Girls wear dresses and Boys wears pants- Why? Kathy

I remember the hours spent in the fitting room of a children’s clothing shop called “Toddlers Place” in Ohio from the ages of three to seven. It was a large store with oversized teddy bears strewn across it divided into two sections; ‘toddler girls ‘and ‘ toddler boys’. Immediately upon entering my mother walked straight toward the frilly pink dresses and rows of headbands with me in tow. Within ten minutes she would have armfuls of shiny dresses and skirts all for me to try on for upcoming family or holiday occasions. By the age of four this seemed natural to me; pink dresses, purple skirts, sparkly headbands. Similarly, when my mother would take my brothers out for clothes shopping they would go to the sections painted in blue and red where racks of pants, shorts and collard button downs awaited them. They wore what my mother put on them without complaint (except when it came time to wearing tight ties.) I never recall them once questioning why we were dressed in such different outfits, nor did I ever question it myself. These two separate attires were the ‘norm’. It was how my friends and their brother’s would dress as well as all the adults around me. My mom rarely, if ever, wore a pant suit as I saw my father wear every day before heading off to work.
One of the factors that is prominent in this noticeable issue is society. From an early age a girl wearing a dress and a boy wearing pants is considered normal. All the dolls I played with, including my ballerina Barbie doll, were dressed in these outfits. Even the Cabbage Patch doll I had she was dressed in a yellow gown with lime green flowers. On the other hand my brothers would play with tough looking GI Joes dressed in camouflage pants and jackets. Even from a young age we’re shown what our sex is supposed to wear. I never questioned why this was because I never knew it was something to wonder about. From the time I became remotely aware of these difference, around the age of five, it just was. The only time I wanted to wear shorts was when playing outside in the yard but other than that I didn’t mind the skirts and dresses.
This classic idea of a woman in a dress and man wearing kakis goes back hundreds of years. It’s deeply pressed into our society that this is the correct and proper way to dress as your sex. As a fellow blogger, Erich Vieth, wrote about in his discussion of this topic, he said the reason why the sexes dress as they do is “just because.” There is no explicit answer for this question except that is just is. It’s been this way for as long as anyone knows but in time I predict it will change. Only in the past couple decades has this notion began to change form. People are beginning to question the gender bounds and what it means to be a woman and dress like one. The opposite is true with men. Does a man have to wear pants to be a man or can he wear a skirt and be viewed in the same light? As people keep questioning and pushing the sex and gender bounds this black and white issue will eventually turn gray. “Just because” will no longer be a suitable answer.