Dads and DEI Parenting

Every single girl alive needs to know in her heart that bias about her abilities is completely unfounded.

But if we only offer vague ideas about unfairness, we’re not really helping girls fully understand the message and how to react. We need to teach them the exact words to use. They need specifics.

While there’s no perfect script for conversations about gender bias, hopefully, the sample conversations and suggested responses in this article will give you a good starting point.

Define gender bias together

First, help your girl understand what gender bias is. You can start by telling her what you think it is. So that she can understand it at her level, you could define it as:

“Sometimes in the classroom, teachers unintentionally show gender bias by allowing more boisterous behaviors from boys than girls, or expecting girls to turn in homework more consistently, or calling on boys more often to answer math questions.”

Gauge her reaction here. Hopefully, she’ll be nodding her head in agreement. Then, without putting her on the spot, ask her what she thinks ‘gender bias’ is.

Really listen to her answer. Her opinion about gender equality might be completely different from what you’re planning to communicate. Consider her words carefully before you continue.

If her thoughts are basically aligned with yours and she just needs a deeper understanding with a few tweaks here and there, you’re on the right track. Continue by working out a definition of gender bias together that combines both of your input.

Here are some phrases you could potentially use during your conversation:

“This is a tricky topic. I’m glad we’re talking about it.”
“How did it make you feel to hear that?”
“If you think of any questions that you want to ask me, you can ask me anytime. You don’t have to wait for the right moment. If it’s important to you, it’s important to me too. Even if it feels silly to you, we can talk about it together. Anytime.”

Most importantly, your girl needs to feel like she has a knowledgeable, safe person she can go to if she has a question or concern.

Teach her about the falsehood of gender stereotypes

When we hear something repeatedly like ‘boys are better at math than girls’ or ‘girls can’t play sports,’ we tend to consider it as truth. But just because something is said repeatedly doesn’t make it true. Your girl needs to know this.

Based on your girl’s age and maturity level, here are some TV shows and movies you can watch and discuss together that defy gender stereotypes:

Project MC2 — a TV series where being good at math and science are more important to four girls than their appearance. Trailer
Andi Mack — a Disney TV series about a young gay girl who’s trying to determine where she fits in and the many amazing ways she can live her life without conforming to gender stereotypes. Trailer
Arrival — a movie about an accomplished female professor who leads an elite team of investigators to avoid global war. Trailer
Billy Elliott — an oldie-but-goodie movie about an Irish boy who wants to be a ballet dancer despite his macho father’s objections. Trailer

If she’s eager, let her come up with her own suggestions and watch them together. Encourage her, subtly, to explain to you how her selections defy gender stereotypes.

Help her ‘discover’ how rooted gender bias is in our culture.

Sometimes people aren’t even aware they’re being biased. Assuming women’s inferiority has become so routine, it’s ‘baked’ into our culture.

Here are some examples of common phrases that we often don’t even recognize as sexist:

drama queen
man up
grow a pair
throw like a girl
don’t you worry your pretty little head
honey, dear, missy
boys will be boys
you guys

The list is endless. Girls need to know that this kind of unconscious gender bias blindly dictates everyday decisions, what the hidden meaning is, and how it affects them.

Keep in mind that kids learn most effectively when they feel like they discovered a concept on their own instead of believing something just because that’s what they’ve been told.

Your message about unconscious bias will be more effective if your girl feels like she’s discovered it independently. Here are some ideas for helping her ‘discover’ unconscious bias:

Explain why terms like ‘drama queen’ are so insulting. But leave it at that. Encourage her to come up with more examples.
Suggest that she start listening for gender-biased words and phrases in everyday conversations. You can get her started by watching a TV show together and calling attention to examples.
Make it a game. Challenge her to come up with a list of sexist phrases and gender-neutral alternatives. Tell her you’ll do the same, and see whose list is longer. No Google!
Watch a few TV shows together and ask her opinion of how boys and girls are depicted in the media.

The goal here is to get her to think of gender-bias examples (on her own) that are ‘baked’ into our culture.

Then look for instances together that defy gender stereotypes. For example, on a television show, maybe a girl is depicted as the first student to solve a math problem, or maybe it’s a woman who does the voiceover for a computer commercial. Make sure she sees you praising this behavior.

Just talking about entrenched gender inequality with you will hopefully guide her toward clarifying it in her own mind.

Give her specific words for responding to gender bias.

Once you feel like your girl understands what gender bias is, its prevalence, and why it’s so demeaning, it’s time to help her respond to it.

Sound out the specific words she could use to combat bias. Sound it out together. It may seem silly, but it’s a very effective way to help her remember what words to use.

Suppose she tells you a boy in her class says she’s not good at math because she’s a girl.

If you give her enough options for responding to him, she’ll hopefully select the words that feel right for her and take ownership. Here are some ideas for potential responses:

“Some girls are better than boys at some things, and some boys are better than girls at other things.”

Or she could use humor:

“You just WISH you were as good at xyz as I am.”

Or simply:

“What made you say that? Can you explain it to me?”

Sometimes just pointing the behavior out without being accusatory can make a difference. Ask her what words she would use.

Give her as many options for responding as you can so she can pick the one she’s most comfortable with. Work on wording together.

Open, honest communication is key here. More than anything, she needs to feel like she has a knowledgeable ally she can confide in anytime.

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This article was originally published on https://www.deiforparents.com

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This post was previously published on medium.com.