Paper #1.... Gender Roles

Throughout my life I have been trained to be the traditional American woman. I was raised in a very small town and my family is deeply rooted in the church. The religion I practice is known as Church of Christ. I was born into this specific faith and my mother had me in the church almost every time the doors were open. I was taught to cook, clean, and take care of children. Since the age of fourteen I have helped to run the church nursery and my first job was tending to children at a local day care. I love children so I thoroughly enjoyed my job but I never realized that I was being trained to live a specific lifestyle. My mother was also brought up in the church and raised very similar to the way I was but my mother always encouraged me to go after my dreams and pursue a career as well as poses the qualities that she believes makes a household functional (i.e. cooking and cleaning).
The first time I realized that men and women are not completely considered equal was when I entered High School. As a freshman, my mother encouraged me to participate in extracurricular activities. I had been a cheerleader throughout my Junior High career so I tried out for a position on the High School squad. I participated in the drama club, FFA, 4-H, SWAT, and various other activities. All of these activities were great but my high school was home to a prestigious Mock Trial team. Our Mock Trial team was one of the very few respected extracurricular activities at our school and I really wanted to be a part of it. I spoke with the teacher coach, who was also my English teacher and an old family friend who had been to several of the debates I participated in. She encouraged me to audition for the team. Because she had attended some of my debates, she had noticed that I seemed to possess the ability to think quickly and she urged me to audition for an attorney roll on the team. Prior to my auditioning there had only been three females make the team as an attorney. I practiced very hard and studied the exclusions and exceptions laws for days.
Finally the day came for attorney auditions and I entered the waiting room. To my surprise I was the only female auditioning for the spot. Almost immediately the boys began to ridicule me. They tried to convince me to just leave and save myself the embarrassment because the role of lead attorney always went to a seasoned male. Questions about why the role always went to men were swirling around my brain. I didn’t understand why they believed that because they were boys, they could play the part of attorney better than I. At one point I was so upset at the fact that everyone around me was discouraging me I exited the room to call my mother. After several minutes of crying she reminded me that I had worked very hard for this and if I it be god’s will, and I deserved it , I would get what I wanted , I just had to pull myself together and show the judges exactly how capable I was. Their doubts fueled my desire to obtain the role and although it was very hard, I stayed to audition. When I entered the audition room I noticed there was only one female on the panel of judges. All three judges were flabbergasted that I, a female, was auditioning for this specific part. “Wouldn’t a pretty little girl like you be better suited for a witness role” they said, “Why don’t you audition a role that better suits your personality” they said. Again I was astounded at their disbelief. I looked to the female judge for maybe a look of encouragement or something, but she was just as appalled by my audition choice as the men were.
It was then when I realized that women were still not considered equal to men. Although I was discouraged, I was raised to never quit anything I start so I auditioned for the part. As I sat and waited on the judges to deliberate, I wanted to just leave. I was embarrassed to even be there. The boys in the room continued to taunt me even after my audition and encouraged me to leave before the results were announced in order to save myself from public humiliation. But their attitudes made me so angry I couldn’t leave yet, I had to hear the results. The judges entered the room and announced the first two attorneys. Those roles went to two very intelligent and capable men. The role of lead attorney was the only spot on the team that hadn’t been filled and the odds were not in my favor. There was three other men and myself all up for the position and when the judges announced that I had gotten the part all of my competitors jaws dropped and even though I had proven myself capable of holding my own, my competitors were angry with me rather than happy for me. I as the lead attorney, and two male co-council members led the team to the state championships where we took the state title. I remained on the team as an attorney throughout my high school career. But it wasn’t until we had won several matches and was almost to the state level that my co- council began to respect my ideas. The members of my co- council didn’t appreciate the fact that a girl was lead attorney and therefore telling them how to play their parts.
In conclusion, I believe that women are just as capable as men in any field available and I find it terribly upsetting when young girls are discouraged from doing things because some people feel that a man would better suit that particular job. I hope that because of my personal accomplishments more women will audition for roles within the Mock Trial team that are usually taken by men.