Gender Roles

One of Chris' friends shared this on facebook. It was too cute to ignore :) I linked the original poster to the image, it's not mine. I decided it was a sign to post this entry that has been sitting around for a few weeks. Forgive me if it lacks flow, half of it was written a month ago and the rest I'm typing up while nursing.

I'm sure plenty of you saw this floating around facebook a month or so ago.

Hard to see? Click on it to go to the Huffpost article. It's easier to read there. From what I can understand the teacher had a packet (probably that someone else made) of busy work for a book the children read. The purpose was to bring attention to gender bias, but apparently the teacher failed to understand the purpose of the lesson. This was obviously an attempt at good teaching gone wrong. Instead of commending the girl she chastised her. Ridiculous.

It reminds me of when I was in sixth grade. The teacher had a list of books for the girls and a list of books for the boys to read over the year. I wanted to read the books from the boys list. I was told I could not read the books off the boys list for my mandatory books, but the ONE free choice book I could. What a crock.

The book I read by choice.

I honestly don't remember any of the books I was forced to read.

I was at a book store a few weeks ago browsing the homeschool section. It was written in the last ten years, that's a plus. In case you don't know, most homeschooling material is religious. I forget what got my attention about this particular book, but I thought it was one of the few that wasn't (I was wrong). In the first 10 pages it had a list of things to teach boys and things to teach girls. I was so livid by the time I finished reading the two lists I nearly threw the book across the building. The fact that teachers might screw up and mistakenly teach gender bias to their charges is regrettable. The idea that parents would purposefully enforce these things in their own children makes me furious. It said the priority for young girls should be to learn housework, handwriting, craftwork, obedience, scripture, and cooking. It equated to a girl shouldn't be taught to be an independent functioning member of society, but be taught their entire purpose in life is to be a housewife.

My daughters' worth WILL NOT be based on their ability to please anyone else. Their worth WILL NOT be based on how they look. Their worth will be based on their whole being. And their WHOLE BEING is welcome to be whatever it wants to be. My girls are welcome to be as feminine or masculine as they want. Our toy room is full of barbie dolls, superhero figures, animal bones the girls find in the yard, stuffed animals, kitchen toys, tools, we run the whole gamut. We have a costume box that ranges from medieval and princess dresses to spiderman and pirate get ups. I do not want them to feel there is something they are supposed to be other than themselves and they should never feel ashamed or guilty because their interests are against the grain.

Another thing that burns me was all the people asking me if I was "finally having a boy?" Then asking if we were going to "try again?" Seriously people?? As if my life is somehow incomplete because I don't have a boy. As if the only reason I have four children is due to a 'gamble and hope' we'd get 'lucky' and have a boy eventually. Seriously??? We have four children because that was the number of children we both agreed we wanted when we were dating. It has nothing to do with gender. I sure hope that is not the way most people do their family planning!!

So, anyway, I challenge you to think twice before you say things like this to pregnant women. I also challenge you to be open to where ever your children's interests lead them even if it's not inside your expected behavior or comfort zone.