Breaking the Gender Mold

With Junior year and the college process just beginning, I've been thinking about what I want to be when I grow up, and I decided that for myself as a 16 year old girl, my top two choices are fire fighter or professional football player. Just kidding.

Many people would think that absurd and probably laugh, but the real question is, why in our society today would that be a joke? Who decides that women are not allowed to be football players or fire fighters, that those are careers for a man. Our society today is one that is supposed to be so revolutionary, one that has made immense progress with women's rights and one in which you would not think of racial hatred as an every day thing. However, many people overlook the subtle gender roles inflicted on youths even today.

Just yesterday, my grandpa was visiting from out of town and when I walked in from a field hockey game looking all sweaty and disgusting he did not say anything but a simple hello.  However, when my brother strolled in behind me after his hockey game in the same condition my grandpa could not stop bombarding him with questions about the game, "How did you play!... Did you score?...Did you take anybody out?...Was it a close game?" Then twenty minutes later when my brother and I came downstairs after showering, changing, and getting ready for dinner, my grandpa's comment to me was, "Wow, your a changed woman, you look so beautiful," with no comment directed to my brother.  

It was very interesting to think that by his comments he was subtly making a statement that my brother looked great and that being in his sports gear was the mold he was meant to fill, while I was meant to be dressed to impress.  These are the types of comments that affect the younger generation and guide them to their "correct" gender role, even though in America today it would be frowned upon to tell a girl directly they cannot play sports. 

Even last night I was babysitting a family where the parents had taken their son to the Northwestern vs Ohio State football game and left the girls at home with me. Was that because they felt the young girls wouldn't be interested in something as "manly" as football? Even as I hung out with these young girls, their favorite activity was playing make believe, where the youngest daughter played the baby, I played the older sister, and the eldest daughter played the mother. The eldest daughter would direct us to act out scenes of her taking care of her children. Is this just what is engrained into our DNA, or is it something that our society inflicts on children in subtle cues that tell them what gender mold they are supposed to fill?



I believe America today still inflicts these subtle gender cues in many things that are generic items for children, like giving little girls dolls to play with and practice childcare, while we buy little boys balls or toy cars that they can build and practice creating things on their own.  

The cartoon above depicts a prehistoric couple demonstrating the most basic gender roles where the man does all the hard manual labor like hunting and the woman does the easy gathering. However, in this cartoon the woman is rebelling against her assigned gender role because she has hunted down and killed an animal and she is now getting reprimanded. The picture above represents the traditional gender roles that many people would choose to say simply do not exist still in our society. But that is the easy answer, in reality it is not true.

Although woman in America today have made great progress in society by having more rights and such, there are still subtle cues such as the one represented in the picture to the right.  It starts with the young children and takes place in modern day, and even on bathroom signs, there is a stereotype that girls must wear dresses, or at least look more ladylike. Very much like how my grandfather expected me to be more ladylike and look more presentable than be wearing my athletic shorts.

The picture on the right poses some questions to consider in today's America, because although we have made progress with gender roles, we need to keep progressing because there is still a mold that needs to be broken, "How do traditional gender roles limit you? How much should they limit you? What are you going to do about it?" 

Feel free to comment your thoughts! I'm curious to hear ;)