Women’s Work
When working cattle everyone has a job to do.
These jobs are assigned based on everyone’s skills and where they can best be used. Granted it doesn’t always work out that way. In which case others may need to jump in and get the job done.
We will just assume that in general, everyone is going to quietly go about doing their job.
In order for the work to go smoothly, everyone needs to do THEIR job. When a job is ignored to watch someone else do their work, then there’s a job out there not getting done. That can create a big hitch in the get along.
Allowing people to do their job while taking care of your own still applies if one of the people working is female. Being female does not magically mean that she will need a man to come along and ‘help’ do her job. Being female does not mean she will be weak, incapable, or incompetent. In fact there’s a good chance that being female will mean that she is skilled, hard working, quiet and easy going in her way of working cattle.
Odds are the men who are convinced that the poor little woman needs his help will not be.
If he were skilled and capable, he’d see work being well done and leave well enough alone.
By all means keep an eye on your fellow workers next time cattle are being handled. If a job isn’t getting done, pitch in. If you think a job may not be able to be accomplished because of the sex of a hand, maybe check in your britches to make sure you aren’t compensating for an undersized pee pee.
