Q. Men lead. Women serve. Do you agree?

Danish philosopher Kierkegaard once said Once you label me, you negate me. This is precisely
what gender stereotypes do. While some people envisage that it is best for society that its progress
and development should be led by men whereas women should take a step back and fulfill more
subservient roles in the basic unit of the family. However, it is censurable that such restraining
perceptions should be adopted in our society. This essay will argue strongly against this notion by
showing how quintessential the concept of individualism is to modern day society and explicitly
demonstrate how stereotypes like that in the question would only impair the development of the
individual as well as hinder the progress of society.

Firstly, we must recognize that each individual is born unique with distinctive strengths and
weaknesses regardless of their sex. Thus, is imperative for society to discern that the individuals sex
does not foreordain ones abilities to excel in certain fields of expertise. For instance, there are many
instances where women have performed equally well, if not better than men in the governance of
society. For instance, under the leadership of the iron lady Margaret Thatcher, Britain has changed
drastically since the 1970s when Britain was perceived as the sick man of Europe. At the helm of
the government, Thatcher ensured that Britain went on the track of economic recovery to eventually
end Britains economic decline despite unjust denigration by her male colleagues. This example and
many others clearly elucidate how women have the ability to lead as well as men and as such,
society should not use ones gender to determine his or her suitability for a role in the government.
On the other hand, not all men are suitable to be leaders, neither are all women suited to play
subservient roles in our society as it is a fact that our society comprises of people with a variance of
personalities and competencies. Hence, instead of unfairly attributing certain roles to people based
on their gender, it is crucial that society allocates roles based on peoples individual characteristics
and strengths.

Furthermore, we must be cognizant of the fact that in todays society, efficacy is of utmost
importance in ensuring that society uses resources to maximal utility and to minimize wastage of
essential resources. As such, we cannot arbitrarily distribute roles to people based on their gender.
As mentioned earlier, society has people with a multitude of inclinations which allow them to
perform well in certain areas. However, these inclinations may also render them unsuited for roles
in other fields. For instance, in accordance to John Hollands research on our personality types, those
who tend to be more investigative are more suited for jobs in scientific research and intellectual
pursuits. However, it also means that they are less enterprising and are consequently less befitting
of roles that involve leadership and persuasion. Thus, by allocating roles arbitrarily based on ones
gender, society grossly neglects the individuals suitability to roles in society and as a result, it is very
likely that many people will get roles which are a mismatch with their personality. By preventing
people from playing roles which correspond well with their personality, societys efficiency will
indubitably decrease as these people would not fulfill their roles as well as others can. Similarly, they
are able to fulfill other roles better than others can but they do not gain a chance because of gender
stereotypes. John F. Kennedy once said that Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of
growth. Society cannot blindly allocate roles based on ones gender and coerce people to conform
to their roles based on their gender as it may cripple societys productivity. Furthermore, by
stereotyping males to be the leaders of society and females to play passive roles to support society,
society effectively decreases competition for roles in the government. Free competition amongst
individuals would help ensure that only the best suited candidates of society are chosen to lead the
global community. By adhering to gender stereotypes, we effectively deny women the chance of
playing key roles in the governance of our society. This is detrimental to society on two tiers. Firstly,
there is a range of abilities in both males and females. To ensure that our society is well governed,
we must place the cream of the crop of both genders in positions of power and by dictating that only
men are allowed to participate in the governance of society, it is societys loss that women of high
caliber do not obtain the opportunity to lead society. On the second tier, it is extremely unfair to
women to confine them to less significant roles in society. This is because by doing this, we deny
them of their freedom of choice as well as the opportunity for them to nurture their leadership
capabilities. As article 21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that everyone has the
right to take part in the government of his country, women should also be granted the right to
participate in the government of their country. Thus, disallowing women from taking up leadership
roles in society is tantamount to an infringement of their fundamental human rights and this should
not be the case.

However, some people are persistent in arguing that men should continue to lead society while
women should follow mens lead as in ancient patriarchal societies where men govern the state,
those societies have achieved laudable progress as they rapidly develop in numerous facets such as
science and technology and the arts. For instance, emperor Taizong of the Tang dynasty led China to
a golden age of civilization with significant developments in art, literature and technology by
channeling resources to fund endeavors in those areas. As such, these people opine that males have
demonstrated strong competencies in leading society and therefore they should continue to lead
while women should serve. Though this may be true, such an argument is flawed and insufficient in
dealing with the complexities of the issue of allocation of roles by ones gender. Upon closer
inspection, one is encouraged to temper with this argument and view it with nuance and objectivity.
Irrefutably, there were many male leaders who have brought civilizations to peaks of excellence and
times of prosperity. However, what enabled these leaders to achieve success are reasons that do not
arise solely based on their gender. These leaders succeeded because of various traits such as
foresight, decisiveness and perhaps their ability to command respect from their subjects. What we
have to acknowledge is that there are women who do have similar traits as these male leaders and
would definitely attain accomplishments of similar standards if not outshining them. Thus, what
society necessarily has to do is to allocate leadership roles based on ones merit and suitability to the
role; not gender.

In conclusion, society has a need to allocate roles of leadership according to a persons strengths,
weaknesses and personality in order to evaluate their suitability in roles of authority. This is also
necessary to ensure our society progresses with optimal efficiency. This essay has also examined
how some people may argue that men should lead while women should serve because of past cases
whereby men have excelled in positions of power and has refuted this argument by showing that
that what determines the success of those leaders are traits which do not involve the fact that they
were male but their own abilities. Thus, we should allocate leadership roles by a system of
meritocracy so as to ensure fairness and equality. Consequently, this essay disagrees that men
should lead while women should serve.