I start with a couple: knitting and crocheting. They are two of the two most useful things I’ve learned so far, all thanks to my grandmother and one of my aunts. Creating bags to carry things, repairing pants, jackets and backpacks, creating little cushions for my lower back or to support my wrist when I’m in the office, etc.
I still remember with some humor how my grandmother insisted to me that, as a man, I should not be ashamed of knowing how to crochet.
Oddly enough, my sister is the one who doesn’t know how to do either those things lol
It’s kind of ridiculous that any skill is gendered.
Or speciated! We share like 50% of the banana genome. Who says I can’t be a delicious source of potassium if I want to.
I know, right?
Men and woman have different mental and physical strengths and weaknesses.
While this is true, there is a considerable amount of overlap between men and women, and a great deal of skills and tasks can be done by either gender.
Of course, but those differences are the root causes of gendered work. It doesn’t get ridiculous, as OP stated, until one says, “Men/women can’t do that!” Or suck at whatever.
There is generally a greater range in the physical capabilities of either sex than there are between the sexes, and in our modern world the number of jobs that require brute strength, those traditionally done by men, are progressively fewer simply due to the benefits of advanced machinery.
As for mental tasks, there are almost none that men or women are better at for any other reason than social programming and, again, in those the variability within the sexes are very nearly as great as those between the sexes.
So, at this point, the biggest reason for gendered tasks is tradition, which is generally the stupidest reason to do anything. So it’s just as ridiculous to bring gender into the task in the first place.