Cinderella is Pregnant Barbie

We've been reading a few different versions of Cinderella. This, combined with a few playdates with friends has sparked an interesting outcome. First, Buzz Lightyear has gone to a ball, this was when he played with his friend, Miriam. And Keohi has declared in my old beaded necklace, that he cannot go to the ball because all he has is his old petticoat. I told him not to worry, I was sure the godmother would show up pretty soon.

Tonight I played Cinderella with his doll Pregnant Barbie who sports a purple and pink minidress (Barbie has removable stomach w/baby, gift from godfather). Cinderella is missing one purple platform shoe, so the story works nicely with the missing shoe reality of Pregnant Barbie. She danced with the Prince at the ball. Prince is what you'd expect--a short squat guy, more specifically an ice cream spoon with a handle in the shape of a plump penguin. Godmother, is the other ice cream spoon--the handle in the shape of a pig. Coach is a Halloween pumpkin, and the evil stepsisters and the coach footmen are those old Fisher Price figures from my own childhood, plastic and wood squares and circles.

I was thinking a lot about re-enactments and games of imagination and how they may or may not be encouraged based on gender. I have noticed that boys are more likely to be encouraged to play games with vehicles, but that with rare exception, human and animal figure games, which would give rise to a potentially more complex level of play--nuance of emotions, situations, plots, and characters, are encouraged more in girls, simply because girls are given the opportunity to play with human figures, like dolls, and may have a larger collection of stuffed objects. This is not to say that boys don't have their fair share of animals, very often not stuffed, but small animal figures, but what does it really mean that boys are not given human replicas to play with as frequently as girls? How does that foster a certain kind of learning, and thus, a certain kind of play, and therefore, a certain type of human interaction and emotional development?

I was thinking of my friend Renee's son and how he had the Little Bill doll, and trying really, racking my brain to think of other little boys who play with dolls, and cannot think of many, if any, offhand. Keohi's first doll he really likes is Buzz Lightyear. He had another generic baby doll, but never developed a strong passion for it. Then there was a brief fascination with his friend Emma's orange haired battery doll that had a godawful song it sang (Emma gave it to Keohi, and Keohi has now passed that on to a little girl...and the girl's parent has told me he wishes the battery would die! Of course it won't. It's made in China. And toys made in China that you want to break, never break!). Anyway, I digress, but thinking of how what we foist upon our children is really gender based, one has to make a conscious effort to avoid gender based toys and it is not easy.

I actually asked him if he liked playing with cars recently, and he said no, and his cars now seem to serve a function for the other human or animal figures and don't exist as a toy in and of itself as much as they did a year ago. It's all about imaginary play now and the interspersing of a few films with book plots and random events. And guns, he got a gun for a birthday gift. But after its limited play arena (ask for it, an adult takes it out of the bag, then you play with it alone because you can't shoot the sponge bullets at anyone, especially mom, and let's face it, he's an only child so who else gets to be shot at in the house?) he grew tired of it. That said, there was a lot of pretend gun stuff on the playground a few weeks ago, and he's always doing the Buzz laser to me, so his interest in annihilating someone like his mom has not totally left. I also know that pretend guns do not necessarily lead to real guns. I played with a water gun. I have not killed anyone...yet.

The other day Keohi was crying about something and Stephen said, don't tell him not to cry. He'll get that all the time as a boy, and it's not healthy. Boys have to cry too. I said, what about the fake cry? I've told him that there's crying for a big thing and then crying for s small thing, and Stephen said, that's confusing, just don't say don't cry. I thought about this and still try to reason with Keohi about this, but I'd have to agree with Stephen here. There is a way that people treat boys that can be quite different from how they treat girls. Very complex. And saying that boys don't or can't cry is such a wrong thing to do, but it's done all the time in very subtle ways.

I believe the last time someone said something inane to me about boys and girls with regards to my son, I finally said this: OK, you tell me, you want your daughter to marry a jerk who expects her to cook, clean, take care of him, and thinks she is less simply because she is female? Or do you want her to end up with a guy who thinks she's an equal and can talk to her and respects her? That's what I want my son to be.

Women are often the primary caretakers and are most definitely responsible for creating ideas of gender. And they say the most outrageous things! And if I hear one more person blather about how boys are genetically programmed to like automobiles or girls the color pink, I really will eat the person for breakfast! AUGH.

Looking for Feminist Mothers in Hong Kong. Are you there? I feel like I'm in a goddamn desert sometimes.