So in a class we were discussing an essay to do with gender roles today, and I witnessed the most annoying thing I think I've ever seen in my life. But before we go into that, let me explained gender roles.
Gender roles are roles played out that are assigned to a specific gender. In American history some gender roles have been women staying home with children, or men working. The problem with gender roles is they do not continue to stay a "role" and they ultimately become what a gender is. They begin to be the gender. Gender roles are harmful to everyone, and yes that includes men! We do not look at how gender roles affect men (In America at least) and we more focus on how they harm women. And gender roles do harm women, but also men.
How do gender roles harm people? And more specifically, how do they harm men? Well we are all pretty aware of the effect gender roles have had on women; they have allowed women to be forced to do things that they do not want to do (ex. staying home, no voting rights, and some more serious things like marrying men who they don't want to marry). They have led to many females being forced to stay home, being harassed, having no say in government, and have led to countless minds being told that they are nothing but a meal maker. BUT they hurt men too! Many men are made to believe this idea that you have to be a certain way to be a man; you have to be aggressive, you have to belittle women, but not so much that you don't have a woman, you have to be good at sports, you have to be a "man's man" and if you like to spend time with women you either have to be trying to seduce them or you are automatically homosexual and "girly." This is harmful. This is teaching society that being a woman is one thing and being a man is another and they are two completely different things that have nothing in common. Yet, we have a lot in common. We are people.
Everyone you meet has thoughts. Everyone you meet needs air. Everyone you meet needs food and water. Everyone you meet will form an opinion on you. Everyone you meet will have an opinion formed about them by you. Everyone you meet is trying to survive in this world. Yet, here we are separating people due to whether they have a penis or vagina, and if they are not separated they have to be reproducing. Because to be a man you must be focused on sex, and to be a woman you must be open to sex but not demand it.
So why do we polarize things? Why do cats and dogs hate each other? Why is it men against women? Why do we have "all a certain gender" schools? Why do we send boys to an all boys camp and girls to another? And why do we teach these boys and girls that being with someone of the other gender must be sexual or romantic? I have many male friends, and every single time I go out with them someone says "You make a cute couple" or "Hey nice girlfriend" or "I didn't know you had a boyfriend!" I don't, he is my friend, surprising I know. We make opposites up; we teach everyone that men and women are completely different creatures. When we are young children we don't realize that someone is a boy or girl and that they are different, we are taught that. This is why gender roles are harmful, because we are not only telling people who to be, we are telling them that those who are not like them cannot be trusted.
Now the reason I bring this up is because today, while discussing this essay that attacks male gender roles, someone went "Well is the author gay?" Then someone else commented "He's really feminine." Just let this sink in. It was just read that gender roles are harmful and being told that being a man is one thing, and nothing else, is hurtful, yet someone commented that the author was not a man.
THIS is why gender roles are harmful.
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