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This isn’t the sort of thing i’d normally blog about, its not work related, its about something important 🙂

But its been on my mind for a while so i thought i’d put it out there, primarily to get it off my mind.

As the Dad of a daughter I’ve been thinking a lot recently about things that will impact her life as she grows up and what I can do as a Dad to protect her and/or remove impediments to her happiness, the one that i keep returning to and thinking about is Sexism.

Why sexism? Well, recent stuff like:

• The ongoing Lord Rennard debacle
• The horrendous stuff that caroline criado-perez had to endure off the back of the campaign to get a woman’s face on the £10 note
• Spend 5 minutes reading https://twitter.com/EverydaySexism (which often seems to depart from sexism into sexual assault and abuse)

But its not just these big obvious events that have got me thinking, often its the little implicit things that get my goat recent examples are:

• (daughter dressed up in medical outfit) ‘Oh are you pretending to be a nurse?’ (Why not a doctor!?)
• Family member: ‘I was going to buy [daughter] a book about rockets and space but thought, that is a boys book, so bought one about princesses instead’ (btw my daughter is currently mad about space and wants to be an astronaut)

OK, those two examples might be pretty lame in the grand scheme of things, but I guess i’m just stating the obvious that there are both the explicit and implicit forms of sexism.

Just like any parent I guess, I think my daughter is the most funny, clever, caring and insightful little person I know and possesses a boundless and energetic imagination with boundless potential.

I feel very strongly that its really important that, as a parent, I remove any possible constraint or impediment to that imagination and potential. So I’ve been pondering:

What can I do as a Dad of a daughter, or what can we (other Dads of daughters), collectively as Dad’s of daughters do together to help fight against sexism (in its implicit and explicit forms) to help make the world of our daughter’s future a better place to be the funny, clever, caring, strong women that they will grow into? 

Let me be clear though, I’m not a saint, I’ve been sexist in that concious post-modern/ironic way similar to when you tell an un-pc joke, except its not a joke and ironic sexism is still sexism just with added dickishness.

I’m mindful that in writing this post I’m probably still being sexist in that more implicit way by unconsciously reinforcing existing sexual stereotypes and disappearing up my own arse through some form of recursive sexism/patronising because i’m writing a post pondering how men can help women as if only men can help the damsel in distress

but i’m not, honest!

I feel passionately about my daughter being uninhibited by either explicit or explicit sexism in doing whatever she want with her life. If I had a son I’d feel exactly the same.

In my head at the moment I’ve just got this vague idea about would some sort of movement or collective, consistent action be a useful addition to existing efforts?

‘Dads Against Sexism’?

What do you think? please let me know.