From 1789 to 2015, 43 people have served terms in the presidential office, and yet still none of them have been female. With the presidential election right around the corner in 2016 and Hilary Clinton nose deep in the race, we have yet again come to discuss the notion that women aren’t seen as a right “fit” for running the country.
On Jimmy Kimmel Live! this past Thursday night, Kimmel himself conducted an interview to discuss gender equality in the White House. Rather than focus on various adults’ opinions towards the subject matter, Kimmel instead gathered a group of young children—two male and two female—to gauge their thoughts towards a female president.
Although Kimmel was hopeful for his results to portray a more accepting generation stating that, “Our best hope for equality is our next generation,” unfortunately, the focus group did not show the type of “evenhanded take” on gender inequality most expected.
The two boys that we being interviewed automatically showed their disapproval of having a woman as commander-in-chief in the first round of interview questions. When ask to name previous woman presidents, the collective responses from the two boys resulted in, “I think women are not presidents,” “They’re too girly. They’ll make like girl rules.” (Girl rules included free make-up for everyone and painting the White House pink)
The boys and girls quickly divided on the issues at hand. When asked if women could do anything men could do and if women were smarter than men, the boys asserted that women are too girly and not buff enough. The girls opposed saying that women were definitely smarter than men, and in times of crisis, such as a war, a woman president would “make it stop so people could be healthy and won’t die.”
Sure, the kids being interviewed are at a very young age, too young to understand the gender equality issue that has so prominently been fought over for decades. As a society though, we cannot just laugh off what they are saying. Instead we need to take a closer look at their responses and understand why children have unequal views towards gender. Kimmel said it himself, “Children are our future,” and if the next generation already has predispositions on what is right and wrong then our fight for equality will be left in a stand still.
A problem that our society needs to address is the idea that telling girls that they can be anything they want is not enough. It is, of course, an important lesson that has been deemed affective, as seen in the round-table discussion when the girls preached their ability to accomplish the same things that men can. The issue at hand here is that we aren’t teaching boys that women can and are equal to men to the extent that we should be. Young boys are still growing up with the idea that women are weak and cannot be leaders, including president.
The next generation is important for our growth in our gender equality debate. If we are able to immerse our children in men and women role models and leaders, kids will be more accepting and grow up to be a generation blind to gender.
