Unnoticed differences

For a while now I have been aware of the differences and unfairness between females and males. Listening to Mr Robertson, I expected to hear the same thing I already knew. However, he talked about other differences that never would have crossed my mind to think about, specifically when he talked about how language uses us and swear words. Every other culture has pronouns for males and females when speaking, for example in Spanish, the term for males is ellos and for females is ellas. But when talking about a group with both men and women, Spanish speakers say ellos even though there might be some girls involved. I have taken Spanish since I was in the 6th grade and never have I even thought to consider the sexism of those pronouns. Another topic that Mr Robertson talked about that had my mind racing was swear words associated with a certain gender. The swear words associated with males are not nearly as bad as the swears used for females. The words used for males involve body parts (some of which men don't even have), and insulting mothers (son of a b**ch). To add on, some of the words like stud and player are words that some boys strive to be because it might be considered "cool". On the other hand, the words used for women are all hurtful and lightly associated with sexuality. Words like bitch, slut, whore, prude, are not things women strive to be and they all relate to relationships with men.

Towards the end of the lecture, Mr Robertson read some stories from 2nd graders and tried to have us as students determine whether the stories were written by a girl or a boy. The stories written by boys involved competition, winning, heroes, villains, war, and other violent actions. The girls stories were about the lives and feelings of others, their communities, and not involving anything really related to violence or war. This was interesting to me so I did some digging when I went home for stories I wrote, as well as my brother. In 4th grade, I wrote a creative story about three giraffes surrounded by all the rest of the animals in their community. The story ended with the giraffes and the other animals working together to see their town strive. I then read my brother's story. His was about a conflict between a lion and a tiger. The story ended with the lion defeating the tiger and becoming king. Reading these stories simply assured me that what Mr Robertson was talking about was correct. It amazed me to see the differences in girls and boys stories because it was something I had never thought about especially at such a young age.