Gender stereotypes have a long history that people are often not aware of. Colors like pink and blue became associated with specific genders only relatively recently. Forcing rigid gender stereotypes onto children can negatively impact their development and sense of self. It is important to avoid assigning activities, clothes, or behaviors exclusively to one gender or another in order to let children explore their identity freely without limiting social pressures.

1. I.Intro
Attention Getter: (Wearing very obvious masculine clothing) Would you consider what I am
wearing as masculine? The answer more than likely is yes. This is because we have all grown
up with gender stereotypes forced into out minds since we were children.
Thesis: People should not force gender stereotypes on others and shouldn’t force their children
to follow those stereotypes.*
(I am still working on my thesis, but this is the overall picture of what I want to do)
Credibility: After growing up with these stereotypes constantly forced upon me and seeing it in
others, I feel like I have obtained a good grasp on the understanding of gender stereotypes.
Preview: In order to solve the problem of stereotypes with gender we must look at the history of
these stereotypes, how it manifests itself with color, why we should avoid them, but we must
also look at how these stereotypes might help us.
II.Body
A. History of gender stereotypes
1. Boys wore dresses and had long hair as children in the 1800’s
2. Women fought for the right to wear clothes such as pants, pant suits, t-shirts, etc.
3. At one point in history colors were assigned to gender, pink to girls and blue to
boys, and everything became very gender oriented
B. Pink is for girls, blue is for boys
1. Why have these do these stereotypes exist?
2. Pink tends to be a softer color and blue is seen as more masculine
a. History of when the colors were switched
3. There should not be any specific color for any gender
C. How these stereotypes could work for some people
1. People tend to be biased towards certain groups.
2. Colors can help teach people from birth about their gender as a group
3. It also teaches people to be aware of their gender and the importance of their
gender
D. Why and how to avoid all these stereotypes (for yourself and the future generation)*
1. If people feel like they are forced into these gender stereotypes, they may never
ever feel like themselves
a. Example of person
2. Don’t force the future generation (or your children) into the typical pink and blue
clothes from birth
a. This will cause them to possibly grow up and despise the other color
3. Boys and girls could become discouraged if they want to wear the opposite
gender’s clothes because of these stereotypes.
III. Conclusion
Review: In order to avoid these stereotypes we had to look at the history, the reasons behind
why certain colors are assigned to genders and why we should avoid these stereotypes.
Restate thesis: Gender stereotypes should not be made/forced on others and shouldn’t force
our children to follow those stereotypes