We avoid pink and blue and buy constructive, creative toys. We encourage girls to play doctor and boys to play dress up. But when it comes to pushing the old gender divisions, nothing beats kids' TV.
I'm flicking through channels and all I see is a sea of pink and blue. This shouldn't surprise me; just the other day in the supermarket I saw a couple with two under-10s, dressed in identical outfits but perfectly colour coded. In spite of our allegedly enlightened times, I expect it from parents, having heard even the most sensible of people spout nonsense like "boys just innately like cars", and even, in one case, that it was "an injustice" not to let girls be girls by deliberately buying them pink, "girly" things (I know, ten out of ten for logic).
However, I thought that maybe the creative types who went into television production for children might flow against the boring tide of gendered rubbish. Sadly, I forgot that it's the merchandising managers that are in charge, and you get more sales by pitting one 'side' against the other.
Smurfette Syndrome is rife, of course. In case you haven't heard the term before, cast your mind back to The Smurfs, and consider how many female characters there were. And she was created by Gargamel in order to create discord among the male Smurfs (though really to sell more to little girls or perhaps to stop questions about Smurf sexuality)! The casting of the token female continues unabated, and I struggled to find a single example that wasn't, well, pale red.
In one newly launched programme, the three main characters, all pirates, found tricorn hats. The two boys exclaimed that they would play at being captains - one with a fearsome nickname, the other with his own name - and the girl announced that she'd be a "beautiful pirate princess"; this on the back of the fact that they boys carry a sword and a magical map respectively, while she gets the gift of pixie dust from fairies.
Now, I am a lifelong, ardent, Disney fan and always will be. Their cinematic female leads have been getting better and better from Belle to Tiana, but at the same time the marketing department has just hosed every doll in bubblegum shades that make me want to cry.
Handy Manny takes a stride forward by having a female hardware store owner, but can't resist dressing her in the-colour-beginning-with-p. To add insult to injury, Minnie Mouse's classic, gorgeous red polka dot dress has been watered down to, ahem, a paler shade for the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse - though at least there are three female characters present including the gleefully bonkers Clarabelle Cow.
But let's not be unfair; there's plenty of tiresome stereotyping on this side of the pond too. The Tweenies might be multicoloured, but both females wear dresses, one pink, and have more submissive personalities. In ZingZillas, the boys are confident, positive and creative; one girl is ultra-feminine, the other a childlike, sensitive soul. And then there are offerings that don't even attempt to disguise it, like Ben and Holly's Little Kingdom, where the boys are elves and the girls are all fairies led by Princess Holly.
I credit it to the British fondness for the slightly surreal that a few gems do still surface. In the Night Garden... is a peaceful dreamscape where gender takes a back seat to good old fashioned creative weirdness. Baby Jake is entertainingly bizarre. In Peppa Pig everyone is pink, but they are pigs, after all, and she is exuberant, active and cheeky, plus she has a working mum! And of course when all else fails there is the relentless brilliance of Justin Fletcher, whose Something Special features plenty of girls as well as boys as guests and also helps shine the spotlight on the abilities of children with special needs.
Of course no-one wants their kid to be square-eyed and sit in front of the telly all day, but it's unrealistic to think television has no impact on them. In the end this is one of the big things they'll be talking about at school and even the most active, book-loving child enjoys a half hour winding down in front of the tube.
While you can ban certain programmes and encourage others they will likely take a shine to at least one thing you grit your teeth over. It would be nice to think that we could trust that programmes designed for children would be pushing positive messages for girls as well as boys, but it actually takes some work to discover programmes that don't, in some way or other, reinforce harmful stereotypes, and that makes me sad and angry.
I know that I'll have to strike a balance between pointing out these messages to my daughter and lecturing so much that she switches off and ignores me. And when the television does get switched off, it's not like the written word is entirely without its minefields.
I guess this is just one more battle a feminist parent has to fight.
Alexandra Roumbas Goldstein is a mum of one, digital marketer and online community manager who takes any opportunity to blog about parenthood, social media, cats, baking and Disney. Follow her on Twitter @mokuska.