[Bbradley62]

gordontd, on 2015-February-11, 11:17, said:

I've tried to buy green or yellow clothes for new-born babies of friends and they seem not to exist. I suspect that most parents want there to be a way of avoiding others guessing wrong or having to ask.

I presume that since OP mentioned toy tractors and make-up kits as potential items for the blue and pink baskets, we're not talking about things for newborns.

[gordontd]

Bbradley62, on 2015-February-11, 12:22, said:

I presume that since OP mentioned toy tractors and make-up kits as potential items for the blue and pink baskets, we're not talking about things for newborns.

The topic is "blue for boys pink for girls ".

[onoway]

The idea was for school age kids. Certainly the gift basket term was mine as they were supposed to be baskets to be raffled off to be used either by the winner or as gift baskets if the winners themselves weren't into whatever it was that was in it, sorry if that was misleading. It's a fundraiser thing.

The seeds were to be part of the basket for the kids. People are not going to buy books, they figure they can get them for free from the library and many people here are struggling a little. My angle was to get something useful and interesting, with a little sheet about how to make a sunflower fort with living plants to foster the idea that there are interesting things to be learned out there. The gender thing never came into it until this last meeting. Of course there are gender differences, and there's nothing at all "wrong" with traditional roles except if they are restrictive, or lead to restrictive and narrow minded attitudes and incompetencies which are unnecessary and silly. Unfortunately they often do.

It used to be common in this area that women did not drive, some never learned even how to open a bank account or write a check. When their husbands died, they were easy prey for anyone who got in there, and some were taken advantage of.It would have saved me hundreds of dollars had anyone ever told me that a draft stopped in June, is not necessarilly a draft stopped in January. With the divorce rate what it is, women had best learn how to use a hammer and men to use a stove, as just one example. Although most of the famous chefs have been men, I've known some men who literally had no confidence in trying to learn to cook even a fried egg. This is silly.

It's not appropriate, imo, for a library or a school to foster the sense that there are areas which are not perfectly accessible for either gender.

[Fluffy]

I loved this one:

http://www.avclub.co...man-marry-94206

[Cascade]

It is very interesting to me that the societal norm of blue for boys and pink for girls is a very modern fashion. There is much evidence that only around 100 years ago pink was considered appropriate for boys and blue for girls. Do a google of pink is a boys colour.

We can break down these stereotypes by refusing to bow to the pressure. I have a pink cellphone cover in part to challenge those norms. I get into many interesting conversations just based on the colour of my cellphone.

[kenberg]

Perhaps I will be a little provocative:

You say:

Quote

one for women with bubble bath and ornamental stuff to go in gardens, and golf stuff and fishing rods for the men

Am I rgiht in assuming that there was no gender requirement for the purchaser? If a man wanted to buy "bubble bath and ornamental stuff to go in gardens" he could. right? And a woman could buy the golf clubs and fishing rods? I doubt I would buy any of it. I bought my first golf clubs by riding my bike down to the Salvation Army. The driver was 75 cents, the irons less. But if I were to buy clubs today I think I would be a little more choosy. And Becky is not really a bubble bath sort of person. She likes a good sauna.

Anyway, I sympathize with the unexpected trouble. It falls into the "no good deed goes unpunished" category.

As to the feeling of "just how did I end up here", I think I may have mentioned that a few years back the guy across the street left his wife for another woman. She was quite upset, especially about the fact that he took most of the gun collection with him so that she now had only five guns.

Btw, all in all, was the event a success?

[PassedOut]

Cascade, on 2015-February-12, 04:23, said:

It is very interesting to me that the societal norm of blue for boys and pink for girls is a very modern fashion. There is much evidence that only around 100 years ago pink was considered appropriate for boys and blue for girls.

My mother was born in 1915 and her mother definitely thought that pink was for boys and blue for girls. (That was one of quite a number of things that my mother and her mother disagreed about.)

[barmar]

Fluffy, on 2015-February-11, 16:07, said:

I loved this one:

http://www.avclub.co...man-marry-94206

I guess the anti-gay-marriage folks are right, we ARE on a slippery slope.

[blackshoe]

mike777, on 2015-February-10, 23:45, said:

I've been here ten years and the place still astonishes me with how much it's still in a time warp from the 1950s

By "here" I take it you do not mean BBO. Or do you?