Welcome To The ‘Pussification’ Of America
By: Martie Sirois
Tags: LGBTQ, Culture, Misogyny, Transgender, Feminism

Welcome To The ‘Pussification’ Of America

That’s right; feminine folx aren’t going away. But misogyny has overstayed its welcome.

Several years ago, one of the largest American retail stores, Target, made a concerted effort to radically change the way they marketed some of their products. In a 2015 news release, Target Corporation announced they were ditching gender labels in some of their departments. They noted how guests had raised important questions, specifically, about some of the signage in Target that indicated product suggestions based on gender.

“In some cases, like apparel,” the statement read, “where there are fit and sizing differences, it makes sense. In others, it may not… in some departments like Toys, Home or Entertainment, suggesting products by gender is unnecessary.”

Image by Ian Wilson from Pixabay

How were they going to accomplish this? Simple. They’d do away with gender suggestions on signs in some departments. After all, those things seemed to be antiquated relics in a society that was evolving and growing ever upwards in its quest to embrace a more non-binary construct of gender.

I remember the Target “gender desegregation” movement well; I was totally on board with it. As the mom of 3: a boy, a girl, and my youngest, who was a 9-year-old, self-described “gender creative boy” at the time, this movement resonated with me. None of our toys at home were gender segregated. My son would bring his army men and play Barbies with his younger sister, and sometimes she’d rather play with his toy guns than anything else in the world. And our youngest had no interest in typical “boys” toys whatsoever.

I was excited later that fall when I visited Target and saw it for myself. What was formerly “boys Legos” and “girls Legos” were now merged together, all neatly stacked in one unifying place. “Good,” I thought. “Good for them. Way to be progressive in a southern, red state.” I looked forward to revisiting this aisle when I’d start my Christmas shopping the next month.

Photo by freestocks.org on Unsplash

But when I came back, I was perplexed to find no signs of the colorful, gender neutral Lego aisle. In fact, all the Legos were right back to how they appeared only a month earlier: sex-segregated. Fairy themed and soft pastel colored Legos were situated separately on their own aisle, while ninjas, shades of camoflauge, and dominant primary colors were a whole separate aisle over.

Whereas the boy-designated Legos offered options of superheroes, all sorts of vehicles, and entire build-your-own city sets which featured everything powerful from police stations to hospitals to fire brigades, the girl-designated Legos were called “Lego Friends.” Lego Friends featured curvy figures incompatible with traditional Lego figures, and invited female builders to create awesomely fun places like hair salons, pizzerias, garden pool parties and beach-scapes. It was sopping with sexism.

“Welp… that didn’t last long,” I thought. Not surprised, just a little dismayed.

I figured too many customers must’ve complained. Or maybe it was media backlash. Had a mega giant corporation like Target caved to the pressure of notoriously conservative news outlets like Fox and OAN?

At the time, Elisabeth Hasselbeck was co-hosting the Fox & Friends weekday news program, and they’d spent a whole segment that morning bashing the very idea. Hasselbeck, along with co-hosts Brian Kilmeade and Steve Doocy grew visibly more and more aggrieved over this story. There was plenty of gun and bible clutching as they speculated and frantically questioned the hypothetical what-ifs. Reporter on the scene, Alcides Segui, asked, in overstated alarm:

“Is this gonna confuse you? I know it’s gonna confuse me! (Ah-hahahaha!)”

During the “recap” portion of this report, Hasselbeck speculated that kids would end up “self sorting,” as she noted her own kids, who couldn’t read at the time, were able to find exactly what toys they wanted without any signs. But Kilmeade was not letting it go without a fight. You could almost see his hackles raise when he asked, with privileged paranoia: