The Paradox of Masculinity
The short version of this argument was just long enough for a Twitter update, but I’ll expand it a little here.
My first premise is that our culture regards individualism as masculine. (This is true in the US anyhow; I’m not sure how much it’s true in other countries.) The ideal of masculinity is the John Wayne character who does things his own way and refuses to be constrained by the expectations that society has of him.
My second premise is that our culture values unambiguous sexual identity. It wants men to be masculine and women to be feminine. A man who isn’t sufficiently masculine is a wuss. A women who isn’t sufficiently feminine is - I’m not sure what the epithet is, but being a butch chick is uncool.
So if you’re a man and you choose to be masculine, you’re doing what society expects of you. Thus you are a conformist, not an individualist. Therefore you’re unmasculine. Being masculine makes you unmasculine. Our culture’s concept of masculinity contradicts itself.
Hopefully this is enough to show that our culture’s concepts of sexual identity are inherently absurd.
My first premise is that our culture regards individualism as masculine. (This is true in the US anyhow; I’m not sure how much it’s true in other countries.) The ideal of masculinity is the John Wayne character who does things his own way and refuses to be constrained by the expectations that society has of him.
My second premise is that our culture values unambiguous sexual identity. It wants men to be masculine and women to be feminine. A man who isn’t sufficiently masculine is a wuss. A women who isn’t sufficiently feminine is - I’m not sure what the epithet is, but being a butch chick is uncool.
So if you’re a man and you choose to be masculine, you’re doing what society expects of you. Thus you are a conformist, not an individualist. Therefore you’re unmasculine. Being masculine makes you unmasculine. Our culture’s concept of masculinity contradicts itself.
Hopefully this is enough to show that our culture’s concepts of sexual identity are inherently absurd.