I pulled this off of someone's journal at OKCupid. I think that he is raising a mighty good point, and one that I think we are all putting forward: let's get this set, binary, opposite gender roles idea out of our heads. I try not to act masculine for the most part, but I have been socially conditioned to be masculine, and to accept masculinity, and to compete like this. Not always, and I think the fact that I don't play sports anymore, aren't in a major corporation, etc. keeps me away from some of this stuff, but I still get enraged when I see/hear/read about people acting in such masculine ways, and defending it as something natural. There may be some natural basis behind what the different genders do (there are chromosonal differences between male and female, and while these are extremely small compared to the similar genes, they may be enough to play a role in behaviour. This isn't taking into account those whose genes make them of an indeterminate sex), but much of it is social. Anyway, I am going to run and catch my bus. Maybe I will talk more, later.
- Jordan
The High Cost of Manliness
By Robert Jensen, AlterNet.
Click here to view the article. (Article text cannot be reproduced here due to copyright. Please come back to post your comments!)
notes
While it's been a few days since I read the article, what I still take from it is something I've seen at least a few times before in discussions of masculinity/femininity.
The "negative qualities" associated with masculinity (greed, dominance, violence/aggressiveness, etc) are 'bad things' for all people. The 'good qualities' associated with masculinity (leadership, rationality, etc) are 'good things' for all people. And the same for those qualities associated with femininity (compassion, caring, empathy are generally good for all people, while irrationality, 'weakness', passiveness, and so on are generally bad for all people).
*I don't think I need to mention here that I by no means feel these qualities are essential to one sex or another. I think the connection they have to their respective sexes is exaggerated at best, and incorrect re-affirmed by confirmation bias.*
So we shouldn't be talking about good and bad masculine and feminine traits (that imply links to males/females), but instead discuss what good and bad human traits are. (Like pride. Is pride a good thing? I think generally not but I get very conflicting messages on this :). )
mekyla