Socializing the Sexes (2/4-6)

From our earliest memories, most people could probably remember a time when they had gender roles imparted on them.  I would bet that if we could go back to our birth their would almost certainly be some article displaying gendered language, such as "It's a girl!".  It seems at birth an individual has no worthwhile characteristics, at least in societies minds, besides gender, in fact some individuals have not even been named yet.  Unfortunately, farther reaching memories such as ones birth and early childhood are often irretrievable or murky at best.  An easy and common experience that was part of my childhood was Disney movies.  The movie video attached shows a plethora of examples of gendered terms, attire, cultural expectations, gender roles, to name a few.  The dialogue focuses on men which, as a male both in biological sex and how I recognize myself, resonates with me more.  However, even just looking at the clips it can be seen that women are the "damsels in distress" or must be unrealistically attractive, or else as the Emperor says "Let me guess, you must have a great personality.".  When watching this video for the first time one clip of the films used as an example that struck a memorial nerve was Hercules.  I remember watching that movie in the theater as a young child with my mom.  I also distinctly remember that in the parking lot after the movie she explained to me that this was just a movie and was not reality.  I think she helped me to open up my thinking in some ways by doing this and showing me that not everything that I saw on TV was reality.  I think this is important for children to understand.  Another thing that came to mind when watching this clip was in relation to Thorne.  Both the clip and Thorne discuss the role of aggression, in regards to boys.  I think that the profuse male violence with male characters young males learn that this is normal behavior for their gender and should act accordingly.  As Thorne points out this behavior is often aggravated by authority figures passiveness, offering responses such as "Boys will be boys" and "The kids were just teasing".  Exposing youth to such stringent roles and ideas and encouraging such with adult indifference or outright endorsement causes misunderstanding and confusion for youth in our society and I believe we need to begin to be honest and educate them.