Not every toy manufacturer it seems believes that only boys should play with machine guns and all other death defying instruments that normally signal masculine tendencies. According to one Swedish toy manufacturer, Top Toy, little girls should be allowed to share in the same adventurers and not necessarily be constrained to playing with their doll set.
The outlet’s latest Christmas toy catalogue in fact goes one further, not only are girls playing with machine guns but little boys are now also (finally 35 years too late may I add) allowed to play with doll sets too.
The switching of gender roles comes after the outlet was called out back in 2008 for what some regarded its strict adherence to stereotypical depictions of boys and girls which at the time had many weary especially after Sweden made a big push to promote gender equality in schools, spending as media outlet rtnotes some 110 million Swedish crowns ($16.3 million) in an effort that included the introduction of laws requiring teachers to actively help reverse gender stereotypes.
Offered Top Toy director of sales Jan Nyberg :“With the new gender thinking, there is nothing that is right or wrong. It’s not a boy or a girl thing, it’s a toy for children.”
Isn’t it refreshing that little girls and boys are finally being encouraged from a young age not to accept societal imposed limitations which should inform them how to act or not simply because they were born a girl or a boy….?
Then there was this comment that caught my attention too:
Of course your physical appearance has nothing to do with what toys you play with! Ditto for sexual orientation, mental health, fabric of society and whatever other inane, bigoted BS you’re paranoid about. Not to mention the obvious fact that this isn’t about forcing children to play with certain toys — this is about giving them the freedom to play with toys they WANT to play with, but may be too embarrassed to express, due to the prevailing culture.
Bottom line: This is the kind of crap that’s been used as arguments against every major social progression: ending slavery, giving women equal rights, legalizing gay marriage, etc. They were all supposed to lead to the apocalypse because they were supposedly going against what God/Nature/Society/Science said was right — maybe it’s time to think about why exactly none of that came to pass.
