Friday, August 14, 2009

What Happened to Good Ol' Gender Roles?

I'm starting to think gender roles provided greater equality to women and men, rather than the popular assumptions...

Think of it. In the old days (the exact historical dates confining the old days are unknown to me) women were expected to be mothers and housemaids. They cooked, cleaned, and in general made life pleasant for the man. She may have been encouraged to be smart if she was lucky enough. Yet the man was in charge of making the money, making the family decisions, and driving the family to success. Things were pretty black & white, or male & female.

It's coming to my attention that this dismissal of gender roles has yes, given women more power, but now we're expected to do everything. And men are starting to do less & less. Now that they can feel free to explore hair products without getting ridiculed it's as if all their male duties have been tossed on over to the female area. As if a collective male sigh has been let out, "Ahhh. Freedom from standard responsibility!"

I mean, women in their twenties are expected to make a lot of money- and men are starting to judge us on this in their standard "potential mate" package rating. I hear guys all the time talking about women who make money and how she's more of a prospect. What happened to being judged solely on our looks? Now we have to be gorgeous, naturally thin (as we should be able to eat whatever he wants us to), a giving caretaker (coddling him when he has the sniffles), great in bed, a potential fantastic mother (in case things get dangerously serious), a skilled cook, a housemaid, and the majority breadwinner. All in one. Oh, and we can't spend more than 40 hours max at this job providing us with such a stellar income because that affords less time to massaging him and lining up the TIVO record.

I'm just saying- give a girl a break. Sometimes a few gender roles are good. Keeps everything equal.

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