When my oldest son was in second or third grade, I went to a Mother's Day event at his school. Now, this was in the late 2000s, so you'd expect the school to not assume all mothers are wearing pearls, vacuuming the house, and baking cookies at home during the day. Right?
Unfortunately, you'd be wrong.
Instead of a song or performance about how much the kids loved their mothers, I was treated to the most stereotypical "mom" song you've ever heard. My son had to stand on stage and sing with his classmates about how Mom greeted him after school every day, brought him to his activities, made dinner, cleaned his clothes, and (not joking) had fresh cookies waiting for him when he got home.
The only problem: I don't do any of those things. And neither do the 40% of mothers who are breadwinners, or many of the 71% of women with kids under 18 who work outside the house. It was as if the school had sung the same song since the 1950s and hadn't bothered to make any changes.
I had a talk with my son after that, asking how he felt about the song. He laughed and said it was silly and nothing like our family. I explained that there are all types of families with all different kinds of working arrangements and that all families are wonderful. Sometimes there's just a mom, or a dad, taking care of the kids. Sometimes Grandma and Grandpa head up the family. Maybe only Dad works, or just Mom, or both parents. And sometimes there are two moms or two dads! All families are wonderful and should be celebrated.
My son's school isn't alone. I've seen all kinds of stereotypes over the years. People think I must need to rush home after work to get the kids off to activities, or that I won't want to travel for work because I have young kids at home. My husband is made to feel like someone has sighted a rare unicorn in the wild when he mentions he's a stay-at-home dad.