gender roles

Right away, from the minute we are sent home from that hospital we are put into our prospective gender roles. Even down to the most hideous baby outfits- girls usually wear a bow on their heads to show their gender as infants (so people don't mistake them for males). Girl nursery's are usually pink while males are usually blue. This isn't because each color seems to be more stimulating toward one gender verses another, rather this is to put a child into their appropriate gender role.
Once the child reaches preschool, girls are usually enrolled in dance class while males into some sport like T-ball or hockey. Not many dare put their child in an activity that doesn't match the gender of the child because they are scared their child will grow up differently than how they are supposed to.
Until now, it never occurred to me how much I've been socialized to be a woman rather than being one on my own. When I was little, I hated shopping, but I was dragged so much I learned to love it. While I wasn't a tomboy, my closest friends were male up until fourth grade. I was actually the co-creator of an ultra not-so-secret spy society on the playground, which now that I look back was very unladylike of me. We would run around the playground on foot or scooter keeping order. When students accused me and my best friend (who was male and the other co-creator of the spy society) of being married, we denied it and ran away to our secret club house (under the slide). I now realize they did this because that's what we thought men and women did- get married. But I wondered why people couldn't just accept us as friends.
People like to categorize everything, and it gets annoying when they can't figure out what gender to place a person. That is why we are put in these gender roles- because people are ignorant and not open to new ideas. However, with breakthroughs in technology and Transexuals becoming more prevalent, people are going to have to change their traditional views of males and females.

BE WHO YOU ARE!

~ Jessie <3