AIBU - to feel unsupported in my feminist beliefs in the playground

[Goldiloz]

I feel like this is the straw that broke the camels back.
I don't understand why mothers aren't supporting women's rights at primary school. Surely most sane people think that girls should be given the same opportunities as boys. We shouldn't pigeon hole 50% of the population just because they will grow up to have boobs and maybe pop out a kid or two. I feel like I am fighting a losing battle listening to some of the other mums in the playground.
It ranges from presents at birthday parties. The 'norm' seems to be buying girls creative/pink stuff unless they are a 'Tom boy' when they can get 'boy' stuff instead. And boys are only given sports and superhero stuff.
And party bags! Separate ones for boys and girls????
I just don't understand why women fail to see the issue with this and continue to justify it with generalised comments about 'most boys' and 'most girls'.
AIBU to expect more from modern women?

I was perfectly able at maths, and chemistry and physics but didn't find them very interesting. I didn't want to pick up the books to read further. Not good for further study really.

they were, unfortunately my best subjects so I ended up being persuaded to take them.

"There is a wall over there Bert . You probably need to bang your head against it."
Thank you, willow. It kept me occupied during just over 5 hours in a hospital waiting room- a perfect counter irritant!

Headofthehive55
I was perfectly able at maths, and chemistry and physics but didn't find them very interesting. I didn't want to pick up the books to read further. Not good for further study really.

Of course not everyone likes Maths but there's no good reason why more boys should like it than girls. Thats the point.

Poor choice of words. You are correct, brains don't have wires - they have neural circuits. Try the Stanford Medicine article called Two Minds.

So are there people who actively encourage sexual stereotyping? Who think it's a good idea that girls and boys play with different toys? I think so, can't swear to it but I have seen people discouraging girls when they wanted a boys toy. Sixty years ago my favourite toy was a zoro mask, cape and sword, my sister loved her cowboy hat and guns. No one thought anything of it, well if they did they never mentioned it.

BertrandRussell hope everything went well at the hospital, if you weren't feeling rotten when you got there you probably were after five hours.

www.newscientist.com/article/dn28582-scans-prove-theres-no-such-thing-as-a-male-or-female-brain/

A quote from the article fruitcorner linked to...."It reveals that most people have a mix of male and female brain features". So there are distinct male and female brain features then. The Stanford article doesn't purport that people either have one or the other. I have a mix of both. I think my point stands.

By referring to make and female brains features it is referring to what are viewed traditionally in this way ( e.g. spatial awareness being male)

"their findings suggest that we all lie along a continuum of what are traditionally viewed as male and female characteristics"

It does find an overall difference on average between the make up of brains based on gender but says very clearly that there are not two types of brain and that there could be more differences between the brains of two females than that of a particular female and male.

I think that's where stereotypes come from originally - there is often more than a grain of truth in them. The problem lies them when you aren't allowed to deviate from the stereotype.

fruit I think therefore more males lie on the continuum towards enjoying maths then perhaps?

I don't dispute that fruit, and offer myself as prime example of a real mix. But the point I'm making is that I'm not that way because I wore a blue dress or was gifted meccano and cars. Frankly I longed for the pink dress but I wanted to play with meccano and cars. I was born this way. Taking a rudementary view, a girl is not going to excel at maths because she found a pirates sword rather than a fairy wand in her party bag. She's going to excel because that's the brain she was born with. The point is society must show her that she was born to excel at that. But allow her to enjoy the fairy wand too

I sort of know what you mean but think the stereotypes mainly come from men oppressing women for centuries. It was assumed they werent as intelligent and they were considered inferior. Thats more than just noticing different characteristics and its hard to break the stereotypes unless we all accept they are nonsense.

Happy I actually completely agree. I dont think the party bag example is a good one at all.Being forced to play with toys which dont fit your personality is wrong but being allowed to play with toys which are traditionally associated with your.own gender isnt harmful as long as you are also allowed to play with other toys too.

There is no difference between a female and male brain at birth. You can't tell gender by looking at the brain scan.
The differences start to show later and depend on the nurture of the child. The part of the brain affecting spacial awareness develops more strongly in boys because of the activities they are encouraged to do. The part of the brain affected by empathy develops more strongly in girls, again, because of how they are treated and what they are encouraged to play with.
These changes increase as time goes on.
Parents who claim their daughters are just naturally all 'girly' or 'boyish' and its nothing they have done are probably fooling themselves. There are thousands of different ways you will treat your baby daughter to your baby son.

They may claim that they dont 'like' it but there is no biological reason for this. So why dont more girls 'like' maths? I believe its a confidence thing ,we are doing something to girls to make them lack.confidence in their skills and abilities in STEM subjects

I didn't like Maths or Physics or Chemistry. I did like and was good at Biology as it made sense to me.

I was at a state school which very clearly prioritised the tiny %age of its pupils, including me, who were destined for university (at a time when only around 10% of the general population were) over the vast majority of pupils who were going to get a job anyway. (Wealthy rural area if you could read, write and drive there was a job for you)

It was nothing to do with confidence- I am probably better than Maths than the average person but nowhere good enough to ever have considered doing it at university or a career.

Gottagetmoving my argument is that the male and female brain idea just doesn't exist.That each human brain has differences and similarities. My understanding is that adult males are NOT more likely to have good spatial awareness, that this is a myth. By perpetuating this myth we are teaching girls that they will probably find subjects like Maths more difficult than their male counterparts which,in my experience, is one of the reasons why fewer girls study Maths.

quote taken from new scientist article: “Across all kinds of spatial skills, we find very, very few that are sensitive to sex,” says Hausmann. “We have also identified spatial problems where women outperform men – the black-and-white idea of a male or female brain is clearly too simple.”

LassWiTheDelicateAir with all due resect you are just a single example, I am talking about an overall trend which suggests that girls who are good at Maths are less likely to study it than boys who are equally as capable. With both genders there are always students who genuinely don''t like the subject. The research suggests it's not a cognitive thing so it must be something about the way we are bringing up girls.

The stereotypes mainly come from men oppressing women for centuries. It was assumed they werent as intelligent and they were considered inferior.

Which was very convenient for the super clever men as they could then keep all wealth and power for themselves and exclude the inferior unintelligent women from such tiresome activities such as earning money, inheriting wealth , owning property, governing the country, having self autonomy etc etc.

My DD did Maths, Further Maths and Physics at A level, she was at a mixed school. Amazing that her primary school teacher didn't put her off maths by constantly telling her she was a nuisance for completing her work sheets too fast.

One thing I have noticed is friends saying that it didn't matter that their daughter was no good at maths because they hated it and it didn't matter.

Algebra put me off at maths when I was at school, I was good at the rest. When I look at it now I don't know why it frightened me so much.

Just to add she did maths at university as well.

I struggle with this issue simply because I am not aware of it ever being an issue. I grew up in the 80s / 90s in a not particular girly way. I don't remember feeling that I could not do a particular subject or something was for boys (but I did go to an all girls secondary). There is a general bias against STEM in the UK but it wasn't girl specific. I see some very strong and confident young women coming through my workplace. So on that basis I struggle to get excited about gendered party bags though I'm not keen myself. As my children are only just entering school though I may change my mind pretty quickly so find the debate interesting. I am perfectly willing to acknowledge my experience is not universal. Probably the first time I hear something is not for girls I'll implode!

Perhaps there are unconscious signals we give but my DD has a definite strong leaning towards dolls and babies that my son never had. She loves to point out babies in any story. She was always exposed to his toys but the first time she saw dolls at a play group at about one year she went crazy for them so we got her some and she still loves them. I'm not sure where it's from or why it should be an issue really.

It bothers me that sometimes this debate seems to edge on colluding with the idea that so called 'girly stuff' is bad and to be avoided.

Fwiw I think girls clothes are super - so much more interesting than boys clothes and lots of lovely colours and styles (which are also practical).

Poor choice of words. You are correct, brains don't have wires - they have neural circuits. Try the Stanford Medicine article called Two Minds.

If you inferred from that that 'male and female brains are wired differently' then you didn't read it properly.

famousfour I have a similar experience to you growing up in the nineties which is why I am struggling to blame party bags and my little pony. I loved dolls and my little pony as a girl and was always put in dresses but I studied Maths at university and never lacked confidence in my abilities.

I do think upbringing and the role models you have (particularly female ones) are far more important than whether you play with certain toys or wear blue or pink.

I don't do boy/girl party bags. Because I can't be arsed. Give them some chocolate and crack on.