Week 8: Gender

*The picture on the left is my "tom boy look"

*The picture on the right is of me and my older sister competing in the Miss Santa Clara Pageant in January 2009.

I really like talking about gender and how my gender(female) is shown through my personality and way of life. I would consider myself both a girly-girl and a tom-boy at the same time. It's hard to explain how I can be both, but if you get to know me, I think you'll see how this works for me. First of all, being a girly-girl for me entails dressing up whenever I leave the house. This means putting on make-up, doing my hair, and wearing nice, cute, girly clothes. I love being flirty, going shopping and eating politely most of the time. I also dance and have been competing in Miss America preliminary pageants since I was 13. This is a huge contributor to my overtly female side. However, I can also be quite the tomboy. I love going out in basketball shorts and t-shirts sometimes with my hair up in a ponytail because it's extremely comfortable. Also, a good majority of my friends are male and being around guys often makes me immune to their conversations and the way they talk and act in public and in private situations. If I was born male, I think that I could probably do just fine in the world. I might be more accepted in the workplace and through sports because I feel that males still have an advantage, even in our modern day society. I feel like as a female, there are definitely certain advantages and disadvantages. One advantage is that you get sympathy and care from others more easily and you are allowed to show emotion most of the time. There are so many disadvantages of being a female that I can think of, but I will just name a few. First, I hate that people think I'm delicate or I need to be taken care of all the time. I love feeling independent and I do not like being treated unequally. An example of this comes with my own family. If I bring up a male cousin or close friend that "got to do something" when he was my age they often say something like, "well, it's different because he is a boy." I always hated this and found it to be very sexist because I do not care if he is a boy and I actually think I am smarter and more capable of handling myself in a bad situation if one were to arise. Another disadvantage comes with holding power positions. Females still aren't accepted in high ranking jobs and positions in our society. We have yet to see a woman president and the majority of CEO's of our nation's largest companies are men. Despite the disadvantages, I love being a female!