Blog Archives

No pink for you, Michael!

2/21/2013

One of the examples I use to show how pink used to be an acceptable color for boys is Walt Disney's 1953 animated film, Peter Pan. The youngest child, Michael, wears pink pajamas throughout the entire movie. (Don't take my word for it: just search for images for "Disney Peter Pan Michael")

Disney is re-leasing a special DVD version this year, and I've caught a few of their TV ads. It sure looks like Michael's pj's have been re-colored. All I have been able to find online is the cover art (on the left). Has anyone seen the new version?

Please don't tell me they got rid of the pink pajamas and left in "What made the Red Man red".

ETA: I suppose I should be grateful they didn't change Wendy's dress to pink.

Re-visiting the 1960s

2/1/2013

“You’re a liberal or a conservative in America if you think the ’60s were a good thing or not. If the ’60s was a good thing, you’re left. If you think it was a bad thing, you’re right. And the confusing thing for a lot of people that gets a lot of Americans is, when they think of the ’60s, they don’t think of just the sexual revolution. But somehow or other — and they’ve been very, very, clever at doing this — they’ve been able to link, I think absolutely incorrectly, the sexual revolution with civil rights.”
source: Rick Santorum and repealing the 1960s (Charles Blow for the New York Times)

Girls' swimsuits, Sears 1963

One of the reasons I wanted to write about unisex fashions is that they seem emblematic of a very complicated -- and unfinished -- conversation about sex, gender and sexuality. Rick Santorum's comment from last year is one expression of that conversation, and I thank him for being so honest in putting it out there. Many of us who grew up in the 1960s have mixed feelings about that era, though mine are more positive than Mr. Santorum's. Unlike him, I feel that family planning is good, abortion should be safe, legal and accessible regardless of income and that biological sex is an interesting category but not my be-all and end -all.

But here's the catch: something happens in the coding for feminine clothing in the 1960s that essentially conflates femininity, youth and sexual attractiveness, and it shows up in girls’ clothing. Six-year-olds in bikinis -- thank the 1960s.

More to come, as I am deep in writing mode for the next nine months. This site will also be changing to reflect the widening scope of my work. In my ample free tie, as they say.

No pink for you, Michael!

Re-visiting the 1960s

Jo Paoletti

Archives

Categories