The World Health Organization wastes money on gender theory studies:

Girls are weak and boys are strong — that’s the crushing finding of a comprehensive new study of children and their parents around the world.

The groundbreaking global study, released by the World Health Organization and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, reveals that it makes no difference whether a child is raised in Baltimore, Beijing or New Delhi — the universal stereotype surrounding what it means to be a girl or a boy prevails.

“We found children at a very early age — from the most conservative to the most liberal societies — quickly internalize this myth that girls are vulnerable and boys are strong and independent,” said Robert Blum, director of the Global Early Adolescent Study, based at Johns Hopkins University. “And this message is being constantly reinforced at almost every turn, by siblings, classmates, teachers, parents, guardians, relatives, clergy and coaches.”

The six-year study of gender expectations around the world saw researchers speak to 450 children aged 10 to 14 with a parent or guardian, from 15 different countries of varying degrees of wealth and development.

As Sarah Hoyt observes, these alleged “stereotypes” aren’t so much harmful as they are realistic. And these “gender expectations” are associated with success and happiness. That is to say, if you want your son to grow up to be a successful man, he must learn to be strong. Women like strong men, and while it sounds insulting to call women “weak” or “vulnerable,” parents of girls have to protect their daughters, and girls must learn to protect themselves, to avoid dangerous situations.

Much of the epidemic of anxiety and depression among young women is, I believe, caused by the unrealistic rhetoric of “empowerment” that schools, media and parents are drumming into girls’ heads. The expectation that every girl will grow up to be a fiercely independent success story — a Yale graduate with a Harvard law degree, or a Stanford-educated software engineer — is preached like gospel in suburban public schools. All the programs on TV portray women having high-powered careers and also, of course, having romantic adventures in glamorous settings. This Hollywood imagery of “empowerment,” reinforced in schools and by parental ambitions, is driving girls crazy.

Y’know what? Bring back home economics. Teach girls it’s OK to enjoy doing girl stuff — cooking, fashion, interior design, child care. There are actually career opportunities in these fields, and if educators would stop insisting that every girl has to go to college, maybe they could find some kind of job where they’d be happy. But oh, no, the feminists wouldn’t allow schools teaching girls to make sandwiches . . .

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