What about the boys?

Following on from my post about inspiring girls I have been thinking about boys.

Whilst preparing for international women's day and Aspirations day at school I thought how women and girls are really encouraged to be whatever they like. The success of the England women's football team and improving numbers of women in engineering etc are examples of how much more choice girls now have.

Do boys have this freedom? At 5 years old Bear does. At 8 years old, with no conscious encouragement from her parents, Dizzy informs her brother he cannot wear pink, he shouldn't use a pink cup and he shouldn't want a Frozen Kinder Egg!

Bear is a dancer. He is the single male in both his ballet and tap classes. His friends are mainly girls but he has 2 close male friends. One at school and one at church.

He has always loved playing mums and dads and schools.  His comforter is a Fisher price soft doll called Baby George who was a 1st birthday present and has gone most places with us since. I have had to tie George to his 'daddy with a long scarf on numerous outings. One year I had to 'help' George make a Father's day card for him to give to Bear!!

My nephew is not allowed a doll. He's not allowed a dolls pushchair.  I have asked his parents if they are afraid of him turning into a good parent so they are preventing him from practicing.

Bear loves playing schools. Primary schools are still very female dominated, especially in the infants and nursery settings. Bear is lucky that he has an amazing year 1 teacher Mr H. Bear adores this man. All I hear about is how funny he is. Bear frequently wants to make him things. He's planning to learn to knit to make Mr H a scarf! There is a male PE teacher and a male TA in year 2. 3 male members of staff out of around 40. Again, men in the minority.

Mr H is young, silly, cheeky and over excitable. He's very much like Bear. Whilst Bear shys away from rough play and rough and tumble at school he is very boisterous and active and often described as a typical boy. Both appear to be 'typical' boys (sorry Mr H , I have kids  I babysat for older than you!) doing what appears to be a typically female role.

When Bear was unwell, I was too. His Daddy stayed in hospital with him until I was recovered enough to. Every one seemed surprised. Why wasn't his mother there? When my daughter was in hospital, nobody asked why her father wasn't at her bedside. Dad's aren't all incapable and only able to babysit their children. They are an important part of a parenting team.

Why shouldn't male our children learn to be good dads, to clean, to cook when we expect our little girls to grow up and work like men?

My boy is not 'camp' or girly. He is boisterous and he has the male brain of an engineer. He also likes dancing to exercise, enjoys reading and has compassion for other people.  He cries when he is sad.

Why don't we, as a society, expect our boys to aspire to be anything they want to be? Why when it is socially unacceptable to pigeonhole girls into being mums, nursery workers and pretty are we belittling a man's ability to look after his child?

Just as my girl can be anything, so can my boy (and he doesn't have to be gay to do it!)