When I was a kid, I was taught that red, yellow, and orange were girls' colors, and that blue, green, and purple were boys' colors. As a result, these colors have a sex associated with them, even now more than twenty years later. When I see the color red, I see the girl's color red. When I see the color blue, I see the boy's color blue. This is probably like the French, for whom every noun has a gender associated with it. I wonder if this association is just something I picked up from my family and local neighborhood, or whether everyone in the country makes the same associations.

I do know that gender identity seems to be very important for young children. A few years ago, my brother bought my then less-than-five-year-old niece a ray gun. She got very upset with him and had a fit, saying, "No! No! This is a boy's toy. I'm a girl. I can't have a boy's toy!". My niece was a very physically active child, who liked to run and fight and play outside, so it was the sort of gift that otherwise made sense.