Dave, here. I decided to adapt a post from my own blog, since it deals with a recent news item. Enjoy!
For some time, I've been meaning to write a blog entry on the failings of popular gender construction in contemporary American society. It began when I read "Women at Risk" by Bob Herbert (New York Times, 08.07.2009). Herbert writes, "We have become so accustomed to living in a society saturated with misogyny that the barbaric treatment of women and girls has come to be more or less expected."
Herbert's column focuses primarily on the level misogyny tacitly accepted in our culture. He concludes, "We would become much more sane, much healthier, as a society if we could bring ourselves to acknowledge that misogyny is a serious and pervasive problem, and that the twisted way so many men feel about women, combined with the absurdly easy availability of guns, is a toxic mix of the most tragic proportions."
I believe he has a point. I also believe he's missing the deeper source of the issue. He probes closest to it, though, when he says, "One of the striking things about mass killings in the U.S. is how consistently we find that the killers were riddled with shame and sexual humiliation, which they inevitably blamed on women and girls. The answer to their feelings of inadequacy was to get their hands on a gun (or guns) and begin blowing people away."
This concept of "sexual humiliation," of shame, is linked directly to conceptions about what it is that makes one who is male a "man." It is no great leap of logic for one to ask, these days, what is a man, and how does that relate to maleness? How, apart from biology, is he any different from a woman? Is there any difference at all?
Science tells us many things about these differences. We know about differing brain chemistry, about different patterns in behavior and psychology, about how the physiological aspects of sexual dimorphism affect who we are, how we think and feel, what we can and will do. Rather, I should say we believe we know things about this. How much is nature, how much nurture? I certainly cannot answer this question, but I can suggest a few other relevant questions.
I am far from the first to ask, but why must we assume so much about what it means to be male, to be female? This extends far beyond whether one is encouraged to play with GI Joe or Barbie. Note, I am not discussing literal gender identity; that is another discussion for those who know more about it to conduct. No, I'm interrogating what it means to be a certain gender. Why must boys be "strong," and why must girls be "gentle"? Naturally, we can prove that this is not absolute. We know it is not always the case. These are not at all new ideas.
Yet, children are still encouraged to follow models of gender behavior that enforce cultural tradition. These have nothing to do with biological imperatives. It may be that boys are, on average, "naturally" more aggressive than girls -- though, I'm skeptical of such assumptions. Even so, there are expectations placed on males from birth as to what role they will fill in society -- they grow up told to "be a man." This can mean many different things, but in almost all cases it carries a strong imperative.
I do not, by the way, suggest for even a moment that there are not equally problematic gender constructions in place for women and girls. I just happen to have considerably less knowledge from that perspective.
Inevitably, part of being "a man" seems to -- almost always -- include proving one's heterosexual virility. Some might protest this claim; others might say, "Of course it does." Either way, the elephant is in the room. The emphasis on this "masculine" role is complicated by commingling with sexual partnering. It requires a partner who is not only female, but is willing to be "feminine" by the same schema that makes the male "manly."
Do we believe for a moment that sexual conquest is not a pressure impressed on men? Women, by the way, are not very likely to endorse the "man conquers woman" model these days -- if one believes that they, as a population, even really accepted it. Individual cases vary, as they always do, but if I may be so bold as to characterize the "woman" of contemporary Western culture, she's about a hell of a lot more than fulfilling a role in the archaic fetish of masculine dominance.
So, we have a culture where men are encouraged to strive for a position in relation to women that women are increasingly unlikely to tolerate. Now, consider Herbert's article, and you can see how absurd the entire model is. The entire thing boils down to the problematic nature of our cultural understanding of the gender binary.
Now, I'll come right out and say it: I find the whole thing stupid. Enforcing (or encouraging, or whatever term you find comfortable) "masculine" and "feminine" behavior accomplishes nothing but forcing people into roles and identities that may or may not be natural for them. I posit that if males were not pressured into "manly" roles and behaviors, they would be better able to cope with their difficulties.
After all, what could could teaching emotional openness, same-sex intimacy (platonic or otherwise), and willingness to seek help when they need it possibly do for men?
No, I suppose I'm not really very willing to give fair consideration to traditionalist arguments about gender roles, especially in the masculine case. I'm equally appalled at the tendency to attempt to enforce heteroexuality on males, contributing to the difficulties of growing up as a homosexual in our society. It seems absurd to enforce a masculine stereotype, as much as it does to assume that homosexual males will be foppish or effeminate.
In the end, I can't resolve the issue -- only rant about it. Sadly, it will take a great deal more than meandering blogs -- one, two, or even few thousand -- to make a difference. The difference can only be made in how we live our lives, the difference we're willing to make, such as putting aside traditions or expectations we have been given so that we can instead embrace progress. Scary thought, I realize.
Perhaps, just perhaps, we might choose having a healthy impact on our perception of what it means to be a man, rather than focusing on outmoded assumptions or selfish expectations -- or, at least, we can always blog about it, hoping for an interesting conversation.
For some time, I've been meaning to write a blog entry on the failings of popular gender construction in contemporary American society. It began when I read "Women at Risk" by Bob Herbert (New York Times, 08.07.2009). Herbert writes, "We have become so accustomed to living in a society saturated with misogyny that the barbaric treatment of women and girls has come to be more or less expected."
Herbert's column focuses primarily on the level misogyny tacitly accepted in our culture. He concludes, "We would become much more sane, much healthier, as a society if we could bring ourselves to acknowledge that misogyny is a serious and pervasive problem, and that the twisted way so many men feel about women, combined with the absurdly easy availability of guns, is a toxic mix of the most tragic proportions."
I believe he has a point. I also believe he's missing the deeper source of the issue. He probes closest to it, though, when he says, "One of the striking things about mass killings in the U.S. is how consistently we find that the killers were riddled with shame and sexual humiliation, which they inevitably blamed on women and girls. The answer to their feelings of inadequacy was to get their hands on a gun (or guns) and begin blowing people away."
This concept of "sexual humiliation," of shame, is linked directly to conceptions about what it is that makes one who is male a "man." It is no great leap of logic for one to ask, these days, what is a man, and how does that relate to maleness? How, apart from biology, is he any different from a woman? Is there any difference at all?
Science tells us many things about these differences. We know about differing brain chemistry, about different patterns in behavior and psychology, about how the physiological aspects of sexual dimorphism affect who we are, how we think and feel, what we can and will do. Rather, I should say we believe we know things about this. How much is nature, how much nurture? I certainly cannot answer this question, but I can suggest a few other relevant questions.
I am far from the first to ask, but why must we assume so much about what it means to be male, to be female? This extends far beyond whether one is encouraged to play with GI Joe or Barbie. Note, I am not discussing literal gender identity; that is another discussion for those who know more about it to conduct. No, I'm interrogating what it means to be a certain gender. Why must boys be "strong," and why must girls be "gentle"? Naturally, we can prove that this is not absolute. We know it is not always the case. These are not at all new ideas.
Yet, children are still encouraged to follow models of gender behavior that enforce cultural tradition. These have nothing to do with biological imperatives. It may be that boys are, on average, "naturally" more aggressive than girls -- though, I'm skeptical of such assumptions. Even so, there are expectations placed on males from birth as to what role they will fill in society -- they grow up told to "be a man." This can mean many different things, but in almost all cases it carries a strong imperative.
I do not, by the way, suggest for even a moment that there are not equally problematic gender constructions in place for women and girls. I just happen to have considerably less knowledge from that perspective.
Inevitably, part of being "a man" seems to -- almost always -- include proving one's heterosexual virility. Some might protest this claim; others might say, "Of course it does." Either way, the elephant is in the room. The emphasis on this "masculine" role is complicated by commingling with sexual partnering. It requires a partner who is not only female, but is willing to be "feminine" by the same schema that makes the male "manly."
Do we believe for a moment that sexual conquest is not a pressure impressed on men? Women, by the way, are not very likely to endorse the "man conquers woman" model these days -- if one believes that they, as a population, even really accepted it. Individual cases vary, as they always do, but if I may be so bold as to characterize the "woman" of contemporary Western culture, she's about a hell of a lot more than fulfilling a role in the archaic fetish of masculine dominance.
So, we have a culture where men are encouraged to strive for a position in relation to women that women are increasingly unlikely to tolerate. Now, consider Herbert's article, and you can see how absurd the entire model is. The entire thing boils down to the problematic nature of our cultural understanding of the gender binary.
Now, I'll come right out and say it: I find the whole thing stupid. Enforcing (or encouraging, or whatever term you find comfortable) "masculine" and "feminine" behavior accomplishes nothing but forcing people into roles and identities that may or may not be natural for them. I posit that if males were not pressured into "manly" roles and behaviors, they would be better able to cope with their difficulties.
After all, what could could teaching emotional openness, same-sex intimacy (platonic or otherwise), and willingness to seek help when they need it possibly do for men?
No, I suppose I'm not really very willing to give fair consideration to traditionalist arguments about gender roles, especially in the masculine case. I'm equally appalled at the tendency to attempt to enforce heteroexuality on males, contributing to the difficulties of growing up as a homosexual in our society. It seems absurd to enforce a masculine stereotype, as much as it does to assume that homosexual males will be foppish or effeminate.
In the end, I can't resolve the issue -- only rant about it. Sadly, it will take a great deal more than meandering blogs -- one, two, or even few thousand -- to make a difference. The difference can only be made in how we live our lives, the difference we're willing to make, such as putting aside traditions or expectations we have been given so that we can instead embrace progress. Scary thought, I realize.
Perhaps, just perhaps, we might choose having a healthy impact on our perception of what it means to be a man, rather than focusing on outmoded assumptions or selfish expectations -- or, at least, we can always blog about it, hoping for an interesting conversation.
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