I wasn't feeling very well yesterday (stressed and discouraged, with a slight sore throat) and so I decided, quite selfishly, that I deserved a break from the rigorous and painful sugar strike I put myself on last week. I had already anticipated this would happen, back when the determination to eat healthy and nothing but healthy was fresh and strong, and had removed all of the obvious sources of temptation from my house. Still, in my new sugar-starved state, I was able to work around this obstacle with the help of my roommate: we baked some cookies. Ah ha! Outsmarted myself again!
Most of my life has been filled with this kind of conflict with myself. I'm always the winner, but then again I'm always the loser as well. It's a messy situation.
But that's besides the point. The reason that I had not anticipated cookies as a possible method of breaking my healthy foods-kick is because the idea that I myself might actually bake cookies did not occur to me, not just because cooking and me have traditionally gone together about as well as Hannity and Colmes, but also because I am a boy.
Something that really bothers me about our society is the classification of so many activities and objects as belonging exclusively to the “masculine” or “feminine” identities. Sewing, dolls, and cooking are GIRL things, while camping, baseballs, and farting are BOY things. And yet, I would argue, there is nothing inherent in the things I mentioned that would indicate that they belong to one gender over another if seperated from their cultural context. The critique to my argument might be that nothing CAN be separated from its context, and so its pointless to argue about something apart from the context in which it exists. To which I would respond, “Use your freaking imagination, already.” But I digress into a thereotical debate hotly debated by professors of English and of other abstract disciplines, which is altogether quite irrelevant to what I'm trying to say here.
The point is that, even though I dislike these traditional definitions of gender-allowable behavior, I still unconsciously played into them by failing to forsee myself baking cookies. This is because these definitions are so pervasive – they've been shoved into your head since you were a baby. Boys wear blue, girls wear pink, boys play with tools, girls play with Barbie, boys are physical and logical, girls are emotional and nuturing. Now I do not mean to suggest that there are not natural, biological differences between the sexes; of course there are. A simple glance at a book of anatomy will reveal several significant ones. I'm talking about behaviors. The problem is that it is impossible to determine, in my opinion, how much of what we perceive as the behavorial differences between men and women is a result of purely biological factors and how much derives from the very specific and continually reinforced gender roles that society demands us to play. Gender, in a sociological perspective, is only partly a physical characteristic; it is also a performance, a role, something you do as much as something you are.
This is why drag queens are so interesting. Ok, I've lost you, but hold on I'll explain. These are men performing the role of a woman. Yes, its still a man under there, but drag queens are often referred to as “she” or “her,” (maybe you didn't know this) when they are in drag and “he” and “him” when they are not. There's some truth to that convention. Pretending to be another gender involves more than dressing up their clothes, it requires certain ways of talking, moving, and thinking. The role part, the performed aspect of gender, becomes quite clear when its the opposite gender acting it out.
As I said before, many activities get labeled for either the man or woman's realm,
and woe be unto them that try to defy these boundaries. Its quite silly in some cases. When I took a yoga class as part of my acting regimen, I could not do my excerises at my apartment because of the incessant teasing I was subjected to by my roommates, who believed vigorously that yoga was “a girl thing.” “You're the only guy in the class, aren't you,” they asked smugly. In fact, over half the class was male, as was the instructor. Yoga was created by male Buddhist monks, I think, and probably practiced for thousands of years by men. Any attempt to limit it to the feminine sphere is simply absurd.
And baking cookies has nothing inherently feminine about it! You just think that because your grandma always does it, but, I found, it is actually scientific, like a chemistry experiment. You mix together a certain number of ingredients, expose them to heat, and are astounded at the product that is created.
Another example: as an English major, I frequently enjoy books and movies that might otherwise not be appreciated by the fellow members of my sex. This includes English films with long, slow-moving plots, dry and subtle monologue, with no action sequences or sex. Many women, especially in the local culture, do enjoy these movies and so they are officially labeled “chick flicks.” “Pride and Prejudice” is an example, which was banned from our apartment by the roommates mentioned above for being unpardonably feminine. Here comes the amusing anecdote to back up my point (Mom, you'll probably want to start reading here):
A former roommate once convinced me, after some debate, to watch “Anne of Green Gables.” I had no desire to see the movie, because it was a girl movie and obviously had nothing in it that would appeal to me. He was very persuasive, however, and when I finally broke down and saw it I was surprised to discover that it was quite good. Yes, the story focuses on a teenage girl, but that makes it a “girl movie?” How many movies about young males are there, and do we consider them to be “boys only” movies? This is an evidence of sexism, in my opinion.
Anyway, after our viewing of said film, this same roommate and I got it into our heads to watch the sequel, “Anne of Avonlea” just to see how everything plays out. He didn't have that one, so we had to go to the video store to rent it. We couldn't find it anywhere, and my roommate boldy went up to the man behind the counter and asked, “Excuse me, can you tell me where I could find 'Anne of Avonlea?'”
The man blinked at him in confusion, then, his voice dripping with sarcasm and disdain, said, “Yeah, I think its over there in THE LITTLE GIRLS SECTION!” Yeah, we all had a good laugh about that. But if college age girls had come in and asked for, say, “Stand By Me,” a film about a group of teenage boys having life-changing experiences, they would not, I suspect, have been teased in any way. There's a double standard there.
To be fair, women can be and more frequently are subjected to the same kind of criticism when they try to enter into the “man's realm.” I know girls who like video games, football, math and science, and all that masculine stuff, and I'd bet they get plenty of grief from others as if there was something not quite right with them.
And that, in the end, is the proof that so much of these complex gender identities are constructed, not inherent: there are always exceptions, lots and lots of exceptions. We are beginning to recognize that some guys like to shop, have good hygiene, and dress well,
but only by giving them their own separate identity in which to exist: metrosexual.We're all about labels, and society doesn't much like people who break the mold. Do I have to adhere to some abstract standard of “masculinity” and fear the reprisals if I too flagrantly break the "rules?" Can't I just be me instead of constantly worrying about fitting into some kind of prearranged formula? Embrace diversity. That's what I say.
Anybody want a cookie?
(By the way, if you've read my blog about marriage and my critique of why girls aren't cool then you may be inclined to call me a hypocrite. Please remember, that blog was written by my confirmed bachelor, woman-hating persona, and this blog was written by the literary theorist and feminist persona. Its a different personality all together.)
Most of my life has been filled with this kind of conflict with myself. I'm always the winner, but then again I'm always the loser as well. It's a messy situation.
But that's besides the point. The reason that I had not anticipated cookies as a possible method of breaking my healthy foods-kick is because the idea that I myself might actually bake cookies did not occur to me, not just because cooking and me have traditionally gone together about as well as Hannity and Colmes, but also because I am a boy.
Something that really bothers me about our society is the classification of so many activities and objects as belonging exclusively to the “masculine” or “feminine” identities. Sewing, dolls, and cooking are GIRL things, while camping, baseballs, and farting are BOY things. And yet, I would argue, there is nothing inherent in the things I mentioned that would indicate that they belong to one gender over another if seperated from their cultural context. The critique to my argument might be that nothing CAN be separated from its context, and so its pointless to argue about something apart from the context in which it exists. To which I would respond, “Use your freaking imagination, already.” But I digress into a thereotical debate hotly debated by professors of English and of other abstract disciplines, which is altogether quite irrelevant to what I'm trying to say here. The point is that, even though I dislike these traditional definitions of gender-allowable behavior, I still unconsciously played into them by failing to forsee myself baking cookies. This is because these definitions are so pervasive – they've been shoved into your head since you were a baby. Boys wear blue, girls wear pink, boys play with tools, girls play with Barbie, boys are physical and logical, girls are emotional and nuturing. Now I do not mean to suggest that there are not natural, biological differences between the sexes; of course there are. A simple glance at a book of anatomy will reveal several significant ones. I'm talking about behaviors. The problem is that it is impossible to determine, in my opinion, how much of what we perceive as the behavorial differences between men and women is a result of purely biological factors and how much derives from the very specific and continually reinforced gender roles that society demands us to play. Gender, in a sociological perspective, is only partly a physical characteristic; it is also a performance, a role, something you do as much as something you are.
This is why drag queens are so interesting. Ok, I've lost you, but hold on I'll explain. These are men performing the role of a woman. Yes, its still a man under there, but drag queens are often referred to as “she” or “her,” (maybe you didn't know this) when they are in drag and “he” and “him” when they are not. There's some truth to that convention. Pretending to be another gender involves more than dressing up their clothes, it requires certain ways of talking, moving, and thinking. The role part, the performed aspect of gender, becomes quite clear when its the opposite gender acting it out. As I said before, many activities get labeled for either the man or woman's realm,
and woe be unto them that try to defy these boundaries. Its quite silly in some cases. When I took a yoga class as part of my acting regimen, I could not do my excerises at my apartment because of the incessant teasing I was subjected to by my roommates, who believed vigorously that yoga was “a girl thing.” “You're the only guy in the class, aren't you,” they asked smugly. In fact, over half the class was male, as was the instructor. Yoga was created by male Buddhist monks, I think, and probably practiced for thousands of years by men. Any attempt to limit it to the feminine sphere is simply absurd. And baking cookies has nothing inherently feminine about it! You just think that because your grandma always does it, but, I found, it is actually scientific, like a chemistry experiment. You mix together a certain number of ingredients, expose them to heat, and are astounded at the product that is created.
Another example: as an English major, I frequently enjoy books and movies that might otherwise not be appreciated by the fellow members of my sex. This includes English films with long, slow-moving plots, dry and subtle monologue, with no action sequences or sex. Many women, especially in the local culture, do enjoy these movies and so they are officially labeled “chick flicks.” “Pride and Prejudice” is an example, which was banned from our apartment by the roommates mentioned above for being unpardonably feminine. Here comes the amusing anecdote to back up my point (Mom, you'll probably want to start reading here):
A former roommate once convinced me, after some debate, to watch “Anne of Green Gables.” I had no desire to see the movie, because it was a girl movie and obviously had nothing in it that would appeal to me. He was very persuasive, however, and when I finally broke down and saw it I was surprised to discover that it was quite good. Yes, the story focuses on a teenage girl, but that makes it a “girl movie?” How many movies about young males are there, and do we consider them to be “boys only” movies? This is an evidence of sexism, in my opinion.Anyway, after our viewing of said film, this same roommate and I got it into our heads to watch the sequel, “Anne of Avonlea” just to see how everything plays out. He didn't have that one, so we had to go to the video store to rent it. We couldn't find it anywhere, and my roommate boldy went up to the man behind the counter and asked, “Excuse me, can you tell me where I could find 'Anne of Avonlea?'”
The man blinked at him in confusion, then, his voice dripping with sarcasm and disdain, said, “Yeah, I think its over there in THE LITTLE GIRLS SECTION!” Yeah, we all had a good laugh about that. But if college age girls had come in and asked for, say, “Stand By Me,” a film about a group of teenage boys having life-changing experiences, they would not, I suspect, have been teased in any way. There's a double standard there.
To be fair, women can be and more frequently are subjected to the same kind of criticism when they try to enter into the “man's realm.” I know girls who like video games, football, math and science, and all that masculine stuff, and I'd bet they get plenty of grief from others as if there was something not quite right with them.
And that, in the end, is the proof that so much of these complex gender identities are constructed, not inherent: there are always exceptions, lots and lots of exceptions. We are beginning to recognize that some guys like to shop, have good hygiene, and dress well,
but only by giving them their own separate identity in which to exist: metrosexual.We're all about labels, and society doesn't much like people who break the mold. Do I have to adhere to some abstract standard of “masculinity” and fear the reprisals if I too flagrantly break the "rules?" Can't I just be me instead of constantly worrying about fitting into some kind of prearranged formula? Embrace diversity. That's what I say.Anybody want a cookie?
(By the way, if you've read my blog about marriage and my critique of why girls aren't cool then you may be inclined to call me a hypocrite. Please remember, that blog was written by my confirmed bachelor, woman-hating persona, and this blog was written by the literary theorist and feminist persona. Its a different personality all together.)
Comments
Yes, SJ. I pinky swore. I'm a man of my word.
you baking cookies was probably pretty healthy.