You're too stupid for real science.
Instead, we will package stuff for you in cutesy pink with flowers and call it adorable.
Don't worry, because teaching you to make perfumes and incense is really the best use of science for you.
A girl can't aspire to actually BE a scientist. M'kay?
I first read about this crap at The Defiant Marshmallow
Linked to this blog Spasms of Accommodation
I did read the stuff at the website for the kits. The copy on the web page does use actual scientific terminology, and perhaps one could say that at least it points out to the pink and helpless variety of young woman that some sort of science is possible. That cosmetics and fluffy things are actually science. But I find it insulting.
Why can't we just say that it's science and let kids know that boys and girls can learn the same stuff? Why package it in pink and blue and make it gender specific when it's not necessary?
I can tell you that when we do any sort of science at work, I make damn sure to use appropriate scientific terms and concepts when I can. We have talked about inertia, neutral buoyancy, gravity, liquid/solid/gas... and I can tell you that not only do the girls understand things just as well as the boys, they're better at spelling the words when they want to write them down, and very good at explaining to their parents what we've done that afternoon. Not that the boys aren't good at it, too. But I just don't understand the idea of making 'boy' science and 'girl' science.
Unless of course it's a study of the opposite sex. But although I may have a mixed age and gender group, none of them are too concerned about that yet. They're just kids.
So what do you think about this?
Insulting?
Great idea?
I raised my kids with the understanding that knowledge isn't gender specific.
ReplyDeleteYeah, that sort of stuff drives me nuts too. I really hate the idea of "boy toys" and "girl toys". My son has always said that he wants to be a daddy and to have a baby someday.
ReplyDeleteScience kits should be for both genders and not specifically made to look more attractive to a girl. Girls either like science, or they don't. It's a personal preference - not a gender thing. Insulting? Nah. Great idea? Nope. Just silly and presumptuous.
It's a little insulting, and irritating, but so is the culture and media our girls are exposed to. If a little "girly-girl" crap leads a few girls to discover a latent interest in science, then I'm all for it. "Gender neutral" is perfectly sensible and even ideal, but it doesn't appeal emotionally to either girls of boys. Not in this society, anyway. I'd call it a necessary evil.
ReplyDeleteSuz is so right about our culture and media!!! We are surrounded by many things that perpetuate a certain mythos about how girls "should be" and how boys "should be". Blech!
ReplyDeleteBoys should never want a baby (tell that to my son) and girls should never want to be smart and use big words (as I'm reminded by insecure wives around me all the time).
How very Jane-Austen-18th-century-society all of that is!
It makes me think of the other day, when my husband told me not to stand on counters any more if I need to reach things up high, and I yelled, "THIS ISN'T THE 18th CENTURY! This is 2011!"
OK, he has a point, as far as safety is concerned, but *must* I wait around for the 6-foot-tall guy to do something on my behalf? Hells no!
However, it makes me start to wonder if society, as a whole, has really changed all that much since Jane Austen's times...
I mean, Lizzy Bennett in "Pride & Prejudice" is told by her mother not to say anything too intelligent. Buh-wha?
And, oddly enough, I've been surrounded by women who do the same thing to me!
Well, now you've got me going off on a tangent (though it is related), so I'll stop ranting on your blog. I know you get the point. Heh.
The girls in my science class tend to be the ones who are patient enough to set up an experiment, while the boys whine about that part being "boring".
ReplyDeleteOf course, in a homeschool class we're skewed towards boys who aren't in public school because they don't have the attention span to sit in a classroom all day. But I still have the impression that the girls are all going into STEM, while the boys are going to go into acting classes, or some other venue where they can make a career of fart jokes.
So my take on who is capable of "real science" is currently whacked out.
And, hey Wendy, my husband gets mad at me for climbing on the counters, too. But he takes our daughter to a climbing wall on a regular basis. Maybe all these anti-counter-climbing guys got yelled out for stuff like that when they were little, and now they can't stand to see someone else do it.
I think they package it this way for the parents and who is buying, actually. *shrug* if you do boy and girl, then you buy 2 instead of assuming they can share one kit, right? more money in their pockets
ReplyDeletethe thirst for knowledge knows no gender
ReplyDeleteWe've never been gender biased in raising our daughter although she went through a frilly pink phase around ages 4-5 but outgrew it. She always had toys like blocks, Legos, and so on in addition to any "girl" toys and we've just never made her conform to her gender. Now that she is 12, she herself notices this bias in society and it really pisses her off! She came home from her science class the other day, and apparently after she stated she liked explosions on MythBusters (they watched it for a topic) the boy sitting next to her turned to her with big eyes and exclaimed, "But you're a GIRL! That is weird.". She got VERY offended. I don't blame her. What an idiot.
ReplyDeleteWe got a catalog early this week and I hear Keilee screaming, "This makes me so mad, they have little pink perfume kits for girls and cool robots and space kits for boys"!!! I agree 100%. What a crock. One day maybe...but good grief, it IS 2011!
ReplyDeleteWhy can't there be a science of making perfume and cologne. Or making "war paint" and makeup?
ReplyDeleteEducation isn't gender specific. There may be ways to make it more apealing, but if kids aren't interested, they aren't interested.
Doesn't matter how much sugar you coat it with... unless it's a chocolate dipped oreo coated with colored sugar. Then everyone's interested.
And while we're at it, why can't boys learn to cook, do laundry and clean house? Yet all the pretend toys in that arena are marketed towards girls. Who hasn't seen a little boy spend hours (okay, maybe minutes, they have a short attention span) in the play kitchen making things? They love it too.
ReplyDelete