Unnoticed Gender Inequality Seeped in Our Lives

Joy Yejin Oh Y8

I define gender inequality as providing different opportunities or treating people differently due to dissimilarity between themselves and others, simply based on their gender. These days, the rate of gender inequality within the world has remarkably decreased compared to the past. Lots of things have changed; the proportion of women receiving doctoral degrees dramatically increased, men’s participation in households increased, gender stereotypes have improved, etc. However, unlike these significant gender inequality improvements, minor but instinctive gender inequality still exists within our society. Firstly, online. For experimental purposes, I have tried googling the terms ‘women’ and ‘men’ Have in Kor a look ea at n, th which ar e result. e 여자들 and 남자들.

“Fig 1. Screenshot “남자들"” “Fig 2. Screenshot “여자들”” When you type ‘men’ , pictures of men simply come out. However, if you type ‘women’ , it claims that you should verify that you are over 19 to see the normal results. Inappropriate images for young people show up and lead us to the question ‘why?’ . Why only women? People say gender inequality isn’t a big issue these days, but all the stereotypes and racism are shown through small but distinct things. Secondly, in the household. Have you ever been in a house where all your cousins, grandparents, aunts and uncles gather and have a joyous holiday? This is the typical holiday scene, whether it is the New Years or Chuseok. At first glance, this tableau looks jubilant and pleasing with everyone smiling and laughing together. As a matter of fact, that is only partially true. According to ‘JOBKOREA’ , 65.9% of the men get stressed due to holiday gatherings, and 74.0% of the women get stressed due to several different reasons.

One of the biggest factors of this stress is the elders’ nitpickings aimed towards those between the ages 19 and the 40s especially. Out of the above-mentioned percentage of stressed individuals, both men and women are stressed of nitpicking from the elders, resulting in a stress percentage of over 30 from both genders. According to ‘nownsurvey’ , men usually get nagging about their career, profession, or salary. On the other hand, women are usually nagged about making a boyfriend or marriage, having a child, going on a diet, and so on. There is a certain difference between them. However, close enough with the percentage scored for nitpicking, 29.0% of women are stressed because of house chores. Did you notice that women are almost always the ones who make the food for other family members on holidays? I certainly have noticed that every holiday. While men are having a chat together or watching TV, almost every woman in the house - mom, aunts, grandmothers - gets together and makes food in the kitchen. That explains the fact that 36.7% of married women are most stressed by nagging about making more food and staying longer. Lastly, in school. Fortunately, NLCS Jeju does not have as apparent gender inequalities recognized by the students. However, in many Korean public middle and high schools, gender inequality is easily perceived in their school songs and mottos. Unequal features are especially shown well in girls middle/high schools and boys middle/high schools.

“Fig 3. Table of mottos and lyrics from girls’ and boys’ school. ” These Korean words are some of the common words that are used in either boys’ school or in girls’ school mottos. In boys’ schools, ‘goal’ , ‘independence’ , ‘future’ , ‘skill’ , ‘challenge’ , etc were used. Contrastingly, in girls’ schools, ‘compassionate’ , ‘share’ , ‘cooperation’ , ‘service’ , ‘beautifully’ , ‘women’ , ‘love’ , etc featured prevalently. Can you see the difference? These words are the words that are considered ‘masculine ’ and ‘feminine’ . These stereotypes should not be used across public and educational spaces like schools. Girls have goals and futures, they can challenge themselves and develop their skills. Boys can be compassionate and sharing, they can love and they can give service. There are no words that can determine a characteristic of a gender. In conclusion, as you can see from all the examples I have given, minor but too many substantial gender inequalities are unseen, veiled by familiarity. I believe we should be changing these small inequalities first to work on more major issues of gender inequality.

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