Are Girl-Focused Engineering Toys Reinforcing Gender Stereotypes?

theodp writes: VentureBeat's Ruth Read casts a skeptical eye at the current rage of toy segregation meant to inspire tomorrow's leaders in STEM: "Toys geared at girls serve to get them interested in coding and building when they're young, hopefully inspiring their educational interests down the road. But these gendered toys may be hurting women by perpetuating a divide between men and women." Read concludes, "Ultimately, girls (who will become women) are going to have to learn and work in a world where genders are not segregated; as will men. That means they need to learn how to interact with one another as much as they need to be introduced to the same educational opportunities. If STEM education is as much for girls as it is for boys, perhaps we should be equally concerned with getting boys and girls to play together with the same toys and tools, as we are with creating learning opportunities for girls."

Comments

Poor exploited women

[Skylinux]

One just needs to fire up a random twitch stream hosted by a female. There is a VERY high chance that you'll look right down her cleavage because SHE positioned the webcam that way.
Most webcams by men stop at the shoulders or right below .....

I know it is the fault of men because some watch it and by doing so are forcing her to expose her boobs.

Poor exploited women!

Re:Wow, just wow...

[qrwe]

Yes. But this doesn't mean one has to add up to any known differences with stuff that doesn't make sense. Why making stuff more "girl-ish" (or boy-ish" for that matter) that doesn't need any sort of gender extravagance? E.g. I find pastel colored/pink LEGO for girls nonsense. Why? Because it's...nonsense – I can't see how that makes anyone good to point out what's for girls and what's for boys. Instead, make multi-colored LEGO for kids who likes them. End of story.

Re:Down with "research"! (Re:Wow, just wow...)

[AmiMoJo]

The homosexuality issue is slightly more complex than your understanding of it. While there may be some element of choice to some degree, what is important is that many people, probably most people, feel that they can't change their's. Most straight people feel that they couldn't choose to be gay, and would be upset if people blamed them for "choosing" to be straight. They would feel it was unfair and discriminatory, because while it is perfectly fair to criticise people for their choices it isn't fair to criticise them for things they have no control over.

So actually, the science of it isn't even that important. What is important is that most people can't choose to be straight or gay, they just are, and people who blame them for that deserve criticism. I think most people understand that, but somehow you got bogged down on one specific detail and missed it.