Every day, we hear terrible incidents of women being raped, sexually abused in and around or at workplace or news about female foeticide.
Teaching our son to fight against gender stereotype is the need of an hour, instead of lecturing daughters, we need to have a candid discussion with our sons how to respect women. Change the pre-conceived notion of “ raising daughters more like sons… to raise our sons more like our daughters.”
Here are some insightful responses, how to teach our sons to give respect to our daughters
Without preaching them the direct stories, make them google about famous females who have contributed to our society just like any men such as Kalpana Chawla and Sunita Williams realizing them women are equally potential than the men in the society and can give off their valuable, and excelling help to the society.
If a boy has girls as best friends, teach them to ask for their consent for every small thing they do together, either borrowing pen, going out for a party, hugging her or travelling somewhere together. Tell them to seek for a girl’s consent in everything they do together.
Stop using phrases such as ‘don’t cry like a girl’, ‘why you are behaving like a girl’, ‘boys are better than girls’ etc. cast a wrong impression on kids.
Boys in their teens make their own perceptions about everything. Teach them to treat the same manner he would like his mom or sister to be treated in a particular situation, If someone passes a lusty comment at your mom or sister, how he would react against it, we expect him to do the same for his female friends as well.
Telling sons every day about gender equality and stressing over it that no work should be labelled ‘just for woman’. Helping in every household chore with your wife will make them understand more the above statement.
Underestimate the use of several memes, sexiest comments for women, being displayed on social media, and on television. Presenting woman in wrong light, tagging them in some misleading role should be never encouraged.