Moms_undies

I'm an older millennial and as a kid, I was a tomboy. My mom told me that it was okay for girls to like "boy stuff" because the distinction is just based on stereotypes. She told me that I could be anything I wanted to be because girls are just as smart and capable as boys.

Two things peaked me:

1. I work in academia in a STEM field. Being a woman in STEM can suck because it has enclaves of old boys clubs that don't even try to hide their misogyny. I'm a mom and that makes it even harder. But I feel like I have a duty to girls interested in STEM to blaze the trail for them and stand up to discrimination. It makes me really fuckin mad whenever I see a TIM invited to panels on being a woman in academia and/or STEM because they have no idea. They never had to be the only girl in middle school programming classes. They never had to be constantly interrupted at meetings. They never had to deal with comments about having baby brain while visibly pregnant at work. F them.

2. The girls who should be told that it's fine to prefer toys marketed to boys or wearing jeans and a t-shirt or being good at math are being told that they're not girls. We're going backwards.