An Australian mother fed up with the way that girls’ clothes are designed differently from boys’ posted on Facebook about her frustration, and her post went viral. The store in question that was stocking the clothes, Big W, says that it will respond to the woman privately.
It all began when Nikita Friedman wanted to buy a pair of shorts for her 1-year-old daughter. At that age, you might think that there would be little difference in clothes for boys and girls, but Friedman noticed this was not the case. Size 1 shorts for boys were significantly longer than size 1 shorts for girls. Friedman snapped a photo of two pairs of shorts together to demonstrate that difference. She said the inseam on all the little girls’ shorts in the store were only a couple of centimeters and that this interfered with her inability to teach her daughter about self-respect as well as how to stay safe in the sun.
According to Friedman, the disparity suggested that little girls were already beginning to be seen as sex objects at such a young age. She said that within about five hours of her initial post on the store’s website, around 1600 parents had agreed with her and she added that she hoped that the store would take notice. However, she said she also received a number of messages attacking her.
Some other people posted in her support. One woman said she bought boys’ shorts for her daughter. She said that the focus should be on clothes that are comfortable for growing children’s bodies and not on fashion.
Big W responded by saying that their buying process was a rigorous one and that they made an effort to stock a variety of products to suit many tastes. Eventually, it appeared that the mother who originally posted had removed her Facebook account, but by then, many other parents had already posted on the Big W page asking for similar changes. Thanks to this one mother, there might just be a change in how at least one retailers markets clothing to little girls.