In which she is sick of being pink
Mar. 21st, 2011 07:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
zeborahI speak not of sunburn, although that's slowly fading from scarlet to something that might almost accurately be called pink. No, I speak of course of advertising for women and its necessary precursor: sexing products to determine whether men or women should be allowed to buy it.
I went shopping today for a new umbrella, my current one being broken, and my real current one being stuck in my out-of-bounds office. I wandered through Farmers until I stumbled across some umbrellas next to the handbags. They were those tiny fold-up ones that aren't that big even unfolded, and they fall apart since making things collapsible makes them flimsy. But that's all there was so I took one of the non-pink ones to the cash register and said, "I suppose you keep all your umbrellas in the one spot?"
"You could look in the men's section," she said.
Sure enough, in the men's section are the nice big umbrellas, the ones which actually shelter you from actual rain, and which don't break as easily, and which for all these extra features are about 2/3rds the price of the crappy women's umbrellas.
Of course. Of course the men get the good umbrellas.
This evening I got home and discovered that 1-day is selling packages for "Chicks", "Blokes" and "Random". "Random" is illustrated with an image of Georgina Beyer. Since all the cool kids were writing them emails, I also wrote to them and told them my umbrella story (and said don't even get me started on shoes) and suggested as an alternative to sexing their products they could divide them into interest categories like "Sports" and "Entertainment" and "Tools" so people can get things that interest them regardless of whether they (the people, not the things) are male, female, or genderqueer.
I also reminded them that Georgina Beyer is in fact female, not "random". I probably could have emphasised this more but I got the feeling that other people already had, so I thought I'd jump in to answer the inevitable "Wah, but how else can we possibly categorise our merchandise???" lamentations.
On reflection, I think I'll write to Farmers too. [ETA: I did.]
I went shopping today for a new umbrella, my current one being broken, and my real current one being stuck in my out-of-bounds office. I wandered through Farmers until I stumbled across some umbrellas next to the handbags. They were those tiny fold-up ones that aren't that big even unfolded, and they fall apart since making things collapsible makes them flimsy. But that's all there was so I took one of the non-pink ones to the cash register and said, "I suppose you keep all your umbrellas in the one spot?"
"You could look in the men's section," she said.
Sure enough, in the men's section are the nice big umbrellas, the ones which actually shelter you from actual rain, and which don't break as easily, and which for all these extra features are about 2/3rds the price of the crappy women's umbrellas.
Of course. Of course the men get the good umbrellas.
This evening I got home and discovered that 1-day is selling packages for "Chicks", "Blokes" and "Random". "Random" is illustrated with an image of Georgina Beyer. Since all the cool kids were writing them emails, I also wrote to them and told them my umbrella story (and said don't even get me started on shoes) and suggested as an alternative to sexing their products they could divide them into interest categories like "Sports" and "Entertainment" and "Tools" so people can get things that interest them regardless of whether they (the people, not the things) are male, female, or genderqueer.
I also reminded them that Georgina Beyer is in fact female, not "random". I probably could have emphasised this more but I got the feeling that other people already had, so I thought I'd jump in to answer the inevitable "Wah, but how else can we possibly categorise our merchandise???" lamentations.
On reflection, I think I'll write to Farmers too. [ETA: I did.]
no subject
Date: 2011-03-21 06:22 am (UTC)You can totally buy gendered chocolate.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-21 06:29 am (UTC)To: Farmers
Subject: How do you sex your umbrellas?
My ordinary umbrella is stuck in my office at work, pending a proper earthquake assessment, so I went shopping for a new one today and came to Farmers. I wandered around for a while and found some umbrellas next to the handbags. They were those dainty little fold-up ones that I've stopped buying because they're small (so don't actually shelter you from the rain that well) and flimsy (all the extra joints make them extra fragile). But that's all there were, so I reluctantly took one to the counter and said, not very hopefully, "I suppose you don't have any other umbrellas."
"You could try the men's section," said the shop assistant.
So I went to the men's section. It turns out the men's section has the big umbrellas that are really good at protecting you from the rain, and which don't break nearly as often. Of course there's a price trade-off. These superior umbrellas cost 2/3rds the price of the useless umbrellas in the women's section.
So I got the umbrella I wanted, which is a happy ending I guess. But it's left me really curious. How on earth do you decide which umbrellas are for women and which umbrellas are for men?
If it was me, I'd be absolutely stuck on the question (unless they were pink and blue of course: as everyone knows, women will only ever buy something if it's pink and men will only buy it if it's blue). So I'd end up hedging my bets by putting some of each in both places, or maybe just putting them all together somewhere where men and women alike can gather to find an umbrella according to their personal taste rather than their gender.
Best regards, and thanks for the blue men's umbrella,
[Zeborah]
no subject
Date: 2011-03-21 06:39 am (UTC)But everyone knows you sex umbrellas by looking at the amount of extraneous features on the underside.