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Feminists are Anti-Choice
· Friday, February 3, 2012
Horror of horrors! Lego has introduced a new line of gender-specific toys aimed at girls. I might not even have become aware of the controversy had it not been a topic of discussion on the all-female PBS talk show "To the Contrary," on which I frequently appear. That we are still debating the pros and cons of allowing boys and girls to prefer different play choices says a great deal about the failure of the feminist movement.
Lego, which markets plastic building blocks for everything from "Star Wars" fighting vehicles to Egyptian pyramids, has now introduced a line aimed at young girls. The new toys include Butterfly Beauty Shop, Stephanie's Outdoor Bakery, and Olivia's House, all featuring recognizable girl figures with long hair and feminine outlines, unlike the squat, sexless figures that characterize many of the company's other building sets. More importantly, these toys depict girls engaging in traditionally female activities and roles: getting their hair done, baking, caring for children.
The company says that it has introduced the new line because of customer demand. Little girls (or their mothers) apparently aren't lining up to buy Lego's Fangpyre Wrecking Balls or Pirates of the Caribbean. But feminist critics say that the real motive is to reinforce gender stereotypes and limit little girls' aspirations.
In fact, it's the feminists who want to limit women's choices. Their message to girls and young women is: If you're not exactly like men, you don't believe in equal rights.
For much of the last 40 years, feminists have pushed to masculinize women. They have insisted that girls should want to become engineers, firefighters or athletes; that they should be as eager to engage in combat as men; that their careers should define them.
At the same time, feminists have taken on the task of feminizing males. Boys should not be afraid of playing with dolls; they should learn to play nice; they should cooperate rather than compete with others. Men should share child-rearing, cooking, cleaning. They should be sensitive, learn to share their feelings, and value their emotional side as much as their rational one.
The feminist influence on Hollywood has replaced as an icon of female beauty the voluptuous and feminine Marilyn Monroe with the gaunt, well-muscled Hilary Swank, while jettisoning the ruggedly male Clint Eastwood for the softly feminine Jake Gyllenhaal. Feminists have ensured that textbooks depict women as astronauts and fighter pilots and rewrite history to glorify the role of even minor female figures at the expense of eliminating major accomplishments by males.
But despite the feminist movement's almost complete success in refashioning the terms of the cultural debate, feminists have not been able to convince most little girls to want to play with starfighters and missile launchers.
Having been a mother to three boys, a grandmother to six more, and a grandmother to three girls, I know that sex differences in personality, likes and dislikes are usually present from birth. While boys' and girls' preferences range along a broad spectrum, rare is the little boy who doesn't like to build things and then smash them up, and rare is the little girl who is as interested in doing so -- especially the smashing-up part.
So why shouldn't a company that hopes to increase its market share take advantage of those differences? What's wrong with creating toys that'll have an appeal to customers who want to bake cupcakes and have their hair and nails done?
As long as we don't tell girls they should never choose the action figure over the princess or tell boys that they must play with guns and not dolls, we're not cutting off options for either gender. Real choice entails letting individuals -- even young ones -- gravitate toward what they want, not what ideologues wish them to prefer.
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BNgranny
Well, Linda, you got this one right.
It's no wonder boys don't know how to be men and fulfill their roles as providers and protectors. Or girls grow up to think of men as only useful as sperm donors and don't think being a wife, mother, homemaker is a useful occupation.
Feminists are only pro-choice if they are the ones choosing for all. No individualism allowed here.
Posted February 3, 2012 at 10:48:55 AM
wjmccrindle
Gender specific, gender neutral, who gives a rats ass? It will be only a matter of time before LEGO sell homo targeted toys for the aberant union couples who are raising children. When we return to the values of the 10 Comandments and stop pandering to the Idiots of the immoral and atheist left, maybe we will be able to raise reality based children that are male and female, and recognize their real differences, and not some fantasy equality. Boys and Girls are different, and the genger deranged marxist statist anti Christian Islam homo loving delusional liberals should just get a clue, but I wouldn't think anybody that mentaly challenged could separate fact from fiction.
Posted February 3, 2012 at 11:07:00 AM
rippedchef
ya know I like reading things here but that wjmccrindle dude and his brother just lollygag around an issue,I wish they would both just express their opinions already and quit beatin' around the bush!!As to the point,can anyone tell me what is more importanat than raising children??Is there anything more honorable or rewarding for a woman to do??My wife is an amazing woman,raising my 4,homeschooling,running my life,running a household-I don't know how she does it,a true proverbs 31 wife.There isn't a career wielding feminazi that could hold a candle to what she does in a day-I'm the most blessed man I know
Posted February 3, 2012 at 6:59:39 PM
CA Conservative
Linda, Thanks for an enlightened look at the topic of feminism. I think my daughter said it best when as a 22 yr old, right out of college chose Miss to go on her name badge at her her new job. Her boss asked her if she was sure because that might offend some of the "feminists" in the company. My girl replied, "I don't see why, I thought feminism was all about giving me the choice of what I want to call myself. I choose Miss, thank you."
Todays feminist are more about being angry with anybody who disagrees with their now anitquated and disproven concept of sameness of the sexes than they are about the concept of assuring all choices for women.
Posted February 4, 2012 at 5:12:40 PM
Emcee
Right on, Linda! you have said it far better than anyone I know.
WJMcCrindle: "Gender specific, gender neutral, who gives a rats ass?"?? Well, a whole lot of people do! And people can definitely make a difference by the choices they make in the marketplace. Let's support LEGO while we have the opportunity; for your sick, sad prophecy make come true far too soon. Oh, and don't hold your breath waiting for the spiritual revival necessary to make the changes you desire---it is on God's Timetable, and He will bring it about in His time, not ours. Indeed, I do not know what religious beliefs you have, but if you claim to be a Christian, please watch your language...we get far too much of that from the left as it is.
Posted February 5, 2012 at 12:14:38 AM
p3orion
Just as Henry Ford supposedly quipped that customers could have color Model-T they wanted, as long as it was black, feminists (and liberals in general) are all in favor of people having a choice... as long as it's the choice THEY would make.
The idea of being "pro-choice," which should be a conservative ideal, has been pared down to having no meaning except in relation to the abortion issue (in which case it has also been deformed into meaning essentially "pro-abortion.") In that tiny box the phrase stays.
But freedom of choice is largely what small government is all about. But how many liberals applaud freedom of choice in other issues, for example, schools (via vouchers), union membership, smoking, handgun ownership for self-protection, whether or not your children will be taught about unnatural lifestyles, or whether you must buy health insurance, to name just a few?
Only on the one issue on which many on the right would want to limit the options (whether a woman can, with impunity, enforce her wishes over whether her unborn child will be killed, with no regard to its presumed opposite opinion) do they stake out the position that the individual's rights are inviolate.
Posted February 6, 2012 at 4:27:57 PM