Pink is a Gender?

After watching Paris is Burning in this class, I was able to take on a new perspective about gender roles and how they plan out in each individual’s life.  Rachael brought up something I have never thought about before, the overlooked ridiculousness of gender themes parties.  We all have seen one of these gender reveal videos on Facebook that is adorable, but reduces the babies entire identity down to a single color (blue or pink, shocker).  This made me think more about the roles gender plays in my own life and how it shouldn’t be accepted to reduce my identity down to just my gender from birth.  This idea reminded me of a video from BuzzFeed that I watched last semester.  This video was titled Childhood Gender Roles in Adult Life. Simply from the title it is obvious what this video consisted of, a lot of pink, blue, and stereotypical “boy/girl” things.  Essentially this videos purpose was to make fun of the gender norms we place on children (who have had no say in this identity given to them) and how it would be considered ridiculous as adults.  I have always admired BuzzFeed as a company because I believe they do a good job at creating quality content, while putting different (sometimes controversial) ideas into perspective.  There is a market designed specifically “for women” or “for men” products on things like pens and tape that have no gender specific role what-so-ever.  While, this video isn’t necessarily directing any change for companies or people, it is a (small) step in the right direction to start the topic of not assigning specific gender roles to children.  I highly recommend checking out this video and others like it that BuzzFeed has to offer that can give perspective on important topics.