femi-nazi?
for some reason i feel like talking about gender issues right now. i never gave a thought to gender issues until last may, i took a class called "major women writers." i've always been kinda facinated by psychology and sociology, so in class, the first day, when we were given several articles about psychological and physical differences (maybe) between men and women, as well as sociological differences, i was interested. stuff like how some studies have shown that little boys tend to like competitive games with clear winners and losers, while little girls don't so much. generally speaking, of course:) they talked about how little girls were more likely to quit games when disagreements came up, sacrificing the game for the friendships, while boys would not. but also, the fights didn't go beyond the game with boys, but they would with girls. girls will change the rules to keep everyone happy, but boys won't.
but the most interesting thing was looking at assumptions our society is drenched in. like how in so many cases, one of the reasons men are more successful in various fields than women may be because the women always have to prove themselves by the men's standards. the easiest way for me to describe what i mean is using literature, since that's what i know. historically, in western tradition at least, who's decided what makes literature great? men have. which wouldn't matter except that literature is so subjective. it could be argued that literature is considered great depending on how it connects with its reader. if some aspects of men and women's psychologies are as different as some people think, then-- ok, i have to give an example, cause i don't know how to explain this objectively.
ok, again, remember i'm speaking generally, basing what i'm saying on research in articles i read. women's main priority in life tends to be relationships. which makes sense, since women have babies, right? and they want a partner to stay with them, help take care of the baby. men... i forget what. but not relationships, so much. so a lot of women's writing tends to be about relationships, while men may have a little of that thrown in, but it's not the main point, usually. think about romance novels. why aren't they respected as literature? well, ok, so some of them are just bad writing, but not all of them are bad writing, are they? and why is the main female rite of passage into adulthood perhaps the most taboo subject to talk about? you know what i'm referring to here? her first period. it makes most people uncomfortable just to mention. why? why are the most respected female writers women who write like men? what does it even mean to write like a man? why is sentimentality so frowned upon?
you know the term, platonic love? do you know its history? ok, i might not get this all exactly right, cause i'm just trying to remember what i was told during a lecture. so, it's based on an idea of plato's, obviously. it's the idea of, i suppose, there being both physical love and the love that's purely intellectual. but back in the... what, 15, 1600s, platonic love was thought only to exist between two men. this was because women were thought to be so inferior to men, that they couldn't possibly have minds up to the task of being equal to a man's. like how some of shakespeare's sonnets were written to a man? that was common. in some of shakespeare's plays too, there's a lot of platonic love between men that the women could never hope to have. i'm thinking here of characters in the merchant of venice and julius caeser. although in general, shakespeare was really good about how he wrote women.
anyway. i've never thought of myself as a feminist. like, never ever. that's always had a real stigma attatched to it in my mind, for some reason. even now, i'm not someone who gives any thought to equal pay or hiring practices. but the psychological and sociological issues interest me tremendously. one of the articles we read was just bizarre, and about gender bias in biology terminology. specifically in that article, they focused on how female and male reproductive functions are described clinically (and in textbooks we read in junior high), and how that kinda reflects the ideas about women and men the people who originally wrote these things had. personally, i think a lot of gender bias is in the past, but our society is built on the past, so it's almost like... like expressions you use that everyone's forgotten about the origin of. you know. like "i caught you red handed." red handed? how did that saying originate?
anyway, just some thoughts.
but the most interesting thing was looking at assumptions our society is drenched in. like how in so many cases, one of the reasons men are more successful in various fields than women may be because the women always have to prove themselves by the men's standards. the easiest way for me to describe what i mean is using literature, since that's what i know. historically, in western tradition at least, who's decided what makes literature great? men have. which wouldn't matter except that literature is so subjective. it could be argued that literature is considered great depending on how it connects with its reader. if some aspects of men and women's psychologies are as different as some people think, then-- ok, i have to give an example, cause i don't know how to explain this objectively.
ok, again, remember i'm speaking generally, basing what i'm saying on research in articles i read. women's main priority in life tends to be relationships. which makes sense, since women have babies, right? and they want a partner to stay with them, help take care of the baby. men... i forget what. but not relationships, so much. so a lot of women's writing tends to be about relationships, while men may have a little of that thrown in, but it's not the main point, usually. think about romance novels. why aren't they respected as literature? well, ok, so some of them are just bad writing, but not all of them are bad writing, are they? and why is the main female rite of passage into adulthood perhaps the most taboo subject to talk about? you know what i'm referring to here? her first period. it makes most people uncomfortable just to mention. why? why are the most respected female writers women who write like men? what does it even mean to write like a man? why is sentimentality so frowned upon?
you know the term, platonic love? do you know its history? ok, i might not get this all exactly right, cause i'm just trying to remember what i was told during a lecture. so, it's based on an idea of plato's, obviously. it's the idea of, i suppose, there being both physical love and the love that's purely intellectual. but back in the... what, 15, 1600s, platonic love was thought only to exist between two men. this was because women were thought to be so inferior to men, that they couldn't possibly have minds up to the task of being equal to a man's. like how some of shakespeare's sonnets were written to a man? that was common. in some of shakespeare's plays too, there's a lot of platonic love between men that the women could never hope to have. i'm thinking here of characters in the merchant of venice and julius caeser. although in general, shakespeare was really good about how he wrote women.
anyway. i've never thought of myself as a feminist. like, never ever. that's always had a real stigma attatched to it in my mind, for some reason. even now, i'm not someone who gives any thought to equal pay or hiring practices. but the psychological and sociological issues interest me tremendously. one of the articles we read was just bizarre, and about gender bias in biology terminology. specifically in that article, they focused on how female and male reproductive functions are described clinically (and in textbooks we read in junior high), and how that kinda reflects the ideas about women and men the people who originally wrote these things had. personally, i think a lot of gender bias is in the past, but our society is built on the past, so it's almost like... like expressions you use that everyone's forgotten about the origin of. you know. like "i caught you red handed." red handed? how did that saying originate?
anyway, just some thoughts.