Women are underappreciated and belittled every day. We are made out to feel like we are never good enough. Our efforts never seem up to par compared to men. Our knowledge, although equal to men’s, barely gets the recognition it deserves. Although the feminist conversation has illuminated the decades of obvious mistreatment, things have changed for women positively, but slowly. Before I go on and talk about women’s issues, I want to make it clear that I am aware that abortion law injustice is an immense step backward for women, but that could change if there were more women given a chance in power. That brings me back to my main point that women deserve equal acknowledgment; that is the end of the story. 

I will start from the beginning. As young girls, we would see the ridiculously sexist toys in stores and even play with them. It was always pink for girls and blue for boys. Dolls and makeup are for girls, while cars and nerf guns were for boys. Why is the narrative that boys are rough and wild when girls should stay quiet and be kind? It is crystal clear that we have transcended those boundaries. According to the National Association for the Education of Young Children, there was a study done by Professor Blakemore that ended up classifying 100 toys and whether they were “for” boys, girls, or neither. 

Blakemore’s study revealed that toys considered “girls’ toys” were related to domestic ability, caring for others, and physical beauty. The toys considered “boy’s toys” were related to competitive skills, roughness, and danger. The toys that were classified as neither were related to cognitive, creative, and physical competence. 

This precisely reflects on the poor standards set for what girls and boys are expected to be. Those classifications regarding the types of toys are a curtailment that children become conscious or subconscious of at a pressingly young age. Humans are too elaborate to be subjected to a basic status quo. 

To raise more cooperative and stronger future generations, these limitations need to be absolutely obliterated. Children deserve to be who they are, but that comes with personal growth and not the conventional ideology society has created and shoved in kids’ faces. This will take time, but children’s toys are blatantly the easiest way to keep going on this path of growth.

The reasoning behind the need to crush these norms is that it sets up this negative correlation that women are weak, while men benefit from the correlation of being strong and aggressive. If women feel like they have to prioritize physical beauty and the world only values them on attractiveness, then where is our equal chance to show our intelligence when we have constant barriers to push through? 

Another stemming factor of this constant struggle is that with these characteristics men are given, they are then viewed as better leaders or have more potential. I recently went through a personal experience related to this problem. During one of my classes, I was doing classwork with a small group of peers. About half were boys and half girls. When another classmate and I, the other happened to be a boy, finished the assignment at the same time with all of the same answers, we both offered to show the small group our work. When we both put our work down on the table, all eyes went to the boy’s paper. Now, I didn’t care right away because I didn’t understand what had happened, but later in the day, that situation left me puzzled as to why everyone barely looked at my work. No, not because I didn’t get the correct answers because I did. It was because I am a girl. 

I hope the sentence above isn’t one the next generation of women has to say. Women are way more than appearances. Women are strong, creative, brilliant, and hard-working. Women deserve fair treatment. Women are done being overlooked.