Short Paper 1

And the Girls Will Color

When I was in the third grade I learned that boys and girls weren’t treated the same way. I was eight years old, caught somewhere in between wanting to be Bill Nye the Science Guy and a teacher just like my mother, and before one pretty depressing day at school, I honestly had no idea that sexism, misogyny, or chauvinism even existed.

I guess you could say I have feminist parents, although they would never admit it. Nevertheless, I was raised to believe I could do anything I wanted. My gender was never an issue, especially with my father, who lovingly nicknamed me “space cadet.” He still uses it on occasion to this day.

But when I was in the third grade, all that innocence came to a crashing halt, although I didn’t know it immediately. I had recently been enrolled in a class for gifted students that met once a week with a teacher named Ms. Murray. I loved her on sight; She was interesting, she was funny, and she gave me something to look forward to outside the monotony of my regular classes, which probably appreciated my absence (gifted children are very annoying at the best of times). She also was a sexist.

That’s hard for me to admit, that a woman I admired so much blatantly discriminated against women, but she did. Only in the last few years have I been able to realize how serious it was and how very much it bothered me. One day, a few weeks into the program, Ms. Murray gathered all of us together and told us what we would be doing for the rest of the year. Along with various activities, field trips, and puzzles, she told about her plan for our end of the year project. She said, “My boys are going to build bridges and the girls are going to color.”

I frowned. I knew at once that something was wrong with this statement, but I didn’t know what. I loved to color (what little kid doesn’t?), but I also deeply loved jigsaw puzzles and building bridges seemed right up my alley. Why couldn’t I do both?

I left school bothered that day and, since my father picked me up that day, he asked me what wrong as soon as I got in the car. I told him the story and his reaction was instantaneous—he stiffened, face darkening, and turned to me slowly, “She said what?”

“That the boys were going to build bridges and the girls were going to color.”

He took a deep breath, “I need to talk to your mother. We’re going to have to talk to someone about this.”

“Dad? Why?”

“Because that’s sexist.”

And I asked. Of course I did. I always have to know; it’s part of my personality, “What’s sexist?”

He wouldn’t tell me without my mother there and I spent the rest of the car ride thinking that my teacher had done something truly awful. I know now that it’s true. She did. When we got home my parents sat me down on the couch and told me very plainly, “Sweetie, do you know what racism is? Being mean to someone because of the color of their skin?”

I frowned, “Yes.”

“And you know it’s wrong?”

“Yes.”

“Sexism is like racism, only it’s being mean to someone because of whether they are a man or a woman.”

And that’s all they said. I went about my day and my parents had that conference with Ms. Murray. I still don’t know what they said, but I built my bridge that year. It was a good one.

That experience, my first to realize that I was expected to other people’s ideas of gender and femininity, really changed my life. Because of my parents’ reaction, I learned that although I’m going to have to face such stereotypes my entire life, I don’t have to tolerate them. They’re ridiculous, they’re wrong, they can be changed. This belief has served me well so far—it’s the reason I’m in college, it’s the reason I’m in this class, it’s the reason I’m a feminist. If I want something, I have to fight for it, plain and simple, and not accept it when anyone tells me I can’t because I’m a woman.