Princesses and Superheroes.

When I say pink, princess, doll house, kitchen set the image that will appear in ones mind will be of a girl and if I say blue, superheroes, blocks, cars the image will be of a boy. Well this is pretty  natural for anyone to think like that but,  Is it natural?? 

I would like to ask a simple  question,  why particular images popped in head??? 

Is it too obvious, are toys or Colours gender specific??? 

Well anyone who'll enter my home can tell that there's a child in home. By seeing the decor and by a quick peek into the playroom....Train, plain, cars, dinosaur, puzzles, basketball ,cricket kit...one can clearly tell the child is a boy.

Well, we( me and husband) like every other parent loves shopping toys for our five years old son and he too keeps toys decently. Properly arranged and taken care as if it's his biggest treasure.

Whenever we go shopping there are sections pink for girls consisting of dolls, makeup kits and kitchen sets and blue for boys having cars, trucks and building blocks on the other.

I never understood why pink and blue sections. Why define colours as gender specific. Why girls can't have blue or boys have pink???

Recently I got a note from his school saying that they are conducting an activity "Bathing the Doll" in school and further mentioned that the purpose of the activity is to inculcate the Sense of belongingness in children.

When I read I felt little weird, an activity involving doll, what will boys do in it??? Strange, could have thought of something else. It's total waste of time.

So I decided i'll send a sorry note to his teacher that we don't have a doll. Will participate in some other activity. But the thought never left my mind.

As the day for the activity came near, I kept thinking about it. What to do??? I decided to tell my decision to my son that,  "since you are a boy and didn't have a doll, you won't be able to participate in the activity." 

When he heard bathing the doll, he enthusiastically jumped. A smile came on his face that said,  "i'll take care of the Doll and make her take a bath and make her brush her teeth..."  

"Just like you mummy. "

These words shook me. I didn't knew how to react. Why is he interested in dolls???

That day went bit tensed so I shared it with my husband. He just gave one calm smile and said why not, if he is interested. There is nothing wrong, it's just an activity.

Well it gave me bit relief so I agreed but I kept thinking why doll, why not something else....it was bit tough for me to digest.

Other day he was playing with a spatula and using it as a sword and what further opened my eyes were the colour of his pink  t-shirt.

I never backed this colour and gender ideology. When it came to colours while buying clothes for my son I picked every colour that he liked. I always ask him before buying which colour you like the most?? In short, his wardrobe consists of every colour yellow, pink, green, red, purple..why restrict  him to blue or black...?? He loves colours and even I want him to enjoy every colour.

But when it came to toys,  I found myself following  an outdated thought about what is acceptable for boys and girls. 

Interestingly, my son doesn't understand this gender specific programming at this age and the truth is that he is learning this from me and people around. 

I asked myself a simple question what exemplar do i wish to give my child when assuming implicitly or explicitly, "this is for male"  and "this is for female". and this made me realise  my mistake. 

One thing was always clear that toys are meant for playing. They allow kids to use their imagination in best possible  way and teach them difficult  lessons in simplest way. 

The thing i leaned is that toys are gender neutral  just like the colours but the way they are marketed is not neutral. 

So i arranged  a baby doll for the activity because its OK to play.  Like we want our girls to be powerful similarly we should encourage  boys to be not only masculine but also nurturing. 

An activity  that made both me and my son learn a lesson. 

For me: Let toys be toys. 

For him: Nurturing,  Relationship building,  Empathy. 

One thing that i promise to myself is to be supportive of my son to pursue anything that interests him and will never force my views that I think he should be doing.