As someone born in the 1950s, I just wanna say that 1950s housewives were actually a lot less stereotypical and Stepfordy in reality than as presented in adverts and TV shows from back then. And just as the "typical" 1950s housewife was far less into performing sex stereotypes than usually portrayed, most also were far less into spending every minute of their days imposing rigid sex stereotypes onto their kids. Most of the moms back then were too busy, distracted and concerned with other things to hover over us monitoring our every move. So we all grew up with a great deal of freedom - as free range kids, so to speak. And since we spent so much of our time outside the home and outdoors, we didn't have constant consumerist propaganda bearing down on us telling us we all had to be pink and princessy and "feminine" all the time. Yeah, we had to wear skirts to school and dresses on holidays and for church/synagogue or whatever, etc - but the rest of the time we all dressed and acted like Scout in the film version of "To Kill A Mockingbird." Lots of rough and tumble, lots of adventures and physical activity, and a fair amount of mischief.