Who would have thought that the movie Bambi could do so much damage to little boys around the world? I saw the movie when I was a little boy, I must admit I thought Bambi was a girl or doe. Banks concludes that the movie Bambi is propaganda about how men and women ought to behave or, at least, stereotypical gender behavior that our culture deems most valuable.   

  He is probably right, movies, music, parents, friends, our culture teaches us what male and female behavior should be. In fact every culture that ever existed on earth had these male and female stereotypical roles in their society. Banks says this movie is only going to drive boys into deeper sexual stereotypes and that it will validate the worst attitudes of their adult world. I assume he means some male demeaning and dominating attitudes over women. I disagree.

  The fact that men have a role in a society doesn’t make us a people that will consider women less of a person and should be governed by us. This type of bad behavior is learned through ignorance and by bad people not by a role that men are considered to imitate.

  Why do Banks consider society’s male and female stereotypes bad? He says concerning male behavior “and in the explicit terms of one’s inescapable biology” if we are destined by biology to play these roles why should he feel that it is a negative condition to act like stereotypical boys and girls.

  As a father of two little girls (7and 4) and a husband, I am very familiar with these roles and how important they can  be.  The qualities that both my wife and I bring to the picture provide a balance in our girls’ world. Trying to change each other to act more like the opposite gender would diminish the purpose of a marriage and the role parents play in their children’s lives. Our differences create a sense of stability and direction. They share traits from both their parents and knowing that society expects some differences from each gender will probably direct them to have less confusion in their own behavior, and a more balanced personality.  Single parents may have a more difficult time providing this balance of expectations to their children as they raise them because they could only present the way one gender would react to different situations.