If you don't know it's sexist, does it even matter?

Yup. So here are three ways to help inoculate your daughter against the effects of gender bias

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“Do you remember Nana’s story about her bosses tying her up so they could kiss her?” my cousin asked me not long ago.

“Wait, what?!” I asked him. I remembered her pride at being voted ‘Best Legs’ when she was 16 by the boys at the beach (she repeated the story often) and others like it, but not that one. “Yup.” he said. “I think it was the office Christmas party. They tied her to her chair and put a mistletoe above her head and took turns kissing her. She would tell us that story as if it were a bedtime story…like she had NO idea how sexist and wrong it was.”

It’s true. My grandmother’s stories of objectification and “minor” assault made them sound like they were flattering and she’d get mad when we said we thought it was weird. When you learn your worth rests on your appearance, being objectified (or assaulted) becomes a reward, or at least you’re told it is. My grandmother normalized being treated like that. She, like most women of her generation, was brought up to believe that her desirability was all that mattered so sexual attention was the highest form of validation she could expect. Maybe, too, she didn’t want to consider what it meant to spend a lifetime being valued primarily for her body.

While she may not have been traumatized, at least not capital T traumatized, by all the everyday sexism, I have no doubt her sense of self was stunted. The thing with casual sexism is that one instance may seem trivial in isolation, but it’s death by a thousand paper cuts, accumulating and becoming festering wounds of self-doubt.

But that was nearly 100 years ago. No one would tie up a young secretary today, right? Even if that particular “joke” doesn’t happen in this day and age (and I’m not so sure it doesn’t) there are plenty of other forms of sexism that we normalize.

The girls I hear from in my practice and who I interviewed for my book, tell stories of being dismissed, interrupted, and demeaned, of having their butts grabbed, clothing yanked, bra straps snapped, body parts mocked, called a ho, having their feelings attributed to PMS, being casually touched by older men, and so on. As a culture, we dismiss the idea that less violent assault or harassment is worth taking seriously. They can seem like minor indignities—especially compared with something like rape (which itself is often considered no big deal). I repeatedly hear—even from girls themselves—that these less obviously harmful experiences should be brushed off. “It’s fine,” they tell me, or “It’s not the worst thing; I can handle it,” or “Getting upset just fuels the fire.” Girls are so desensitized to it, they accept it as a fact of life.

My grandmother prided herself on her appearance and was a chic redhead until the day she died at 94. So the question is, if you don’t know it’s sexist, is it? Does it even matter? Let’s take a look at the research.

These smaller and more intimate acts of harassment and assault are often justified as part of growing up but they’re associated with a host of upsetting outcomes. The emotional toll it takes manifests in trouble sleeping, absenteeism, and trouble concentrating. And longitudinal studies show those who’ve been sexually harassed by ninth grade, have more mental health issues by 12^th grade, including self-harm, suicidal thoughts, maladaptive dieting, substance use, depression and low self esteem. Moreover, sexual harassment at the beginning of high school is a strong predictor of future victimization by peers and dating partners. It’s a slippery slope from gender bias and sexism to sexual harassment and violence. Certainly, the narratives I hear from girls in my psychology practice confirm these findings.

These microaggressions belittle girls and make them feel inadequate and unsafe over time, the way even the hardest marble stairs can be ground down by years of trampling. If girls do complain, they’re told to lighten up. It’s in the repeated minimization and denial where girls start to feel crazy and begin buying into the idea that they’re just too sensitive. Trauma doesn’t have to be an event; it can be the invisible residue of growing up in a world that believes you’re weak, inferior, irrational, overly emotional, and incapable of leadership and of making important decisions.

It’s heartening that awareness of outright gender-based violence is increasing but violent misogyny seeps into the culture in ever more invisible or tricky ways. Take, for example, men randomly sucker-punching at least 14 women in the face in New York (and Chicago). Or, as I noted in a previous post, Porn and The Rise of Rough Teen Sex, eroticized performative misogyny like the dangerous act of sexual strangulation is now commonplace. Even in countries where violence against women is ostensibly illegal, it’s still widespread, so you can bet that casual sexism, which is less obviously harmful to the naked eye, is still rampant.

Even parents who desperately want to protect their daughters from a sexist culture are unwittingly part of the problem. You might recall the story of my patient Robyn from Girl Interrupted (Boy Interrupting): Helping girls find (and keep) their voices, who took being chronically interrupted and talked over as a sign of having nothing interesting to say. She described her otherwise extremely loving parents as having, “ears for my brother and eyes for me,” meaning they listened to and showed interest in her brother, but mainly focused on her appearance, both complimenting and nitpicking her body.

As parents, we tend to interrupt daughters more than sons, focus on girls’ appearance, teach boys but not girls about money and give them more allowance, believe boys are better at math, and we’re twice as likely to google “is my son gifted” than “is my daughter gifted”—for her, we ask google if she’s overweight, and the list goes on. We have grown up breathing in the air of a sexist culture and exhale those beliefs all over our children without even realizing it.

Even if we could manage to eliminate all sexism in our homes which, of course, isn’t possible, there’s still the culture to contend with. All we have to do is turn on a television or radio to time-travel back to middle school with all its viciousness about women’s bodies, hair, and clothing. Worse though, now it’s the grown ups spewing petty cruelties.

So what are we to do about it? Well, I could write a whole book about it (oh wait, I did!) but here are three ways to start:

1. Address sexism directly

Even those of us who ensure our daughters have books with strong female characters, bring them to Women's Marches, and buy them RBG paraphernalia often feel at a loss when it’s time to get down in the weeds of gender bias and sexism with them. “Girl power” is wonderful for building a can-do attitude and self-respect for the female gender, but it neither prepares girls for unfair and unsavory behavior, nor addresses the hurt and resulting confusion girls confront when they do encounter poor treatment just for being a girl. Like sex, sexism should be an ongoing conversation. We want to help girls identify the biases and sexism inherent in coming of age in a male-centric world and to find strategies to help them avoid internalizing them. Our goal is to give girls the language they need to express how sexism affects them and to highlight the confusion wrought when their experiences are patronized and discredited.

A mother might draw on personal experience and say something like, “It’s just amazing that male exhibitors at the trade show will ignore me and talk to my salesman about the business, even though I introduce myself as the owner, answer their questions, and my business cards clearly say ‘owner’ on them. We’ve got to fight this idea some people have that women aren’t capable of being leaders.” Or you can ask questions to stimulate thoughts on fairness. A dad might ask, “Why do you think school always calls mom when you’re sick even though we’ve told them that I’m more accessible during the day?” Or, better yet, use an example from their lives such as, “Why do you think girls are more negatively affected by social media than boys are?” which can lead to a great discussion about beauty standards and marketing. If they grow up in a household that actively discusses sexism, their “sexism detectors” will be properly calibrated when they’re demeaned or dismissed, helping them realize there’s something wrong with the culture, not with them personally.  

2. Explore your own internalized sexism

An essential part of interrupting sexism is exploring our own internalized sexism and how it shows up in our parenting. (Even those of us who equally distribute chores or, say, write books about sexism, have internalized sexism to some degree). Those are the places we can create the most change. We’re often blind to the roles our everyday behavior, ways of relating, traditions, religious doctrine, and language play in diminishing girls’ positive sense of their selves. Many mothers have swallowed whole the definition of the stereotypical good woman, and they expect the same of their daughters, namely to be pleasant, skinny, and self-sacrificing above all else. When a father disparages an assertive woman, makes a misogynistic crack about his son throwing like a girl, or communicates in a demeaning way with his wife, he diminishes his daughter. By recognizing the ways we’ve unconsciously been reinforcing toxic messages, we create new opportunities to combat them.

3. Stand up for her, especially when she’s young

The harm caused by sexism can be prevented or healed only when it’s acknowledged and understood. You can do that by calling out sexism. You might question what you’ve heard (“do you really mean all girls are [insert sexist comment here]?”), disagree (“That’s not true”) or offer support, (“I’d actually like to hear her thoughts on this”). This is especially important when you witness your daughter being targeted. If she knows you get the “smaller stuff”—that stereotyping is hurtful, that a hand on her lower back or a suggestive comment can be uncomfortable and intimidating, she’ll be able to come to you if more upsetting things happen. Just a simple, “Hey, that’s making her uncomfortable — that’s harassment. Stop” will go a long way.

Zawn Villines

of Liberating Motherhood suggests going even further. In her her response to a reader wondering how to support a 12-year-old experiencing sexual harassment, she suggests:

If you are at an event with her and you see a guy touch her back or grab her arm or stand too close to her... Or if you see her looking uncomfortable, just go over there and interrupt TF outta him. Be loud so everyone else knows what you said and he can't turn it into "a misunderstanding." Say loudly "why are you so close to MY 12-YEAR-OLD NIECE" and "what are you trying to say to THIS LITTLE GIRL that you can't say over here where everyone else is?" Say "GET YOUR HANDS OFF THAT LITTLE GIRL" and "Weird I didn't see you put your arm around any of the BOYS." Get together with the other moms and aunties and older cousins and make a decision that you are ALL going to do this for every girl, every time. When you hear a guy comment on ANY girl's "development," say he is gross right to his face in front of everyone. You want to not put this on her shoulders, and the way you do that is by taking it off them for her.

Yes, there's a possibility that this will put you in some degree of danger, including socially being ostracized or labeled as a "crazy bitch" or whatever. But probably better that you, an adult, face that than allowing her, a child, to try to navigate it.

If speaking up feels too difficult or dangerous to do in the moment or you fear it will mortify your daughter, make sure to get her out of the situation and tell her (then or later) that you're sorry that happened and that she shouldn’t be touched, talked to, or looked at in ways that make her feel her body is not her own.

When our kids have observed us calling out bad behavior, it will encourage them to speak up when they witness or experience sexism or at least remind them they don’t have to laugh or stay silent just to be polite.

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When I was away in graduate school, my grandmother and I would have long-distance conversations over brunch on Sundays. She’d inevitably say to me, “You’re smart enough already. When are you going to get married?” Mostly I’d deflect, figuring she was of another era and just couldn’t understand my need for personal development and to pursue what felt like a calling. I wish now I would have asked her more about the incidents in her life that seemed so demeaning to me. Why did those men tie her up? Was it so she couldn’t stop what was happening if she wanted to or just for the bosses kink? Did she ever wish to be taken more seriously by men? But I’m not sure I would have gotten answers. She kept her own intelligence a secret, maybe even from herself, so it wouldn’t distract from her beauty or famous latkes. There was one less-traditionally feminine skill she did allow herself to be proud of though and that was golf. She’d tell anyone who’d listen about her remarkable hole-in-one, something her husband, my grandfather, never achieved.