Lawmakers in California, US have proposed Assembly Bill 1084, which would ban the gendered marketing of children’s clothing in retailers which have over 500 employees. The bill, introduced as the ‘Gender Neutral Retail Departments’ act, would require retailers “to maintain undivided areas of its sales floor where the majority of those items being offered are displayed, regardless of whether an item has traditionally been marketed for either girls or for boys.”
The bill argues: “Keeping similar items that are traditionally marketed either for girls or for boys separated incorrectly implies that their use by one gender is inappropriate.” If it is successfully passed, it will be implemented on January 1 2024, and any store which violates the bill will be subject to a $1,000 fine.
The bill was created by Evan Low, the chair of the California legislative LGBTQ+ caucus, and Cristina Garcia, the chair of the women’s caucus. Low told KPIX that he hopes the bill will reduce gender-related bullying: “Rather than having a separate boy’s or girl’s section, let’s just have a kid’s section. Let’s make sure that we remove the kind of stigma, the type of bullying that we still see, especially in this day and age.”