Not in the slightest! Very very square, strict and conservative community. This would have been my second grade teacher, Mrs. Longhurst, who was nice, but not “cool”. She was like 60 years old then, can’t imagine she is still alive. I think I am realizing that she had a soft spot for the joy the Cabbage Patch Kids…

It is horrible but it’s just a symptom of our death by a thousand cuts of public education. PTA’s, sports orgs, the arts, they all have to raise their own money to provide these opportunities for students. And the only students who can really take advantage of them are kids from money who can afford the equipment, the…

Nobody thinks of it even though it’s obvious that some kids feel like shit. Schools have had candygrams for decades. It used to be from your peers, so the kid who gets nothing is the kid with no friends. Try going twelve years never getting any of those stupid class-time-interrupting bags of sugar or flowers or…

This is fucking horrible and why aren’t the more fortunate parents encouraged to donate beyond $2 so everyone is included? Cause no one thinks of it till kids feel like shit. People are the worst.

We are fucking poor children on the daily, whether their parents are in jail or not. As a teacher and parent, the growing disparities between rich and poor are now even more apparent. Take for example a recent “send-your-kid-a-gift day at my son’s public elementary school, put on by the PTA. For $2 you can send your…

I was briefly heartened a few months ago, in the grocery store of all places, after an indirect interaction with a mom and her (3- or 4-year-old?) son.  As I passed them, the kid said, “Mom, he has girl hair!”  (I am a dude with hair that hangs below my shoulders.)  Without missing a beat, the mom said, “There’s no…

and yet men who have raped a woman and/or girl get to fight and sometimes win parental rights

There’s a very good chance those woman may not have been convicted of anything.

Our society has never supported parents who put their child first. If it did, it would offer better maternity/paternity leave and make it easier for women or men to rejoin the workforce when they are ready after having children. Our historical precedent has just been women should sacrifice everything and men should…

Took the little beans for Happy Meals on Saturday and the toys are for the Wreck It Ralph sequel. There are little “racers” that are both sexes, and some cars are more “girly” than others. My 4 year old son (who asked to be and was Violet from the Incredibles for Halloween, so he DGAF about gender norms) got a little…

I should preface that my husband is from Europe, where its pretty normal for things to be 50/50.

I worked at McD’s in a small town in Ohio in the late 80s. It definitely wasn’t/isn’t a progressive area but we were already doing that. We’d ask “would you like Hot Wheels or Barbie in your happy meal”. It was the customers who asked for the toy by gender.

I live in Los Angeles and they ask the boy/girl question.  I rarely take my kid to McDonald’s (but his dad takes him more regularly), but the last time I did I didn’t understand the question. I asked what the toys were and the person just reiterated: boy toys or girl toys? No. I want to know what they ARE. “Ma’am DO…

Yep, coming here to say the same. My kids are older now, but I have to say, where I am in MA, they stop asking that years ago. As a matter of fact, Saturday we were driving back from a trip and decided to stop at some random Mdcs in NH and my kids thought it would be funning to order Happy Meals for the first time…

I have found that the cheapest, crappiest plastic things are what my children cherish most.  

I actually don’t believe that’s true, based on every child I’ve ever known (including myself). McD’s toys became bath toys - or got co-opted into Barbie’s sidekicks or props for Lego houses - pretty quickly in my childhood home, and then later got melted down when my brother and I went through our respective…

Our McDonalds already do this here. Well, at least the few locations I’ve ordered happy meals at since Mini Pie was old enough. I was relieved the first time because I saw the poster and knew she was going to want the “boy” one more...but then it was a non-issue.

I’m a male and I love doing laundry. I love the feeling of putting on warm clothes right out of the dryer. I even put this on my bumble profile. So yeah, kind of a catch. 

I came here only to discuss how my ex friend bragged about being the breadwinner for her family, but at home she was diminished to a housewife.

I had a roommate like this in college. Traded her for a girl who wound up being on meth. Good times.

After that, I was also part of the single dorm club. :P