “Uh … really?”
This may be a little excessive, but I like the sound of it as a whole, and we’re major Target shoppers. Kids (and parents) should like what they like, without the need of neon flashing lights gearing you towards one product or another.
I couldn’t keep my daughter away from princess, dresses, or sparkly shoes if I wanted to. She doesn’t need any extra encouragement. I also love how interested she is when I get out my tools to fix something. She’s awesome.
Are we agreed that the sign that started this kerfuffle is pretty dumb? That, of course, does not require the purging of everything gender-related, but the overreaction is illustrative of how ridiculously risk averse major corporations have become–especially ones linked to Mark Dayton (D-Minn).
True, but as someone who became an uncle long before he became a father, I can say that when I was a childless single man I had no idea what might interest an eight-year-old girl (and evidently a scale model of the Akagi was a bad choice).
With the current clothes geared toward yutes, I may not be able to guess. When I see bearded skull caps wearing skinny jeans, I seek out the nearest eye bleach.
Not so sure… I have sons, so I can only assume if wanted a specific building set made for girls, I would seek out that section. But agree with your comment. Mark Dayton is Dayton Hudson right?
The market will sort it out. This strikes me as an opportunity for Target’s less insane retail competition to steal a march on them.
Are these the same people Who insist on referring to Bruce Jenner a woman?
If Target as a free market operator wishes to do this what is the problem? If there is really such a clamoring for gender identified toys and clothes then the market will respond and smack them down.
Right?
650 pounds? That’s what, $900? I wish you were my uncle!
People here can criticize the decision and belittle the reasoning that went into it. That’s the market at work too.
Same ship, different scale.
Sure, and I can respond in kind right?
Right, you should just be careful not to imply that being upset by it is somehow anti-market.
I hate stores like that! Those of us who are fashion challenged need all the hints we can get. When I have to guess, I get very uncomfortable and go somewhere else.
With toys on the other hand I really don’t think signs or segregation are needed.
Was this a market-based decision? Or was it brainwashed graduates of gender studies programs? Meanwhile, one more store where I will not be shopping.
Any relation to Alison Bechdel?
I didn’t say that, nor did I title my post suggesting that Targets move was emblematic of the removal of gender from society.
Wait. Are they seriously considering combining the “Men’s Clothing” and “Women’s Clothing” into just “Clothing”?
Or are they just saying that because that’s what silly SJWs want to hear?
Because that has got to be the dumbest marketing decision ever.
Guess I’ll be shopping for clothes at Farm & Fleet from here on out.
It’s getting worse:
http://www.vancouversun.com/life/fashion-beauty/Androgyny+fashion+headed+gender+bending+moment/11274190/story.html
Quote:
Ech.
Of course this is “high fashion”, not the run of the mill stuff that people actually wear, but still expect to see a lot more of it. Maybe it will drive out the trend for too small hipster “skinny” stuff.
With NO GENDER SIGNS, how will anyone know which bathroom to use?
Note: I welcome any and all to join my grass roots campaign to remind the public that people do not have gender. Words have gender, people have sex.
High fashion follows its own course. Like the hipster stuff that’s been the plague of the last few years it will suddenly go out of vogue as fashion designers “rediscover” that men want to dress in a classy way again, like they did back in the 90s, the 30s, the 50s and 60s, etc.
A major downside to this trend, however, is that I’m guessing beards will go out of fashion again (I think we’ve hit beard critical mass), so I’ll be against the trend again.
Skinny jeans belong in the women’s clothing department.
That makes me think of the episode of The Office where Michael Scott is showing off his brand new suit to everyone. He doesn’t believe it when everyone points out to him that he is wearing a woman’s suit.
They’ll take my beard when they shave it from my cold, dead face.
No kidding. How are you supposed to lift heavy objects in really tight pants?
Jamie,
Sorry, but I disagree. Target is not a small mom & pop retailer. It’s ubiquitous. It certainly does represent “society”.
BTW: I like Target. I shop Target. I respect a store that gets me to spend $200 when I only went for shampoo.