Author:
I noticed this on the Guardian website this morning:
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/mar/23/gender-...
I'm not sure what to think about this. If it's a step towards a time when people can wear whatever the hell they like and no one bats an eyelid then I'm all for it.
But there seems to be a logical black hole at the centre of the argument. If I aspired to be genderfluid I'd first need to define what I was flowing between. Cultural evolution has decided in favour of one set of behaviour patterns for males and another for females - and our mental equipment hasn't developed much beyond the stage it was at on the Serengeti when the subconscious reaction to a stranger was 'is this a threat or can I shag it?'
In other words, any deliberate aim to present oneself as the 'opposite' gender involves recognising the attributes with which society has endowed it. And in doing so reinforcing them.
I probably haven't expressed myself too well in this blog. How I should have put it was 'It's cool to be trans, but not if I have to transition.'
Someone stuck me on the losing side
Everything is someone else's fault
We're not good enough for me to care
And the mantra is
"Too much effort, there's never time"
And your sole solution is a high pitched whine
It's not red-hot coals, it's not busted glass
There's no Mau-Maus after your sweet pink ass
So if not now when, if not now when, if not now when?
If not you, who then?
No one wants to be the first to fail
I won't play unless you guard my back
And the mantra is
"Change the system, and please arrange it
To change some way that I feel no change"
It's not flaming necklaces, household spies
There's no market bombings, no bullets fly
Bosnia, Bosnia
Try spelling "Herzegovina"
Where money talks and bullshit walks
The bullet or the ballet box
Babylon, oh Babylon
We babble on in Babylon
The TV blows, the music sucks
The bullet or the ballot box
We're not good enough for me to care
And the mantra is
"Leave the gun on the table loaded
The first to grab it's as good as voted in"
Comments
Gender Is...
Gender is said to be a cultural concept. Gender presentation certainly is, and it's changed remarkably over time. What Western society expected from each gender in the 17th and 18th Centuries is radically different from the 19th and 20th, let alone today. Males were the peacocks then, and women the peahens. Then it reversed, women wearing cosmetics and rich, ornate clothing, and men the plain garb. The 1970s had a merest glimpse of peacock fashion for men again, colorful clothing, flared pants, layers, accessories, but it faded quickly.
The reality is that humans carry a number of traits we tend to associate with gender but which clearly overlap between the sexes. How we're expected to express them, which ones, and how we're conditioned, depends to a great degree on our culture. For example, some European cultures permit warm social contact between men, and for men to express emotion by crying, whereas American men are terrified to touch each other, other than the "manliest" handshakes, and required to be stoic when not acting completely childish.
Gender fluidity is going to be hard to define in a screwed-up culture. When is it simple rebellion, and when is it something more significant?
My two cents on gender
For my money, it's not a matter of reinforcing binary gender. There's no doubt that there is a binary on physical sex. One is either born male or female. That said, the exception proves the rule in the case of intersex people.
While I'm happy with defining sex as either male or female, even in intersex, it's just a combination of the two, I think we need to make a distinction of terminology when it comes to gender. While gender is, as others have postulated, a spectrum, it can and should be expressed as masculine or feminine at the extreme ends. Most people find their gender pretty much corresponds with the sex on their birth certificate. But the truth is, even among cisgenders, no one really fits at the extreme ends of the spectrum. Everyone is some distance from the end. Those of us in the trans community are just a noticeable distance from the end that would seem to correspond to our birth sex; others not so much. Carl Jung offered the opinion that there was something masculine about every woman and something feminine about every man.
In reality, cisgeneders ought to just get over their bad selves and explore their own opposite tendencies.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
I am trans* myself, as I am
I am trans* myself, as I am female in my heart and sole.
But I am also gender-fluid as well. Even though, I know I am female, I do not fit fully into the spectrum.
I prefer to present more neutral most of the time, blurring the line between male and female, but with female physical hints to who I am. Then there are times, I enjoy dressing up in a simple but nice dress or skirt and going out to a play or a performance at one of the local Music school programs in my area.
For me I deal with PTSD from my childhood due to attempting to be myself and being a ward of the state for a large part of my youth.
It has taken time for me to accept myself and to be willing to once again be myself. So this is the place that I have found that I am happy and can accept and deal with life on its terms.
my thoughts
We all have different views and perspecives on how we would like things like gender and clothing to be viewed.
I for one like the distinction between male and female. Take for instance the debate that clothes are clothes and shouldn't be identified by gender. If that were in fact true, then why do people crossdress? ( to be "seen" as female) Why do the transgendered want to wear "female" clothing? (because they wish thier bodies could properly fit into those clothes) Even if you dismiss things like what materials, colors, and styles that are used. You'd still end up with men's and women's versions due to the cuts required for the different sexes. Women's jeans are cut differently to allow for hips and smother crotch area's, where men's generally have smaller hips and bulk to the crotch. Same for underwear... and it's absolutly pointless for a man to wear a bra. Ever see a busy girl in a male t-shirt? She doesnt look busty in it, she in fact looks overwieght up top with skinny legs that dont match her apperance. All because the shirt wasnt designed with breasts in mind.
I for one find sex and gender to be very key elements that define a person... even if they don't wish it were so.
but that's my opinon, and as stated everyone has thier own to wich they are entitled.