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In reply to the discussion: Growing up female [View all]laundry_queen
(8,646 posts)I'm in my mid-30's so I'm not all that old. My parents would always say things like, "girls can do ANYTHING boys can do" right up until the point I actually WANTED to do something.
I was obsessed with hockey (I'm Canadian, so that's not unusual, lol). I watched all the games on TV with my dad, memorized all the facts and stats of all the players on our local NHL team, begged to go to games. Yet, I was signed up for ballet, gymnastics and figure skating, while my brother was signed up for hockey and baseball. As I got older, the unfairness of it all bothered me and I insisted my parents put me in hockey. I was good enough to play with the boys at that point (played shinny with them all the time at the local outdoor rink) and they knew it so they tried to placate me with signing me up for ringette. I was so sad, I didn't want to play ringette. Thankfully, ringette was cancelled that year because of not enough girls. The next year, I begged and begged to be in hockey, and finally was told the 'truth' of what they really thought. I was told it was pointless to spend all that money putting me in hockey because I'd never make it anywhere (ie, the NHL) like my brother had the chance to.
Let me tell you how angry I was when women's hockey became an olympic sport. Many of those women were my age. I bet their parents didn't keep them from hockey because there was no women's NHL.
It was also customary around here that when boys got old enough to work, their dads would get them hired at the same company they worked at. Girls got the crap jobs. I asked my dad why I couldn't work with him since my brother did (and made $3 more an hour than I did at my job) and I was told "you couldn't handle the work".
I can also relate to a lot of sexual violence too in our school. Bra snapping, pants being pulled down, items being shoved down our shirts, bags were emptied and god forbid you had any pads or tampons, you got harrassed severely for the rest of the school year. I used to bring an extra bra for phys ed and keep it in my bag. I got found out when one guy went in my bag and pulled out my bra. He waved it around showing everyone and I got called my bra size as my nickname for the rest of school. And I was one of the 'lucky' girls in that I didn't get harrassed nearly as bad as some. My almost-15 year old daughter says nothing like that EVER happens at school, to ANYONE anymore. Thank god! I hope things have changed for my daughters.