Different is Good.

I got to watch a movie in my Family Relations class this last week, called "Men, Women, and the Sex Difference" by John Stossel. First of all, I love learning about the differences of men and women, and why those differences occur. In the movie, however, G. Steinham made a comment that "We badly need to raise our boys more like our girls." G. Steinham seemed like an interesting lady... And this comment is definitely interesting. What I want to know is... What? Okay, that's not all I would like to know, but I just feel like this comment was pretty silly, and I would have to disagree.

Men and women are obviously different. Women tend to be more compassionate, expressive, and relationship oriented and men tend to be more tough, aggressive, and task and spatially oriented (notice I said they tend to have these different qualities - there are obviously exceptions and variations on both sides). In the video, a few couples talked about how they tried to raise their children equally, without veering their children of either sex towards any sex specific toy or sex specific action, but there were still differences between males and females. The males, no matter what toy they were given, would usually end up making some kind of gun and rough housing, and the girls would usually end up nurturing the toy like it was a baby. These differences come from biology and from society. There are obvious differences between men and women biologically. Men have high levels of testosterone, which causes many of the manly qualities, and studies have shown that girls with higher levels of testosterone tend to display more of those 'manly' qualities than girls with lower levels of testosterone. Another physical difference is that girls have more white matter in their brains, which is connective tissue from their speech to emotion centers, than men do. Girls also begin mimicking speech at a younger age.

These differences in men and women (and I just named a couple) are not a bad thing, and I believe they actually improve society. I think it is silly how people are trying to make women and men "equal" in today's society, mostly by trying to make them the same. Men and women are not the same, biologically and in the way they are raised by their families and by society. Studies have shown the ratios of men to women working in certain careers, and when men dominate one career certain people think that it is sexist and that women should be able to have those careers because they are  "equal" to men, and the same vise versa. However, because of the innate differences between men and women, I believe that they are both attracted to different types of jobs. We aren't being sexist because there are more men who fight fires. They are simply more suited for the job. We aren't being sexist because more women perform secretarial duties. It is simply that they are more attracted to that kind of profession than men are. I think it is useless to try to make men and women "equal" by making them the "same." We are different, and that is a good thing. It is good to embrace our differences and to work together to make sure everything gets accomplished in our society.

We also see these differences in the family. Men are usually the bread-winners of the family, and women usually are the care-takers. Some people think that this is wrong and that it proves that women are not equal to men. However, a marriage should be between a man and woman, who are equal partners, and who each have different qualities to offer to the marriage. Each quality strengthens the other partner. These differences that men and women offer to their marriage are good because they complement each other and unify the couple and help them become one entity, one unit. The Savior has every good quality, and the fact that men and women offer differences to the marriage is divine. It is so we can strive to become more like him together, as a couple.

So, different is not bad. Men and women offer different qualities to the family and to society, and that is the way it should be.