Tesco's 'sexist' shopping trolleys are making people furious

Tesco has been accused of putting gendered images on shopping trolleys.

The Mail on Sunday reported that a Manchester shopper complained on Twitter that safety instructions only depicted women with children, using the everyday sexism hashtag:

Tesco, is it only women who do the food shopping and look after the kids?

The quoted tweet appears to have since been deleted.

The tweet reportedly sparked a conversation about the safety warnings, with many users complaining that the signs were gendered, assuming that women were the ones to do the shopping with children.

Samantha Rennie, executive director at equality group Rosa UK Fund for Women and Girls, told The Mail on Sunday:

The idea that shopping trolleys should be gendered in any way seems ridiculous.

It's a seemingly small factor that plays a role in reinforcing stereotypical ideas of the woman being responsible for the weekly food shop.

Tesco said that it was aware of the issue and that the company was in the process of changing the icons on trolleys.

A Tesco spokesperson told indy100:

Everyone’s welcome at Tesco, which is why we’ve been changing the icons on our trolleys to use a new, gender-neutral design.

The new design is already on over 20,000 trolleys and will feature on all new trolleys in the future.

Following the initial anger about the trolley icons, the story has received an equally angry backlash on Twitter as some people have deemed it ridiculous and overly sensitive.

HT Mail on Sunday

More: This is how the world's richest YouTuber went from working in Tesco to the Sydney Opera House