(Picture: Dave Anderson for Metro.co.uk)

Toddlers today shouldn’t adhere to archaic gender stereotypes, right?

You’re dead wrong. And anyway, pipe down – it’s not up to you.

Why I’m relaxed about my toddler’s ‘excessive’ screen time

While attempting, as is my way, to make cringingly awkward chit-chat with a fellow parent at the swings recently, I seized upon the feeble icebreaker that my little boy was wearing mostly blue and her little girl predominately pink.

‘I know, right?’ she confirmed, in the torpid tones of the perennially sleepless. ‘I kinda hate myself for it, but it’s what she wants.’


Bear in mind, this is Brighton – a city so exhaustingly progressive, most conversations conclude with at least one participant sponsoring a manatee, signing a petition and/or rolling a joint.



Yet there we were, pushing our respective sprogs; my lad in his beloved dinosaur coat, clutching Gordon the Blue Engine, her girl rocking pigtails and singing ‘Let it goooooo!’ at the top of her adorable little voice.

I’m a fairly forward-thinking, hippy daytime daddy, who wouldn’t dream of indoctrinating my cherished offspring with old-hat, stereotypical notions of clothing, or prescribe him ‘boyish’ toys to play with.

The mum seemed a fairly groovy type herself – if her rad bicycle, purple highlights and clutch of festival wristbands were anything to go by.

Yet, clearly our kids knew better.

Hey gurrrrl (Picture: Getty)

This prompted me to think about the modish folly of gender-neutral parenting.

Essentially, the theory goes that generations of under-5s (you and I included, probably) were emotionally crippled by our parents’ blinkered insistence on buying rayguns and racecars for boys, or ballerinas and beauty aids for girls.

All boys should be given prams and dolls to play with – here’s why

Therefore, the argument concludes, we should studiously avoid any and all ‘gender-stereotyped’ toys, and let little ones figure out complex questions of identity all by themselves.

Before many of them have learned to take an unsupervised crap, I might add.

But what if – and, with respect to childless readers, your opinion means f*** all from here on in – kids seem to naturally like that stuff?

To be clear, I am talking specifically about toddlers here.

Gender-normative stereotypes obviously become untenable as kids get older.

Of course girls can, and should, be into dinosaurs and rockets.

And of course, boys should twig early doors that race-cars are dumb and baking cakes is awesome.

But, anecdotally, across my fairly right-on friendship group (and that cute hippy mum at the swings), girls seem to like Frozen and dollies, while boys are generally drawn to train sets and sharks.

Want something more scientific?

This actual, legit study from City University took kids away from their parents and put them into a room with ‘girl’ and ‘boy’ toys.

Surprise, surprise, young boys went for cars and girls went for dolls.

According to the study:

Biological differences give boys an aptitude for mental rotation and more interest and ability in spatial processing, while girls are more interested in looking at faces and better at fine motor skills and manipulating objects.

Suck on that.

Patriarchy scum (Picture: Getty)

I know some of you will be frothing at this outrage, but is it really so hard to acknowledge biological differences (bone structure, sex organs etc) as a legacy of human evolution and not behavioural differences?



And moreover, as a harried dad (non-parents, once again, feel free to stick a fork in a plug socket), I give my darling little imp certain types of toys because if I don’t, he’ll scream bloody murder at me until I do.

Yes, yes, gender is a construct, and praise be for the glorious rainbow of human sexual expression, post-puberty or whatever.

But don’t give yourself a hard time if you’re a parent and your little boy happens to like shooting toy guns, or your girl gets a kick out of Barbie.

They’ll rebel soon enough, and you can restore your glossy carapace of metropolitan liberal elite smugness.

But for now?

It’s not up to you.

It’s up to your kid.

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