On the reinforcement of gender roles.
Aug. 11th, 2009 03:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gaudiorWent to worldcon! It was awesome! Hopefully I shall post more details presently!
At the moment, though, inspired by a recent post by a friend (friends-locked, or I'd link), I'd like to post the results of an experiment. See, my mother raised me feminist, and did a damn fine job of it-- I think I'm more comfortable with being female, and yet confident to do what I want with my life, than most other women I know. A large part of this was my unconscious construction of blinders that keep me from noticing and reacting to the tremendous number of signals I receive, all the time, telling me that:
1) because I'm female, I should act in certain ways
2) because I'm female, I should not act in certain ways, and in fact would not be physically/mentally/emotionally able to do so
3) because I'm female, I have certain qualities (usually negative, but also positive)
4) because I'm female, my purpose is to serve, care for, and please others, especially males
5) all other females and males should also act accordingly.
So I decided to try taking the blinders off. For exactly one twenty-four hour period last week, I would make a note of every single thing I noticed which reminded me of these messages.
4:15pm — On the street, a passing couple arrives at the corner just as the light turns; he says he’s sad they missed it. She pokes him in the arm — “Oh, be a man!” — and walks across the street against the light.
4:20pm — I start reading In the House of Brede, which I suspect of being feminist eventually, and starts off with a description of a woman who’s unusually powerful and accomplished:
“She has women and men working for her.”
“That must be hard on the men.”
5:20pm — I arrive at a party with my colleagues from my fellowship program. Can’t help but notice that, for the first fifteen minutes, the person holding the floor conversationally is a (admittedly awesome, friendly, sensitive, supportive, etc.) white guy.
6:15pm — One of my colleagues, showing off her two-month-old baby, talks about how she thinks there’s something about being a mother that makes her more willing/delighted to spend hours just staring at the baby, which “men just don’t seem to have.” The rest of the room start telling the father how he must be looking forward to starting to teach the baby sports in a few years.
7:48pm — My colleague with the baby talks about sending the baby to day care when she’s ready to go back to work. There is no discussion of her husband taking time off to split taking care of the baby.
8:55pm — Dinner over, my male colleague offers to help clean up, as a prelude to leaving. Our host(ess) tells him not to bother. Immediately, the four women (and my other male colleague’s boyfriend) in the room start cleaning up, while my two male colleagues sit on the couch and chat. They are joined by me (when I notice this), my male colleague’s boyfriend, and the other lesbian in the group, while all the straight women continue to clean.
9:05pm — Coming home, I go online to read Not Always Right, a blog of ever-so-wrong things customers do/say. Find an entry about a man who bought a flat-screen tv and then infuriated his wife by always having friends over for sports and irresponsibility… so the salesclerk recommended she call her “girlfriends” over for chick flicks, and concludes “Her husbands’ beer buddies never stood a chance.”
9:12pm — I start writing this list. Lila says, “Just include ‘6:15pm — Lila watches a compilation of the best of MGM musicals,’ and you’ve got it right there.”
9:25pm — I read a story about a female clerk who had a male client stare at her chest, lean over the counter, and tear off her name badge.
9:28pm — I can’t tell any more which of these stories have gender in them… I decide, for the sake of my wrists, only to include things I’m sure about, not things that just have shades of “this woman is portrayed as being dumb,” “this woman is portrayed as being entitled,” “this story is about a woman’s breasts, or a man’s penis,” ”this is a story about a woman prioritizing her appearance over her kids’ health” (two of those so far) “this woman seems to be sexually active,” or “this story about a man threatening to shoot a woman is portrayed as funny.”
9:33pm — Can I count a male customer being an idiot, then criticizing the clerk, rolling his eyes, and saying, “I can’t believe they hired you. I bet it’s only because you’re pretty!”? here. I rather think I can.
9:35pm — How about a customer thinking that Moby Dick sounds “ew!” and asking for a copy with a “manlier title”? I will admit this one sounds like a joke-- but the point is not that these be serious assertions of gender roles-- just reminders that they exist, and how constant these reminders can be.
9:58pm — What about one entitled “Be Prepared… for Some Womanly Advice,” where the point is that the clerk gave the (male) customer advice about his love-life, which proved successful?
10:01pm — Oh, fuck everything: Blargh.
10:13pm — Customer screams in anger that the whipped cream on his mocha is “too girly.” I go to bed.
8:36am — Get up, go into the bathroom, read The Funny Times on the toilet, mostly a column by Bruce Cameron about getting a flat tire. I’m not sure whether to include the lines “When my daughters were learning to drive, I painstakingly walked them through the steps for changing a tire, which they dutifully recorded in their notes as, “Step 1: Call Dad.”” Since he goes on to talk about how his father is very far away in a nursing home, maybe that has nothing to do with gender, and is just about kids.
But then we get to the line, “Luckily, I’m a man, so I don’t need to read no stinkin’ instructions.” He attempts something which has no effect whatsoever: “I’m a man, so I kept at it for about five minutes.”
In the end, he calls road service: “The driver very efficiently changed the tire while I stood around and talked hunting and sports to prove I was as manly as she was.”
Again, that's funny and kinda feminist-- but the purpose of this experiment is not to argue that the whole world is sexist so much as to point out the fucking omnipresence of gender roles and expectations. Of which, dude, lots.
10:05am - Go onto lj. Read![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kmd’s thoughtful IBARW entry about the intersection of feminism and racism.
10:45am — Talking on the phone with a friend, we both mention in passing a mutual friend’s household in which they eat out a lot—because the female member of the household has health problems which make it very difficult, and the two (healthy) male members “don’t cook.”
11:05am — Walking by a copy of the Metro on the street, I notice that one of their stories seems to be about the fact that you really can have a relationship in which the woman is taller than the man. No, really! Sure, it’s funny, but these people have done it!
11:40am — Readrosalarian’s entry about how in the professional American release of CLAMP’s series Wish, one of the characters who had been translated as male in other translations is now translated as female. (People who know more CLAMP than I, what’s the deal with this?)
11:50am — Miss Manners points out 1920s hat etiquette for gentlemen.
12:03pm — Reading The Comics Curmudgeon, run across a strip of “Blondie.” And a strip of “Hagar the Horrible,” where Helga berates Hagar for going to France, home of “scantily clad dancing girls.” And one of “Curtis,” in which the mother is portrayed as primarily there to tend to her son and husband, ending with the line, “A mother should love her child more than her husband!” And why are the ants in “Family Circus” called “he” when most ants you see are female? Oh, and a “Beetle Bailey” where one of the soldiers offers the Sexy Secretary tm a small box which she thinks will contain an engagement ring, but turns out to have a tiny, tiny thong! Ha, ha! And a “Crock” where a male character asks a librarian for the book “Pickup Lines to Get Women,” leading to the librarian saying, “Great choice! That’s what I used to catch this beauty,” pulling out (from behind his desk) a young woman who seems somewhat cross-eyed and possibly buck-toothed, though it’s hard to tell with the art in Crock. The guy leaves without the book, anyway. And a “Mary Worth” whole series about how horrified the female character is that the guy she’s been flirting with seems interested in sex. And...and...and...
...and I don't last 24 hours. Because now I'm avoiding the internet, or books, or anything else, because I know I'll see something else I need to write down. And I don't want to think about it anymore. So I give up, and go to co-lead my therapy group: "Coping Skills for Women Trauma Survivors."
...
Note that this is just things that jumped out at me. I didn't analyze clothing and hairstyle, or the fact that I was doing the laundry, or anything else under the surface. That's 1200 words of nothing but in-your-face gender-role reinscriptions.
And I try to ignore these, most of the time. Try to say that I am simply myself, try to be guided by my own beliefs, opinions and desires on this subject, not those which are all around me, constantly, insisting that I am something else. And I'm amazed at how often I succeed.
But doing this experiment makes me wonder. If I didn't have to spend all this effort insisting against all odds on being myself-- if I could just live in a world where people like me were the norm, or at very least widely accepted-- what could I do with all that energy? What could I be?
--R
Reading: C.S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength. Elizabeth Enright, Thimble Summer. Rumer Godden, In this House of Brede.
At the moment, though, inspired by a recent post by a friend (friends-locked, or I'd link), I'd like to post the results of an experiment. See, my mother raised me feminist, and did a damn fine job of it-- I think I'm more comfortable with being female, and yet confident to do what I want with my life, than most other women I know. A large part of this was my unconscious construction of blinders that keep me from noticing and reacting to the tremendous number of signals I receive, all the time, telling me that:
1) because I'm female, I should act in certain ways
2) because I'm female, I should not act in certain ways, and in fact would not be physically/mentally/emotionally able to do so
3) because I'm female, I have certain qualities (usually negative, but also positive)
4) because I'm female, my purpose is to serve, care for, and please others, especially males
5) all other females and males should also act accordingly.
So I decided to try taking the blinders off. For exactly one twenty-four hour period last week, I would make a note of every single thing I noticed which reminded me of these messages.
4:15pm — On the street, a passing couple arrives at the corner just as the light turns; he says he’s sad they missed it. She pokes him in the arm — “Oh, be a man!” — and walks across the street against the light.
4:20pm — I start reading In the House of Brede, which I suspect of being feminist eventually, and starts off with a description of a woman who’s unusually powerful and accomplished:
“She has women and men working for her.”
“That must be hard on the men.”
5:20pm — I arrive at a party with my colleagues from my fellowship program. Can’t help but notice that, for the first fifteen minutes, the person holding the floor conversationally is a (admittedly awesome, friendly, sensitive, supportive, etc.) white guy.
6:15pm — One of my colleagues, showing off her two-month-old baby, talks about how she thinks there’s something about being a mother that makes her more willing/delighted to spend hours just staring at the baby, which “men just don’t seem to have.” The rest of the room start telling the father how he must be looking forward to starting to teach the baby sports in a few years.
7:48pm — My colleague with the baby talks about sending the baby to day care when she’s ready to go back to work. There is no discussion of her husband taking time off to split taking care of the baby.
8:55pm — Dinner over, my male colleague offers to help clean up, as a prelude to leaving. Our host(ess) tells him not to bother. Immediately, the four women (and my other male colleague’s boyfriend) in the room start cleaning up, while my two male colleagues sit on the couch and chat. They are joined by me (when I notice this), my male colleague’s boyfriend, and the other lesbian in the group, while all the straight women continue to clean.
9:05pm — Coming home, I go online to read Not Always Right, a blog of ever-so-wrong things customers do/say. Find an entry about a man who bought a flat-screen tv and then infuriated his wife by always having friends over for sports and irresponsibility… so the salesclerk recommended she call her “girlfriends” over for chick flicks, and concludes “Her husbands’ beer buddies never stood a chance.”
9:12pm — I start writing this list. Lila says, “Just include ‘6:15pm — Lila watches a compilation of the best of MGM musicals,’ and you’ve got it right there.”
9:25pm — I read a story about a female clerk who had a male client stare at her chest, lean over the counter, and tear off her name badge.
9:28pm — I can’t tell any more which of these stories have gender in them… I decide, for the sake of my wrists, only to include things I’m sure about, not things that just have shades of “this woman is portrayed as being dumb,” “this woman is portrayed as being entitled,” “this story is about a woman’s breasts, or a man’s penis,” ”this is a story about a woman prioritizing her appearance over her kids’ health” (two of those so far) “this woman seems to be sexually active,” or “this story about a man threatening to shoot a woman is portrayed as funny.”
9:33pm — Can I count a male customer being an idiot, then criticizing the clerk, rolling his eyes, and saying, “I can’t believe they hired you. I bet it’s only because you’re pretty!”? here. I rather think I can.
9:35pm — How about a customer thinking that Moby Dick sounds “ew!” and asking for a copy with a “manlier title”? I will admit this one sounds like a joke-- but the point is not that these be serious assertions of gender roles-- just reminders that they exist, and how constant these reminders can be.
9:58pm — What about one entitled “Be Prepared… for Some Womanly Advice,” where the point is that the clerk gave the (male) customer advice about his love-life, which proved successful?
10:01pm — Oh, fuck everything: Blargh.
10:13pm — Customer screams in anger that the whipped cream on his mocha is “too girly.” I go to bed.
8:36am — Get up, go into the bathroom, read The Funny Times on the toilet, mostly a column by Bruce Cameron about getting a flat tire. I’m not sure whether to include the lines “When my daughters were learning to drive, I painstakingly walked them through the steps for changing a tire, which they dutifully recorded in their notes as, “Step 1: Call Dad.”” Since he goes on to talk about how his father is very far away in a nursing home, maybe that has nothing to do with gender, and is just about kids.
But then we get to the line, “Luckily, I’m a man, so I don’t need to read no stinkin’ instructions.” He attempts something which has no effect whatsoever: “I’m a man, so I kept at it for about five minutes.”
In the end, he calls road service: “The driver very efficiently changed the tire while I stood around and talked hunting and sports to prove I was as manly as she was.”
Again, that's funny and kinda feminist-- but the purpose of this experiment is not to argue that the whole world is sexist so much as to point out the fucking omnipresence of gender roles and expectations. Of which, dude, lots.
10:05am - Go onto lj. Read
kmd’s thoughtful IBARW entry about the intersection of feminism and racism.10:45am — Talking on the phone with a friend, we both mention in passing a mutual friend’s household in which they eat out a lot—because the female member of the household has health problems which make it very difficult, and the two (healthy) male members “don’t cook.”
11:05am — Walking by a copy of the Metro on the street, I notice that one of their stories seems to be about the fact that you really can have a relationship in which the woman is taller than the man. No, really! Sure, it’s funny, but these people have done it!
11:40am — Read
rosalarian’s entry about how in the professional American release of CLAMP’s series Wish, one of the characters who had been translated as male in other translations is now translated as female. (People who know more CLAMP than I, what’s the deal with this?)11:50am — Miss Manners points out 1920s hat etiquette for gentlemen.
12:03pm — Reading The Comics Curmudgeon, run across a strip of “Blondie.” And a strip of “Hagar the Horrible,” where Helga berates Hagar for going to France, home of “scantily clad dancing girls.” And one of “Curtis,” in which the mother is portrayed as primarily there to tend to her son and husband, ending with the line, “A mother should love her child more than her husband!” And why are the ants in “Family Circus” called “he” when most ants you see are female? Oh, and a “Beetle Bailey” where one of the soldiers offers the Sexy Secretary tm a small box which she thinks will contain an engagement ring, but turns out to have a tiny, tiny thong! Ha, ha! And a “Crock” where a male character asks a librarian for the book “Pickup Lines to Get Women,” leading to the librarian saying, “Great choice! That’s what I used to catch this beauty,” pulling out (from behind his desk) a young woman who seems somewhat cross-eyed and possibly buck-toothed, though it’s hard to tell with the art in Crock. The guy leaves without the book, anyway. And a “Mary Worth” whole series about how horrified the female character is that the guy she’s been flirting with seems interested in sex. And...and...and...
...and I don't last 24 hours. Because now I'm avoiding the internet, or books, or anything else, because I know I'll see something else I need to write down. And I don't want to think about it anymore. So I give up, and go to co-lead my therapy group: "Coping Skills for Women Trauma Survivors."
...
Note that this is just things that jumped out at me. I didn't analyze clothing and hairstyle, or the fact that I was doing the laundry, or anything else under the surface. That's 1200 words of nothing but in-your-face gender-role reinscriptions.
And I try to ignore these, most of the time. Try to say that I am simply myself, try to be guided by my own beliefs, opinions and desires on this subject, not those which are all around me, constantly, insisting that I am something else. And I'm amazed at how often I succeed.
But doing this experiment makes me wonder. If I didn't have to spend all this effort insisting against all odds on being myself-- if I could just live in a world where people like me were the norm, or at very least widely accepted-- what could I do with all that energy? What could I be?
--R
Reading: C.S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength. Elizabeth Enright, Thimble Summer. Rumer Godden, In this House of Brede.
