Dear Target: Boys wear shoes, too.

Oh, Target. You know I love you, right? You're my Happy Place. You're where I go when I'm feeling down and I need some caffeine and really cheap melamine cups for the kids, which are so awesome because you can drop them all day long and they'll never break. You've never let me down, Target.... until now.

I don't understand this, how stores stock 400 times more clothing for girls than for boys. Remember Mervyn's? I was seeing Mervyn's before they all went out of business, and before you came to the town where I lived. Mervyn's did the same thing; aisles and aisles of clothes for girls, and maybe a shelf or two for the boys. I don't understand this. I know that girls care more about fashion than boys do, but it's like you guys have taken it to a whole new level of neglect.

Case in point: A few weeks ago, I needed to buy rain boots for Child 1. Why? Because it rains here. That may seem obvious but I think you need to know that it does, in fact, rain where I live and that my boys need to have something on their feet when they leave the house. Naturally, you were my first thought, because I always love to have an *actual* reason to go to you, so I hopped in my car and went looking for rainboots!

I was shocked by what I found there, Target. Shocked. And a little gassy, unfortunately, but mostly shocked. It's okay, though, because nobody else was around at the time.

There were 2 aisles dedicated to shoes for kids, Target. Here. Let me show you:

Those are slippers on the back wall.

Two aisles of shoes for kids and only one half of one side of one aisle had shoes for boys larger than toddler sizes. That's 12.5% (oh shit I hope I did that math right) of all the shoes you stock that both of my kids could wear. It's also 25% toddler shoes and 62.5% girls shoes.

Does that breakdown seem okay to you, Target?? Do you think your shoe supplies are representative of the actual population that you're serving?? Does that seem fair??

No it does not, Target. No it does not.

So. Did I find the rain boots that I had come there for? I found a pair of boots for boys to wear in the rain, yes. 

There was one pair. One. Fucking. Pair. In the entire store. Naturally it was in the wrong size, and I was forced to leave the store rainbootless. 

This is not okay, Target. This kind of sexual discrimination simply will not stand. Boys wear shoes, too, Target. Boys need shoes, and clothes, and underpants and all that good stuff, because despite what you seem to think, they do not leave the house naked and shivering every day, while fully clothed girls prance happily around them. I'm not sure where you're getting your research numbers from, Target, but I think it might be time to hire a new firm or something.

I'm putting you on notice, Target. Don't make me change your name from my happy place to The Fucked Up Hates Boys Place. Because I'll do it, you know, Target.

I'll do it.

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