Are Gender Roles Valid?

#1 Wives Should Submit To Their Husbands

Men and women are equal, but they should have different roles. One particular gender role that I find valid and helpful is male headship in marriage. Yes, I'm a happily married woman (arguably, the happiest of all married women) and my husband is and should be the head of the household.

Practically speaking, one person must be the head. In Part Six of Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis reasons that one person needs the designation of the final-decision-maker because if a married couple disagrees and can't come to a consensus, then there are only two possible options: the couple separates or one opinion wins out. Wouldn't it be nice if there were some way to decide whose opinion would trump? Wisely, God designed marriage in such a way that the male would be the leader and female the supporter. Notice that this does not mean that men are superior to women; Jesus, being fully equal in power and glory with God the Father, submitted to Him, just as wives should submit to their husbands.

You don't necessarily have to believe in the Christian God in order to buy into the logic of male headship; empirically, it seems that male and female are different and that male headship works in accordance with this difference. (Also, I would like to make the disclaimer that not all Christians agree with my perspective either.)

Submitted by Amanda Stevens. Visit her Facebook Profile.

#2 Since I Can Cook, I Might Give It A Whirl

Gender-based roles happen. And they eliminate confusion. Almost by necessity, gender roles help us operate efficiently in society, community and family. Without them, we’d be forced to have the “Political Correctness” test before everything. I can just imagine what I’d say:

“Honey, I’m hungry – so I’m going to make dinner for us… Are you OK with that? I know its your turf and all, but I figured. Since I can cook, I might give it a whirl.”

But now that I write this, I think I remember Brandi and I having a similar conversation once before. And it didn’t really cause a rip in the veil…because we were open-minded and willing to serve one another.

Gender roles are only wholly invalid when accompanied by closed-mindedness.

Submitted by Jason L. Buchanan. Visit his Facebook Profile.

#3 Women Have Taken Over The Only Roles In Which Men Excel...

~As the subject relates to feminism.

Women have proven themselves to be strong and capable and excellent in truly any field they choose to exploit. I don't think that is up for discussion.

Did feminism do American society any favors? In the end, not really.

While women, as a gender, have the ability to run nations and corporations and anything else they want to run, men, as a gender, generally have neither desire nor equal abilities to raise children and manage the delicacies of homemaking.

American feminism has proven that women can do whatever we want. The movement has also spawned entire generations of children who rarely eat dinner with their families, come home from school to empty houses, spend their early childhoods in daycare, and are raised largely by the public school system and their peers. Feminism encourages women to despise their traditional giftings and believe that what men are doing is better. Women have taken over the only roles in which men excel and abandoned the roles men cannot fill, leaving the vital roles of homemaker and child rearer, simply unattended.

Was it worth it?

Submitted by Beth Rogers. Visit her blog - Veritable Observations.

#4 We're Not Completely Animals, Are We?

Of course gender roles are valid. As is the case with most cliches, there are some truths to gender-specific stereotypes such as women feelings their "biological clocks" ticking and men experiencing mid-life crises. Hundreds of thousands of years of evolution unfortunately (or fortunately?) mean that women take on much of the child rearing duties so assigned to them in their "gender role" while men take on much of the "spreading their seed" duties assigned to them in theirs. It makes perfect sense for the longevity of our species for the females to take on duties such as staying home with the children, preparing meals, cleaning the home, etc.; they carry the offspring and those duties ensure their survival. It also makes perfect sense for the men to work outside the home; they don't have the biological burden of carrying offspring. And, as an added bonus of not carrying the offspring, they are free to spread their genetics all over the place while the women are taking care of these duties in order to ensure genetic variation of the species and the "strongest" surviving.

However, we're not completely animals, are we? That is why while gender roles are valid, they shouldn't be inflexible. I'd like to think what separates humans from other animals is a sense of morality and social justice, and gender roles should be flexible inasmuch as morality and social justice require it. I don't think women should be forced (either literally or by societal pressures to be "perfect women") into procreation or being a stay-at-home mother as much as I don't think they should be forced to wear the nigab or have sister wives. I also don't think that Ellen Degeneres is an abomination because she married Portia De Rossi and likes to dress like a boy (as a matter of fact, I think that's just fine and adorable to boot). Additionally, I think men should be freed from this thought that their worth is based on their ability to provide (in modern America, usually meaning "making a bunch of money"). I also think it debases their worth to be pressured into enjoy strip clubs, seeing Paris Hilton's vagina on the internet, or liking fake breasts if that's not their thing (as if it made them less "manly" that they wanted something more).

In any case, I like to bake bread, can vegetables, and have been getting baby fever just as much as the next woman in her late 20s (well, the baby fever part anyway; I'm pretty sure the first two may just be because I'm a closet hippie). But, I am also not comfortable with the thought of not having a choice on whether to fulfill my traditional gender role. Knowing that society is filled with individuals like me makes it imperative, in my opinion, for gender roles to be flexible.

Submitted by Amanda Rogers, Esq. Visit her blog - Seven Eighty One.

#5 Even After "Working All Day"

I guess it would depend on which gender roles you are discussing...

Depending on whether you are looking at the cultural norms of Biblical times, of the American 1950s, of the Taliban Afghanistan, or of modern America; gender roles are defined by the present community.

Living in America, I have the right to define men and women as equal partners; however, embracing equality does not mean that I deny differences. In my family, my husband and I simply do what is needed to make our family function smoothly. I don’t mind doing the laundry, but I absolutely hate cooking dinner. My husband doesn’t mind cooking dinner (even after "working all day") when he gets home, but he doesn’t care about dusting or organization as much as I do. I mean, no one wants to take out the trash or clean the bathrooms; but why should one "job" be specifically deemed better for one gender than for the other?

As for parents who work by staying home or at a job away from home, I believe the same rule should apply. I have done both. I sometimes believe Jason would be far better a stay-at-home (work-at-home) parent than me. Unfortunately, I could not put my master’s degree to good use in order to be the salary earner after leaving church ministry. Had I been able to obtain a job that would have allowed Jason to be home with the children, this would have been our choice. Ultimately, I do believe during the first five years of a child’s life, a parent at home is irreplaceable...an invaluable experience for both the parent and the child. Yet, if this option is available, I do not believe the best parent for the job should be decided by gender...

Wouldn’t passion or desire seem a better option? Sometimes we ask the wrong questions, and when we do, we are never able to answer correctly...

Submitted by Brandi Buchanan, M.Div. Visit her blog – The Living Witness.

#6 Deciding To Stay Home And Raise Children Is The Hardest Job

My initial thought/reaction is "for whom?" and "for when?"

I would like to reply for our day, time, and culture, but I think that the best approach is usually contextual, and therefore historical. Only when you understand the past can you truly understand the present. The goes for our own interpersonal lives or our own culture throughout time, or even historically cross-culturally, as what we are really talking about are gender roles here in American. And since we are a melting pot, of varying cultures, religion, and yes of time (generational expectations), we really need to think of these things in perspective of their context to ask such a bold question as "are they valid."

If you take the perspective that a woman should be "barefoot, pregnant, and always in the home" one might initially think you could only place this mentality in 1950’s American, however I could also ascribe this worldview to modern day Afghanistan, or even rural parts of the south this very moment. But you can find variations of this all over the world still very much alive, and dare I say it "valid" for those within those cultures globally as well as sub-cultures within America. Which brings me to my second thought, "for what purpose and for whose benefit?"

To this, with regard to the previous example, I would have to say, a very patriarchal and rural and or agricultural society. Again, a state of being which we can find all over the map and even in our own backyard still today. And I want to make clear before going any further, I think that women and men have the right to fill whichever role fits them best, and I think that deciding to stay home and raise children IS the hardest job you can have and is the most beautiful thing any woman can do for society, that is to rear wonderful human beings.

Having well defined gender roles keep everyone in their place, that is to say, keeps things simple and the roles, duties, and responsibilities well defined. Men are generally better suited for manual labor and harvesting, which leaves the house-tending and child rearing to the women-folk. Why confuse things, "if it’s not broke, don't fix it" right?

HOWEVER...

We don’t all live in simple pastoral and male dominated societies any longer (and thank the Lord! If you are among those that don’t think this is a good thing, ask Turkey or Iran how well they are transitioning these days). Some parts of society, more urban settings, and more industrialized nations have the luxury of leaving those previously mandated roles of both men and women to others in society. In many parts of America the men-folk no longer till their own farm and harvest their own crops, nor do they build their own barns and towns. So if they are freed up to pursue more creative passions and higher ambitions if farming or manual labor isn’t for them (of which I think either way is a good and honest way to earn a living, so I’m not knocking either), then why should women be relegated to tending house and children all day? That fancy job in the big city pays well, and women are graduating from college in higher numbers than men, so why shouldn’t we hire maids and nannies? (I wish!) Men are allowed to have different roles and expectations now-a-days, so why shouldn’t women as well?

My point is – that gender roles serve the purpose of their particular society, in its own time and place; they serve as societal guidelines to better serve the larger community’s goals. Furthermore, when gender roles aren’t well defined, this leads to confusion, frustration, bruised egos of men and stressed-out bodies of women. But that’s a whole other tangent, and I’m already waaay over my word-count limit! :)

But I say a good bit of this tongue-in-cheek, because there are those times, after a long day at work, a long night at school, and a longer night of staying up to finish a paper before I have to wake up and do it all again, when I ask myself, "when do I have time to cook or grocery shop, let alone relax, and when will I ever have time to raise a family?" And there are those times when my partner, a man who was raised by a strong independent female who could "do it all" (work, grad school, and raise two nearly perfect children 20 something years ago when it was all that much more difficult), doesn’t open a door, fails to take out the garbage, or doesn’t stand up to a person or situation because he knows that we are equals and I can take care of it just as well as he can – and I wonder, is this really any better than "how it used to be?", Is it worth the trade-off?

Ultimately, I think that what matters most is being able to make the decision for ourselves and not have it forced on us by society or religion, whether it’s a woman wanting to be a high-powered attorney and paying someone to care for the kiddos during the day, or a man cultivating his caring nature and becoming a nurse or stay at home dad. Because the most functional societies are those that are filled with individuals who are allowed to follow their dreams and give of their greatest strengths and talents back to society, whatever roles those might fit.

Submitted by Summer Cartwright.