As people’s education levels get higher and higher, and with the development of society, people have a lot of new ideas or opinions that are different from before. It can also be said that this is a slow advancement or change in our society. Gender and Social Equality has been one of the topical issues in recent years, which has also led to many social problems. There are still many people who have sexism and racism when they treat people of different genders and races. Such as men don’t make-up, men don’t cry, women don’t speak loudly, and women have to take care of their family, some bad words like nigga and chink, etc. However, many people have begun to have a different understanding or idea of Gender and Social Equality, and start breaking the convention.
Many women start to become independent and stronger, men start to makeup and show their fragile side to others, and friendly treatment of people from other races. Moreover, there are a lot of people, governments and countries who start to organize into groups spontaneously and then speak for themselves in society. For instance, The United Nation, work hard to solve the Gender and Social inequality issue and it is work. A lot of people nowadays are thrown out the previous sexism and racism for different genders and groups, and it makes that people no longer have to be bound by tradition, and people are no longer have to be treated unfairly because of their genders and groups.
According to the “SDG 5: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls”, I think this goal is gradually being realized because our culture and mind are changing and people no longer implement the incorrect traditional culture. In previous China, women’s status was lower than that of men. It reminds me that the problem of “Son preference” in China and the story with my grandfather, my grandfather asked my mother to abort the pregnancy because I was a girl. In China, women had unfairly treated a long time ago. The gender inequality makes to different treatments for different genders. In simple terms, was the social status inequality between men and women. In China, 80% of families have the “Son Preference” problem(from World Sustainable Development Outlook 2007). That means parents from those families give more love and attention to a child who is a male than a female. The most common example of this problem is if the mother has a baby boy, then she will get better treatment from other family members than having a baby girl; And male members always receive the best treatment, but the female members always view less important than a male member. Actually, Japan has the same situation with China. Men were like the king, while women were the servants. Only men can order women to do something, while women can’t order men to do something. The women must not refuse the men, but if you did then you will have a hard life after you did it. What is causing these problems? It is because of the saying “Too much learning does not become a virtuous woman.” This quote means that ancient people did not encourage women to learn.
For instance, my grandmother said: ‘Many women in their generation who have not attended school, so she only knows some words and this made it difficult for her to find a job. This is one of the principal reasons why women must rely on their husbands, and they dare not oppose the husband. In our group survey, one of the questions I think is very important to us is “Do you think females getting a higher education is important in your country? ” and then most people have chosen “very important”, it shows the efforts of the United Nations are fruitful and views have changed of people. Nowadays, many women have received higher education and they are starting to work in China, they are no longer just taking care of her family. They are breaking the convention(Traditional Culture)，the gap between the status of women and men became closer and closer. Also, women become more independent than before, they don’t need to rely on their husbands anymore. Moreover, it also reduces income inequalities between males and females.
At the same time, I think stereotypes are one of the reasons for our gender inequality. Stereotypes, it not only affects women and it also affects men. I have read an interesting article before, it is “Bros Before Hos’: The Guy Code” by Michael Kimmel, it is the collection of attitudes, values, and traits that together compose what it means to be a man. According to the article, the author wrote that “Here’s what guys say, summarized into a set of contemporary epigrams. Thinks of it as a “Real Guy’s Top Ten List.”
“Boys Don’t Cry”
“It’s Better to Be Mad than Sad”
“Don’t Get Mad—— Get Even
“Take It Like a Man”
“He Who Has the Most Toys When He Dies, Wins”
“Just Do It,” or “Ride or Die”
“Size Matters”
“I Don’t Stop to Ask for Directions”
“Nice Guys Finish Last”
“It’s All Good”
In other words, the guy code is the stereotype that people define for a real man. Besides, I think that we have to be careful of what we say to the children because it will affect them. I remember that day, we talk about Disney and I was also saying who’s your favorite Disney character, and my little Cousin he said Elsa is a favorite character. Then, a friend of mine said you couldn’t like Elsa. Elsa is a girl, you need to like superheroes because your boy and you need to like a boy character. That was basically the gist of the whole story he said that he liked. Boys should only like boy characters, and so I immediately cut in and said no, it’s totally fine. Why can’t he like Elsa and that’s cool, it’s definitely more flexible if the toddler or the young child is a girl. Also, I believe that the same goes with colors because if you’re a female you can like all sorts of colors. But if you’re a young boy and you say you like pink. It’s immediately like he is a not real boy. It’s in a way; it’s frowned upon because boys are most reliable in their stereotypes. In the other case, it’s all so weird how still this day age if you have a baby shower party and if you’re expecting a boy, you immediately going to go senior party completely blue. If you’re having a girl, your party is themed to pink. That in a way also pisses me off, why are we relating colors to gender when it should just all be like any bloody color they want. Why does it have to be blue for boys or pink for girls? And I think we should be careful what we say to children when it comes to that kind of diversity.
If your son wants to play with a Barbie or a dinosaur, I think let him and he should be completely free to make that choice up for himself. We as a parent shouldn’t your biggest concern be that he’s happy? As long as he’s happy who cares what his preferences and color toys and gender. We really need to start to be careful of what we say to the children because children just so easily susceptible to that whole sort of stereotyping. If you teach them from a very young age that they should be aware of these things: that boys should only go in that direction and girls should only go in that direction. Similarly, social equality issues are in the same situation. Stereotype, it does not help them, but instead, it really can turn out to be a harmful idea in the end. Therefore, I think we should not over-judge a person by using the “guy code,” “girl code,” or race, and we should put aside stereotypes about genders and groups.
Gender and social equality, this problem is very complicated. It is impossible to solve in a short time, we need a long time to address this issue and to change it, and it still needs a lot of people to participate and work on it. The UN explains: ‘Gender equality is not only a fundamental human right, but a necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world. I totally agree with this opinion. However, change is always possible but only if we work together in making our society better.
