Liking things not intented for your age/gender

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I like children's movies and my favourite movie is 'Flushed Away'. I also like 'Mary Poppins' and 'Alice in Wonderland'. My favourite 'Flushed Away' character is Sid, who happens to be male, though he looks androgenic, meaning that you can't tell if he's male or female, just by looking at him.

The movies that I usually like to watch, are for kids between the ages 6 and 12. I'm 33 years old.

Bionicle was a unique phenomenon when it came out: I had friends who had given up the well thought out military fantasy of GI Joe at age 12, suddenly buying Bionicles after college graduation. I'm still not sure why this was: The storyline was hard to access and inconsistent.

Transformer collecter myself (and a subtle one too), so I certainly don't accept marketers' age recommendations. In fact, in some cases, they're completely arbitrary. Are that many primetime "adult" oriented shows really more intelligent than well-done "children's" cartoons?

Example: In one TF cartoon, the Autobots were mediating peace talks between 2 warring planets, only to learn that some other aliens called Quintessons had started their conflict just so they could sell increasingly powerful weapons to both sides, hoping they'd exterminate each other before anyone knew. Tragically, that's often the role that the military industrial complex plays in real life conflicts, but I can't think of many "adult" dramas that acknowledge this. Can anyone else? Seriously, let me know; I watch a very narrow range of television.

I can think of one instance where the usual gender-interest crossover was reversed on a large scale: In the mid '90, DIC's US broadcasts of Sailor Moon had a huge closet following of teenage boys, because there was no other anime airing here at the time, and it was nothing but hot schoolgirls in miniskirts fighting monsters that were sometimes even hotter women. Oh they TRIED to market it to 8-year-old girls, but that hardly obscured what it was. If they'd done the toys more like action figures instead of Barbies with poorly-done cloth outfits, inaccurate anime faces, and rooted hair, they might have outdone '90s sales of DBZ figures, but they just had to follow the rules of gender-targeted children's marketing all the way to the grave.

Cartoons actually weren't targeted in this way until the '80s, when they became so important in selling toys.

I've always been proud that my interests aren't dictated by what I'm "supposed" to like. Hell, the later Transformers comics actually gave me a more mature view of the greater universe than most people get from actual religion.

"Hah! For all their supposed omnipotence, even gods can be conned!"
-Alternate-Reality Galvatron, 1990

It's cool - really, really cool.

Wow...

I think more girls should play with boy toys 'cos IMHO they're more fun.

(and less realistic - ie: about fantasy things rather than mummies and daddies).

BTW: My father had real problem with me liking Star Wars figures when I was little. He used to kick them and break them etc... and called them dolls.

i hear you about boys liking girls stuff being a hard stand.

although i grew up loving lego and everything related, and having my share of boyish traits, i completely abhor this whole "manly stud" ideal. i mean, ive got a brain, why not use that for thinking instead of testosterone? pretending to have no feelings seems ultrastupid to me, as well. all this weird need to prove ones abilities all the time, how much one can drink, how many girls you had and how diverse the collection is (i hate it with a passion when guys go like "oh, i hadnt had a punk yet" when someone mentions a punk girl or similar.) etcetera... that is just one step removed from drumming ones chest and throwing bananas at each other.
i generally dislike this whole idea of "appropriateness" in relation to gender: its appropriate for a guy to shave his beard and put energy in getting in good shape (all hail the c-cup pecs. blergh), but its highly inappropriate to pluck ones eyebrows or shave ones armpits, let alone wear kajal or a little lipliner to catch up some little imperfections.

also, its not appropriate for either gender to value dreams and ideals - reality is where the bread and butter is. everything else is just foolish dreamery. that goes as far as trying to reduce emotions to hormones or whatever random explanation model.

Well, I love barbies, and I'm 16 too, so that's not odd at all

i like rings. at my old house we had all those wonderful gemshopping networks and i always watched them

I rarely socialize within my own age group.

Yeah, I never really got into the war toys that most NT boys like, such as GI joes, cowboys and indians, toy guns, ect. I was, instead, interested in more mental or skill-based focuses, such as building models, playing chess, space-related stuff, ect. I am rather embarrased to say so, but I have once knitted a hat, and found it to be rather soothing, the sheer simple repetativeness of it.

I'm 43, and I like things considerably older people might like, such as 1960s Rock and Roll and Roger Bannister. I also like more childlike things like Sagwa, The Chinese Siamese Cat.

I'm 16.
Spongebob Squarepants (younger)
Law & Order (older)
The Discovery Health Channel (older)
Catholicism (way older)
Classic literature (older)
Swingsets (younger)
Froot Loops (younger)
Oatmeal (older)---I think people my age are supposed to eat pop tarts for breakfast.

The only thing age-appropriate I like is Japanese pop music.

Who wrote the book on who is supposed to like what? I havent' every seen this book. Help please?