Robin Gerber may have a point about how the education system steers men towards one career and women towards another. Despite the progress that has been made, how many counsellers will look at a young man and say "I'll bet he'll make a great elementary school teacher!" or a young woman and say "She has 'auto mechanic' written all over her!" Gerber, however, undermines her entire point by choosing the worst possible examples and bullyworking the exact counterargument (it's all about personal choice) she seeks to rebut. As an example, she points to the fact that nearly all cosmetologists are men. Of course, that could be a product of a generational predisposition being perpetuated by reinforcing stereotypes... but come on now. Most guys who don't perform rarely wear makeup. Most women everywhere do. For every cosmetologist that work with performers, there are ten that work with beauty salons. At the risk of perpetuating stereotypes, I doubt I am going on a limb to say that an overwhelming majority of the clientelle of your average salon are women.

I used to work at a Supercuts as a sweeper and receptionist. The only mail hair-dresser there was a gay man. One might be able to argue that is due to gender bias in vocational training, but isn't the more obvious culprit that women are more concerned with personal appearence? There are of course many vain men out there but women, even non-vain ones, still spend much more time in front of a mirror prettying themselves up. You could argue that this is another example of cultural influence, but even if this is the case doesn't that mean that the "problem" extends far beyond school counsellers and our education system?

Guys, on the other hand, are more instinctively interested in how things works. Whenever I help a guy friend or coworker with his computer problems, he is much more likely to ask questions. The girl friends I help merely want it to work. These are people relatively uninfluenced by the vocational training Gerber describes as they are not IT professionals. Again, it may be cultural. Again, that really doesn't matter when it comes to the way Gerber wishes to attack the problem.

There are, of course, those women that are interested in mechanics. One friend of mine likes to refurbished broken down classic cars. There were certainly a lot of female techies-in-training at the UH College of Technology. Nothing was stopping them from pursuing computers because that's what they want to do. Maybe they weren't pushed into it like some of the men were, but they were certainly not held back. The answer, then, is not to tell counsellers to tell women to be mechanics and men to be cosmotologists, but rather to encourage people to think for themselves.

The idea that there is a systemic bias against girls becoming plumbers is foolish. Those who skip college to go into the workforce or vocational school ought to do what they are most comfortable doing. Even if the reason they are comfortable due to some abstract cultural suggestion. They have more important concerns than being trailblazers for a political cause that is of far more concern to champaigne liberals than the people it is purported to benefit.