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Masculinity and Gender - and a message
7 years ago
Time for a rant by your favorite queer sociologist.
Alright so Im going to talk about something that queer men (especially gay men) obsess over and that frankly, I shouldnt have to talk about. Some of this is for me, some of it isnt, but first Im going to go over some things to set the ground floor and make this as basic as possible for people to understand.
Biologically speaking there is no actual imperative for any concept of masculinity or femininity. There is biological sex, and there is the society and acculturation (the process by which you learn how to "be" in your society) that defines every facet of what it means to be "male" or "female." Gender with almost total entirety is a construct. What does this mean? It means it is a result of our society, something humans made up along the way. Something "constructed" to function within our society. Sex is biological, gender is not. Humans have two sexes within our usual biological paradigm. Sometimes our genes decide to do their own thing, and an intersex person is born, or a transgender person is born. These people can choose to gender themselves, or they can choose to not to. Anyone, in reality, can technically choose to play or not play what I call "the gender game".
Literally every facet of our lives is defined by this infuriating construct. The moment I was born with a penis the expectation that I should like cool colors, sports, and that I would marry a woman was attached to my entire being. It didn't matter if I actually wanted any of these things. What mattered is that SOCIETY expects them, and literally demands them. This process has existed and grown in strength for thousands of years. Our society has spent centuries obsessing over gender and what it "should" be. The reality? Nature doesn't care. In nature MEN are beautiful and dramatic, and flamboyant. Dont believe me? look up bird of paradise, or lions. In nature WOMEN usually do most of the work. Again, look up bees, female lions, etc.
Human cultures have defined themselves with VERY few exceptions around war, greed, and power struggles. And at the center of this Men have forced their way to the top. Men have controlled most of society for centuries, and they have as a by product of this defined our entire species' social engineering. This process has been conscious and unconscious. The result is that the traits that men with control often exhibit have taken precedence, and are overvalued. Traits like aggression, dominance, physical strength, "virility" etc. You may recognize these traits as what can be described as "traditionally masculine."
Here's something for yall to chew on. There is no such thing as anything inherently masculine or unmasculine. The same is true of femininity. There is only what your culture has defined as masculine or feminine; and with almost no exceptions all cultures overvalue men, and traits that have been shown over and over again to be toxic to nations, the environment, and any form of progress. You know who ACTUALLY survives in nature? Who lives the longest most of the time, and propagates the fastest? Communal species. Species that make use of altruism and learning. Species that adapt and learn to work together. Species that learn mutual respect in one way or another. Dominance and power are simplistic and TRANSIENT. They mean nothing in the long run. All empires fall, all civilization write their own ruin again and again throughout history if they base their societies off of human greed, selfishness, and male obsessed power.
Men and women can choose to be whatever the fuck they want to be. Men can be KIND, and GENTLE, and SUBMISSIVE, and still be just as much of a man as anyone. Men can be beautiful, and glamorous, and intelligent, and they are just as valid in who they are as anyone else. Men can be all of these things, some of these things, or totally different things. Physical strength can be marvelous and attractive, it is STILL overvalued. ALL society constantly derides and removes worth from femininity and women. This is absurd, disgusting, and wrong. Your attractions are not unconscious in entirety. You as a person cultivate what you find attraction in. If the only reason you wont date someone is because they are feminine? black? etc? You have a problem.
The natural world is overwhelmed with beauty, elegance, grace, and strength all wrapped into one. Humans just forgot, or choose to forget. Nature doesnt care about our constructs and obsession with controlling other people's appearance, fashions, and beliefs. Nature doesnt need us. We need nature. The gay community is RIFE with the same heterosexual male power fantasy obsessed shit that mainstream society is. The entire culture overvalues physical strength (muscled beardy dudes) and stereotypical masculine traits while ignoring or demonizing anyone else. Yall will write no fats, no femmes, no blacks or asians on your tacky ass grindr profiles while simultaneously freaking out over a drag race that EXISTS TO PRAISE AND REVERE FEMININITY IN ALL COLORS. Yall obsess over getting shredded at the gym, and give the most LAZY lip service to helping your own people, women, and other minorities while never actually extending yourself for any of them.
Feminine men are marvelous, stronger then any of you "masc" douchebags could ever imagine, and do more for their sex then you have in your protein crazed life. Beautiful men exist, have value, and are not lesser than anyone because they speak with elegance, enjoy makeup, put on a freaking dress, or dont enjoy the gym. Chubby men who like to draw and paint are not less worthy of manhood then anyone else. Submissive men are not weak, they are not your toys, and people who abuse them are some of the most vile monsters I have had the displeasure of interacting with. Men, are allowed to exist in ALL forms they appear. Cut the shit, remove your toxic masculinity, and understand that more exists in the world then your protein shake and the next fucking set. You're muscle means nothing if your personality and goals are simplistic and self obsessed.
furries- some of yall are trying and I see it and I see you. But most of yall still have massive strides to take before you will ever achieve a modicum of actual happiness and decency thats not derived from cliques, orgies, and teenage drama yall never expunged in high school. Have some humility, and learn to be compassionate.
bears- I literally couldnt care less if you arent into me because I look like wood elf lol. I have twice the personality that yall have, and three times the compassion. I'll take that over your lung cancer and abusive toxic masculinity. Yall dont want to date feminine men? Thats fine, we really dont want yall either.
gayjocks- Yall need to understand that the gym and your fucking "gains" need to NOT be the center of your worlds. Half of you arent actually being healthy, and the other half is so arrogant that if you removed the stick up their ass they'd finally realize they were bottoms and get off their insecurity high horse. (ok, lol that was funny).
I look like an elf, I am smart, extremely passionate, deeply compassionate, and totally unashamed of loving myself, and every last trait you people continuously "brand" on me as feminine like thats a bad thing. To quote Adam Rippon, "Im a glamazon bitch ready for the runway"
Alright so Im going to talk about something that queer men (especially gay men) obsess over and that frankly, I shouldnt have to talk about. Some of this is for me, some of it isnt, but first Im going to go over some things to set the ground floor and make this as basic as possible for people to understand.
Biologically speaking there is no actual imperative for any concept of masculinity or femininity. There is biological sex, and there is the society and acculturation (the process by which you learn how to "be" in your society) that defines every facet of what it means to be "male" or "female." Gender with almost total entirety is a construct. What does this mean? It means it is a result of our society, something humans made up along the way. Something "constructed" to function within our society. Sex is biological, gender is not. Humans have two sexes within our usual biological paradigm. Sometimes our genes decide to do their own thing, and an intersex person is born, or a transgender person is born. These people can choose to gender themselves, or they can choose to not to. Anyone, in reality, can technically choose to play or not play what I call "the gender game".
Literally every facet of our lives is defined by this infuriating construct. The moment I was born with a penis the expectation that I should like cool colors, sports, and that I would marry a woman was attached to my entire being. It didn't matter if I actually wanted any of these things. What mattered is that SOCIETY expects them, and literally demands them. This process has existed and grown in strength for thousands of years. Our society has spent centuries obsessing over gender and what it "should" be. The reality? Nature doesn't care. In nature MEN are beautiful and dramatic, and flamboyant. Dont believe me? look up bird of paradise, or lions. In nature WOMEN usually do most of the work. Again, look up bees, female lions, etc.
Human cultures have defined themselves with VERY few exceptions around war, greed, and power struggles. And at the center of this Men have forced their way to the top. Men have controlled most of society for centuries, and they have as a by product of this defined our entire species' social engineering. This process has been conscious and unconscious. The result is that the traits that men with control often exhibit have taken precedence, and are overvalued. Traits like aggression, dominance, physical strength, "virility" etc. You may recognize these traits as what can be described as "traditionally masculine."
Here's something for yall to chew on. There is no such thing as anything inherently masculine or unmasculine. The same is true of femininity. There is only what your culture has defined as masculine or feminine; and with almost no exceptions all cultures overvalue men, and traits that have been shown over and over again to be toxic to nations, the environment, and any form of progress. You know who ACTUALLY survives in nature? Who lives the longest most of the time, and propagates the fastest? Communal species. Species that make use of altruism and learning. Species that adapt and learn to work together. Species that learn mutual respect in one way or another. Dominance and power are simplistic and TRANSIENT. They mean nothing in the long run. All empires fall, all civilization write their own ruin again and again throughout history if they base their societies off of human greed, selfishness, and male obsessed power.
Men and women can choose to be whatever the fuck they want to be. Men can be KIND, and GENTLE, and SUBMISSIVE, and still be just as much of a man as anyone. Men can be beautiful, and glamorous, and intelligent, and they are just as valid in who they are as anyone else. Men can be all of these things, some of these things, or totally different things. Physical strength can be marvelous and attractive, it is STILL overvalued. ALL society constantly derides and removes worth from femininity and women. This is absurd, disgusting, and wrong. Your attractions are not unconscious in entirety. You as a person cultivate what you find attraction in. If the only reason you wont date someone is because they are feminine? black? etc? You have a problem.
The natural world is overwhelmed with beauty, elegance, grace, and strength all wrapped into one. Humans just forgot, or choose to forget. Nature doesnt care about our constructs and obsession with controlling other people's appearance, fashions, and beliefs. Nature doesnt need us. We need nature. The gay community is RIFE with the same heterosexual male power fantasy obsessed shit that mainstream society is. The entire culture overvalues physical strength (muscled beardy dudes) and stereotypical masculine traits while ignoring or demonizing anyone else. Yall will write no fats, no femmes, no blacks or asians on your tacky ass grindr profiles while simultaneously freaking out over a drag race that EXISTS TO PRAISE AND REVERE FEMININITY IN ALL COLORS. Yall obsess over getting shredded at the gym, and give the most LAZY lip service to helping your own people, women, and other minorities while never actually extending yourself for any of them.
Feminine men are marvelous, stronger then any of you "masc" douchebags could ever imagine, and do more for their sex then you have in your protein crazed life. Beautiful men exist, have value, and are not lesser than anyone because they speak with elegance, enjoy makeup, put on a freaking dress, or dont enjoy the gym. Chubby men who like to draw and paint are not less worthy of manhood then anyone else. Submissive men are not weak, they are not your toys, and people who abuse them are some of the most vile monsters I have had the displeasure of interacting with. Men, are allowed to exist in ALL forms they appear. Cut the shit, remove your toxic masculinity, and understand that more exists in the world then your protein shake and the next fucking set. You're muscle means nothing if your personality and goals are simplistic and self obsessed.
furries- some of yall are trying and I see it and I see you. But most of yall still have massive strides to take before you will ever achieve a modicum of actual happiness and decency thats not derived from cliques, orgies, and teenage drama yall never expunged in high school. Have some humility, and learn to be compassionate.
bears- I literally couldnt care less if you arent into me because I look like wood elf lol. I have twice the personality that yall have, and three times the compassion. I'll take that over your lung cancer and abusive toxic masculinity. Yall dont want to date feminine men? Thats fine, we really dont want yall either.
gayjocks- Yall need to understand that the gym and your fucking "gains" need to NOT be the center of your worlds. Half of you arent actually being healthy, and the other half is so arrogant that if you removed the stick up their ass they'd finally realize they were bottoms and get off their insecurity high horse. (ok, lol that was funny).
I look like an elf, I am smart, extremely passionate, deeply compassionate, and totally unashamed of loving myself, and every last trait you people continuously "brand" on me as feminine like thats a bad thing. To quote Adam Rippon, "Im a glamazon bitch ready for the runway"
Ask any person who used to be considered "very obese", then lost the weight. I've asked a bunch, and it's night & day how even random strangers would treat them, based on only their appearance alone.
Many people will not talk to, befriend, etc. anyone who they do not feel is attractive to them, and they act only based on this criteria. So anyone outside of it gets treated like garbage. They think with their sex drives.
I admit I'm somewhat hypocritical on this and we all are in a way hypocritical to certain things. I'm mainly on here to, well, look at yiff. But the difference is I don't feel the need to be mean to anyone who doesn't fit what I call attractive.
I gotta wonder, if maybe hypnotism can change human attraction. As creepy and problem as it sounds, I mean maybe it can undo a lot of criteria we use to date someone etc.
One more thing:
> "In nature MEN are beautiful and dramatic, and flamboyant. Don't believe me? look up bird of paradise, or lions. In nature WOMEN usually do most of the work. Again, look up bees, female lions, etc."
Interestingly, some human societies are still like this, but because they're not considered "mainstream western society", they often get ignored.
The truth of the matter is that some cultures are LESS antagonistic towards ignoring or blending gender, but there is no major human culture left that actually maintains in itself the freedom to "be" in the sense of gender/sexuality. Many Indian cultures for example expect a kind of beauty from both men and women, but those are extremely specific and surrounded in cultural norms, expectations, and rules. Humans are obsessed with gender, and obsessed with male power. The UN has a separate bill of rights specifically designed to protect women and children because of this fact. So yes, it is easier in some cultures than others to blur the lines or ignore gender, but it is still not accepted much less appreciated or desired.
The fickleness of the "attractions problem" cannot be solved with mental manipulation, or something like hypnotism (thats a new one to be suggested to me lol xD). How we perceive one another has been established over 3000+ years of social engineering. It takes people actively examining themselves, their actions, their attractions, and use of critical thinking to move past this. Its taken me years to get past my own cultural baggage and become the kind of person I am today. I can with confidence say I can be attracted to almost anyone if very basic parameters are met. I still have preferences yes, but they are transitory. This has taken years of effort and cultivation to achieve though, and almost no one is going to do this.
People wont realistically cross examine their entire personality 90% of the time. They CAN and should however always keep an open mind, and understand that their attractions themselves shouldn't decide who they do and dont date. Appearance, is skin deep.
Just out of curiosity, do you study languages too? Sorry if that's an uninformed question.
I had the Maasai people in mind when I made this post. The men have long braided hair in adulthood. Women shave their heads and do the physical labor.
That said, I feel like cultures as these aren't necessarily more free. What if a woman didn't want to shave her head? What if a man didn't want his long? It's basically just a reverse of what we're used to, which I think we both agree isn't much if any better.
Was there ever a human civilization that had no gender roles at all?
And a lot of people roll their eyes at me when I say hypnotism, some take it as an insult. But I'm being serious. My attraction can be rather picky and superficial, but it's hard to get past it. We've mostly been taught to judge and date based on appearance. I do wish I could be hypnotized to find anyone attractive- I've turned down dates with guys who seemed really nice and cool because I didn't like things such as how they looked.
Also, I think that perhaps many people are so picky with looks because they hate their own appearance. And for this reason, attraction may be extremely important, to fill some kind of void that they missed out on ever being considered "attractive".
The reason why hypnotism is... strange (and not always legitimate) is that it is body/mental manipulation. Its not mind control. Its just a subtle "push" in a direction/action. It cant be used to change someone's personality. It can only be used to manipulate actions themselves.
The basic thing is this. You dont have to find absolutely everyone attractive. Thats never been realistic. You should however not allow your attractions and preferences to automatically determine if you'd enjoy someone. In essence, keep an open mind and if a person is decent allow them a chance. If the ONLY reason you "arent into someone" is the fact that they're more feminine than what you typically prefer, etc (just as an example) thats superficial. If more people paid deeper attention to what someone believes, how they treat others, etc (their personality) relationships would be far more stable, more loving, and less prone to breaking apart. Instead people just think with their dicks and the stereotypes of their own culture; and are then surprised when everything feels empty.
Tbh, I would not want anyone dating me if they didn't find me attractive physically. I'd find that odd. But I know that's because I've been taught to find it odd.
And sometimes it didn't, and I ended up dating someone I had no attraction to. It wasn't a great situation. I've talked to other guys who did this too, hoping the attraction would come later on, and it didn't.
Basically, both guys end up cheating on each other (one to find the attraction they long for; the other to get the intimacy they long for that the unattracted guy isn't giving them). And it's just not a happy situation at all. Ends in heartbreak.
Sometimes, I would do as you said and try to be just friends with a guy, even if I wasn't attracted.
Within a few days at most, he'd start pressuring me into sex or to date him when I didn't want to. =\
So it kinda scared me off of even befriending single gay men tbh.
I'm more into men who are sweet and kind. Being minotaurs is a plus though :P
If yall want to know my type, Its Ajani Goldmane or Gideon from MTG. xD
Rare to find gay/bi/pan/etc. guys like that IRL though. Most I know are straight.
http://www.artofmtg.com/art/oath-of-gideon/ Boy has FLORAL embossed gemmed armor xD I like dudes that like color and pretty shit and aren't afraid to make use of it.
But I still wouldn't consider him very feminine. Idk.
Well Pearl mixed with crazy Aztec priest :o