Reply #44: It's not easy for anybody growing up...

[NewJeffCT]

A few things:

1) As the person at Disney noted in the article, they were just capitalizing on a market that was already there. Despite this, girls perform better in school and make up a majority of college students. That said, I'm somewhat okay with the Disney stuff for my daughter, as she'll some days want to be pirate Captain Jack Sparrow instead of Mulan or Snow White. However, I'm completely against things like that Libby Lu store (our local mall has one) - putting on make-up and glitter is just too much for me.

2) When I was growing up, boys were expected to play sports, be aggressive, to not cry when hurt, etc. Additionally, I graduated high school in 1985 and college in 1989 and it was still almost unheard of for a girl/young woman to ask a boy/young man out on a date. And, I went to high school and college in the blue state of Connecticut. So, it was a very painful 8 years for me being a very shy guy - I didn't have a date until my sophomore year of college and my first girlfriend my senior year for a grand total of 6 weeks. I ended up marrying (and quickly divorcing) the first woman that asked me out.