January 19, 2014

Everyone in between, not male or female

I had a very interesting conversation with my brother a few years ago. We were talking about calling ourselves male or female and my brother, very smartly pointed out that I am not all female as he is not all male. Let me explain.

I will first list out the common characteristics or traits that are generally associated with a 'female' or being 'feminine'. This is in no particular order, just whatever pops up.
  • Grooming - to do with dressing oneself up, hair, clothes, fashion accessories
  • Homely - strong attachment to home, of having one, decorating one
  • Motherly - protective of loved ones, worrying about safety and security of loved ones
  • Responsible - thinks about the future, wants a secure life
  • Loving - expressing love by words and actions
  • Emotional - strong attachments, understands and appreciates aesthetic beauty
Now, for some that are associated with 'male' or being 'masculine'.
  • Physical strength - ability to fix things at home, ability to carry weight
  • Competitive - winning is important in everything, career, life
  • Navigating powers - has a strong sense of direction and reads maps like it is no one's business
  • Practical - hands on, no nonsense approach to problems
  • Problem solving abilities - solution finding high on the mind all the time
I can go on but you get the gist. You probably already know what I am getting at. Do these make any sense? These are just words that are associated with a certain gender to create certain stereotypes. Stereotypes are required for our minds to distinguish and create some pictures of words, so we know what they mean but we have to realize that is all is their purpose.

Take anyone you know, in fact I would say start with yourself and try to put yourself in the basket of 'male' or 'female'. I am sure you will fit into both, maybe more in one or maybe half and half. Each feet in a different basket or two feet in one but head leaning on the second or lying horizontally on both! I would say I am 60% female and 40% male. Note that this has nothing to do with whether you have male or female genitalia! Obviously, that is not all there is to gender.

Now there would still be some who are 100% male or 100% female. But the majority would fall in between. So, I simply don't get what is the problem people have with in-betweens, we are all the same! That is the norm, get it?

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