When it comes to raising boys and girls, a lot of parents can agree on one thing: It's important that kids feel valued and celebrated, no matter what gender they may or may not express. And for years, educators, parents, and experts in the United States have put a lot of emphasis on making sure we celebrate our girls and daughters as much as we celebrate our boys and sons.
This celebration has had an amazing impact on girls in the United States. While things are still far from equal, girls are generally given greater access to education, career options, and cultural norms that they just didn't have access to in the past. As a woman, this has been an incredible thing to witness, and it's something I've been really excited to benefit from and to promote in others.
It's also been really fun to see girls being encouraged to do things that have traditionally been thought of as "boy" activities. However (isn't there always a however?), it still seems like there's not as much of the reverse happening; it seems like many of us still struggle to encourage our sons and boys to engage in activities and interests that are typically thought of as something that only girls do.
One thing I have observed is that parents, teachers, and pretty much anyone involved with kids love to encourage girls to do traditionally "boy" activities. As someone who loved playing softball as a kid and who taught herself how to code and to build websites as a teen, I totally love this. Girls should do whatever they want to do.
What troubles me is that I haven't exactly seen the reverse happen nearly as often.
In our home, we've always encouraged our son to dig deeply into any interest he has, watch any television show that appeals to him, wear any color that he likes, and play with whatever toys he wants. As a result, he's really engaged with a lot. We saw Frozen four times in theaters. He had Barbies as toys for years. He loves wearing bright colors, including pink and purple, and he's currently growing his hair long.
But on the flip side, he used to watch Mighty Machines so often that I had the intro memorized, he has an arsenal of Nerf guns that is mortifying, and he practices archery and plays hours of video games. Balance. Right?
He's also always had close friends who are boys and close friends who are girls. You can take him to anyone's house, and he'll find a way to have fun there, no matter what their toys are like. These traits aren't just part of who he is — they're the result of hours of conversations and a lot of careful deliberation, of being choosy about our words and how we talk both to him and around him. Kids can (and do) learn a lot just by listening in on your conversations.
I love that girls are told they can do anything they want to do, even if it's something boys usually do. What I'd love to see more of is boys of all ages being told they can do anything they want to, even if it's something that girls usually do.
It's tough; boys and men, especially white boys and men, are still very privileged in the United States (and around the world). It can be hard to see around that, especially when it feels like the privilege extends to every part of life. But though they have a lot of advantages, boys are behind girls in a lot of ways.
For example, many boys read at least a full grade level behind their female peers, but it's not like boys are just inherently bad at reading. It's also not like boys don't enjoy reading, because lots of boys and men do. It's more likely that boys just aren't encouraged to read (or portrayed as readers in pop culture) in the same way that girls are.
While I don't agree that there is a "war on boyhood" being waged in the United States, I do think that we are generally failing our boys in one huge way: We aren't teaching them empathy. Boys, like girls, are born empathetic. Infants and young children feel and respond to the feelings their parents express. But somewhere along the way, we've all decided that empathy is a "girl" emotion and it's not something boys need to practice or be taught.
I think a lack of empathy for girls and women is part of the ongoing cultural (and educational, and emotional) divide between boys and girls, men and women, people. Girls are raised to consider the emotions of other people around them; many boys aren't. Girls are raised to make peace and get along with everyone, even if it means playing with "boy" toys when you don't want to. In my experience, a lot of boys just aren't taught that they need to play with dolls because that's what everyone else is doing right now.
I'm not saying it all comes down to being taught that it's OK to play with Barbies, but I believe that if more boys were encouraged to adopt characteristics, traits, and hobbies that are traditionally thought of as feminine (like many girls do in reverse), more boys would be empathetic to the feelings and thoughts that girls have, and boys would reap the personal rewards that come with having a more fleshed out, fulfilling experience in general.
After all, at the end of the day, most of us want to live in a world where boys and girls, men and women, and all people are treated equally. We want to live in a world where we each feel valued. That might be a pipe dream, but there's no way we'll ever change the world we live in now if we don't come up with new ideas for how something else could look.
I'm not an expert in parenting or psychology; I don't have the best tricks for creating an equitable and just society. But I am a big believer in moving through the world with kindness, even when I fail at doing exactly that. I am a believer in encouraging what's special about each person to be allowed to come out, and in nurturing curiosity in everyone about everything. So to me, it makes sense that I apply these thoughts and beliefs to raising a kid — and to share them in case they appeal to others who are doing the same.
