Jay Clark
When reading the article about gender roles in early childhood
I began to recollect many similar memories of my own that prove the same
points. I remember as far back as
preschool their being a clear line drawn between boys and girls in sport. Still, I do not think I fully understood why until
I began to play organized sports in grade school. I think the line is drawn so easily by kids
because the “boys vs. girls” idea has been implemented into us from the beginning,
whether it is from cartoons, TV shows, or even our elders. When you are young it is not so much about
the talent level between boys and girls but the fact that boys and girls are
two clearly different sexes. Young boys
may see girls as the enemy simply because they are girls. I also feel that gender roles are pretty well
set in stone and would take a great deal of time to change. Still many circumstances, especially in our
current day, push for a more defined ruling on these gender roles and how they
should be implemented.
In my opinion gender roles should be respected and
upheld. The prospective on a genders
role in sports however needs some revising.
A man or women should not be limited in their opportunities to express their
talent due to a problem in defining their gender. There needs to be a universal rule answering
these questions on gender in sport, to provide stability in the world of sports
as we move into a more socially liberal society.
Jay,
ReplyDeleteAs I was reading the article I realized that, even though gender roles have such and important part in sports today, I never gave it a second thought back when I was a kid and boys and girls were first being separated in sport. I went to a private, Christian school until I was in fifth grade and, at that school, boys and girls played sports together the entire time I was there. After fifth grade I moved to a public school and from there on out boys and girls were separated. Although I never really thought about the change, your point about how boys and girls separate themselves based on the fact that they are different makes a lot of sense. For boys, being exposed to something different (girls) while there are an equal number of similar kids around (boys), it is easy to be afraid of the girls simply because they are different. Even though separating boys and girls in sports early on may, at times, seem like a bad idea, I feel as though the boys and girls would eventually separate each other anyway.
Evan Sechler
I agree with both of your views. I also never gave much thought about Gender roles when I was younger. As a child, I played all the stereotypical boy sports with other boys and I did not give much thought about why that was the case. Also, when I was younger boys and girls generally stayed away from each other because sometimes our interests differed so much. This is not a bad thing however; there is nothing wrong with including members of the opposite sex when playing sports at a very young age. This can teach children that girls can be just as good if not better at a specific sport. When I was in middle school playing baseball, I had a female on my team. At first people were a little skeptical but she ended up being one of our best players on the team.
ReplyDeleteCorey Krupa
Back when I started playing sports, girls were on all of my teams and I never thought anything of it only that they are a kid just like me and want to have fun playing whatever sports team we were on. In contrast to Jay, I never really saw that clear line between boys and girls to much later in life. As a kid, I noticed that girls were different from boys but I was always thinking that girls are out here practicing and getting better as well and could become better than me. It was around the time of junior high when I began to realize that line of girls and boys in sports. During gym class I noticed that girls just did not want to do anything that the boys played because of the level males play at compared to the level females play at. From there on out, I began to see the gap between female sports and male sports. However, even though the levels of play may be different I still believe that female sports should still be given a fair chance and coverage like many male sports do.
ReplyDeleteBilly Nowak
When you’re young and playing sports, it doesn’t seem to matter who you’re playing with, whether it’s boys or girls. I can remember having girls on my baseball team until I was about 10, but that wasn’t the last girl in a competitive sport that I saw. There were many successful female athletes I knew growing up, even a girl that went on to play college hockey who was better than most of the boys. I can also remember the game of baseball I played as a high school freshman when we arrived at the field and saw there was a girl on the other team. I remember laughing and joking around with my teammates about how this game would be a piece of a cake until we ended up losing thanks in part to the female second baseman’s stellar play. Gender roles may make you think one thing but actual observation may prove you totally wrong.
ReplyDeleteMax Perry