Heartbreak Nympho’s Gender Carnival!
Wilhelmina Wang is having a contest over at Hearbreak Nymphomania, wherein she asks readers to answer the intriguing question, “What does your gender mean to YOU?”
That’s interesting to me, because I never really think about “my gender” per se… I think about society’s gender roles all the time, because I butt up against them on a regular basis, but I never frame it as “my gender”, always as “society’s gender roles.”
I was blessed with a hippie mom who never chastised me for wearing “boy’s” clothes. In fact, she bought me boys jeans when I was little, because they had reinforcement patches in the knees. Apparently I spent enough time crawling around on the ground pretending I was a horse to wear out girls pants far too fast for the family budget.
So, I was lucky to be raised by a woman who put no stock in, “how girls are supposed to be,” and all stock in, “be who you are.” I do sometimes wonder if I’d been raised in a more “traditional” family, if I would have more gender issues than I do. As it is, my only gender issues are with society telling me how I should be, instead of accepting me for how I am.
For the record, I usually identify as a heterosexual woman. I have no disputes with my biologically female sex/gender. I am entirely more inclined to be involved with a man than a woman. I identify as bisexual when I’m involved in a conversation with people a) who are totally against homosexuality, and b) who are interested in discussing what you find attractive more than who you get into relationships with.
What does that all mean for what I think of my own gender? Nothing. I don’t really ever think of my “gender” as an important issue. I am who I am, and that is that. If you have a problem with me being assertive, not wearing a skirt, or knowing my way around the underside of my car’s hood better than a random man on the street? You are not someone whose opinion I give a shit about.
Gender, in my opinion, should not be an issue. That doesn’t mean gender isn’t an issue, and a damned important one for a lot of people, but it shouldn’t be. Gender shouldn’t be any more of an issue than who somebody loves… and that is apparently a huge issue for a lot of (sad, insecure) folks.
The rules for entering Wilhelmina’s contest follow the jump. :-)
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