A Twentieth Century Woman

I wonder about a lot about gender roles, and I wish as many books were being written about men’s as there are about women’s, for men would be happier and probably live longer if they took a good look at their roles and made some important changes.  Do men who are successful in their careers but are lousy uninvolved fathers understand how much fun and joy they are missing by not being involved more with their children?  Do they miss as much happiness and comfort with themselves as women who neglect their intellects?  Would everyone need to succeed at both to feel good about themselves?  Would life would be easier for women and men if they didn’t feel such pressures to choose one role or the other but were encouraged to attribute equal importance to and do both?  Would  life would be happier for the children then, too?  How much in conflict are the needs of children with the needs of parents?  Would family finances be more stable?  What would be the best modification of gender roles to help them meet the needs of men, women and children more easily and satisfactorily?

Certainly, the loving and nurturing side of my father, perceived by many as not an important part of a man’s role, was more important to me than the money he dutifully provided for my support, and my mother’s lack of the feminine traits hurt me a lot and was not totally made up for by her helpful example of more typically masculine strength. Getting both from both would have provided me with the happiest and healthiest childhood.  Is there any way our society can begin to work on that?

I really don’t know about how other people would feel about these notions, but they have helped me understand for the first time that assigning more importance to either men’s or women’s stereotypical roles is nonsense, for both are equally important and can be handled well by both women and men and provide great satisfaction and happiness.  Also, society’s belief that the ability to make a lot of  money is the main requirement and measure for success makes me feel very angry.  Look how cruel that attitude can be and what it did to my family and me.  Besides, it’s simply not true, for many rich people are very unhappy and many relatively poor ones are very happy.  Though having more than enough money is nice, it does not provide a sure path to heaven on earth.

Possibly the most important potential gift of the Twentieth Century is that it provided the freedom for the first time to question traditional gender roles which at times are wonderful and at other times awful and gave us some new understandings of human psychology to help us understand the best way to handle them.  We are no longer cave men or pioneers or live in a society with so few technical advances that women have to work all day to weave clothing or cook meals over fires and men have to travel for miles on foot to hunt or work with primitive tools in fields and protect their families from tigers.  The gender roles which were appropriate in those days are no longer necessary, and life became much happier for me when I finally realized that.