Disparity Between Boys and Girls - Essay Example

The bringing up has been slightly different with boys being preferred over girls. This paper helps to thus discuss the kind of disparity that has ranged over the years between boys and girls as well as the kind of discipline that reigned between mothers and fathers with respect to bringing up their children.

In the nineteenth century, America faced a great amount of debate with respect to the role of men and women within society. In most countries and customs around the world, women were always believed to be the ‘lesser mortals’ and were given lesser preference over men. Women were seldom allowed to work or leave the house in order to carry on with their own lives because their lives were supposed to revolve around their male counterparts, families, and households. Women did not receive much education either, because their parents believed that they were to be married by the time they were nineteen or twenty, and thus there was not much scope to study or work after getting married.

As time proceeded, women were given more and more important in society as they began to prove themselves at par with the men. They came up in business, and corporate sectors as well as education and extracurricular activities like sports and other culturally related aspects of life. Women began to read and write and the literacy rates went higher up. In the household, in earlier times, fathers had more say over what their children were to do or be when they grew up. In older America, most fathers ruled over the lives of their children, mostly the boys, and they were brought up to believe that their only purpose was to carry on the family name and legacy as well as the business if there was one. Mothers did not have much say in the lives of their children and only cared about the girls with respect to understanding the pain and trauma that the children went through.

In recent times, however, such a thought process has undergone a vast amount of change as women have truly come up and shined in all aspects. Sports are no longer seen as a man’s domain as women have proven themselves there as well. In the family, mothers and fathers have an equal say in the decisions that they are to take about their children, and in modern homes and families, both boys and girls are provided with equal opportunities to study, pursue a career, and work. Marriage is given secondary importance today and children have the freedom to choose their partners for life. Girls are permitted to study and earn for themselves in order to create an independent lifestyle and then go ahead and settle down with their careers and family prospects.

Thus, in conclusion, in nineteenth-century America, the role of women was subject to taking care of the family and household but in the modern day and age, women have come up and shown what they are capable of, leaving no room for men to dominate the competition within.