The time has come for me to slack on writing for class, so I bring you some idle musings on the topic of gender.
Gender confuses me. I’d like to think that I’m beyond gender, that I treat men and women, or more to the point, males and females congruently. But that is, of course, bullshit.
But it got me thinking, what is gender? Sure, sure, it’s a social construct, a notion of what is appropriate for each sex: As well as appropriate attire, food, modes of thought, socialization, etc, etc. A pervasive social construct defining how to be. And gender roles are damn restrictive. Men can’t cry. Women can’t fight. Being queer throws an interesting monkeywrench into it. Am I dealt a female deck of expectations or a male deck? There are camps, but no consistent answer. I used to like to think I’m androgynous, but most folks assured me I’m pretty male acting. And on reflection, that’s pretty true. There was my memorable quote from my cabin trip up north a few months ago. On the subject of masculinity, I said “I’ll take it up the ass, but I won’t do drag.” Everyone laughed, but think about that for a second. It’s a rejection of a female gender role, or at least the trappings of one, while accepting a female gender role (to some people’s minds, anyway.)
But how should I view gender? A cage for human behavior? An arbitrary, fluid set of suggestions to help me get along smoothly in society? And, at the risk of offending some good people who read this, should I pity transgender individuals as the ultimate victims of gender roles, pople who feel the need to make some fairly extreme modifications to their bodies to fit within their desired roles? Or is “transgender” the wrong word here? Should I think of them of as transsexuals, people who want to be a different sex, fuck the gender question? Maybe that’s a case by case basis. Death to stereotypes. And, quite frankly, it’s none of my damn business what other people do with their bodies, unless they ask me to get involved.
Another interesting point to view here are the intersex, a small minority of people born with genitalia that doesn’t quite match boy or girl genitalia, which they sometimes keep throughout life. Doctors used to perform little sex change operations on these kids to make them one sex or the other. Essentially performing a surgery on the kid so that society wouldn’t have to think too hard about which box to put them in. While we can argue about the chromosomes, in reality, I haven’t done a chromosomal analysis of anyone I know. I never heard anyone mention having been analyzed that way. We judge sex by primary and secondary sex characteristics, and by the outward manifestations of gender, clothing, behavior, etc.
In general, I try to treat people with respect, regardless of their sex or gender. Why should either of those things matter? (…says the monosexual) Is there inherent value to breaking down my internal gender roles? I dunno. Just some stuff that’s been rolling around my head lately.
A topic heavily on my mind as well, as I’m researching constructing sexual identity in blogs, which interplays with gender. I definitely have an “other” category, which I could theoretically break down even further, but not in the context of a class paper. Perhaps when it’s a comps paper, or even if this topic goes to dissertation (which it could, I think).
On a more personal level, though – you remember what I said to you at my wedding? What are you? You’re Stephen. That’s what matters to me. And really, to anyone who cares. You’re a unique individual with a combination of traits that can be seen by society in various ways and with which you express yourself and interact with society.
In a study of gender, like what I’m workng on now, and will in the future, we can pull apart characteristics and label them in some way. But we do that in the context of a number of other individuals to see if x characteristic correlates with y expression, and so on and so forth. We pull apart the characteristics when we want to study the forest. When we want to look at a tree, at the individual you are, those characteristics shouldn’t be pulled apart.
Of course, to some people, they are. Some people think that since you identify yourself as queer, then you should have x, y and z characteristics and if you don’t, something’s wrong with you. People like that are dumb. Unfortunately, there are a lot of dumb people in the world.
Is there value in breaking down your internal gender roles? Only if -you- think there is. If you want to analyze why you do something, sure, it could be valuable to you. But if you don’t, it’s your business.
That’s my spare-change-of-whatever-currency for the moment, at any rate!
I have to say, I have trouble getting my head around many of these arguments. It’s not that I don’t see value in the analysis, but it is not a topic that has ever resonated with me. Like it or not, I am a man, whether that is by genetics of social construct. For me to become something else would be a mutilation of myself.
That being said, probably my favorite author is Jan (formerly James) Morris, a transexual. I’m not blind to the existence of the issues, but I have never felt them in myself.
Is this generational? I think people younger than me are more open to this subject than I am.
I beg to differ
People of any age or generation can and do understand transsexuality. I refused to be agist and devalue someone’s ability to understand a concept merely because of their numerical age.
That’s a cope out way not to have to challenge oneself further and understand something apparently unsettling.
Re: I beg to differ
Sure, but there are trends. You’ll find increasing acceptance of queers of all stripes with increasing age. That’s not to say that every 18 yo is accepting and every 80 yo isn’t. Because some 18yos don’t understand or accept and some 80yos do. But I’d lay money on the accuracy of the acceptance trends correlating to age.
Re: I beg to differ
One cannot justify halting the process of analyst because of one’s age. My parents’ aunts and uncles (so the generation of my grand-parents) accept and support me. My parents do not. My sister (who’s 27) is the worse.
My issue is with your friend saying that it’s alright he doesn’t understand trans because of his age. That’s a terrible reason, trend or no trend (and whatever is being qualified as a trend here) not to want to learn and understand it better.
Re: I beg to differ
Well, as I said, I have read a lot about transexuality and have known trans people in large numbers over my life. But I notice a lot more interest in the issue among people younger than myself in this regard: they look at how gender constructs apply to them much more than most people my age or older. My interest in trans people and my understanding has been based on what their experience is for themselves. I’ve never had any interest in it as it pertains to me, personally, in my own identity.
I think it is a similar thing to college age kids today and their much more open sexuality than what was about when I was in college.
I think there is a generational element to it. Talking it over with the office manager over the summer, we discussed a transsexual at the headquarters office. She kept using the women’s bathroom and several of the women in the office objected. Feathers flew. He was more confused and less accepting of her views than I. I had hands off tolerance, where I felt I understood everyone’s perspective, but felt the fundamental conflict was stupid. The cisgendered women should have talked to the person in question themselves. I can understand abstractly the transwoman’s troubles using a men’s room. My ideal solution would horrify most people: shared bathrooms. It would even work against my happiness, as it seems men’s rooms tend to have fewer lines. But perhaps that would change with a mixed gender scenario. Regardless, dumb.
I just think that there is an age divide in perceptions – younger people are much more flexible. Hard certainties of life have gotten progressively fewer over the decades. Compared to my eldest siblings, I grew up in a different world. Those 10 years younger than me grew up in one even more different. I think we have compressed generational change into decade degrees, rather than multiple decades.
It is interesting to me.
The “little sex changes” still happen on infants in this country almost every day. It’s one of the only “emergency cosmetic surgeries” performed.
Charming isn’t it? Kinda makes me want to puke.
Sometimes they do it to us later in life when puberty isn’t going according to their plan. They don’t care how much you protest when your parents agree with them.
Any parent who’d force a mentally competent child to have any medically unneccesary surgery they didn’t want should not have legal rights over that child.
Parents are doing what they have been advised by a medical “professional” is “necessary” (it’s doctors who define that most often). And it isn’t always surgeries. All physical modifications to my body were done on me prior to my 2nd birthday. But I was forced onto HRT when I was 14 since puberty wasn’t happening “normally”. I protested to the gynocologist on repeated occassions. It’s the gyno I hold responsible and the medical institution more generally. My mother was doing what she honestly beleived was best for me.
Estrogen therapy was not the solution and I wound up in the hospital more than once during those 2 years. They should have operated but I suspect they wanted to try and cover up their mistake as “hush hush” as possible.
you should look up queer theory, gender theory ( and gender performativity, judith butler, etc.), and the notion of a gender/sexuality career.
Someone who’s birth declared sex generally matches the gender roles assigned to that sex is usually referred as cisgendered 🙂
It is key to seperate gender from sex. My gender hasn’t changed much at all, my body/sex has. I didn’t have issues with my gender. I was fortunate enough to grow up with a mother who allowed me to have short hair, who insisted on treating me as unisex as she could (with selection of toys, clothes and extracurricular activities). Obviously I was gendered to some degree at home, heavily at school and elsewhere but my dysphoria was with my body not my gender performance. Transition isn’t about passing (despite what many trannies still try to convince me) or having one’s body match more closely the gender role one performs. Transition is about one’s relationship to oneself and their body dysphoria.
I think I know what you intended to mean, but I don’t think anyone (trans, women, queers, people of colour, etc…) wants to be pitied for being a “minority” or disenfranchized by society.
There are over 20 different types of intersexity, only a handful of wish are visually identifyable at birth. The modifications are not just done to the genitals in all cases. Some take form of hormone therapy at puberty so the secondary sexual characteristics match the primary ones in cases where this would not otherwise occur. In some cases, someone declared male at birth can subsequently be modified later on (I have one friend to whom they gave a make-shift vulva at puberty while they debated his right to keep his penis). All these practices are indeed deplorable but unfortunately still current.
cisgendered
Someone who’s birth declared sex generally matches the gender roles assigned to that sex is usually referred as cisgendered 🙂
Well, I’ve certainly seen you use “cisgendered”. However, you are the only person I’ve ever seen use it. Not to take a potshot, but to call that “usually” inevitably leads to the question “by whom”. My immediate observation only suggests you, but I strongly suspect that there are several people consciously trying to normalize the transgendered by giving a less value laden term to describe the cisgendered. In fact, the first time I recall seeing the “cis-” prefix was about a week before I first saw you use it, and that was in a wikipedia article on fatty acids.
I was somewhat bemused by it at first, but it’s growing on me.
Re: cisgendered
Well monosexual I would put more as the opposite to polysexual or someone who only likes one sex (eg monosexual vs. bisexual).
Cisgendered is quite commonly used in “community” in Toronto. I came across it about 4 years ago now, but I couldn’t tell you who first thought of it or what their intent behind it was. I say it beats saying non-trans though!
Re: cisgendered
That’s precisely the sense in which I intended monosexual: not bisexual. =) I first ran into that one in Lady Slings the Booze by Spider Robinson, which I “borrowed” from and never returned. I offered to replace it years later, but she’d already replaced it. At least, that’s my recollection.
Re: cisgendered
“In general, I try to treat people with respect, regardless of their sex or gender. Why should either of those things matter? (…says the monosexual) Is there inherent value to breaking down my internal gender roles?”
Then I’m not sure I follow. What does the fact that you love one sex (presumably male) have anything to do with your internal gender? (Whether you’re breaking it down or leaving it alone) We agree monosexual deals with one’s sexual orientation/who you’re attracted to. I don’t tend to lump gender in with that. You could have a genderqueer person who is monosexually attracted to one sex only.
Have I misunderstood?
Re: cisgendered
Oh yeah, very much males that I sexually desire.
It was simply a question of refenence. I was commenting on my monosexuality in relation to how I treat people, and how sex/gender does enter into the question, not with respect to breaking down my internal gender roles. =)
Yeah, “pity” is a loaded word, but I wasn’t using it lightly. It’s not how I feel. But I can totally understand some of the more extreme reactions. We’re talking the removal, creation, and/or reconstruction of technically functional organs. As well as the end of reproductive capacity. I don’t know how I feel. I know it’s not pity, and I do respect people’s right to do far more extreme things to their bodies. I believe in a right to suicide, for instance. But, in some sense, I grieve. And it seems wacky to me, but it fits. I grieve that things don’t always fit and that some people find these painful sacrifices necessary to their sense of self.
Not that it is the crux of what you’ve said here, but the end of reproductive capacity isn’t a given. I have a close friend, a trans guy, who is closely monitoring his still intact “xx” parts and fully plans to give birth when he’s found the right guy and the right time.
I have a lot of grief for the radical things people do to their bodies everyday. We could start with antibiotics, or smoking. You’re going to roll your eyes right now, I know, but hear me out. Extremity is absolutely entirely in how you see it. For me, the relatively minor surgery I had to undergo was fucking no issue compared to what a lifetime of smoking has cost my grandmother. I was in and out and no problem, and that little thing – that 5000 dollar thing – so utterly changed my life that I cannot even begin to compare my life now with my life then. Utterly cured. For my grandmother, she gets the benefit of surgery, chemotherapy and a probably truncated life filled with regret and unhappiness.
And for what?
I really don’t see it as particularly extreme in that context, but then I’m partial as both a transsexual and an alternative health professional. 🙂 Also, the surgery for me wasn’t a sacrifice, it continues not to be a sacrifice. I think this is where non-trans folk really just don’t… get it. (I want to mention here that I’m obviously not speaking for all trans folk, particularly as I have a view of my transsexual status as a pathology.) There was no more sacrifice in me having surgery than there is in a person with acute appendicitis getting an appendectomy. You might say that the former was a “functional” organ and the latter was “non-functional,” but really this is dishonest. Both threatened the lives of the possessor, both caused incomprehensible pain. I think a lot of people simply struggle with the former because the disease is perceived to be “mental” and thus the whole deal falls into the sad realm of misunderstanding around “mental” pathologies.
BTW – I rarely comment but always appreciate what you have to say.
Eric
Yeah, the appendicitis analogy came to mind while I was writing it. I was trying as much to hash out the conflict more clearly in my mind. And to understand everything involved. One thing that came mind was the line from Transamerica when the main character tells her social worker how she feels after her surgery. Something about being impaled on a splintery stake. All surgery involves pain and recovery, and often scars.
I had idly considered the possibility of making babies with a transguy, myself. Of course, I’d have to find the right transguy, but it would make for interesting conversation. And I have to wonder how my parents would take that one. =)
I’m not sure I buy the antibiotics as extreme, but I do buy long term smoking as extreme. Whether the disease is worth the treatment is another question. How severe is the problem? With gender dysphoria, only one person can answer that question, and it’s a different person with each case.
I had a chance to do my karyotype, for fun/educational reasons. It was XX. It’s not something that ever comes up in conversation.
I stand corrected. =) But I think my fundamental claim that we don’t generally identify gender with lab tests holds. =)
If you’re thinking about this kinda stuff you have too much time on your hands. ;p
Kidding aside, I found some of the required Gender stuff for my psych degree interesting. The field is still pretty dynamic as everything is relatively new. There’s so much to puzzle through and it’s all rather threatening since it asks us to break down who we are as individuals, redefining what genetalia supposedly means. The best quote that comes to mind was, “Traditions are group efforts to keep the unexpected from happening.” And that’s what we’re up against… traditions.
my take
There are all sorts of angles you can take to get perspective on this. Biology, sociology, even politics. Biologically, gender is pretty fluid on evolutionary time scales. If there is “noise” in our genetic programming that makes certain parts of our brains male/female-typical while making the rest of our bodies the other way, it is only because there is some genetic advantage in this fluidity. Even in “lower” animals there can be multiple “genders” even among individuals with typical XX/XY genotypes. So why not in humans? How many times have we heard “alpha male” referring to a human male? Maybe we have multiple gender roles to begin with, and this is just complicated in the extreme case that someone feels that their body is wrong for their identity.
Of course, accepted roles in a given society might differ from our genetic programming. As you have pointed out, our society is changing to allow some room for non-male/female-typical behavior. In some sense gays and lesbians have opened the door for this – we just need to make sure not to slam it shut behind us.
I say, keep thinking about it, challenge yourself, try to think about how you would define your own gender role if you could start from scratch. Maybe you’d live in a world where wearing a dress was ok for men, or maybe not. Just don’t forget that trans people probably need your advocacy more than your introspection (although there’s always that man-in-the-mirror argument)
Re: my take
…or I guess I should say person in the mirror 🙂
For more on the biology, check out “Evolution’s Rainbow” by Dr. Joan Roughgarden, who is an absolutely delightful person, aside from being brilliant.
I don’t have any answers to your questions, but thanks for the thoughtful post. The intersex question is a good one…hopefully there will come a day when we don’t feel it’s necessary to put anyone through extreme measures just because we’re uncomfortable with ambiguity.