Rather than run through the many ways in which the beastly hydra of gender inequality manifests itself in this society like a shopping list, I will divide the major ways my gender has influenced my life into three categories, of respect, alienation, and objectification. I have chosen to focus on these categories because of their personal importance to me. I do not deny that I have been influenced in other ways, but were I to attempt to explore them all, this essay would be some ten or twenty pages longer, and somewhat less cohesive. Most of the influences I have left out – language differences, religious differences, educational differences - are reminiscent of the first category I wish to discuss, that of respect.
Walking around in a male body, with a male expression of concentration, introspection, or even mild annoyance, on my face, I am eligible for instant respect.
I have never been turned down for a job I've applied for on grounds that I didn't seem qualified. In interviews and when conducting relations with the public I can express an aura of control, awareness, and confidence, but I feel this aura is subtly buoyed by an impression that is already established before I arrive. The male version of confidence is not an inviting smile or a sociable air, but a composed attention. One presents oneself as an instrument to be set to work, one that is self-aware enough to catch any misuse. I am generally pleasant and cheerful with people, but perhaps I can be this way because I have that foundation of respectability to fall back on.
I can refuse to take bad treatment. Where others, perhaps more often women, are compelled to take abuse in stride or ignore insults, I often seek ways to redress or retaliate. The less respect one has, the costlier it can be to retaliate, and I think I have benefited from what is mostly a male privilege to not have to take any crap.
If one has respect, it behooves one to maintain it, and recognize one's position in the pecking order. Inevitably, I have also felt powerless and flawed at times. This is the other face of the respect coin. I spent many years unable to show my weaknesses to anyone, having little avenue for the dissemination of my fears except through the detached safety of email and some rare occasions of openness with male friends. When a male is granted respect, it is respect for his privacy as well as his ability, and this allows for serious harm to both sexes.
I have been able only recently to develop relationships where I feel comfortable in collapsing out of my confidence shell, letting my private thoughts wander, because I have only recently recognized that there is essential emotional value in the practice, regardless of how it reflects on my 'respect'. In a revealing trend, these more intimate relationships have all been with women, with the uncommon exception of four close male friends, one of them incidentally bisexual, and one homosexual. (I personally see no reason to distinguish between my homosexual friends and my heterosexual friends, but this fact is worth mentioning on grounds that it may speak for the attitudes of my friends: none are homophobic, none fear intimacy.)
A more subtle influence of this predisposed respect is illustrated in what I am not. I am not inside a desirable body that men might try to manipulate me into bed for. I am not told that I must be pleasing to anyone by smiling or dressing elaborately. I was taught earlier in life that any projection of vulnerability I made would be amputated by the callous socialization of other men. I have found that I must work to cultivate sensitivity and vulnerability, romance, warmth, and emotional respect in my private life to correct this imbalance that being male can bludgeon me with in public. I find that when I am in public with friends, it is a lot easier to disregard stereotypes, for I have a support group to fall back on, maintaining my 'respect', protecting me from the second influence of sexuality in my life: Alienation.
Though I grew up with two sisters, I spent most of my youth and teenage years avoiding them. Virtually all of my friends were male, and even now most of my friends are male. Now that I am starting to integrate with more people, and develop relationships with women as well as men, I find nothing sensible that justifies the boy/girl segregation that took place earlier in my life.
I never talked to most girls. I never did things with them. I only watched them, kept my distance, and wondered. Nowadays I see little good in this practice, and a lot of harm. I grew up predisposed to believe that any female I encountered would not be interested in my opinion, or would even be annoyed, confused, or offended by my thoughts. (So I felt like killing myself sometimes, so what? None of the girls I saw appeared to have these thoughts- all smiles and dresses) This became a self-fulfilling prophecy. Left with no direct resources from which to draw my impressions of women in general, I wove my own attitude out of hearsay, guesswork, and popular culture.
One result of this was that I imposed impossibly high standards on the women I let into my life. I was only able to appreciate my older sister after she managed to exceed these standards of physical health, sensitivity, strength, and wisdom. She returned to Santa Cruz a college graduate, living by herself, healthy survivor of a self-esteem crushing relationship. In the span of many visits I realized that I could talk to her in as much depth as I talked with any of my close male friends. Even if one were to explain our present closeness by observing that we are, after all, siblings – this does not explain why I'd spent more than a decade deliberately avoiding her, wrapped up in pursuits that were radically different from hers.
There are thousands and thousands of women in this world like her; as strong, understanding, wise, and healthy as she is; or at least as dedicated to becoming so. I had to convince myself that this was true, for I'd subconsciously denied it most of my life. It had justified my avoidance. These days I am sure that they exist, but I am still struggling with how to find them amongst all these other people. Here I touch upon the third major influence of sexuality in my life: Objectification.
It has been hard for me to come to terms with my heterosexuality. As I was growing up, it seemed more sensible to be bisexual, since I found people of both genders worthy and capable of love. Yet the female body excites me in a way that the male body does not. I sometimes feel that I have been insensibly forced to exclusively pursue women, against my better judgement. Making matters worse, (in my eyes,) I have cultivated an enormous sexual appetite, as men are often taught to do in this culture. This part of me I refer to simply as 'the beast', and the beast likes to be fed on a regular basis, with the physical contact of hugs, kissing, grooming, hand-holding, massages, and sex. Without enough physical contact I feel cold inside, and in wanting to touch people, especially attractive people, I can objectify them.
Being painfully aware of this objective desire earlier in my life, I attempted to lessen it's harmful effects by consciously convincing myself to find attraction in traits that I reasoned were beneficial in other more tangible ways. My self-shaping worked to a degree.
I found athletic women attractive on the premise that they were healthier and had a more sensible regard for their bodies. I developed an averse reaction to perfumes and makeup, swearing that my girlfriends would be secure enough in their self esteem to use neither. I cultivated a disdainful view of women who dressed too revealingly, taking offense at what I interpreted as a conscious or subconscious desire to manipulate me by pandering to my base nature. This disdain extended to fancy modes of dress in general, including elevator shoes, nail polish, rings, and elaborate hairstyles. My clothes were simple and utilitarian. It didn't occur to me until later that some people just like to dress up, no matter what others may think, but by then my preferences had solidified – to this day I am more attracted by women wearing pants and shorts than skirts and dresses, more attracted by doc martens and sneakers than high heels. My most radical departure from the more common trends in this society is that I find women with unshaven legs attractive. I think it takes real, bankable guts to keep from succumbing to that practice (leg shaving).
Of course, in the end my relationships often happen regardless of my preferences. My last relationship was with a girl who wore a lot of makeup, heels, and shaved her legs. What made it work was that her personality didn't seem influenced by these habits. We got along so well together I realized that I could easily get used to physical differences. (Unfortunately, I soon moved to another part of the state.)
After being unwittingly segregated into my own male world, and spending a lot of my time trying to defy it or break from it, the conventional dating scene seemed like an artificial construct designed in the idea that men and women were separate species, each with a set of rules to follow in order to remain tolerable to one another. It was what I saw on TV, what I read about in fiction, and what I heard people talking about obsessively, and it grated against me in every way, for it was more my habit to talk frankly, dress casually, and split the check. (This is the way I am with all my male friends, after all.) It took me another round of thinking and social lessons to realize that this was only the way popular culture pretended it should be, and there were women around who felt the same as I did. I met many of them at college, and still do.
In fact, on the whole, sexual inequality and sexual stereotypes appear to me more and more as one big glorified lie. Each day I meet new people, and confirm my personal hypothesis – people come in all types, and the differences between individual people are greater than any general difference between the sexes. Though I accept my sexual desires as part of a basic human mating urge, I refuse to give them precedence over anyone's basic humanity, be it my own or others'. In this society, this is an ongoing battle.
Raw spewing:
Positive influences:
Not so much as interested in the attributes the have been influenced by sexuality that I can recognize, but the attributes that I cannot recognize. The influences that I am not aware of, that are an undetectable part of me, inevitably wield the most influence.
In my own life I recognize two typed of influence that are far and away the strongest
Alienation and objectification
Walking around in a male body, with a male expression of concentration, introspection, mild annoyance, on my face, people grant me respect.
I have never been turned down for a job I’ve applied for on grounds that I didn’t seem qualified, come to think of it, I’ve never been turned down for a job I applied for that I felt qualified to do.
In interviews and when conducting relations with the public I can express an aura of control, awareness, and confidence. The male version of confidence is not an inviting smile or a sociable air, but a composed attention. I present myself as an instrument to be commanded, but one that is self-aware enough to catch any trickery.
And I refuse to take bad treatment. I am unbending in this sense – where others, perhaps more often women, are able to take abuse in stride or ignore insults, I seek ways to retaliate. I think it is mostly a male privilege to not have to take any crap.
A more subtle influence is in what I do not present, along with what I do. I do not present a desirable body that men might try to manipulate me into bed for. I do not present a desire to be pleasing to anyone by smiling or dressing elaborately. I do not, in general, project an air of sensitivity, for I was taught earlier in life that any projection of vulnerability I made would be amputated by the callous socialization of other men.
Inevitably, I have also felt powerless and flawed at times. This is the other face of the confidence coin. I spent many years unable to show my weaknesses to anyone, having little avenue for the dissemination of my fears except through the detached safety of email and some rare occasions of openness with male friends. I have been able only recently to develop relationships where I feel comfortable in collapsing out of my confidence shell. In a trend that I am vaguely bitter about, these relationships have all been with women, with the uncommon exception of three close male friends, one of them homosexual.
I personally see little reason to distinguish between my homosexual friends and my heterosexual friends, but the fact seems worth mentioning on grounds that it may speak for the attitudes of my friends. None of my friends are homophobic.
Alienation:
Though I grew up with two sisters, I spent most of my youth and teenage years avoiding them. Virtually all of my friends were male, and even now most of my friends are male. Now that I am starting to integrate with more people, and develop relationships with women as well as men, I find nothing that justifies the segregation that took place earlier in my life.
I never talked to girls. I never did things with them. I only watched them, kept my distance, and wondered. Nowadays I see little good in it, and a lot of harm. I grew up predisposed to believe that any female I encountered would not be interested in my opinion, or would even be annoyed, impatient, unsympathetic, or offended by my thoughts. This was a self-fulfilling prophecy to a large degree. Left with no direct resources from which to draw my impressions of women in general, I wove my own attitude out of hearsay, guesswork, and popular culture.
The primary result of this I have noticed is that I often carry impossibly high standards for the women I let into my life. I was only able to appreciate my older sister after she managed to exceed these standards-- then my relationship with her changed greatly.
Objectification:
I had only limited influence when developing these objective standards. Some cultural factors, like the desire of physical beauty, proved to be too monolithic and omnipresent for me to resist.
I have no way of knowing how many perfectly good relationships I have avoided on the pretext that the person I encountered was not physically pretty enough.
Being painfully aware of this shortcoming earlier in my life, I attempted to lessen it’s harmful effects by consciously convincing myself to find attraction in traits that I reasoned were beneficial in other more tangible ways. My self-hypnotism, my self-shaping, worked to a degree. I found athletic women attractive on the premise that they were healthier. I developed an averse reaction to perfumes and makeup, declaring that my girlfriends would be secure enough in their self esteem to use neither. I cultivated a disdainful view of women who dressed too revealingly, taking offense at what I saw were blatant attempts to manipulate me by pandering to my base nature. This disdain extended to fancy modes of dress in general, including elevator shoes, nail polish, rings, and elaborate hairstyles. I was, in retrospect, taking all the attributes I liked about the male gender role I knew, and projecting them onto my desired relationships.
Drafting:
I can meaningfully divide the ways sexuality has influenced my life into three categories, of respect, alienation, and objectification.
Walking around in a male body, with a male expression of concentration, introspection, even mild annoyance, on my face, I am eligible for instant respect.
I have never been turned down for a job I’ve applied for on grounds that I didn’t seem qualified. In interviews and when conducting relations with the public I can express an aura of control, awareness, and confidence, but I feel this aura is subtly buoyed by an impression that is already established before I arrive. The male version of confidence is not an inviting smile or a sociable air, but a composed attention. One presents oneself as an instrument to be set to work, one that is self-aware enough to catch any misuse. I am generally pleasant and cheerful with people, but perhaps I can be this way because I have that foundation of respectability to fall back on.
I can refuse to take bad treatment. Where others, perhaps more often women, are compelled to take abuse in stride or ignore insults, I often seek ways to redress or retaliate. The less respect one has, the costlier it can be to retaliate, and I think I have benefited from what is mostly a male privilege to not have to take any crap.
If one has respect, it behooves one to maintain it, and recognize one’s position in the pecking order. Inevitably, I have also felt powerless and flawed at times. This is the other face of the respect coin. I spent many years unable to show my weaknesses to anyone, having little avenue for the dissemination of my fears except through the detached safety of email and some rare occasions of openness with male friends. When a male is granted respect, it is respect for his privacy as well as his ability, and this allows for serious harm to both sexes.
I have been able only recently to develop relationships where I feel comfortable in collapsing out of my confidence shell, letting my private thoughts wander, because I have only recently recognized that there is essential emotional value in the practice, regardless of how it reflects on my ‘respect’. In a revealing trend, these more intimate relationships have all been with women, with the uncommon exception of four close male friends, one of them incidentally bisexual, and one homosexual. (I personally see no reason to distinguish between my homosexual friends and my heterosexual friends, but this fact is worth mentioning on grounds that it may speak for the attitudes of my friends: none are homophobic, none fear intimacy.)
A more subtle influence of this predisposed respect is illustrated in what I am not. I am not inside a desirable body that men might try to manipulate me into bed for. I am not told that I must be pleasing to anyone by smiling or dressing elaborately. I was taught earlier in life that any projection of vulnerability I made would be amputated by the callous socialization of other men. I have found that I must work to cultivate sensitivity and vulnerability, romance, warmth, and emotional respect in my private life to correct this imbalance that being male can bludgeon me with in public life. I find that when I am in public with friends, it is a lot easier to disregard stereotypes, for I have a support group to fall back on, maintaining my ‘respect’, protecting me from the second influence of sexuality in my life: Alienation.
Though I grew up with two sisters, I spent most of my youth and teenage years avoiding them. Virtually all of my friends were male, and even now most of my friends are male. Now that I am starting to integrate with more people, and develop relationships with women as well as men, I find nothing sensible that justifies the boy/girl segregation that took place earlier in my life.
I never talked to most girls. I never did things with them. I only watched them, kept my distance, and wondered. Nowadays I see little good in this practice, and a lot of harm. I grew up predisposed to believe that any female I encountered would not be interested in my opinion, or would even be annoyed, unsympathetic, or offended by my thoughts. (So I felt like killing myself sometimes, so what? None of the girls I saw appeared to have these thoughts- all smiles and dresses) This became a self-fulfilling prophecy. Left with no direct resources from which to draw my impressions of women in general, I wove my own attitude out of hearsay, guesswork, and popular culture.
One result of this was that I imposed impossibly high standards on the women I let into my life. I was only able to appreciate my older sister after she managed to exceed these standards of physical health, sensitivity, strength, and wisdom. She returned to Santa Cruz a college graduate, living by herself, healthy survivor of a self-esteem crushing relationship. In the span of many visits I realized that I could talk to her in as much depth as I talked with any of my close male friends. Even if one were to explain our present closeness by observing that we are, after all, siblings – this does not explain why I’d spent more than a decade deliberately avoiding her, wrapped up in pursuits that were radically different from hers.
There are thousands and thousands of women in this world like her; as strong, understanding, wise, and healthy as she is; or at least as dedicated to becoming so. I had to convince myself that this was true, for I’d subconsciously denied it most of my life. It had justified my avoidance. These days I am sure that they exist, but I am still struggling with how to find them amongst all these other people. Here I touch upon the third major influence of sexuality in my life: Objectification.
It has been hard for me to come to terms with my heterosexuality. As I was growing up, it seemed more sensible to be bisexual, since I found people of both genders worthy and capable of love. Yet the female body excites me in a way that the male body does not. I sometimes feel that I have been insensibly forced to exclusively pursue women, against my better judgement. Making matters worse, (in my eyes,) I have cultivated an enormous sexual appetite, as men are often taught to do in this culture. This part of me I refer to simply as ‘the beast’, and the beast likes to be fed on a regular basis, with the physical contact of hugs, kissing, grooming, hand-holding, massages, and sex. Without enough physical contact I feel cold inside, and in wanting to touch people, especially attractive people, I can objectify them.
Being painfully aware of this objective desire earlier in my life, I attempted to lessen it’s harmful effects by consciously convincing myself to find attraction in traits that I reasoned were beneficial in other more tangible ways. My self-shaping worked to a degree.
I found athletic women attractive on the premise that they were healthier and had a more sensible regard for their bodies. I developed an averse reaction to perfumes and makeup, swearing that my girlfriends would be secure enough in their self esteem to use neither. I cultivated a disdainful view of women who dressed too revealingly, taking offense at what I interpreted as a conscious or subconscious desire to manipulate me by pandering to my base nature. This disdain extended to fancy modes of dress in general, including elevator shoes, nail polish, rings, and elaborate hairstyles. My clothes were simple and utilitarian. It didn’t occur to me until later that some people just like to dress up, no matter what others may think, but by then my preferences had solidified – to this day I am more attracted by women wearing pants and shorts than skirts and dresses, more attracted by doc martens and sneakers than high heels. My most radical departure from the more common trends in this society is that I find women with unshaven legs attractive. I think it takes real, bankable guts to keep them unshaved.
Of course, in the end my relationships often happen regardless of my preferences. My last relationship was with a girl who wore a lot of makeup, heels, and shaved her legs. What made it work was that her personality didn’t seem influenced by these habits. We got along so well together I realized that I could easily get used to such things. (Unfortunately, I soon moved to another part of the state.)