Sexism is when someone is looked at or treated differently based on their gender. Sexism can be experienced by a male or a female but it is more likely to be experienced by a female. Women experience sexism in many ways every day. Sexism has always been a part of the world we live in.
Nowadays women have more rights than they did a long time ago, but still, men are seen as if they are superior to women and people think that this is not right. Great strides have been made towards ending sexism, but it still is a very real problem in the world and it is affecting women working in nontraditional careers, girls at an early age, everyday women, women playing competitive sports, and women in the healthcare world.
Women that work in non-traditional careers with men are treated unfairly compared to how employers treat the men. Some women may not even get hired or get that big promotion because they’re a woman. Many people believe that Hillary Clinton did not win the presidential election of 2016 over Donald Trump because of this particular reason; sexism. Voters thought that she didn’t have the strength to be in such a powerful position as the head of government of the United States of America.
It has been proven that Clinton was indeed more qualified than Trump, being that she was a US Senator for eight years while Trump was just a television personality and a businessman. (CITE)This man had no political experience but because he is a man he is seen as a better candidate to some people. Even when a woman receives the same job as a man they still have to work twice as harder than the men. For example, a man and a woman may work on a competing project for their boss.
The woman will work tirelessly all night putting her best ideas into the project, making it the best she can. The man may just simply do little to nothing. Their boss will know that the woman’s project is the best but still pick the man’s project over hers. Women have to do twice as well as men to be to be thought half as good. Employers tend to exploit their women employees because they know that woman have higher standards on themselves because of the world we live in today.
Women being judged for being women is not the only kind of sexism that is practiced in the workplace. Men of a higher power will touch a woman in a lower power than them in an inappropriate way. It’s not enough for men to be superior in the world, so they have to be superior in the workplace as well. When a woman is touched inappropriately in the workplace by a man of a higher power she may be afraid to tell someone.
She may fear that she’ll lose her job, nobody will believe her or maybe she thinks that people might even say it was her fault. A woman doesn’t want to lose her job that she worked so hard for or suffer the embarrassment and harassment she might experience from people, so she keeps quiet. A woman shouldn’t have to be afraid of the consequences of speaking out about something that is wrong.
Sexism makes a woman’s job more exhausting to deal with. Before a girl decides who or what she wants to be, society is trying to make her what they want her to be. Young girls shouldn’t have to experience sexism at such an early but sadly they do.
At school girls are frowned upon for what they wear. Schools are interrupting a girl’s learning time to go tell her to change into something more “presentable”. Clothes help young girls to express themselves in ways they cannot express verbally. Schools are taking that form of expression for them. Boys can wear whatever they please to school without being embarrassed by teachers on how their outfit isn’t appropriate for school.
If a boy can wear basketball shorts at the knee, why can’t a girl wear her favorite skirt that stops right at her knees? Another thing is the traditional saying, ”boys will be boys”. Boys are able to act out and express their emotions while girls are just supposed to be nice and happy all the time. Boys get to punch holes in walls while parents are just throwing their daughters a diary to write her feelings in.
Growing up parents have made their daughters stay in the house and play with dolls while their sons run around outside and play in the mud. This way of life has been going on for far too long, girls need to be able to express themselves. Freedom is a thing girls rarely get from their parents until they are grown and out of the house. When a girl goes out on her first date parents say things like, “ be back by 9”, or “come straight home ”. With boys, parents are always so proud of them there is no strictness from parents just a simple “don’t be back too late”. What is even “too late”?
Parents don’t scold their boys for being out too late because they are boys and boys are supposedly stronger than girls. In the twenty-first century, it is exhausting for a girl to just be a girl. Women are disrespected by men every day. Sometimes men do not realize it but most of the time they know what they’re doing. Sometimes women like to feel sexy or just comfortable, so she may wear her best outfit.
When a man sees a woman that has a revealing outfit on he may call her a slut, whore, or maybe just an attention seeker. A woman doesn’t put on clothes for men to see or lust over her, she just wants to feel beautiful. Even if a woman wears something that is not revealing at all she may be called a lesbian or a virgin. Men put labels on women because they are not how they would like them to be.
A woman should be free to feel comfortable in what she wears without being labeled a slut or a lesbian. Men may make sexist jokes as well. They think they are harmless, but these jokes are actually very disrespectful. Jokes like “get back in the kitchen”, or jokes about how women supposedly never let you finish a sentence. These jokes can come off as harmless to men but really insulting to women. (2016,Butler-Wall, A., Cosier, K., & Harper, R. S.)
This is highly disrespectful because no girl wants to be called out of her name, referred to as a dog, or treated like property. Young men should have enough respect to refer to their girlfriends in a respectful manner. Sexism is a big problem for women playing competitive sports. Just a few months ago, Serena Williams was docked a game for speaking out to the umpire who had accused her of cheating. Many men in the sport of tennis have said way harsh things to umpires than Williams did, but they were not docked a game like she was.
Williams herself even said, “There’s a lot of men out here who have said a lot of things, but because they are men, that doesn’t happen to them.” (CITE) If the umpire would have never taken a point from Williams she would have had the chance to come back and win her twenty- fourth Grand Slam title. Another thing about tennis is that in the Grand Slam men play best of five sets while woman play best of only three sets.
This is unfair because it limits the chance that a woman has on winning while increasing the man’s challenge on winning. If men are so superior to women they should be able to win with three sets as well. Pay is also a big problem in competitive sports for women. The women of the WNBA earn only 20 percent of an NBA player’s minimum salary, which totals out to be only one hundred and ten thousand dollars, Many WNBA players choose to play for both the overseas and WNBA leagues.
While playing overseas and for the WNBA equals more money the women do not have enough time to rest because they play year round. Referees make more money than WNBA players with a salary of only one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and they are not even athletes. In the list of today’s highest-paid athletes of 2018 from twenty three countries there were no women athletes featured on the list.
Just when people thought sexism couldn’t get any worse it appeared in the healthcare world. When it comes to health everyone should be treated equally and have the same oppurtunities, but that is not the case all the time. Some health insurance plans may cover viagra for older men , but they may not cover birth contol or emergency medical services such as abortions. If a medicine for erectile dysfunction is covered by insurance than birth control should be covered as well.
Health insurance plans are basically forcing women to make a choice. Have a baby that they can not take care of or pay for expensive birth control and abortions by themselves. A man should not have the choice to fix his genital area if a woman doesn’t have the choice to keep a baby or not. Viagra is not as important as birth contol and abortions are. In the 60s , even if a woman’s health care plan covered abortions doctors would not perform the abortion without her husbands permission.
If a woman’s husband was abusive and she didn’t want to bring a baby in that enviroment she was forced to keep it. A woman’s body is hers and she should be able to make her own choices about things that concern her body. Opposers may say that sexism is not real, it has already been eliminated, or women are just simply challenging male dominance. If sexism is not real then why are women being denied jobs that they are skilled for just for men that are not as skilled to be offered them?
Why are women having to work harder than men to get a job? It is said that women have to do twice as well as men to be thought half as good. Even when a man and woman work together on a project at work, people automatically think that the man did more work than the woman. Even when women do a project by themselves and do an excellent job, people will assume that she just got ‘lucky’.
If that is not enough to show people that sexism is indeed a real thing , then they must be blind. Hillary Clinton didn’t get elected president because people feared that her being a woman would affect her ability to be a president. Of course women are sometimes overly sensitive or highly emotional, but women should not be denied things that they deserve. When people think of sexism, it can be tempting to proclaim it a thing of the past , but sexism has not been eliminated it has just found new expressions.
Yes, women are getting ahead more today in the workplace and beyond, but that doesn’t stop the sexist comments, inappropriate touching, and even women being judged for what they wear. A woman can’t go outside without a man catcalling her. Some men even rape women because of the way that they’re dressed, they think that if a woman is showing a little skin then she wants it.
Sadly , sexism is still happening and it has not been eliminated. Women have been living in a male-dominated world all their life, so it doesn’t make sense for women to start challenging men now. Women just want to be something in life just like men do. It is true that women are becoming leaders in some male-dominated careers, but maybe it’s just the career that women like and not the idea of challenging men.
