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Selina Castro
Professor Ditch
English 113A
30 September, 2014

Parents Gender Roles

When children are growing up parents enforce social gender roles to them. They teach their children
norms of how society expects them to be depending on their sex. Not only do children have to be
accepted to society but to their parents as well. In From Women, Men, and Society by Claire Renzetti
and Daniel Curran and No Way My Boys Are Going to Be Like That by Emily W. Kane discuss that
parents play a very large part on children by enforcing social constructed gender roles in their life, so
that they can be accepted in society and not be discriminated against them. Parents lack of children's
individuality because they think society will not accept their children. I can relate to this because as a
female my parents taught me how females should act in society.
Often now a days people get confuse about gender and sex. They just throw it out there and don't
know the difference. Sex is female and male, while gender is feminine and masculine. People
categorize males and females and they assume what is acceptable and unacceptable. If people see
something is odd as for example a male in pink clothes or a girl in blue clothes then that would be
considered unacceptable to society. In our daily lives it is inevitable for people to not say negative
feedback at someone who is for example male and acts feminine thus leading to not be accepted into
societies social norms.
In the essay No Way My Boys Are Going to Be Like That shows how mothers and parents act
differently with their children depending on their sex. ...mothers and fathers expressed these kinds of
efforts to accomplish gender differently for their sons with similar frequency but mothers tended to

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express them with greater certainty while fathers were less enthusiastic and more likely to include
caveats.(92) When it comes down to mothers and sons they have a tendency in being the comforter
and wanting them to be able to take care of themselves, while on the other hand we have the father
being all tough and expect him to grow up as a man. In a boys world they are expected to grow up to be
a strong man and seem all tough, yet girls are referred to as weak and to just be cute. In Renzetti and
Curran's essay Research indicates that parents tend to engage in rougher, more physical play with
infant sons than with infant daughters (79) It is knowledgeable to say that the sex of the parent also
plays a great part in children's gender life because each parent tends to act differently with their child
by expecting certain norms depending on their sex and even by the way they interact with them. As the
child is growing up it can feel limited on how he or she can be and therefore having to conform society.
By following what parents say to children they are being held down to be how they probably feel it is
wrong and not how they want to be.
When you are born, depending on your sex your parents know what kind of things would
interest you. If it is a girl then their room will most likely be pink and have pink clothes. Then if it is a
boy therefore their room will be blue and have blue clothes. It it the exact same thing when it comes to
preference of toys to children. Parents will most likely buy the toys that are most fitted with their
child's sex because even now in every store you will find how every type of toy is put in a certain
section. One isle would be filled with cars,trucks, male dolls and all blue and be labeled as boy toys,
however it can also be related to the girls isle where all items that are relative to the female identity are
placed on that isle. As the child is growing up you have the parents that buy and give their child the one
for them and later on boys would not want to touch girl toys because their parents teach that to them
that those are not proper one for him. Here is where the child starts to develop on their own what they
should play with and with what they shouldn't. They are following the norms of the people around them
and especially to their parents to satisfy them or fit in.

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Parents already have in mind of how their child must grow up whether it is female or male.
Sometimes children do not want things that their parents buy them such as clothes or even toys. As the
parents start to see how their child is being consistent on things that they want, parents see it as
unacceptable and start to act on it. In Kane's essay He put on nail polish on himself one time, and I
said 'no, you can't do that, little girls put nail polish on, little boys don't.(93) When parents see their
son doing what is considered to be feminine they will often put a stop to it as soon as possible. When
saying little girls they are asserting that it is a girl thing when boys should only be doing what a boy
should do which is not putting on nail polish. As their child does not stop on wanting certain feminine
or masculine things it can have an effect on the parent by having them think that people will not accept
that and also be disappointed in themselves as a parent.
As growing up as a female child , my mother was always trying to get me to dress feminine
because I was a girl. My mother would buy me all kinds of pink clothes as well as girly toys as well.
For some reason I never really found them interesting at all, and because of that my mother especially
would get frustrated with herself. I remember her always telling me You are a girl , you must put on
dresses and play with barbies just like how any normal little girl would do. Whenever she would tell
me that I would feel limited on the things that I would do and could wear. In my family I have four
brothers and just one sister meaning I grew up with more boys in my family. I would always play video
games with my brother as well as get his cars and start to play with them. One day I asked my mom to
buy me a toy car I saw at the store and I remember looking at me in a weirdly matter and said no.
After that my dad came and asked what was wrong and I told him what was wrong, he on the other
hand did not seem to mind me getting a toy car so he went ahead and got it for me. That day I was
walking along the street with my new toy car and I get home and my aunt tells my mom why did she
buy me that specific toy if only boys are suppose to play with that not little girls. All the times that my
mother tried to enforce certain toys or clothes on me , she will see them as unacceptable and would get

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mad. I never quite understood why it was such important for me to grow up to be feminine and not
being able to just be how I wanted to be without having society see it as an odd thing to them. Now a
days you see how parents place certain restrictions to their children on what they choose
to wear or buy. I remember when I was at the store with my little niece and she was going back to
school so we had to buy her new school supplies. She had to buy a new backpack, so she had chosen a
batman one. As soon as she shows my sister what she had chosen she says don't pick that one , it is a
boy's backpack and everyone at school will make fun of you. I was able to notice that my sister had a
fear of buying her that specific backpack to my little niece because she thought that kids and even
parents might questions why she has that backpack or simply make fun of her, which of course that is
something she did not want. So that day everything that she chose was just unacceptable because it was
not following her mother's gender role and especially something that is considered wrong in society.
That meant no boy backpacks , or blue notebooks not even an image that was place on the object that
was boy relative. By having my sister acting like that, she was therefore limiting the choices my niece
had just because she is a girl which leads to having to be feminine.
Parents have a huge impact on their children by forcing certain gender roles on them , just to
make sure they fit in with societies gender norms. When parents are going through this with their child,
they expect them to act feminine if they are female and masculine if they are male. They do everything
they can in order to have them fit into the right category which is masculine or feminine or else it is
wrong if they fail to do so. Often they feel guilty if they raise their child to be a certain way yet they
choose to go against it. Society has placed these specific roles on how people should be depending on
their sex which leads to having people be limited to themselves. When having to be limited they are not
being able to choose for themselves since parents and everyone else are expecting to be a certain way
and then not having the freedom. Parents have expectations on their child to follow gender roles that
society has created so that they do not get discriminated on the long run.