With rare exceptions, I am not a timely blogger. There have been occasions where I've reacted quickly to a current event or topic but I've usually regretted it. I'd rather think something through before committing myself to a "side." I've been offered jobs to blog for sites that cover hot topics, but I can't. Writing is a sideline for me at best, and I can't drop the things I'm supposed to be doing to quickly dash off a post during the small window when people want an opinion on the outrage of the moment. Besides, I'm not interested in fueling any fires. I'd rather find ways to put them out if possible.
So here are my thoughts on a local story that briefly went national many weeks ago, now that nobody remembers or cares. Because gender issues interest me, I do have an opinion unlike any of the ones I heard at the time, and I do find myself still thinking about it.
The elementary school a few blocks from our house had something called Switch It Up Day during their version of a spirit week. Lots of schools have special dress up days. My kids' school did an 80s day at one point, and I think a backwards day. The thing I remember most from those kinds of dress up days when I was in high school was that at the end of the week we were supposed to be decked out in the school colors, but Ferndale High's colors were brown and white and that was just boring.
Anyway, the nearby school was getting reactions from all over the country about what was being called "Gender Bender Day" on the news. The girls could dress as boys and the boys could dress as girls. Nobody had to do anything, of course, it was supposed to be voluntary and fun, but apparently one parent got bent out of shape over it, and suddenly everyone had an opinion on whether or not this was harmless or something to do with the decay of society and gender norms.
I wouldn't lodge a formal protest if I were a parent of someone at that school, because that's not the hill I want to die on, but I do object to the idea of Switch It Up Day. And probably not for the reasons others might.
My own space apart from the babble of the internet
Showing posts with label gender. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gender. Show all posts
Friday, August 2, 2013
Friday, February 8, 2013
Defining Women and Men
There are times when I feel like as a society we are getting on a more enlightened track about gender issues. That there is a broader range available to people about what is tolerated or even acceptable when it comes to personal expression of gender and it makes me glad.
Then a media story will spark the debate anew and people, even people I like and respect, will start writing reactions that I don't agree with or even fully understand. The most recent example to catch my attention was back at the end of last year when there was a story on Fox about how men aren't as interested in marriage currently because women essentially do too much for themselves, and a blogger I admire agreed, saying it made sense to her since, "Women aren't women anymore."
I think about gender issues a lot. I find them fascinating. There are so many variables that impact how we think about gender including culture, history, technology, tradition, fashion, science, religion, sexual orientation, biology, parenting.... Some elements seem fixed, others fluid. The questions about what is masculine and feminine, and what is male and female, are so obvious on the surface, until you start to break it all down. Under close examination very little is obvious, and all of it is interesting.
When I was in high school I had a biology teacher who gave us an assignment to write down two lists: one of characteristics that were masculine and one of characteristics that were feminine. The catch was we were not allowed to include any characteristics that were physical. It seems like an easy assignment until you really start to think about it. To this day I am still thinking about it. (Now that's a good high school biology teacher.)
If physical strength is discounted as a defining characteristic, as is anything delicate in appearance, where do you go next? I suppose I would say at this point in my life that I see boys and men as generally more reckless, but is a cautious and sensible man less of a man? No. And whether or not a woman is more of a risk taker has little to do with if she's perceived as feminine in my opinion. (I suppose it depends on what kind of risks.)
Men as protectors comes up a lot. And yet, if you need the ultimate example of ferocity in the service of being protective isn't it always of a mother bear defending her cubs? The most basic view of a good mother, which by definition is the most feminine role one can hold, is of a woman who will protect her children at any cost. Is she stepping over into masculine territory at that point, or is that fundamentally feminine because it is so basic?
Women as nurturing also comes up. And yet I personally don't know any man who when given the opportunity to be involved in the life of a child finds himself incapable of caring for one. Just because traditionally men may not have often been as involved with child rearing does not mean they aren't up to the task. My children are lucky to have a stay at home parent as kind and patient as my husband. And no way in hell is he less of a man for being there for them.
Here is where I think the real problem with the discussion lies:
Then a media story will spark the debate anew and people, even people I like and respect, will start writing reactions that I don't agree with or even fully understand. The most recent example to catch my attention was back at the end of last year when there was a story on Fox about how men aren't as interested in marriage currently because women essentially do too much for themselves, and a blogger I admire agreed, saying it made sense to her since, "Women aren't women anymore."
I think about gender issues a lot. I find them fascinating. There are so many variables that impact how we think about gender including culture, history, technology, tradition, fashion, science, religion, sexual orientation, biology, parenting.... Some elements seem fixed, others fluid. The questions about what is masculine and feminine, and what is male and female, are so obvious on the surface, until you start to break it all down. Under close examination very little is obvious, and all of it is interesting.
When I was in high school I had a biology teacher who gave us an assignment to write down two lists: one of characteristics that were masculine and one of characteristics that were feminine. The catch was we were not allowed to include any characteristics that were physical. It seems like an easy assignment until you really start to think about it. To this day I am still thinking about it. (Now that's a good high school biology teacher.)
If physical strength is discounted as a defining characteristic, as is anything delicate in appearance, where do you go next? I suppose I would say at this point in my life that I see boys and men as generally more reckless, but is a cautious and sensible man less of a man? No. And whether or not a woman is more of a risk taker has little to do with if she's perceived as feminine in my opinion. (I suppose it depends on what kind of risks.)
Men as protectors comes up a lot. And yet, if you need the ultimate example of ferocity in the service of being protective isn't it always of a mother bear defending her cubs? The most basic view of a good mother, which by definition is the most feminine role one can hold, is of a woman who will protect her children at any cost. Is she stepping over into masculine territory at that point, or is that fundamentally feminine because it is so basic?
Women as nurturing also comes up. And yet I personally don't know any man who when given the opportunity to be involved in the life of a child finds himself incapable of caring for one. Just because traditionally men may not have often been as involved with child rearing does not mean they aren't up to the task. My children are lucky to have a stay at home parent as kind and patient as my husband. And no way in hell is he less of a man for being there for them.
Here is where I think the real problem with the discussion lies:
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Gender Expectations (Babble)
(Quinn art: girls and boys with balloons)
I’ve written something about this before. I will probably write something about it again. Few topics interest me more than people’s thoughts on gender, both as it relates to their own personal lives and to society at large. I think it’s something many of us implicitly believe we all agree on to a certain extent, until we actually ask someone and discover how much variability there really is. Sort of like the notion of ‘common sense,’ which is not always so common because what may seem perfectly reasonable to me could sound like a terrible idea to someone else. People’s beliefs about gender are all over the map, despite whatever tacit agreement we may believe we share.
Personally, I’m rather torn. Because there are some basic ways in which I believe men and women, boys and girls, tend to be different. I just can’t decide how important we should think those differences are.
For instance, I remember very clearly when seeing the movie Gladiator (back before children when Ian and I were able to see movies in an actual theater) having an uncomfortable revelation during the opening scene. Men on either side of a clearing are preparing for battle, and when the signal is given, they rush at one another killing anyone they come close to. It’s brutal, and it’s horrible, and even though it’s only a movie, it doesn’t show anything that hasn’t happened in human history countless times over. It struck me as I sat there in the theater that I would not be capable of running toward that kind of carnage on someone’s order. But my husband could. I believe if someone were inflicting harm on my children I would be capable of killing that person if necessary, but I cannot fathom rushing into a battlefield and simply killing whomever. I think the trait of choosing to run toward a battle rather than away from it is more typical in males.
But just because a behavior is exhibited more often in one sex than the other does not give it exclusive claim to that trait. There are many soldiers who happen to be women who are prepared to kill and die on someone’s order. That does not make them lesser women or more like men in my opinion. Men who wish to avoid violence are not lesser men. I can’t think of any one trait that should be held up as a standard by which either sex should be specifically judged. This is probably where the opinions about gender diverge, because most people I talk to seem to draw a line somewhere about what is masculine and and what is feminine, and that line is in different place for everyone I meet.
When I was in high school I had a biology teacher who asked us to make a lists of characteristics that we defined as either masculine or feminine, but we were not allowed to include anything physical. This was a hard assignment, and one I still ponder from time to time. Both sexes are capable of strength, compassion, humor, aggression, weakness, caring…. I honestly would not know what to put on those lists today. But that same teacher once made a stereotypical comment in class about either boys or girls, and when someone spoke up in protest he said, “Quick! Everyone point north!” and all the boys did, and all the girls looked around at the boys first before following their example. I found that fascinating, but is it important?
Innocently offered statements about ‘what girls are like’ or ‘what boys are like’ almost always get my hackles up. Of course there are generalizations you can make about girls and boys. But generalizations are not laws, nor standards by which individuals should necessarily be judged. When people start repeating things like, “Girls are nurturing” and “Boys are active” I feel as if it sets up artificial definitions that imply someone is anywhere from different to freakish if they don’t fit within those limits. I have two girls and a boy. All three of them are nurturing. The most active of the bunch happens to be a girl. I don’t see any of them as stepping over any lines in these ways. They just are who they are.
When I was pregnant with Quinn after having two girls I was shocked at the number of people who jumped to the conclusion we were ‘trying for that boy.’ I honestly didn’t care which sex my child was, but I started to almost wish for a girl out of a weird sense of spite. I know nobody meant anything remotely bad by it, but it seemed insulting to my girls somehow, and presumptuous about what a boy would be. I worry when people express desire for one sex of a child over another, because what if the child doesn’t conform to certain expectations? I don’t understand people who want a girl because they say they want to dress them in pink, because plenty of girls don’t like pink, and it doesn’t make them failures as girls. I hoped to be able to play music with any of my children, but I wouldn’t be disappointed in them if their interests lay elsewhere. We can’t tell our children who they are. They’re supposed to tell us.
I’m not saying there aren’t differences between boys and girls, I’m just saying that the differences that exist within the group that is girls and the group that is boys are wider than the differences between the two groups. Why anyone cares about the sex of another person beyond themselves or a potential sexual partner is a mystery to me.
I think on issues of gender (and many other characteristics for that matter) people need to recognize that a need for conformity has more to do with personal insecurity than some greater good. We feel safer in our own choices when we can relate to the choices and behaviors of others around us, but we need to realize our own comfort is not enough to dictate what others must do or be. The sex of each of my children is an interesting and important part of who each of them is. But it’s far from the most important.
Monday, December 6, 2010
Rethinking Pink (the Misogynist Within) (Babble)
Pink. Pink is the current most identifiable symbol for what is
girlie. Pink is nothing in and of itself, but it is the tip of an
iceberg. I have been, on some level, struggling with the color pink in
different ways for most of my life, and I may have finally come to
terms with it. Maybe. But it’s taken accepting some hard truths about
myself to get there.
Anyone with any proximity to someone raising little girls in our culture knows that pink dominates the girlie girl landscape. For those who love pink this is wildly convenient. For those buying clothes or toys for girls who do not care for pink it can be problematic. Then there are parents like myself who personally have tried to push back against the avalanche of pink based on our own tastes and preferences, regardless of what our particular girls want.
My girls have both been through fluffy looking princess phases, and they both like pink, but they like other things too. We’ve never had a problem with them insisting on any particular color, so I never felt as if they had been brainwashed by society to choose one. But I resisted the onslaught of Disney princess related movies and merchandise as much as I could, and I was thrown into a mini crisis in my mind one Christmas when a relative gave my girls Barbies and I debated whether I should let them keep them.
I have never thought of myself as particularly feminine. I’m always surprised when other people see me that way, since I don’t wear makeup, I live in clothes that could double as sleepwear half the time, and I don’t have pierced ears or interesting shoes or a cute purse. (Actually, I own one cute vintage purse I found in an antique store, but I’ve never found a time to use it and I likely never will.) Many of my interests have put me in environments dominated by men. When I gave a lecture about violin making to the local Woodworkers’ Guild a man actually came up to me afterward just to say how jarring it was at first to listen to a woman talk about tools, but that the longer I talked the more he got over it. So I’m used to moving in circles where I don’t feel I’m being judged by particularly feminine standards.
I fretted a little for my girls because I don’t want them to feel limited in this world. I want them to tackle whatever interests them and not be held back. The princess stories bothered me because they struck me as promoting images of women that were passive and weak and dependent on men for happiness. Barbies seemed overly focused on physical beauty as a woman’s greatest attribute. Everything wrapped in pink hit me as mildly distasteful and unhealthy for these reasons.
Then I had a boy. And you know what? He’s a boy who adores his older sisters and when he was two his favorite shirt was a hand-me-down that made him feel included. And it was pink. I had to stop and reassess for bit. Because it started to dawn on me that there was bigger issue with pink that I hadn’t considered before. The bigger issue was misogyny, and I was guilty of it.
That may sound extreme, but when I started to look around at the larger society for cues about how my son would be treated walking out into the world in a pink shirt I did not like what I saw. Among my family and friends there was no problem, but once you are attuned to stories about boys in pink you start hearing some very scary things. The intolerance in some cases is frightening.
And that’s when I began to come to the defense of pink. Because what I see all too often now is that girls and the things they like are considered inferior. If a girl aspires to partake in things more stereotypically associated with boys–anything to do with weapons, or sports, or tools–she is viewed by many as taking a step up. Conversely, if a boy wants to pursue something regarded as feminine–like sewing, ballet, or organizing a tea party–this can still be controversial. It’s okay and often encouraged if a girl wants to play with boys’ toys. We think it’s cool if a girl can throw a football or fire a gun. If a boy wants to play with girlie things–with pink things–the reaction can be incredibly negative. It might be tolerated, but seldom encouraged.
I became offended by the idea that somehow the toys my girls liked were contaminated. Pink was lesser. I was guilty of having thought that too. I had avoided pink for myself because it lumped me in with girls. I wanted to be better than girls. That’s misogyny.
I began to really look at things differently. I started with Cinderella. I had remembered the Disney movie as a sad example of a woman waiting to be rescued by a prince and not much more. But I sat and watched it with my kids and that’s not what I saw at all. I saw a variety of different female characters, from the scary step-mom to the silly step-sisters, to some industrious mice, to Cinderella herself who was strong and decent. She was in an impossible situation without real options and she worked hard and looked for the good in life despite her circumstances. Yes, she’s eventually rescued by a prince, but he’s more a symbol of the ultimate prize of love and wish fulfillment. The prince is part of her reward of the better life she deserves. (I still can’t stand the Little Mermaid, though. You don’t relinquish your voice.)
Next I looked at Barbie. I never liked Barbies and my kids aren’t particularly interested in them either, preferring snuggly stuffed animals as I did, but when I took a look at the Bratz dolls suddenly Barbie was looking pretty good. Barbie at least seemed to have an education and could hold a variety of jobs. The Bratz dolls just looked trashy. I tried to pinpoint what bothered me about Barbie, and I realized it was unfair to essentially dislike her because she was many people’s idea of pretty. Yes, I know the problems associated with unrealistic body image and emphasizing looks over substance, but isn’t it wrong to discount people because of their looks either direction? If I dismiss Barbie the veterinarian because she’s blond and wears heels, how am I likely to treat a real woman vet who is pretty and wearing heels? If all I had against Barbie was her looks, well then I’m being shallow. (I’m still trying to figure out how I came to feel I need to stick up for Barbie, but there we are.)
When I started looking at any number of female figures from past and present with the perspective that feminine did not equal less valid I learned something. What looks like passivity is sometimes really patience. Being polite and gentle is not the same as weakness. To blame a woman for being judged by her beauty is to blame the victim.
But where does this sense of the feminine as lesser come from? I think it’s a power imbalance. The worst insults you can throw at a man are all some way of calling him a girl. At its core, I believe it comes down to the fact that typically during sex the woman is the person who is ‘done to.’ I’m not saying I don’t understand about all the different varieties of intimate behavior possible between people, but at a basic level it’s understood that women are at the receiving end of the sex act, and there is a sense that that is lower. It’s not considered a position of strength. For the same reason I think for many men the underlying root of homophobia is really misogyny. The idea of a man accepting a feminine role is intolerable to some, because it flies in the face of accepting the masculine role as superior. I don’t think it is.
But the masculine role can be more threatening. And women are so disproportionally the victims of violence that I think a lot of misogyny is not wanting to be vulnerable out of a sense of self-preservation. When you witness abuse you see two sides–the abuser with the power, and the victim who suffers. Many people don’t want to identify with victims because it’s an unsafe place to be. When you choose masculine pursuits you are choosing power. You are choosing safety. Choosing pink means needing protection. We don’t respect the vulnerable as equals.
I want all children to have the freedom to choose what interests them. I don’t believe in girl toys and boy toys. There are just toys. I don’t think my son’s toys are inherently better than his sisters’. And I don’t think pink is a sign of something weak simply because girls like it. I’m not saying it’s wrong to think a tea party game is more boring than a wrestling match–everyone is entitled to his or her personal preferences–but it is wrong to use your personal preferences to judge something as negative. The tea party is different but not less valid. I may still have no interest in Barbie, but I no longer harbor any sense of disgust about her either.
Freedom to choose does not make my less-traditional choices better, it just makes them truly mine. I want my kids to have choices and sometimes they choose pink. Pink is fine. For anyone. Even me, finally.
Anyone with any proximity to someone raising little girls in our culture knows that pink dominates the girlie girl landscape. For those who love pink this is wildly convenient. For those buying clothes or toys for girls who do not care for pink it can be problematic. Then there are parents like myself who personally have tried to push back against the avalanche of pink based on our own tastes and preferences, regardless of what our particular girls want.
My girls have both been through fluffy looking princess phases, and they both like pink, but they like other things too. We’ve never had a problem with them insisting on any particular color, so I never felt as if they had been brainwashed by society to choose one. But I resisted the onslaught of Disney princess related movies and merchandise as much as I could, and I was thrown into a mini crisis in my mind one Christmas when a relative gave my girls Barbies and I debated whether I should let them keep them.
I have never thought of myself as particularly feminine. I’m always surprised when other people see me that way, since I don’t wear makeup, I live in clothes that could double as sleepwear half the time, and I don’t have pierced ears or interesting shoes or a cute purse. (Actually, I own one cute vintage purse I found in an antique store, but I’ve never found a time to use it and I likely never will.) Many of my interests have put me in environments dominated by men. When I gave a lecture about violin making to the local Woodworkers’ Guild a man actually came up to me afterward just to say how jarring it was at first to listen to a woman talk about tools, but that the longer I talked the more he got over it. So I’m used to moving in circles where I don’t feel I’m being judged by particularly feminine standards.
I fretted a little for my girls because I don’t want them to feel limited in this world. I want them to tackle whatever interests them and not be held back. The princess stories bothered me because they struck me as promoting images of women that were passive and weak and dependent on men for happiness. Barbies seemed overly focused on physical beauty as a woman’s greatest attribute. Everything wrapped in pink hit me as mildly distasteful and unhealthy for these reasons.
Then I had a boy. And you know what? He’s a boy who adores his older sisters and when he was two his favorite shirt was a hand-me-down that made him feel included. And it was pink. I had to stop and reassess for bit. Because it started to dawn on me that there was bigger issue with pink that I hadn’t considered before. The bigger issue was misogyny, and I was guilty of it.
That may sound extreme, but when I started to look around at the larger society for cues about how my son would be treated walking out into the world in a pink shirt I did not like what I saw. Among my family and friends there was no problem, but once you are attuned to stories about boys in pink you start hearing some very scary things. The intolerance in some cases is frightening.
And that’s when I began to come to the defense of pink. Because what I see all too often now is that girls and the things they like are considered inferior. If a girl aspires to partake in things more stereotypically associated with boys–anything to do with weapons, or sports, or tools–she is viewed by many as taking a step up. Conversely, if a boy wants to pursue something regarded as feminine–like sewing, ballet, or organizing a tea party–this can still be controversial. It’s okay and often encouraged if a girl wants to play with boys’ toys. We think it’s cool if a girl can throw a football or fire a gun. If a boy wants to play with girlie things–with pink things–the reaction can be incredibly negative. It might be tolerated, but seldom encouraged.
I became offended by the idea that somehow the toys my girls liked were contaminated. Pink was lesser. I was guilty of having thought that too. I had avoided pink for myself because it lumped me in with girls. I wanted to be better than girls. That’s misogyny.
I began to really look at things differently. I started with Cinderella. I had remembered the Disney movie as a sad example of a woman waiting to be rescued by a prince and not much more. But I sat and watched it with my kids and that’s not what I saw at all. I saw a variety of different female characters, from the scary step-mom to the silly step-sisters, to some industrious mice, to Cinderella herself who was strong and decent. She was in an impossible situation without real options and she worked hard and looked for the good in life despite her circumstances. Yes, she’s eventually rescued by a prince, but he’s more a symbol of the ultimate prize of love and wish fulfillment. The prince is part of her reward of the better life she deserves. (I still can’t stand the Little Mermaid, though. You don’t relinquish your voice.)
Next I looked at Barbie. I never liked Barbies and my kids aren’t particularly interested in them either, preferring snuggly stuffed animals as I did, but when I took a look at the Bratz dolls suddenly Barbie was looking pretty good. Barbie at least seemed to have an education and could hold a variety of jobs. The Bratz dolls just looked trashy. I tried to pinpoint what bothered me about Barbie, and I realized it was unfair to essentially dislike her because she was many people’s idea of pretty. Yes, I know the problems associated with unrealistic body image and emphasizing looks over substance, but isn’t it wrong to discount people because of their looks either direction? If I dismiss Barbie the veterinarian because she’s blond and wears heels, how am I likely to treat a real woman vet who is pretty and wearing heels? If all I had against Barbie was her looks, well then I’m being shallow. (I’m still trying to figure out how I came to feel I need to stick up for Barbie, but there we are.)
When I started looking at any number of female figures from past and present with the perspective that feminine did not equal less valid I learned something. What looks like passivity is sometimes really patience. Being polite and gentle is not the same as weakness. To blame a woman for being judged by her beauty is to blame the victim.
But where does this sense of the feminine as lesser come from? I think it’s a power imbalance. The worst insults you can throw at a man are all some way of calling him a girl. At its core, I believe it comes down to the fact that typically during sex the woman is the person who is ‘done to.’ I’m not saying I don’t understand about all the different varieties of intimate behavior possible between people, but at a basic level it’s understood that women are at the receiving end of the sex act, and there is a sense that that is lower. It’s not considered a position of strength. For the same reason I think for many men the underlying root of homophobia is really misogyny. The idea of a man accepting a feminine role is intolerable to some, because it flies in the face of accepting the masculine role as superior. I don’t think it is.
But the masculine role can be more threatening. And women are so disproportionally the victims of violence that I think a lot of misogyny is not wanting to be vulnerable out of a sense of self-preservation. When you witness abuse you see two sides–the abuser with the power, and the victim who suffers. Many people don’t want to identify with victims because it’s an unsafe place to be. When you choose masculine pursuits you are choosing power. You are choosing safety. Choosing pink means needing protection. We don’t respect the vulnerable as equals.
I want all children to have the freedom to choose what interests them. I don’t believe in girl toys and boy toys. There are just toys. I don’t think my son’s toys are inherently better than his sisters’. And I don’t think pink is a sign of something weak simply because girls like it. I’m not saying it’s wrong to think a tea party game is more boring than a wrestling match–everyone is entitled to his or her personal preferences–but it is wrong to use your personal preferences to judge something as negative. The tea party is different but not less valid. I may still have no interest in Barbie, but I no longer harbor any sense of disgust about her either.
Freedom to choose does not make my less-traditional choices better, it just makes them truly mine. I want my kids to have choices and sometimes they choose pink. Pink is fine. For anyone. Even me, finally.
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