Saturday, 15 March 2008

• Damn society and gender roles

  OK, so my sister emailed me to tell me about this new tonka commercial that says "boys are built different and tonka has the blue print". What is that supposed to mean? How is it we've decided little boys and little girls are so different that they need their own toys? One has a penis and one has a vagina.ok lets make one cook and one build, sounds good... no
  Our culture has gotten this idea that we need to smother kids in "sex friendly" colors and toys and games to make sure they grow up "normal" we can't have little boys playing with dolls and little girls should never play with tools, because "thats not how they were built". We raise our kids this way, and then they end up doing things their sex is "supposed" to do, dance, play football, art, play with bugs, show emotion.. and then they go into a career their sex is "expected" to go into. We wonder why it seems like careers are normally dominated by a certain sex. Education, the sciences, business, social work, we've been brain washing kids from the second they were born.
  "You cry like a girl" "You throw like a girl". "be a man" it's common, everyday phrases liek these that make growing up and finding ones identity so difficult. People "worry" about a little boy who likes dolls.. or plays with his mothers makeup. What the hell, it seems like we dont let kids find themselves, we TELL them who and what they're going to grow up to be. And the ones that "rebel" and find themselves in a different way are labled "butch" or "fag".
  A woman my sister came across was talking about the commercial and modern feminism.And how she just "doesn't get it" I admit, i am a feminist, but i dont think it takes a feminist to admit our culture feeds us gender roles and expects us to live by them, and if you don't theres "something wrong with you".  Ok first,  she says "So why is this commercial worth such scorn? Because they actually said the word “boys” out loud, instead of just implying it by only showing little boys playing with it? Give me a break." Please lets just use our brains here, clearly the fact that they said "boys" is not the problem , the problem is by saying "boys are built different" and saying tonka... a toy company that makes only TRUCKS, has the "blueprint" is the problem. If they didn't say that, and just left the little boy playing with a truck, and not chauvinistically imply that boys are so different from girls that they need a special toy company to make them ( BOYS) special toys that only boys can play with.. THEN, there wouldn't be a problem.
  She goes on to say.. "Maybe I’m missing something, but it’s starting to feel like anything deemed ‘male’ is coming under attack anymore. Boy Scouts are being sued to allow girls, men cannot have social clubs that women are not allowed in. Men are just not allowed to be men anymore, and I think that’s a damn shame if there ever was one." What?! WHAT?! i think shes trying to sound ridiculous.. really i do. Under attack? WOW. ok, first of all tell me why men STILL to this day. in 2008  get paid more (on avg) than women. And usually within the same education and job level. hmm? Please tell me this. Men ARE allowed to have social clubs without women.. and they do.. stop making things up for your argument please. Tell me also, how and why men move up the "ladder" more quickly than women. And why women can't seem to get into positions of leadership as easy as men. Maybe .. just maybe thats why it seems like anything labeled as "male" is under attack these days, because women don't have a chance to be women. The other sex, that is just as capable in succeeding, they just aren't given the opportunity.
  One more quote from her, "One of these days the feminists are going to realize that there is a certain amount of androgyny that occurs in the human species, but overall, boys and girls really are VERY different creatures." Yes we know.. clearly. hence the testosterone, and penis and such. But the point is these "differences" your talking about, are social and cultural creations. What we see as "male" and "female" are not the same in every culture please note. So who decides whats "male' and whats "female"? societies do. And when females get oppressed becuase they were born with a vagina, and they're told what to do and how to act and what to play with.. thats what feminists refuse to "realize".
  
  thank you that is all.
  i just needed to vent, i thought i was going to expload.
  
  
  

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