Unlearning Gender Roles
More often than not, gendered expectations begin even before a child is born. After finding out the sex of the unborn child, parents may decorate the nursery accordingly. Pink walls if it’s a girl and blue walls if it is a boy. Next up, society imposes gender biases the minute a child leaves their mother’s womb and enters this world. Dolls are for girls. Trucks are for boys. What’s worse is when toddlers start gravitating toward gender-appropriate toys because of what they have been offered or encouraged to play with before.
Once kids are old enough, they start paying attention to gender and start drawing black-and-white conclusions about it. Crude stereotypes are formed in their minds. For example, based on the examples they see, they might decide that girls can’t join in on a game of football or that boys aren’t supposed to like a ‘girly’ colour like pink. They might think that women can never fight fires and men are never babysitters. They’re taught that girls need to be quiet and reserved while boys must be assertive and outspoken. Girls belong in the kitchen and should cook while boys have to go out and be active. Boys can’t be sensitive or show emotions. Girls can’t be too tough. And this is just the tip of the iceberg.
So why are gender roles problematic?
First and foremost, these notions set expectations and rules for how people should behave solely based on their gender. There are many people who feel like they don’t fit into their gender (roles). Additionally, gender roles give people a reason to judge each other based on whether they meet the expectations for their assigned gender or not. When in reality, people should be able to choose who and what they want to be.
Gender remains to be a social construct that is naturalized by the performance of gender roles in everyday lives. Performativity creates a dichotomy between masculinity and femininity. Since gender exists as a spectrum and not as a binary, someone’s gender can be fluid or a person can choose to refrain from subscribing to gender altogether. Gender roles can be confusing for these people who don’t fit into the bracket that restricts itself to only two polar ends.
Many a times, gender roles can be ways to justify sexism. These norms prescribe ‘right and wrong’ ways for people to behave. With these skewed expectations, many people are left feeling like they can’t fit in or that they don’t belong. Boys are insulted saying they ‘throw like a girl’, for example.
Social expectations linked to gender influence how women and men behave and this includes their sexual behaviour, attitudes and feelings. Gender roles also contribute to heteronormativity culture. Evidently, heteronormativity excludes everyone who is not heterosexual. For instance, same-sex relationships are still understood primarily in feminine/masculine terms of attraction. But why assign mundane tasks like cooking or handy-work to a certain gender? Unfortunately, gender stereotypes are so deeply ingrained in our society, it is orthodox to consider cooking and cleaning as “women’s work,” just as leadership and being the “breadwinner” are synonymous with masculinity. In fact, couples that aren’t comprised of the traditional ‘man and woman’ are testimonies to show why gender based roles are redundant.
The process of unlearning gender roles is to reconsider some of the values that have been impressed upon boys and girls and have been learned unconsciously through society. These values are neither taught explicitly nor written down concretely. Instead, they are societal norms that are difficult to ignore or throw out from our minds. Unlearning these norms starts with being aware of them and then making a conscience effort to think about the role they play in your daily life. No matter how educated and au courant we are, we all make moral and social judgments based on a set ‘normal’. Everything seen outside this fixed space is therefore seen as abnormal or unusual.
So what can you do to effectively and actively unlearn these negative stereotypes on gender? Respect people’s gender identity and use the correct pronouns. Create a safe space for people to express themselves and don’t judge them for expressing their true qualities. Point out gender stereotypes and norms on the Internet, on TV, in movies and in film. Speak up and challenge those who make sexist jokes and comments, online or in person. Talk to friends, family, colleagues and whoever you can about how gender roles can be harmful and problematic. If you think you’ll be safe and comfortable doing it, break these stereotypes yourself by doing something that isn’t normally associated with your gender.
Ultimately, then end goal is to create a gender equal society — one where anyone can act as they wish, regardless of whether it’s traditionally “feminine,” “masculine,” or somewhere in-between.
