October 2024: Gender Equality
When I travel, I am always struck by the hundreds of faces you get to see of people in other cultures and other situations. And I am reminded that NONE of us would ever exist if not for women. It’s a mind blowing thought but every single human being on this planet is only here because a woman went through pregnancy and childbirth. We men ought to consider being constantly honouring and respecting of the fact that our species only exists because of the physical and emotional courage of women.
Instead, we have somehow developed a culture where women continue to be marginalized. Even as we make minor changes in the patriarchy the gender biases are incredible. A mother told me today that she heard a comedian say that when a mother works she is called a “working mother”, but there are no “working fathers”; just “fathers”. Men take it for granted that women will take care of the children and men take it for granted that women will be responsible for birth control. These are at least two very tangible areas where physiology does not dictate distribution of labour or responsibility. At the very least, men could assume primary responsibility for the hard yards of parenting and we could make it an assumption that birth control is not something that women have to deal with (of course there would have to be some protection for women that men are actually being responsible about this).
I remember when my wife went through morning sickness and all the difficult changes to her body that it felt SO profoundly unfair. We conceived the baby together and yet the physiological discomfort went 100% to her. Then she was the one who had to go through child birth, and she was the one who had to breast feed the babies.
Men can be wonderful parents, and there is nothing about having a penis that dictates that we can’t be the ones to get up in the middle of the night, to change the nappies, to clean the house, to organize the groceries and doctor’s appointments. The patriarchy didn’t create human physiology, but we can take active steps to move towards a semblance of gender role equality. AND we can be constantly mindful of celebrating/honouring/respecting women.
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