My parents are in their mid 70’s and both are pretty much non-sexist. Their kids are all girls, and we mowed the lawn, learned to change tires, cooked, did dishes and helped build shelves. There was never any message of “Girls can’t do that/can’t learn that” and I was fully encouraged to study math, computers and science all I wanted.
Slightly off topic, but I love this story…
Back in the '50s, Mom wanted to study chemisty at a public university. At that time chemistry wasn’t considered a suitable field of study for her, so she had to get a degree in textile chemistry. Somehow because there was fabric involved, it made everything all right.
With all that, they do still tend to have mens and womens chores around the house. Mom does most of the cooking, most of the laundry, most of the cleaning. Dad does most of the yard work and house repair. They can both do all these things, they just tend to follow traditional gender assignments when it comes down to daily life.
Oh, I learned to cook, once I was living out on my own, like I told them I would. My husband also cooks. But, see, I was the girl, so I had to cook. None of my three brothers ever got dragged into the kitchen to help Mom cook.
My parents are, as are my grandparents. It’s not really an overt thing–it’s something implicit that becomes exposed during any big family get-togethers. My husband and I have reversed stereotypical roles, in many ways. He does most of the cooking, the cleaning, and the laundry. I was the one who went to school and got an advanced degree, and now I’m the one who works long days. He tends to be far more emotional than I am. He also tends to want to talk to hear his own voice–that is, he doesn’t want me to solve all his problems. I don’t tell anybody about my problems unless I think they can provide a solution. Etc etc.
Well, my family just cannot tolerate that. They can’t. I mean, I can see that it literally annoys them and makes them twitchy. When we’re eating buffet style, my husband will always fix me a plate first and bring it to me. This drives them batshit because it is clearly very wrong for the husband to serve the wife anything. Why does he do this? Because I’m a fucking clutz, and I tend to spill food when I’m carrying it. Also, because it’s a nice thing to do, and my husband likes to do nice things for me. But oh my god, it’s a huge deal. My grandparents will even chastise me for being a bad wife when they see him bring me a plate. Of course, it’s not just this one thing, but I thought that it was most illustrative of what I’m talking about.
Now, they never tell me I can’t do what I want to do, or be what I want to be. But ultimately, for everybody in my family, there’s a very clear hierachy. The man is the most important person in the home, period. Full stop. End of discussion. For my husband and I to behave like equals–or god forbid, like he actually respects me and wants to be thoughtful towards me–is just too upsetting for them.
Dad wasn’t sexist at all. There were certain fields where he didn’t want me to work and didn’t have a problem with my brothers doing it, but it wasn’t because he thought a woman couldn’t do them well, it was because in his experience women in those fields had to do twice as much work and twice as good as a man’s to get half as much reckoning.
Mom? Mom has led me to posit that machismo isn’t the theory that women are inferior: it’s a mixture of “mi mamá me mima (pero sólo si soy chico)” (Mommy pampers me - if I’m a boy) and of expecting less of boys. I’m her only female child, so she expects me to care for her (and for the Grandparents from Hell); I’m female, so she wanted me to be a teacher (like her) or a nurse (to take care of her, notice she didn’t want me to be a doctor); she got furious when I went to college 400km away because that meant she couldn’t control my every minute and that I wouldn’t spend my weekends doing housework for her… She’s completely sexist.
My mother was a good cook and amy father a fair mechanic. I always wanted to learn how to cook but hated anything mechanical like working on the car, but she would not teach me her skills and he insisted that I learn his, despite increasingly expensive evidence that Skald + tools = disaster.
My little sister hates cooking but likes working with tools. The same thing happened to her in reverse, except we were often forced to eat the results.
My dad (mid-sixties) thinks women should have long hair, wear makeup, and wear dresses or skirts (unless they’re doing things where a dress would be a safety hazard. ).
Outside of that, non-sexist. We were also raised very “Free to Be You and Me,” all of us were expected to help in the kitchen and in the garage. We got both non-gender specific toys and cross gender toys (sports stuff and trucks for me & my sister. Dolls for my brother). And he’s never said or seemed to have an issue with women in any job or office. He would have gladly voted for Hillary, though I know he does not like those pantsuits.
I was surprised when I got to vet school that it was a rarity that someone my father’s age could cook. My roomate’s dad didn’t, and she was surprised that my dad did. In fact, when my dad visited me, he cooked quite a few times. Pancakes, sausage links, hamburgers, roasted chicken… Everything. I did some, too, to help him out.
It’s not that she couldn’t picture it. After all, her boyfriend at the time was the cook in that relationship. It’s just that she found that rare, and to see a cook who was as old as her dad… was weird for her.
For me, though, it spoiled me. I want no deal with guys that cannot defend themselves in the kitchen.
Also, in my house my mom is the handywoman. Dad is basically useless in terms of repairing. A bit weird, as his dad was a handyman. It didn’t get passed on then, and I didn’t get the skills from my mom now.
They could still be sexist in other ways. Like my parents are fine with whatever I do, but it is expected that, if I ever end up with someone, that someone better be up to my level in certain ways that was not expected of my brother.
To put it bluntly, there was nothing wrong and weird in my brother marrying someone who never went to college and doesn’t work. They would be disappointed (at the very least, and most certainly at first) if I were to wind up with a mechanic, construction worker, laborer, etc.
And if we’re talking general smarts… I’ve dated and had lovers who are as smart or more than my SIL (and she’s not dumb), who were also tradesmen.
My parents are both mid-50s. I think my dad actually considers women more competent, in general. He works with a lot of “kids” (20-somethings) and prefers the attitude of the women he meets, for whatever reason. He sees them as more willing to learn, where the young men prefer to boast about what they can already do. (Me, I think everybody that age is kind of a jerk, myself included.) I guess it could be argued that he’s sexist because he’s so protective of the women, but out in the oil patch, I’m sure they’re glad to have someone who’s got their backs. I would be.
I was going to say my parents are not sexist, but that’s not entirely true. My father has been married three times and the one that took is the one to a woman who is very traditional - she does all the woman stuff like cooking and cleaning and sewing and taking care of babies with great enthusiasm and she also takes good care of my dad. She is very feminine, but very strong. So, I guess my dad is sexist in that he prefers the wife who plays the female role very traditionally. He had no male role model growing up, so he does not play the male role at all traditionally, however. All my life I’ve avoided him when he has his decorator magazines out - it was boring when I was 4 and it’s boring now.
My mom was a bit of a man-hater when I was young. I think it was a combination of divorce bitterness and that being in style at the time.
My grandmother was crazy sexist, even saying (to me, her favorite grandchild and a girl) that she always loves it when the boys get good grades because they’re going to need it. The blew my mind.
My dad’s 60 and my mom’s 55. They’re remarried, and both their relationships follow traditional gender roles, though I don’t think it’s really intentional. Of the two, I would say my mom’s the more sexist and misogynist, with her going so far as to say women shouldn’t be soldiers, and that Hilary should have never run for President, but I would be very mildly surprised if my dad felt the same way.
Both my parents are very sexist, though they would never admit it. When I entered grad school for my masters degree, the first thing out of my mom’s mouth was, “Overly, I think you have enough education. Don’t you think it’s time for you to settle down and start making babies?” She’s also horrified that I send my son to daycare and work all day.
My father is also sexist in his own way. Whenever he visits, if something is out of place in my home (which it often is because I have a toddler), he will comment on how messy I’ve left my house and how my housekeeping skills have not improved since college, even if he sees my husband or kid drop clothing on the floor and walk away. In his head, their mess is my mess and they, as males, are not responsible for it. On the other hand, I’m supposed to immediately pick it up, fold it and put it away. Apparently, as a woman, regardless of whether I work or not, my duty is to keep the house in tip-top shape for company. If the house does happen to be clean, but I’m dishevled from cleaning it, he’ll then comment on my appearance because women are supposed to still look as polished as June Cleaver, even if they’ve just spent eight hours at the office, three cleaning and cooking and are operated on little sleep.
My dad’s in his early fifties. He’s a bit sexist in some ways, not so much in others.
He was raised to open the door for girls, let them go first, and all that other chivalrous stuff - it drove my mum crazy while they were dating. He hassled her into growing her hair from around her ears to past her shoulder blades at one point because “all girls have long hair”. He seems to be over that now, though. My sister wears her hair shorter than he does, and he’s never complained. He’s proud of her sporting talent too, though he does talk about how netball isn’t a real sport when he’s teasing her.
He doesn’t think boys are smarter than girls - if he ever did, we must have cured him of it by now. I’m the nerd of the family, and sister seems to be headed the same way, while brother has always been more into sport and his guitar.
He does tend to be much more strict with brother than with us girls in a disciplinary sense, and gets physical with him in a way he never would with us. (Nothing bad, just shaking him by the shoulders and that sort of thing.)
Mum isn’t sexist. She treats us pretty much the same, and didn’t have a problem with buying my brother dolls when he was little.
My grandmother, very seriously, asked my dad how i ate. Not what I ate, but how. See, grandma is married to grandpa, who has cooked probably 5 times in his life. It is simply beyond her comprehension that a man can know how to cook. Of course, she also considers it a scandal that I’m 30 and am single with no kids. So, they both play the traditional roles perfectly.
Just wait until you start dating someone he considers “beneath you”, in a way that won’t be “beneath” to your brother. But if he doesn’t, then I commend your parents.
Seriously… My parents are regarded as pretty much non-sexist. But that comment, made to me, really bothered me and made me realize that they still are.
While my parents were in traditional roles while raising me (she tended to us as small children, she cooked more while he just did Sunday dinners, she cleaned the house more, her career was always a lower priority than his) I can’t recall a single instance where they said or did anything to make me believe girls and boys couldn’t have the same ambitions or achieve the same dreams, from our toy selection to our college education. In a way, I think they’re just too logical to believe otherwise.
I’ve two parents born in the mid-1950s who raised my brother (younger than me by ~3 years) and me the same way, very gender-neutral. We both had stuffed animals, Legos, trucks, dolls… Chores were divided by age, not by sex. Dad taught both of us to cook (Mom still can’t do anything much more ambitious than pasta). Mom taught both of us to sew. Both parents taught both kids how to use their respective washers and dryers. No subjects were emphasized in school based on gender, nor majors suggested or derided in college.
IMO, that doesn’t make him sexist unless he thinks *all *women should be like his wife. It just makes that *his *preference for the dynamic of his own relationship.