Modern Gender Roles

Modern Gender Roles

The role of men and women has significantly changed through the years. In the past, it was important for men to be ‘men,’ which meant to be the alpha male, or the breadwinner of the family. Men would go to work while their wives would stay at home and look after the children. The wives stayed home in part because it was not traditional for women to get a college education, and without an education, they would earn less money than their educated husband, so the man would work because he would make more money. However, this is not the case in terms of modern times. Today, the importance of being a ‘man’ or a ‘woman’ in our society has become less concrete than in the past.

Presently, it is not uncommon for men to stay at home and look after the children and do the supposed ‘women jobs’ like cooking and cleaning. The roles and purpose of men as the 'alpha male,' provider and protector within the family and the community as a whole have come under scrutiny. Because it is common for women to enter the workforce today, they do not need to rely on men to provide for them. This leaves men and women to some extent in contention for the role of the alpha in the family as well as in society as a whole.

There are many reasons (not all of which are dealt with here) why the roles of men and women have changed in the past 30 years, the most important of which being more women are going to college and earning a degree. As a result of women being better educated, they are qualified for jobs with much higher pay than if they had no college degree. Today, there are more female trainee doctors and lawyers than male. The reason this is brought up is that doctors and lawyers are typically viewed as jobs that require great skill and education, which means that before women started going to college, males usually held these jobs.

Another factor is that of socially constructed images. In World War II, Rosie the Riveter represented women who worked in factories where males who went to war worked. While this was only a temporary change, it showed society that women were capable of doing the work it was thought only men could do.

As a real-world example of how men’s and women’s roles have changed, both of my friend’s parents used to work full time – earning very similar salaries (from what I could tell). When the recession hit in 2008, his dad was laid off, leaving his mother as the working figure in the family. Since then, his mother has received two promotions, and his dad is still staying at home. His dad does not seem to mind this role too much because he is able to take care of many home-improvements he would otherwise not be able to do, and now they have no need for the maid they used have clean their house. Nonetheless, his dad is still searching for work because the financial need is always there, and he has been working his whole life and is not quite ready for retirement.

That said, I think there will always be an underlying theme of men as the alpha in society because that is how men were viewed for the past 2,000 years, and I think it is impossible for 2,000 years worth of interaction between the sexes to be diminished to nothing in a scale of tens or even hundreds of years.

As I see it, the importance of being a ‘man’ or ‘woman’ in today’s society is very similar. It is important to both men and women to get an education and to attain a job in the workforce. Likewise, depending on the situation, men or women will stay home to raise children, depending on what is best for their family.