Trucks, Trains and Baby Dolls

As a feminist mother raising a toddler boy I continue to dumbfounded that there are so few books and resources out there to support my quest to raise a feminist boy. There are some great films out there, Tough Guise and Raising Cain but those films highlight the issues (violence, suppression of emotions) and offer little solutions.

These are the strategies I use to help me raise a feminist boy:

• Dress him in purples and pinks and when people ask me why I tell them, "Gender has no color" or point out that they have no problem seeing girls where green and blue.
• I steer clear of all logos and phrases that reinscribe the gender binary like "Mommy's Tough Boy" or those damn rescue shirts that show boys as saviors on a fire truck.

• I deleted all the Thomas the Train videos from our TV set. I just got so fed up with all the story lines being about boys and their adventures. From time to time there would be a girl train (Rosie) but she's be stuck in a dilemma about flowers of all things.
• Books--I provide lots of variety in his books: dump trucks, animals, trains, fishes, instruments, holiday themes. And if the characters are mostly male I change them up to make them female.
• I support with my dollar, female children's book authors (Virgina Burton, Anna Dewdney ). And I seek out books who use girls as their central characters. (Katy the the big Snow, among others)

• I also make everything female in our home and out of the home--the baby doll, the monkey, the fish, insects--you name it, it's female. In a world that sees the male experience as the human experience I am doing my part to balance that androcentricism.   

What do you do? I'd love your tips and ideas for raising your feminist boys. I'll use your comments and ideas in an upcoming post.