Girls, Girls, Girls

To mark International Women's Day (a holiday I didn't even know about until my friend Jacquie told me about it) I decided to write about girls. Something that has been on my mind for a very long time is the question of why it is that despite tremendous strides in women's rights and opportunities, women often continue to have lower self esteem than men, continue to tend to pursue lower-paying jobs involving less risk, feel anxiety about appearance, back off from conflict and extreme competition, and worry ourselves to death over not doing things as well as we should.

Before everyone gets all upset, I'm not saying all women. I am very much aware of exceptions to every one of my statements above. I'm talking about generally. I'm also not going to get into the nurture v. nature argument.

I'm not a scientist, and although I find information on brain chemistry, DNA, and other physical differences fascinating, I so far have not performed any of my own studies and – quite frankly – am not all that well informed about the results of studies other people have performed.

I am a pretty keen observer, though, and I do see many, many ways our society reinforces female stereotypes, many of which seem to undercut self-esteem in our girls and women.

The Soccer Situation

I coached U-14 girls travel soccer for about 5 years. For those of you unfamiliar with travel soccer, this is the competitive program for the kids who are more advanced than recreational players. By U-14, most of the girls who play on the travel teams are very good athletes and have relatively extensive soccer experience. The team I coached had a roster of 14 girls who were talented, strong, and dedicated: In other words, these girls were good. At the end of every practice, I asked each girl to tell me one thing they did well at practice that night. Invariably, the girls all froze when I asked that question. They hated it. One girl even asked if she could run laps instead of trying to think of something she did well and then say it in front of the other players. They often tried to tell me things other players had done well or things the team had done well. It was only after prying and prodding that they would reluctantly admit they had "shot pretty well tonight."

One night, the U-8 boys coach was sick and the league director asked if I could fill in for him. At the end of practice, I told the boys that before I would release them, they each had to come up with one thing they did well that night at practice. The response was overhelming…all the boys raised their hands and once and shouted out amazing things they had done that night, "I scored like 20 goals!" "I was so strong on defense…no one could get past me." They talked over each other listing their wonderful skills and accomplishments, trying to top each other with their soccer prowess, and insisting on having more than one turn to talk.

I have thought about that difference a lot since then. Why were the responses so different? Why do girls chafe at self-promotion while boys relish it?

Halloween

Every year, I have the same problem with Halloween. No, I'm not a candy-phobe. I guess I am a slow learner, though, because every single year I am stunned by the costume selection. Every year, I ask the kids in my son's class what they are going to be for Halloween. And every single year, I get basically the same answers. The boys are going to be astronauts, football players, ninja's, Dracula, super heroes, rock stars, zombies, mummies, or some other reflection of current culture.

The girls are depressingly the same every year. Princesses lead the pack, followed by mermaids. One second grader told me last year she was going to be a "sexy devil." I remember one Wonder Woman, who chose the costume because of the jewelry and the tight-fitting bodice.

Girls costumes seem to come in two varieties – long and flowing (the Disney princess look) or tight and revealing. In first grade, I was thrilled when one girl told me she was going to be a rainbow. I happily told everyone I know that my Halloween stereotype was obviously wrong, because this first grader had stepped outside my those confines. The next time I saw her, she told me she had changed her mind and decided to be a Barbie cheerleader. Sigh.

I don't know why, but I find that depressing. As always, there are exceptions. I knew one second grader who was Medusa. That's about my favorite costume ever…but as a whole, we girls go for the pretty fluff rather than the interesting or exciting or creative. Why is that?

The Way We Play

One of my theories is that girls are programmed to certain kinds of behaviors because of the way we play. Or, more specifically, because of the way society programs us to play.

Look at the commercials aired during kids shows. Compare the advertised toys for boys and girls.

Two popular toys for boys a few years ago were Transformer toys and Yu Gi Oh cards.

For those of you unfamiliar with Tranformers, they are often very difficult puzzles that transform (hence the name) from a car or helicopter into a robot. It requires dexterity and problem solving to get the pieces into place and, even with drawings and instructions, it is a challenging undertaking. More than one of our Tranformers "mysteriously" ended up in the trash while my son was at school because my efforts at transforming it had maimed the poor thing into a mutant.

Yu Gi Oh is a strategy game. Each card has a mathematical value as well as a special ability. It is a complex game involving out-thinking and out-maneuvering the other player. My son eventually gave up on playing it with me because I could never remember the special ability or who trumped what card, and I admit I even sometimes sank to making things up because it was all too confusing to follow.

Compare that to My Little Pony and Polly Pockets. These are two girls' toys from approximately the same time frame that involve dressing and accessorizing dolls. No strategy. No problem solving. No competition.

I think sports also play a role in our development. In general, little boys play some sport. They play team sports and individual sports. They learn winning and losing, team play, balance, strength, stamina, speed, how to judge ball movement, and how to deal with coaches. They also somehow learn they are important because parents schlep them to practices and games and back again (I'll save my lecture on over-jealous sports parents for another time). Playing sports as a kid allows you to join a pick up game of basketball or join the work softball team without feeling completely lost. Studies have also shown a strong link between playing sports early in life and positive self esteem as a teenager and young adult.

Girls often do not have the same exposure to sports. My son plays several sports, with other boys, and there are many boys on the teams who have sisters who "don't play sports." Parents tell me the girls "don't like it" or "don't want to" and parents seem far more willing to accept that answer from girls than from boys. There's even some aversion by parents to girls getting "dirty," which they associate with sports. Better to have a girl sit on the metal bleachers for five hours than to have them actually participate in sports.

I know from my own experience that there is a huge drop in the number of girl's sports teams when they reach 11 years old. About the time they get interested in boys and makeup, they stop playing sports. This is a critical time in development. Sports not only helps girls feel they have a "place" and gives them something positive to do in their spare time, it also exposes them to exercise and helps them develop a positive, healthy body image.

So?

Are women suffering from poor self esteem because we didn't get to play Yu Gi Oh and got dolls for our birthdays? I don't know. I do know there is a strong trend in this country, still, for women to suffer from poor self image, to stay in bad relationships because they somehow believe they deserve them, to toil at unchallenging jobs just for a paycheck because we somehow believe it's the best we can do, and to suffer from incredible guilt that we somehow are not good enough. We try to do it all and never feel we have done enough.

I really don't know the answers, but when I look at young girls and how they behave, I believe we are somehow doing something wrong. Somehow, we aren't getting the message to our girls that they really can be anything they want to be, and that whoever they are, they are wonderful. We owe it to them, and ourselves, to find a way to get that message through.