Perspectives on gender

You're right! The topic is very vague. I've read all of your links and I don't quite understand where you wanted it to go but I'll start here.

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the same forces that affect women are now increasingly affecting men as well.

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I sincerely doubt the same forces of sexual, intellectual and political (to name a few) oppression that have sculpted feminism affect men. Actually, it is probably just the opposite. While women are supposed to not care for sex, intellect or politics men are expected to be experts in all three.

Welcome to Babble, anna_c!

I agree with you and skadie, but at the same time I believe it is always a good time to ask how men come into being. I've been obsessing most of my life about the processes of construction and history of my own gender and only recently realized that it is equally important to look into the creation of men. Schooling, sports, emotional economy, body languages: practices to watch closely. What are the rites of passage for someone on his(?) way to become a man? What are the weaker points at which one can negotiate? What is considered non-negotiable?

One thing that I remembered just now. Many feminist friends that I have that have kids keep telling me that they always find themselves policing their sons into the right gender, steering gently their choices of toys and such towards more male-gendered or neutral ones. Many of them feel the social price of non-conformity would be too high for their sons.

[ July 15, 2002: Message edited by: Trespasser ]

I suspect if you had a daughter, you wouldn't dress her in itchy lace either, Michelle [img]smile.gif" border="0[/img]

Ever hear of John Money? From the Hopkins institute. That guy may go down in history as a seriously fucked up mad scientist for his work in gender studies: nature vs. nurture.

His study into identical male twins raised as different genders with different genitalia is one helluva an example of scientific arrogance and crazed ambition.

To me it seems incredibly naive to think that if somehow my genitals were ripped out ( and PERISH THE THOUGHT), I would become female.

Aren't there Y chromosomes strewn all over the place? And don't they generate hormones and stuff?

[ July 16, 2002: Message edited by: jeff house ]

Adding to the above post ^^ (a bit late, I know)

But you don't actually know for sure what your genetic "sex" is until you get it checked out. Tons of people are walking around with XXY, XYY, XXX, and so on, and they don't know it because our system of gender/sex is so rigidly binary.

If someone wants to call me on the source of that info or what have you, I might bother to look for it. I know I have it around here somewhere...
*takes a survey glance at the mounds of papers strewn about the room* *sigh*

hey 'lance.

you should maybe check out Emi Koyama. She's my hero. She even has her own slogan- "Putting the emi back in feminism". [url=http://www.eminism.com]emi[/url]

Apologies, Doc: Klinefelter Syndrome is XXY. It tends to manifest in problems of fertility and some degree of breast development in about half of cases. XYY was the "hyper-male" syndrome that was briefly believed to be linked to higher rates of violent and criminal behaviour. Another syndrom that shows up much more rarely than either of those is Turner's, where females lack the second X chromosome.

[url=http://www.isna.org]The Intersex Society of North America[/url].

trespasser, thanks for the words of welcome. fausto-sterling's book is indeed an excellent resource for those interested in the historicity of bodily sex and the medical management of intersexuality.

on the weekend, some friends and i went to see "juwanna mann" at the dollar theatre. for those of you not familiar with this specimen of popular culture, the basic premise was that a male basketball player was kicked out of the league due to his poor sportsmanship [sic] and egotism, and arrogance, and because he was broke due to his extravagant lifestyle (?!) he decided to disguise himself as a woman and play in the women's league. disguised as a woman, he became more patient, cooperative (both on the court and off), more humble, etc. he also gained some valuable insight into some unique features of women's experience (e.g. unwanted sexual advances from the "opposite" sex). as a student of feminist philosophy with an interest in the construction of gender and subjectivity, i found the film very interesting. one of the most contentious assumptions the film made was that jamal, the crossdressing basketball player, would be a far better athlete than his female counterparts.
what do you think about that?

I'm not sure I understand the point of those excerpts about hormones. So, like, sex hormones have other uses. Quite a lot of organs and chemicals in the body are multi-purpose! I'd go so far as to say that multi-functionality is the overwhemling norm, not the exception.

So what is that except trying to tell us? Did Tres miss some crucial segment? The only point I can discern is that we concentrate on the sexual function of estrogen and testosterone and not other functions. Well, that's because sexuality is quite clearly a more thrilling subject than, say, breathing, and more prominent and important in all human cultures. So it is only predictable and obvious that that is how we would look at hormones.

The point to me is that hormones become gendered because sexuality is important to us. Sexuality is important to us because hormones make it important to us, to a very large extent. Attempting to "de-gender" hormones and the body is futile--it is, at least in part, "self-gendered." Hormones have an effect on social structures--only thereafter does culture gender hormones, with good reason.

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Bullshit.

Class is a bigger determination of privilage than gender.

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I understand your point and somewhat agree with you. But men ARE privileged in every economic class when compared with their female counterparts. Please show me an economic class where the men of that economic level are more oppressed than the women of that same economic level. Sure, a woman who earns $100,000 a year could very well oppress a man who earns $20,000 a year as her employee. But compare the oppression of that man making $20,000 a year to a woman in the same economic class as he is, and the story would be quite a bit different, I believe.

I worked at a bakery where all the men worked shorter hours and got paid several dollars more per hour than the women. Sure, compared to a rich woman, the male employees at the bakery were "oppressed" economically, and probably as employees too. But nowhere near as oppressed as their counterparts at the bakery, us women.

[ July 29, 2002: Message edited by: Michelle ]

Is there any surprise that we disagree? [img]smile.gif" border="0[/img]

I am not trying to say that the interpretation of hormones is wholly biologically constructed, or that there is no point in trying to reduce their effects on gender as best we can. But blaming the gendering of hormones (or anything else for that matter) on Evil Social Constructs seems rather narrow-minded to me. Is there no room at all to acknowledge that we do have bodies we didn't necessarily ask for, and that these
bodies have an effect on our thinking?

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But men ARE privileged in every economic class when compared with their female counterparts

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I thought about that, and you are right Michelle, except I think it implies that, for example, working class males perpetrate the economic oppression of the women in their class.

Women at my place of work, while equal under the law and protected by the same collective aggreement as the men, earn substantially less.

This is because for many years women were not hired at my place of work, and the ones that do work here have comparatively less seniority. So, they have not had opportunity to progress into the skilled trades or semi-skilled, higher paying jobs. Worse, they are first to be laid off.

This isn't because of the men they work with, it's due to the men (and women) of the proffessional class that for years oppressed them by not hireing them.

I would guess that the men you worked with in the bakery had no say over wages, either.

I think because we all tend to marry within our economic class, there is in fact strong support from men for equal pay. We want our partners to earn as much as us so we can both enjoy greater economic prosperity.

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But compare the oppression of that man making $20,000 a year to a woman in the same economic class as he is, and the story would be quite a bit different, I believe.

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Yes then the story becomes the ruling elite oppresses all of the family. I believe that the women in the $200,000 class are just as oppressive as the men even if on average the men made $250,000 to the women's $200,000. Mind you I don't have the stats at hand but I thought that as educations and incomes rise the differential in wages decreases. So if you compare a woman doctor with a male colleque with the same experience and education there is little or no difference. But if you compare a male janitor to a female housekeeper the difference is still there in spades. But the question is does that janitor have any power over his life or the life of the housekeeper and if he doesn't how can he be the oppressor.

My point is lets look at the [b]root[/b] causes of systemic gender inequities and not at the outcomes.

As far as socialization is concerned again I will take a somewhat different view. My mother taught me to "be a man" more than my father who was away from home most of the time. The women in most societies are the teachers of the children so why don't we produce more sensitive men and more competitive women.

What exactly ARE we teaching our little girls?
[url=http://thomhartman.com/empower.shtml]http://thomhartman.com/empower.shtm...

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Then came the fairy tale.

A short time after that, I was reading the story of Cinderella to my own daughter. About halfway through the book, I suddenly realized what I was "teaching" her with this story. The "good girl," Cinderella, was also the one in the story who was beautiful. The "bad girls" - Cinderella's stepsisters - were physically unattractive. But one level deeper, the story became really bizarre. Cinderella was compliant and uncomplaining, and spent much of her mental life in a fantasy world, while the ugly stepsisters were young women who had a goal and a mission and were trying to reach it. In other words, assertive women were ugly, and compliant women were attractive. Assertive women lived in the real world of power and competence, but eventually would lose out; pretty, compliant women lived in a world of fantasy, but if they kept doing what they were told, even if told so by a fantasy fairy godmother, then everything would work out.

And the prize in this competitive psychodrama? A man. And not just a normal man, but a man who was so self-absorbed that he spent an hour or more dancing with Cinderella but afterwards couldn't remember what she looked like and could only identify her by her shoe size!

I remember walking into the living room and saying to my wife, "I think I've just participated in a cultural brainwashing experiment," as I described my observations about the story I'd just read to our daughter.

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[ July 29, 2002: Message edited by: vaudree ]

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Ain't it interesting, girls. Feminism will always have to defend its reason to exist. And just when you think that after three decades of discussing the intricacies of class-race-gender relations some men on the left would get the picture - no.

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I guess it depends on the picture. One of the reasons I posted was this next quote.

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Males were not brought up to believe they were the inferior sex. Reflecting on my past, I can see so many times when it was detrimental to be a female. Many times as a child I wished I was a boy so I could do more and get the extra special consideration I saw the males receive.

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And many times as a school kid I wished that I could get the privileges that the teachers pet had but I wouldn't suckhole and backstab the way the girl holding the position did. Or in my current office the biggest control freak is a woman and she is good at it and gets a lot of extra consideration. As well as a high school student wondering why the majority of young women would be falling all over each other to date the aggressive loud mouth who trashed women in the locker room. That is also a socializtion tool in our society. I try to teach my son to be respectful and treat all as he would like to be treated and then he says but Dad the girls like the macho guys not the wimps.

Of course gender is a major determiner of many things however I believe that class is a more predominant indicator of what your changes of "success" are in this society.

But to be serious any debate on gender and the class system must also acknowledge that women have free will and many when given the opportunity chose to be the oppressor. Just as many men chose to stand in solidarity against sexism, racism and capitalism.

Like all issues lumping people together, as in men are oppressors, merely on the basis of their gender is self defeating. If men are oppressors no matter what they do and how they act in reality then how can we convince people to act differently.

As well it is my believe that any analysis of our current society must acknowledge that people do not chose their gender and therefore cannot be "blamed" based on characteristics they had no control over. What is important is whether you act as an oppressor and my point is that in my real life experience I have met many rich women who were oppressors especially of other women but also of their " male servants." That is not to say that the majority of people in that oppressor role were not men because they are but just because the majority of any group exhibits certain characteristics doesn't mean that you can then say that because a person belongs to the group they have those characteristics.

And finally to reiterate, sterotyping is a bad analysis tool whether it is used about people based on race, culture, gender or class. These posts were at best a poor attempt at trying to achieve respect and balance in a debate and not find myself vilified because of an accident of birth for this life. Who knows what gender I was in the past or which I will be in the future. I just hope that I continue to grow in the believe that we are all siblings and deserve to share the earth as equals.

[ July 29, 2002: Message edited by: kropotkin1951 ]

[ July 30, 2002: Message edited by: kropotkin1951 ]