"Can banning one school-yard word really change the world?"

"Sandberg -- the chief operating officer of Facebook and author of the best-selling book "Lean In" -- is spearheading the launch of a campaign today to ban the word "bossy," arguing the negative put-down stops girls from pursuing leadership roles."

"We know that by middle school, more boys than girls want to lead," Sandberg said, "and if you ask girls why they don't want to lead, whether it's the school project all the way on to running for office, they don't want to be called bossy, and they don't want to be disliked."

ABC News (video at the link)

Nothing says "confident leadership" like outlawing adjectives. #banbossy
— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) March 10, 2014

Synova said...

Yeah, I'm bossy. Oh, maybe not really, but I sure don't mind the word! I chuckle at myself and call myself bossy.

What offends my sense of reason is the notion that if you call it "assertive" or "leadership" that it stops being bossy... or that there is anything wrong with being comfortable with stepping forward to direct efforts.

True enough I used to worry a whole lot that people wouldn't like me... but not calling it bossy wouldn't stop that! I wasn't worried about the *word*, I was worried that people would resent being told what to do. What I find, now that I'm old, is that most people would prefer not to put *themselves* forward and far from disliking you, are happy that someone else did it so they don't have to.

This is way different from having the sort of personality that won't *let* anyone else be in charge.

But by golly, when you're at a picnic and there isn't a "leader" and everyone stands around for an hour and a half because no one wants to be "bossy" and suggest that now might be a good time to start the charcoal... well, you're not pushing anyone else back in your scramble to be head honcho when you say, "Hey, why don't I start the charcoal, and maybe we can get the food put out now."