This 1959 ad for an airplane toy throws in girls as an afterthought in the final seconds (“Every boy wants a RemCo toy… and so do girls”). It’s easy to dismiss the ad as quaint and representative of a different time, but today’s advertising seems equally gendered, with girls thrown in as an afterthought (like in this dinosaur toy website) or neatly segregated (see here, here, and here).
Found at Vintage Ads.
Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.
Comments 4
Anonymous — December 20, 2009
I work in marketing at a toy company so I'd like to talk about this.
I'm fairly new, and at a lot of meetings I've brought up the gendering of toy products. A lot of toys I see as gender neutral, we are marketing towards boys and then we discuss making a girls version -- which inevitably ends up being something to groom girls into being housewives, like a shopping cart vs. a boat or something.
The issue is, this is what a lot of mothers want for their daughters too, and they won't buy "boy toys" for their girls. So when we do make an effort to produce something for both boys and girls, we don't see any return on that. From a business perspective, it doesn't work for us.
I'll keep fighting against sexism in the toy industry ... it's one of the things I hate most about what is generally a pretty cool industry. But parents have to want it, too, and I don't think they do in large enough numbers. And in the end, we're a business.
Electrickoolaid — December 20, 2009
This reminds me of a book I bought at a thrift store a few months back. It was published in 1962 and from the nature of the story/the size of the print it seemed like it was intended for kids around age 12 or 13. The first page of the book talked about the plot and finished with the line, "It's an exciting murder mystery for boys, that girls will enjoy too."
The Smurfette Principle » Sociological Images — March 2, 2010
[...] women are women and men are people, see our analysis of the “Human” Bodies exhibit, girls as an afterthought, dinosaurs are for boys (and girls), traffic lights with female figures, stick figures and stick [...]
Rick Jason — August 24, 2013
Stupid, politically correct (Orwellian) notions are these that pretend there are no gender differences between boys and girls. No wonder there are so many kids nowadays so screwed up that they think they are supposed to be the opposite sex. The "...and so do girls," line in this commercial is not meant to be an "afterthought" about the female sex, but to AFFIRM that it was OK for girls to play with traditionally masculine toys. 50 years later (2013), flying militarily and commercially is STILL predominantly a male field even with virtually ALL discrimination having been eliminated. My point: Most females are interested in other matters!