TOWARD GENDER EQUALITY

Can we create a society that avoids gender stereotypes, a society of total gender equal­ity? Would you want to live in such a society? Does a gender-equal society mean that we must have unisex bathrooms, or is it something subtler, referring to a sense of equal op-

 

ReviewQuestion Explain how gender roles change as people enter later life.

portunity and respect? Epstein (1986, 1988) believes that gender distinctions begin with basic, human, dichotomous thinking—the splitting of the world into opposites like good-bad, dark-light, soft-hard, and male-female. This very basic human process tends to exaggerate differences between things, including the sexes, and society invests a lot of energy in maintaining those distinctions.

Many religious and cultural systems clearly define gender roles. Advocates of such systems deny that differentiating gender roles means that one gender is subordinate to the other. For example, Susan Rogers (1978) has argued that we cannot apply Western notions of gender equality to countries with fundamentally different systems. She argues that inequality can exist in society only when women and men are seen in that society as fundamentally similar.

In Oman, for example, women are subject to strict social rules that we in the West would clearly see as subordination. Yet Rogers argues that women in Oman see them­selves as quite different from men and are uninterested in the male role and male defin­itions of power. Is it appropriate for us to impose our categories on their society and sug­gest that women in Oman are exploited and subordinate even though they themselves do not think so? Such questions go to the heart of the discussion of power in society.

The goal for many is not a society without gender distinctions; a world without dif­ferences is boring. Yet a world that restricts people’s ability to express difference because of the color of their skin, their religious beliefs, or the type of genitalia they happen to have (or not have!) is unjust. It is the content of gender roles, not their existence, that societies can alter to provide each person an opportunity to live without being judged by stereotypes of gender.