hmm

[textualdeviance]

Random ponderation..

I think what it is I hate so much about extremes of gender roles is that they're so damned immature. The people who embody them seem to be living out the pink aisle and the war aisle at Toys R Us. The women are all playing dress-up and mommy and the men are all pretending to be GI Joe. Apparently no one wants to actually grow up and be a real adult with real maturity and responsibility.

Although maybe it's a self-fulfilling thing. We give our kids all these toys that reinforce the idea that all women do all day is clean, care for babies and make themselves pretty little objects for men, and that all men do all day is try to "win" some competition or other, preferably by the use of violence or other physical domination. The world of actual, complex, responsible adults is not represented in most children's toys. So unless a kid gets the message some other way about what being an adult entails, they never learn that there's more to life than makeup and automatic weapons.

Comments

[weetanya.livejournal.com]

all women do all day is clean, care for babies and make themselves pretty little objects for men

now that school is over, thi is *all* i have to do. thank god... heh

[indiwise.livejournal.com]

Well, my daughter never played with Barbies, they weren't really allowed in the house..she read, and had a chemistry set, and a microscope. She did do all the 'let's play dressup and house, etc' stuff....and it didn't hurt her.

It's the parents' jobs to make sure that a balance is there. I did likewise with my son..the best things we can do for ourselves and others is raise open-minded kids.

These guys have been exposed to every shape/size/colour/creed/religion/age group imaginable..sincerely...and it's done nothing but broaden their scopes....and lesson the 'surprise/curiosity/shock' of seeing other ways of life/cultures.

[van.livejournal.com]

I agree with you on a very large scale. Girls are taught to be "princesses" too, where nothing is ever denied them, and they are SO SPECIAL and everything, and so they grow up expecting the world to cater to them. And a lot of men get suckered into that view because they've been told to conquer and so they get the woman and conquer her.

My mom has this theory that people will act immaturely like this all their lives unless they graduate from college. I'm not sure how realistic her view is but from the people I've seen/know, it tends to be fairly accurate. My friends who have never gone to college, or dropped out of college, are still very immature and adhere to their childish stereotypes, whereas the friends of mine that finished college are a lot more focused on the real world and seem to realize equality between the genders and just aren't so damn pigheaded.

All I know really, though, is that the extreme genderstereo types bug the fuck out of me. And, the extreme homosexual stereotypes bug the hell out of me too (i.e. lesbians have to be raging, feminist bulldykes and gay men have to be flaming, Judy Garland worshipping pussies)

[mrdorbin.livejournal.com]

There's a vast, untapped market for Foreign Policy Barbie(tm). Help Barbie and her friends negotiate a mutually beneficial trade agreement while maintaining a focus on local human rights!