Sunday, February 10, 2008

a-HAH - I always suspected this!

Whether girlie or girlist, girls, because they’re allowed more latitude in their identities, can still be girls: Boys, on the other hand, must be boys — unless no one is watching. In another study of younger children, Cherney and London found that if ushered alone into a room and told they could play with anything, nearly half the boys chose “feminine” toys as often as “masculine” ones, provided they believed nobody, especially their fathers, would find out. That made me question whether any more expansive vision of girlhood can survive without a similar overhaul of boyhood, which, apparently, is not in the offing. Learning to “create an amazing dance routine” (as suggested by “Everything”) is still far more Dangerous for boys than, as their own volume suggests, learning to juggle.


NYTimes Magazine

That's what is known as The Patriarchy at Work.