Gender Equality My Ass

I'm a daughter of the 1980s. I believe that girls can be good at math and science, that I can bring home the turkey bacon and fry it up in a pan, and that men can be fantastic stay at home dads. I want my son to grow up knowing that girls are smart and fun to be around and that it's not a threat to his manhood to marry a woman who makes more money than he does. I want him to know that his Daddy is not only not less of a man, but more of one, because he cleans the house better than Mommy ever could or would, and that Mommy worships the ground Daddy walks on for his spectacular, homemade, from scratch, Sweet and Sour Chicken.

So why is the American toy industry conspiring against me?

My kid doesn't yet know that the world thinks that there are boy toys and girl toys, or boy colors and girl colors. But the world knows that if something is pink, it's for a girl. And if it's frilly, it's for a girl. I don't really mind that too much - I don't have a burning need to put him in a frilly pink shirt.

But I DO have a burning need to buy him a doll stroller.

He plays with doll strollers all day at school. When the little girls bring them to synagogue on Saturday all he wants to do is play with them. He puts his teddy bear in them and pushes them around the room. When a doll stroller is unavailable, he'll push around his umbrella stroller, no matter how unwieldy it is. I really, really, want to get him one.

Every last one I can find is pink. Really pink. Majorly, monumentally pink. We have had this problem once before, when we wanted to get him a play kitchen. They were all pink. And frilly and stereotypically girly. (Thank goodness for Step 2.)

Here's a word to the toy industry. My kid is 18 months old. He doesn't know that kitchens and strollers are for girls. I know I should be enlightened enough to get my kid pink toys and not care, but I'd like to get him something that says it's ok to be a snips-and-snails-and-puppy-dog-tails kind of boy and still like to cook and play with dolls. (Have we learned nothing from Free to Be... You and Me?)