There is a phrase that has rung continuously in my mind for the past week or so.
I saw a tik tok of a person responding to the phrase “boys are easier to raise” and (what I’m about to say may or may not shock anyone, depending on how well you know my beliefs) no truer saying exists in this here world.
Of course, there are exceptions, and things are changing so boys are becoming harder to raise (big ups to boy parents who are taking time to teach their sons life skills, compassion, boundaries and all that makes a holistic human being, we see and appreciate you). However, those are few and far in between. The average boy parent might consider his parenting easy, what with only requiring him to learn to “man up”, “hold your tears in” and “if you don’t become successful you won’t command respect so man up, hold your tears in and go…be…successful!!!”
Girl children, however, need to be taught a myriad of skills, listed below.
•How to cook so you get a husband, and he does not leave you for the help
•How to clean so you make your house a home
•How to make space for others so they feel comfortable around you
•How to navigate predatory uncles and avoid being preyed on, by dressing modestly and sitting with your legs trapping all the pheromones and African heat
•How to take care of children and their male parents
•How to pick up after others.
Frankly, I don’t know any parent who wouldn’t be overwhelmed by all that.
The result, dear friends, is grown adults having difficulty navigating living with others, with one half struggling with feelings of inadequacy if unable to financially support and having no other skills, or desire, to assist in the home. Then you have the other half struggling to juggle meeting their own, as well as others’ needs from being stretched too thin.
Things are changing, and parenting is evolving, because the world is moving. However, we are still paying for the set-up that suggested that domestic labour should be taught to one gender for the benefit of the other. Because, while more women are entering paying careers and financially providing like their male counterparts, the home is still largely left to women to labour in, without financial compensation.
Has this been a rant? Yes, yes it has, and with reason. I personally am exhausted with the discordance of the gender evolution. If we are moving towards blurring the lines of who has to provide and protect, let us, too, blur the lines of unpaid domestic work. And that begins with how we raise our boy children. Then we will realize that boys are NOT easier to raise, we just don’t raise them at all.
Blaq And Gold 