“Halloween Beyond the Cliche: Packaging Boyhood Part Two”

From Amy Jussel, Shaping Youth

Oct. 27, 2009 It’s the Tuesday before Halloween, perfect timing to wrap up part two of our Packaging Boyhood post about gender clichés, costumes, and ‘Saving our Sons from Superheroes, Slackers & Stereotypes’ as the book’s title says.

Moreover, we have tips & tactics for those eager to hear how to best play dodgeball with ambient influences.

We’ve all heard those exhausted “NOW what?” frustrations from media literate parents confronted with pester power and exposure to “what’s perceived as cool” even if the wee one has never “seen the movie, show, or media attached to it.” (THAT is ambient marketing, my friends)

Media and marketing are so ubiquitous with saturation on so many emotional levels of ‘peer acceptance’ that if you try TOO hard to veer elsewhere you may land smack dab into ‘forbidden fruit’ territory…one step forward, three steps back. So the first given that the Packaging Boyhood authors impart is to try not to ‘over-react’ and make such a ‘huge’ deal out of it all in wide-eyeballed, ‘omg, what are you even thinking!’ mode.

Truth be told, I used to predict a direct correlation with the playground posse…the more sanctimonious the parenting style,  “My child will NEVER be seen with a ____ gun, weapon, Barbie doll, makeup, Lunchable, piercing, tattoo, etc. (insert item du jour) the more likely that very same child would be the one coveting said item the most. (more…)