Are We Still Living in a Man's World?

“It is far harder to be a boy today than it is to be a girl.”

These were the words uttered out of the mouth of a mother of three boys and one girl. To my response “why?”: “Well if a boy and girl go for a job, it’s going to be handed to the girl purely based off her having a vagina.”

The current rate of employment for female university undergraduates is 3.5 percent higher than for men. So yes, it is more probable that a girl will get a job over a boy. One cannot deduce as to why women are acquiring employment over men. I for one hope that it is because she is better, more qualified, and quite frankly will kick ass at the role but in many cases it is because she is female. Companies are filling quotas in the fear that if they do not, the witch hunters at The Australian will come after them. But so what? So what that a woman may be slightly “less qualified” or “less deserving” for a job than the man? She has had to overcome so many obstacles that a young boy could not even have imagined.

It started with her in primary school being labeled bossy when her male counterpart was confident. It ensued when she was encouraged to sweat over her burnt chilli con carne in home economics when her male classmates were able to thrive in economics. She then was the only girl in her lecture at university where her professor would answer the shooting up hands of her testosterone-fueled classmates over hers. Her brothers were handed internships at her father’s golfing buddies' companies and made a web of contacts at after work drinks. And then she gets to the interview, wobbling in her uniform appointed 2-inch court shoes with the adequate marks and she gets it over the boy with slightly higher grades and a few internships under his belt. At that point in time, yes, he may be "more qualified" for the role but that is because she hasn’t been given the chance to shine. She has not been encouraged and nurtured to take on the same roles as her brothers because she is female. Yes, young girls are always told that they can “do whatever they want” and “aim for the moon” but they aren’t told that they won’t be taking a path of gender parity.