Dont step out of the box, break it.

It had been a while since I had thrown a controversial speech at my school, and I took the opportunity with my final term English viva. I spoke about stereotypes......specifically in schools.

As we all know there are general stereotypes in every school. Such as, students who aren't the best at studies are lazy and don't work hard enough and that students who get very good marks are considered better, in every possible way. That they are greater. (this is when I realized that my brain's 'make-sure-you-don't-say-something-dumb' filter thing was off)

But these stereotypes are so normal and ingrained that we don't even notice them anymore, and that needs to change.

Today I am specifically going to speak about gender stereotypes.

A lot of schools have these in their structure, their dress code. It is clearly specified that girls aren't allowed to wear nail polish, earrings, henna, etc which kind of expects you to assume that boys will never wear these.

And yes, I will go as far as to say that if girls are allowed to wear trousers instead of skirts, boys should be allowed to wear skirts instead of trousers. But I understand that this is probably too much for now.

However, I feel that the most affecting thing is when teachers use gender stereotypes in a passing reference. like, how a chemistry teacher may speak on the carbon in girls' kajal or how when your mother cooks food, the steam that comes from it forms water droplets.

To conclude, in life, people, society is always trying to mould us into someone we are not so that we can be easily categorized into a box. And it would be preferable if it didn't start in school