
When Did Girls Start Wearing Pink? - pguzmang
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/When-Did-Girls-Start-Wearing-Pink.html
======
ChuckMcM
One practical aspect of the same clothes until age 6 is that kids grow so fast
you need to re-use clothes. In the 18th and 19th century when having clothes
made was much more expensive, and the number of children a family had was
high, the re-use would have been essential. Any parent today who has had two
kids of one sex and then the third comes along of the other sex finds they
have a bunch of boxes of things that they don't want to use.

We sought to keep our baby clothes especially and up to about age 3 clothes as
neutral as possible for that reason.

~~~
mc32
While boys and girls wore "dresses" till about age 6 or 7, till they were
breached[1], they carried gender markers --at least in the upper classes. The
clothes were not interchanged. The styles were different and people of the
time would be able to identify the gender.

[1][http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeching_(boys)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeching_\(boys\))

~~~
mjn
Two differences, fwiw:

1\. Boys more often had square collars. For example, if you look at
[http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_children_of_Charl...](http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_children_of_Charles_I_of_England-
painting_by_Sir_Anthony_van_Dyck_in_1637.jpg), the girl on the left has a
rounded collar, while the boy 2nd-from-left has a squared-off collar.

2\. Boys sometimes wore bands
([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bands_(neckwear)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bands_\(neckwear\))
). Due to their frequent use of lace they often are perceived as feminine
today, but were perceived as masculine at the time. You can sort of see that
on Roosevelt in the linked article. Some clearer examples are visible in the
Wikipedia gallery of unbreeched boys:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeching_(boys)#Gallery](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breeching_\(boys\)#Gallery)

Source, unfortunately paywalled (and it's a very minor part of the article, so
not necessarily worth digging up unless you're interested in the main article
subject):
[http://www.jstor.org/stable/1923418](http://www.jstor.org/stable/1923418)

~~~
ars
Both of those gender markers look like they would be easy to alter with a bit
of sewing, so the idea that clothing is gender neutral to make reuse easier
still stands.

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shirro
I am sure with higher infant mortality and bigger families there were massive
cost savings in gender neutral clothes for small children. We have our first
girl due. I went to the local semi-quality big chain store and a stack of nice
pink onesies were on the rack for under $5 (AUD) each. I got them to the self-
checkout and found they were all marked down to around $3 which is less than a
large cup of coffee around here. So although we will reuse our huge supply of
robot, dinosaur and truck outfits, colour coding her gender in public for the
benefit of strangers isn't going to be a huge financial burden.

More pissed off with the pink toy aisles. I can buy my boys a semi-decent
quality kitchen to play Gordon Ramsey in for $110 AUD on special at the same
store available in pastel pink only (all the kitchens stuff has pictures of
girls on it and is pink - all designed by or for Americans I guess). A similar
gender neutral product in the same store is available by online order only for
nearly twice the price. So the boys have a pink kitchen because fuck it - boys
cook and women haven't been trapped in a kitchen for decades.

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ams6110
Never heard that dresses were gender-neutral for small children in the 19th
century. Seems I've seen plenty of old photographs that show boys wearing
traditionally "masculine" clothing, though commonly with short pants,
transitioning to long pants during adolescence.

~~~
ronnier
My guess is that it was very rare but because of agendas, it'll be played up
and mentioned to seem as though it was more common than it actually was. Just
me guessing... knowing nothing about the subject.

~~~
CapitalistCartr
Yes, you don't know. This isn't a matter of opinion or guessing; its a matter
of established fact, with lots of written and photographic documentation. As
Daniel Patrick Moynihan supposedly said: "Everyone is entitled to his own
opinion, but not his own facts." You add nothing to a rational discussion with
nasty slander.

~~~
auctiontheory
Fantastic quote - I'm going to use that.

------
bobwaycott
> _Today’s color dictate wasn’t established until the 1940s, as a result of
> Americans’ preferences as interpreted by manufacturers and retailers._

That is the bit of history I'd like to read far more about, from primary
sources. Specifically to suss out whether manufacturers and retailers
_interpreted_ these color preferences or _manufactured_ them.

Also, it's annoying when sites inject links and other shit into copying and
pasting a sentence from the article to quote it elsewhere.

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Zelphyr
Now I'm not colorblind but I do know the girl in that first picture isn't
wearing pink and OHMYGODTHATSABOY...

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pan69
Related segment on QI:

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2f7urmRaRxY&t=2m12s](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2f7urmRaRxY&t=2m12s)

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auctiontheory
It's only within the last few Presidential election cycles that the
Republicans have become "red" and the Democrats "blue," which is the opposite
of what you might expect.

What has "always" been true usually has very definite origins, sometimes quite
recent.

~~~
moocowduckquack
Am now just waiting for the GOP to adopt the red flag as a symbol and then the
great circle of irony will be complete.

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harest
Everyone who is not colorblind perceives that there is a special emotion
linked to a specific color. This applys to Children as well - they are not
emotionless entitiys until the age of 6. They have thier favourite colors
afore.

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TazeTSchnitzel
It would be nice to return to the times of gender-neutral clothing, and
perhaps keep it that way until the child expresses a preference. After all,
genitals don't determine gender, they determine sex.

~~~
Tichy
That gender discussion is so weird. It seems people who are concerned about
being forced into a role because of their gender go to great lengths and
mental acrobatics to define some kind of new genders. So they struggle and
struggle to actually define new roles they can be confined to.

Wouldn't it be easier to simply not worry about gender at all and simply use
your sex in any way you please?

~~~
derleth
> Wouldn't it be easier to simply not worry about gender at all and simply use
> your sex in any way you please?

The people who do this fit into the box marked 'genderqueer'.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genderqueer](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genderqueer)

~~~
Tichy
I don't think so - just because you don't worry about gender boxes doesn't
mean you want to live all kinds of gender roles.

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emmelaich
My information on why red/pink _was_ associated with males is that red dye is
more expensive. Thus the wearing of red is a status symbol.

(Source: talk on Vikings at Jorvik Viking museum/village)

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vacri
_Why have young children’s clothing styles changed so dramatically?_

As opposed to all other demographic segments?

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circa
do you not get the Victorias Secret catalog?

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Dewie
It is interesting that some social conservatives (or maybe just non-liberals?)
care about consciously enforcing gender roles through clothing. This would
seem to imply that they are similar in their beliefs with feminists when it
comes to the nature/nurture question: that gender is enforced through culture.
But this is usually thought of as a very liberal idea (or whatever I should
call it).

Pink as an effeminate color has always seemed kind of arbitrary to me. I just
can't see how a color would have a specific gender.

~~~
endtime
Sorry to be crude, but there is a very non-arbitrary reason for pink to be
associated with females (and to a lesser extent, blue with males). In fact I
always assumed this was indeed the cause for the association - I'm very
surprised to learn it used to be reversed.

~~~
Dewie
> Sorry to be crude, but there is a very non-arbitrary reason for pink to be
> associated with females (and to a lesser extent, blue with males).

You're excusing yourself for being crude? How is this crude?

> Sorry to be crude, but there is a very non-arbitrary reason for pink to be
> associated with females (and to a lesser extent, blue with males). In fact I
> always assumed this was indeed the cause for the association - I'm very
> surprised to learn it used to be reversed.

So what is the non-arbitrary reason? The one mentioned in the article?

~~~
meepmorp
> So what is the non-arbitrary reason? The one mentioned in the article?

You seem smart enough to have figured out the implication, but I believe s/he
meant that the inner portion of the labia and opening to the vagina are pink;
the word pink is also used as a slag term for the female genitalia.

~~~
Dewie
Well in that case: the penis glans is pink.

~~~
meepmorp
Sure. I'm not endorsing the theory, merely stating it more directly (or so I
think - I might be wrong).

~~~
endtime
You're not wrong, that's what I meant. Well, and that the tunica albuginea is
bluish, I believe.

