Quote:
Victorian times, pink was the color for baby boys and blue for baby girls. Sometime in there it got swapped. You've cited a certain Edwardian style, maybe you just have to push it back a monarch.
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Yes, I emailed an article about that very thing --the arbitrary gendering of pink and blue -- to a gay friend who was simultaneously empowered and embittered. Yet it's amazing how tenaciously certain cultures cling to the synthetic tropes of masculinity.
For example, in NYC (which is far more provincial than many of my fellow citizens want to believe), people in the street actually voice their anger when a man who is not walking with a woman carries pink bags or accessories. Last time I was at my laundromat on Hudson, I was offered two bags in which to carry my clothes and chose the larger of the two, which happened to be pink. This incensed the woman behind me, who declared, "Zat ees *not* a bag for a man. I cannot be-*live* you chose zee pink wan!"
Having just worked for twenty hours straight, I found the bon mots were not flowing and walked out saying "It was *larger*!"
On the way home, I reflected on the encounters I might enjoy if I carried a pink reader with me and read it at a bar in Loisada.