Published on 12, July, 2020
I've been mulling over this for a long time. In the workplace it's expected that the female/female identifying colleagues will take care of the soft skill aspects of being in a team. Team member has a birthday? Well you're expected to arrange flowers, cake, card, gift, lunch, dinner. Male members are not expected to do this kind of work. In my most recent position I have been open about being autistic yet all the time I am aware that the males get away with not giving a damn if it's someone's birthday or what a team member is going through, yet I'm expected to do the work of putting myself out because what? I have secondary sexual characteristics that in their eyes define me as woman/ nurturing/should care. I don't care unless I actually care about the person. It's stupid and unfair that in the NT world we have to survive in I'm expected to make this effort for some stupid sexist notion about what it means to be female.
Sexism goes both ways. As men have a lot of expectations on them too. I am sure some of the men would love to go out and arrange the cakes or whatever.
As a woman myself , I actually like doing these kinda things. When it happened in old workplaces, we girls (and sometimes a guy or two) would go out and get the cakes etc and have a chat, and sometimes a wee sneaky coffee total skiving. It was a great way to get to know each other too.
But yes I think that it needs to be mixed up a bit, so that it is more equal, so you are correct.
some people like to do that sort of thing, some don't and that is what should be respected here.
I was just thinking about my mum putting big hairy spiders in envelopes and posting them under the bathroom door when my dad was shaving. She was laughing so much at my dads scream...so much for men spider wrangling and soft women !