“Stay Calm And Go Shopping” shouted the ginormous poster, hanging smack bang in the middle of the room. Its lilac font bold and big against a white background. Shudder.
This is what greeted me when I walked into the girl’s dorm at one of the top 100 independent schools in the UK. To say that I was taken aback is an understatement.
The lilac theme extended beyond the poster to adorn every single wall – and a few duvet covers too.
The room, with its ingrained, subliminal and not so subtle messaging saddened me no end.
At a time when increasing noise is being made to promote gender equality, it appears little is being done at this establishment to address social conditioning. Without changing social conditioning, there can be no equality. Why? Because it’s all about what we learn every day from the people around us – from what they do and say, from what we can see, hear and read. So when this top notch, top charging co-ed school incorporates gender and confirmation biases like this, we’re socially conditioning the next generation(s) to behave in a way that got us into this unequal pickle.
And it’s not just about changing the world for the better, it’s also about making space for girls who don’t like this sort of thing.
My niece is 9. The room and its messaging would have made her very uncomfortable. She is her school’s star footballer, cannot find clothes that she likes and wants to wear in the girl’s section of any high street shop, and hates shopping.
So to see the female quarters, and to hear the – I must say delightful and very polite – young students who took me on a tour – a girl and a boy aged 10 – say that “If a girl wants to do a boy’s sport like football, then that’s ok.” got me worried. Worried for them, for my niece, and for our future wellbeing as people, families and societies.
I was more interested in getting my guides’ perspectives on things and their conduct than the actual facilities on offer. Polite, charming, clever and engaging. Keen to share the wonders of the school they love so much. But it kept happening: I was watching a sketch of pretty much every gender generalisation going: aside from the football remark, the girl deferred to her male peer on every single count – whether it was which direction to walk, which room to step into, where to stop and talk about something, which poster to show me. It was fascinating, and once again worrying.
The mannerisms and behaviours I was observing might be because the girl is less confident by nature – I accept that – or is it? Did the boy take charge and assume control because that’s the way he is – or the way the school, and his home, is run?
Modeling behaviour should never ever be underrated.
And I thought to myself: this place has such a lot to offer. But it isn’t enough if the children who pass through have gender, expectation, role modeling and more that appears to celebrate more of what the world is allegedly struggling to change. It is does not have true, simple equality at its core.
