On Peg's gender post

[mrissa]

I've been thinking about pegkerr's post about her identity as a woman ever since she put it up lo these days ago. The main conclusion I've come to is that I have an extremely strong sense of myself as feminine. I don't mean that I consider whether what I'm doing is feminine and try to hold to an external ideal of womanhood, but the opposite: everything I do becomes Stuff Women Do to me by virtue of me doing it.

In the right atmosphere, it can be a really powerful feeling to be walking gender integration. You can stand at the door of some classrooms and pull your foot in and out: "You're integrated! You're not integrated! You're integrated! You're not integrated!" My girl cooties trump all your cootie shots effortlessly. They are mighty, mighty cooties.

So all sorts of things with grace or beauty, ethereality or curves: meh. None of it got very solidly associated with gender for me, because it was so clear that People Vary was the principle in operation.

We joked about my friend Jeff in high school having a portable right-of-way: when Jeff was on his foot, pedestrians had the right-of-way, and when Jeff was in his truck, vehicles had the right-of-way, and we suspected that if he'd gotten a pogo stick, jumpers would have had the right-of-way. I guess I feel that way with femminess. Mine is with me always. If I start taking things apart to tinker with them, taking things apart to tinker with them becomes femmey, and the rest of the world will just have to deal with that.

My most solid sense of What Women Do is that women do What Needs Doing. That is also my most solid sense of What Men Do: it is a grown-ups thing, not a gender thing.

Comments

[ckd]

The Mighty Mighty Cooties should tour with the Mighty Mighty Bosstones.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I have to admit that both have made me jump around the living room like a maniac. Just not simultaneously.

[angeyja.livejournal.com]

and try to hold to an external ideal of womanhood, but the opposite: everything I do becomes Stuff Women Do to me by virtue of me doing it.

Pretty much exact to what I do on the job.. in terms of possibilties, and maybe more importantly, what I do be being who I am and keeping the house here.

[(Anonymous)]

I cannot get to the post you linked - is it friend locked?

For me there are two different issues in your post. First is that I do not HAVE sense of myself as a female. I am me, not female, even when in middle of pushing a baby out of my body.

As to What Women Do, that is largely tied to situation at hand. It baffles me and I have just given up telling stories of my parents, as in their marriage the roles were very traditional outside (well, my mother had higher military rank, but that was because she was older), but I never saw that as anything due to their gender.

Aet

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

pegkerr said she was going to friendslock it eventually. Last I saw she hadn't, but apparently now she has.

I'm not arguing or agreeing with her so much as going off on a tangent.

Anyway, yes, someone on Peg's and my friendslists commented very similarly, that she doesn't have a strong sense of herself as categorically a woman but as an individual self. Some people do and some don't, from the looks of it. I never claimed that mine was the universal response, just that it's mine.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I have an extremely strong sense of myself as feminine. . . . [E]verything I do becomes Stuff Women Do to me by virtue of me doing it.

Yes. No. Maybe. (For myself.)

I identify as female, though not as feminine. But the second sentence quoted above: yes, absolutely. So I'm always a bit taken aback when I find myself on the "male" side of various scales, which happens quite often. But I've never had the tiniest bit of a "born in the wrong body" feeling; I've always felt that this is completely the right body.

[skylarker.livejournal.com]

I find myself sometimes confused because both things are going on with me: there's a sense in which, yes, if I'm doing it then it's something a woman does; but there's another sense in which I'm conscious of stereotypical roles and ideals about what's supposed to be feminine or masculine.

There's some cognitive dissonance between what I know from personal experience and what I see in the media. I don't fit the stereotypes; most of the people I know personally don't fit the stereotypes - but I have to deal on a daily basis with people who are steeped in the culture that conveys the stereotypes. Being female is only one of my characteristics,and it's not the most important one in my own mind; ut I find that it matters a lot in dealing with people who don't know me as myself.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Most of the stuff I experience with stereotypes is more than just female stereotypes. It's, say, young skinny female stereotypes. Stuff that is clearly a specific subgroup of stereotype. Still doesn't fit any better, but it makes it harder for me to experience it as how women are treated per se.

[skylarker.livejournal.com]

Most of the stuff I experience with stereotypes is more than just female stereotypes. It's, say, young skinny female stereotypes.

There is that. Part of my experience with the stereotypes is the phenomenon of being virtually invisible to some men (and some very role conscious women) because I don't fit the young skinny female model. I've learned to take advantage of this. You can do pretty much what you want when you're invisible.

But aside from that I've found myself influenced in ways I'd never have expected. I was raised by a mother who worked and went to Law School, I attended Wellesley College for Women where there was a very supportive atmosphere for feminist attitudes - and yet, when I was recently reading 'Nice Girls Don't Get Rich' I found that I'd somehow insidiously gained a whole crapload of 'traditionally female' attitudes towards money and the making of it.

An aside, but on topic: I brought some of my artwork to 'The Fairy Godmother' shop yesterday to see whether they'd want some for consignment. The proprietress liked some of my artwork, but I was floored by her comment that the rest was 'too masculine.' (Ok; the Rapunzel drawing has that phallic tower, but the others showed 1) a little girl in a stubborn pose, and 2) a little girl flying a high-powered broom-stick. So, apparently, it's masculine for girls to be moody or powerful.)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Invisibility can indeed be useful (for a long time I had long hair as a portable hiding place -- now I just like long hair), but I also find that if you stomp people's stereotypes hard enough, they're often too busy gaping at you to actually stop you doing anything.

I followed the link from your journal, and I am frankly baffled. I thought, "well, maybe it's a stylistic thing rather than a content," but if anything, I'd characterize the style as feminine though not girly. Muchly confuzzled.

[skylarker.livejournal.com]

I think cakmpls's comments in my journal may explain where the proprietress was coming from. Most of us would probably use other terms than 'too masculine' to describe any style bolder and darker than the light and frilly style predominant in her shop. (I tend to think that even my darker stuff has a girly quality, but there's no accounting for tastes.)

[zalena.livejournal.com]

I think I'm with you on the "If I'm Doing It, than It's a Woman Thing." But there are an awful lot of behaviors I see other women doing that I want to ban from women doing. Like my coworkers who complain about their husbands. They had a long conversation yesterday about how they avoid conflict, because if they push an issue (any issue) their husbands' throw tantrums, and it's just easier to live without than to suffer their husbands' immaturity. My mom was like that with my dad. And I was like that with Ex. And I swear NEVER AGAIN! I'd rather be a nun than experience that kind of piecemeal anhiliation. Conflict is awful, but I gave myself away piece by piece, over the tiniest issues, until there was almost nothing left. I have only recently come to the realization that I prostituted myself to the idea of "peace at any price" and sold myself cheap. And ladies, all this self-loathing has got to stop!

The other thing that makes me feel female is the response I get from males, especially inappropriate ones. I haven't had 14-yr-olds shopping with their moms wink at me, or married men chat me up in bookstores lately, (I'm trying to change my ju-ju) but sex, and anything related to it makes me feel extremely female, and I think other people can tell.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I agree that people shouldn't have to do that, that "peace at any price" is a bad relationship model.

I'm a little baffled by it as "woman behavior," though, because in my social circles it appears to be much more often the woman who pushes things and has opinions and is generally the intense/difficult one, and the men who go along to get along. I mean, I hope I don't have too many people of either sex in my social circle who raise it to a pathology, but domestic conflict avoidance looks a lot more male than female from where I sit.

(This may be another manifestation of the Large Mellow Northern Male subculture. It may be sampling error in one direction or another. It may be something else entirely. Hard to tell. I want to make clear that I'm not arguing with you that you have observed this behavior primarily in women. I'm just saying that I haven't.)

[talimena.livejournal.com]

Thanks, you expressed how I feel about it precisely (except for the bit about thinking about it recently). I think that's one reason I've always found reports about how women do things and how men do so weird, if not infuriating. I get that they're trying to address averages or norms or something, but I don't do things that way (nor do many of the women I know, for that matter), and my way is feminine, in my world.