This boy, even at a young age, knows what is girly and what is manly. His sister calmly searches for a new favorite toy, while he clutches onto his own for dear life. Even standing in the girl aisle could rub off on him and make him less of a boy. Society tells children of all genders that there are two categories to fit in, or else there is something wrong with them. The boy knows that he is in the wrong place and covers his eyes from the “horrors” that his sister calls her identity. He has subconsciously fallen into gender schema, which tells people to categorize things based on whether they are masculine or feminine. The picture was taken at a Toys ‘r Us, in one of their infamous girl aisles that could never be mistaken for boy aisles. The girl not facing towards the camera because she is oblivious to all of the subliminal messages she is being bombarded with in that instant. Her brother, who already went through the boy aisle, is holding onto a symbol of masculinity, a Hot Wheels play set. He is not only covering his eyes because he is embarrassed as well as terrified of the other gender’s lifestyle, but has also taken off his glasses so as to not even be able to comprehend anything around him. He is trying to the very best of his abilities to pretend that he isn’t there. It truly is a serious problem when walking near a “girl theme” will shame and scare boys. Both boys and girls have been socialized to be completely separate from the other gender, when the goal of many boys and girls is to have a family. Children are being given the wrong messages about their opposite genders, and then hold on to these messages as they get older. Giving children these clashing ideas affects their relationships with the opposite gender throughout their lives.
5 comments:
This picture was a good illustration of the concept "The Two Cultures of Childhood". Gender segregation begins early in childhood and children quiickly develop strong gender schemas of what is "female",and what is "male". This picture showed how toys can cause opposite genders to segregate prefering to be in environments respective to their own sex. The young boy in this picture is very unconfortable and knows this "girly" toy aisle stocked with soft, smooth, domestic role toys is not where he, a young male belongs, who are supposed to only play with active, rough and aggressive toys. If he showed interest in playing with those girly toys however that would evoke hostility from the girl in the aisle but even more from other boys who could have been around and saw him violating the norms of masculinity. If the boy did not reject the femanine toys he would be identified as "sissy" but since he did reject the femanine toys he is in line with peer approved behavior of masculinty.
This photo to me is a great demonstration of “The Two Cultures of Childhood.” At a young age, our society has programmed our views on gender and the types of roles both sexes “should” play and act. This photo shows just that. The image’s background is overwhelmed with pink to categorize that this specific toy aisle is “meant for girls.” I like the fact that the photographer took a higher focus on the boy in the image and no the girl. With his eyes shut and his body language exhibiting discomfort, this illustrates his taught gender role conception. His acknowledgement of being in the “girly” aisle with pink toys makes his stance and presence feel as though he is out of his element and not in the correct setting. For him, he feels as though his place is where the blue toys are with action figures and aggressive toys because that is how society has programmed his mind set in differentiating the two sexes. The expression “Pink is for girls and Blue is for boys” is an example that can be related to this concept being portrayed in the image which I find extremely interesting.
This picture shows a great concept about gender segregation. Since we started growing up we are told the difference between what toys girls should play with and what toys boys should play with. If you tried to give a boy a Barbie doll he would more than likely throw it and say these are for girls and vice versa. The picture showed that the boy was more interested in the boy toy whether than the girl one sticking to the code of masculinity. It is sad that we would get judge by the toys that we decide to play with while we were little kids. Kids should be able to play with any toys that they find interesting.
It's so sad that this is the norm. This photo accurately demonstrates gender segregation. This is so toxic to children. The boy literally can't even look to see where he is going because he ashamed to be there in the girl aisle. Unfortunately, this is nothing new. Also, I feel like if you took the girl to the boy toy aisle, she would not be nearly as ashamed and embarrassed and probably would not cover her eyes. This is because society says that it is okay for girls to like "boy things" occasionally, but it is never ever acceptable for boys to like "girl things."
The photo is a very accurate depiction of "femininity is only okay if you're female, masculinity is okay if you're either male or female." It is also a good representation of how binary not only the store isles are, but how everything consumed by children is either very girly or very manly. How the boy is portrayed in the picture is he is very ashamed to be around anything feminine. He feels like he is less of a “man” because he is in the isle. If this was reversed, the girl would not be ashamed to be in the boy’s isle. This says a lot about our culture.
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