surviving the first seven days and the challenge ahead

[amw]

Last week Sunday morning i headed out to the corner of town where my European colleagues are housed up while they are in Taipei. I met up with J from Slovakia, who was one of the first to arrive. He was unprepared for the heat, humidity and torrential downpour that ensued over the next couple hours, but we did have a nice coffee and - more

Comments

[amw]

I think the gender essentialists would say that the reason women have to put up with the cultural complications is exactly because biologically women are the weaker sex, and the culture of oppression and objectification evolved around that fact, which is probably true. But then they continue their train of thought to say that therefore anybody assigned male at birth can never be a "real" woman because they'll never experience the same oppression and objectification because their bodies aren't weaker than men's. Except... that same case could be made against assigned female at birth people who by accident of genetics turn out to be larger and stronger than the average man.

It doesn't stand up as a coherent worldview, because although some aspects of the "female" experience might happen because an individual is smaller and weaker, many more aspects of the experience are applied to all shapes and sizes of the gender because it's already a cultural institution. So here i am, trans woman, and i have to deal with a whole bunch of the same stuff, even though i'm over 6 foot and have tiny boobs and a deep voice. Of course i don't deal with all of the same stuff, but neither do other women who live on either edge of the bell curve, and that's normal. There's still plenty of overlap, and certainly a lot more for me these days with women than men.

[geminiwench]

That's the reality of it, to me... the bell-curve. There is no such thing as a group as large and diverse as the female-at-birth population (who are the majority of all born people...) will *all* share even ONE feature, outside of... being human and judged female-at-birth. All women are human, but that's about the only thing that 100% unites us all,... and sure female-at-birth may have a different set of experiences than male-turned-female later in life, but that doesn't mean they can't have shared many of the same ones, too. I think the idea that women are the bearers of humanity's "curse" and so we need more care, we are smaller, we are weaker, we have more biological responsibility, being the REASON for our oppression... and like that is "special" to females-at-birth that no one else will "understand"... that's like declaring yourself monarch of shit mountain, for all that's worth. That's like agreeing with the bullies that there is a verified reason women *have earned* (and deserve) their oppression somehow, and that it defines womanhood as surely as our genitals do, is just... sick.

One of my favorite nights out with an old friend of mine was how he was a straight man who'd come to the gay club with a bunch of us ladies once in awhile... and he sorta got into it because he was cute and figured out he could flirt for drinks. He was like, "Is this what it feels like to be a pretty lady?!" and felt so powerful. But then he had his first experience of someone with a strong come-on... (as a lady, it was the shit I started dealing with as a teen from grown-ass men) and he was freaked out because... he secretly thought women were flattered by "extra attention" and then once he felt what it felt like to have some big dude look you up, look you down, step in close and lay "a reassuring" (coercive) hand on him using dirty words and a strong hand holding him in place until he gave an answer,... he saw the light.
He said "no, no thanks" and the guy smiled and and winked at him and let him go... but for him, it was the first time he felt scared by someone's flirting... scared by another person **sexually** even though he was only touched on the shoulder.

I think the oppression of women by men, is a pure culture thing that is unrelated to the differences of male/female bodies and based solely on the mentality of one group who feels entitled to own/control other groups for whatever reason they deem morally convenient at the time.

Being human sucks, and the weird culture of ignorance and fear between the sexes isn't doing anyone any favors... except, men of course.