Gender

[gagged_Louise]

The talk page below on "real women" and porn brings home a few easy short circuits and points where the "women who dress in an alluring way are asking to get laid asap, so they shouldn't try to play no blame game" argument tends to get a bit mixed up.

http://www.brunchma.com/archives/For...ML/000508.html

[gagged_Louise]

Though the discussion at the link just above starts out from porn, it soon moves into questions of gender, "slutty dress" and masculine/feminine self-images. The guy called "USADave" and the flat contradictions in his lines of argument - on one hand, he maintains that sexual orientations aren't much to do with your outdoor, daytime personality, it really comes to life in private; on the other he's hellbent that real men and real women are like in an old Western movie - is one of the things that make it so illuminating.

[voxelectronica]

Note that I'm not quoting anyone on this, it's just a feeling i get from the last couple of posts and my responses to them.

The idea that lesbians and straight men like curves and gay men and women like angles is way off base. If that were the truth then all lesbians and straight men would also like anyone who was chubby.

The truth is (and I've seen this especially in lesbians) what people are attracted to is wildly different even in the same person. There are a lot of angular lesbians who attract a lot of lesbian attention.

I also very much like social roles because they have their place. Women are scientifically different than men and from those scientific difference we derive our stereotypes.

Martha is the BEST example of that actually. Women have more white matter which makes them better at lying, communication, language, and manipulation. Martha more times than not simply used those to her advantage in her empire. She didn't get ahead by "out manning" a man in a "man's world"... she did it by out womaning him. Women are meant to get ahead... quietly.

For me, the biggest tell about gender roles are trannies. They FEEL feminine, they feel like their body needs to match that. When i start talking about hunting and camping i start to feel more masculine, so do a lot of m2f. It's when physical members of another gender identifies with feelings and attitudes that they all believe to be of the opposite gender to the degree that they must change their physical appearance that you have to accept there is a difference.

I don't think that it's your junk which defines you as your gender as a lot (if not all) transgenders will tell you, it's how you feel and they are real men and real women based off how they feel and act.

[blythe spirit]

Men and lesbians are attracted to curves.
Women and gay men are attracted to angles.

Is that the norm, Oz, based on research? The reason I'm questioning it, is because I know too many men who don't like curves. They're attracted more to straight lines.

The idea that lesbians and straight men like curves and gay men and women like angles is way off base. If that were the truth then all lesbians and straight men would also like anyone who was chubby.

I don't believe you (collectively) can equate curves with chubby. Curves are a shape, whilst chubby is more so defined as being slightly overweight.

[voxelectronica]

I don't believe you (collectively) can equate curves with chubby. Curves are a shape, whilst chubby is more so defined as being slightly overweight.

The state of being chubby gives you the shapes of curves. That's not saying all curvy women are over weight. In high school I remember telling some really mean fat girl that my curves, curved in while her's curved out.

If all straight men and lesbians liked the shape of curves then they would have found both me and the ridiculously overweight girl equally appealing. I just don't see how that would be true.

[Ozme52]

The state of being chubby gives you the shapes of curves. That's not saying all curvy women are over weight. In high school I remember telling some really mean fat girl that my curves, curved in while her's curved out.

If all straight men and lesbians liked the shape of curves then they would have found both me and the ridiculously overweight girl equally appealing. I just don't see how that would be true.

Obviously you don't want to consider the concept that it's about how we're wired in the brain... which is what the post was about... and the discussion of shapes described how I got to the concept!!

There are other cues that cause us to react, (you know, cues that create feelings in us,) both visual, such as facial hair, aural cues, olfactory cues. The things that help us recognize whom we're interfacing with. They cause reactions in the brain and thus feelings about our place in relation to the person we're in contact with.

[Ozme52]

Is that the norm, Oz, based on research? The reason I'm questioning it, is because I know too many men who don't like curves. They're attracted more to straight lines.

As I said, it was just an observation of mine.

Nor was I suggesting there was a normative type. No specific set of curves or angles. Just a generality.

[hopperboo]

White matter? lol.

[Ozme52]

Note that I'm not quoting anyone on this, it's just a feeling i get from the last couple of posts and my responses to them.

The idea that lesbians and straight men like curves and gay men and women like angles is way off base. If that were the truth then all lesbians and straight men would also like anyone who was chubby.

Well no one else said anything like this... so you must mean me.

I was just pointing out one aspect. Visual cues. And if you want to quibble after I already said I knew I was oversimplifying the idea... fine. So let's quibble.

The truth is (and I've seen this especially in lesbians) what people are attracted to is wildly different even in the same person. There are a lot of angular lesbians who attract a lot of lesbian attention.

How am I "off base" for pointing out something "I" obsrved and believe, but you know "the truth" because you've "seen" it?

I also very much like social roles because they have their place. Women are scientifically different than men and from those scientific difference we derive our stereotypes.

What!!! Do women have a different set of scientific theories than men? I mean yeah, individuals may disagree on how the world works... but I have NEVER heard anyone say there's a basic gender-driven basis for what men and women believe to be true.

Martha is the BEST example of that actually. Women have more white matter which makes them better at lying, communication, language, and manipulation. Martha more times than not simply used those to her advantage in her empire. She didn't get ahead by "out manning" a man in a "man's world"... she did it by out womaning him. Women are meant to get ahead... quietly.

Huh? Are you implying that scientific theories proposed by women are lies because they have more white matter? Or did you actually change the topic midstream... I'm disappointed that you think a woman can't be successful because she's smart... but has to lie to get ahead.

For me, the biggest tell about gender roles are trannies. They FEEL feminine, they feel like their body needs to match that. When i start talking about hunting and camping i start to feel more masculine, so do a lot of m2f. It's when physical members of another gender identifies with feelings and attitudes that they all believe to be of the opposite gender to the degree that they must change their physical appearance that you have to accept there is a difference.

What the heck do you mean by "feel"? Where's it come from. What makes you "feel" the way you do? How does one "feel" masculine or feminine? If you're going to argue against something like visual cues being interpretted in the brain, give us something more than "feelings" because they're generated in the brain too... and ultimately, you're saying exactly the same thing as I said.

I don't think that it's your junk which defines you as your gender as a lot (if not all) transgenders will tell you, it's how you feel and they are real men and real women based off how they feel and act.

Yep. Exactly the same thing.

[voxelectronica]

I'm not arguing with someone who is openly angry and hostile.

[gloombunny]

For me, the biggest tell about gender roles are trannies. They FEEL feminine, they feel like their body needs to match that. When i start talking about hunting and camping i start to feel more masculine, so do a lot of m2f. It's when physical members of another gender identifies with feelings and attitudes that they all believe to be of the opposite gender to the degree that they must change their physical appearance that you have to accept there is a difference.

I'm not sure if this is what you meant, but it kind of sounds like you're saying that, for instance, an MTF transsexual is someone who identifies with feminine attitudes so much that they go through all the hassles necessary to get a female body? 'cuz that really isn't how it works. Transsexuality isn't about how feminine or masculine you are or want to be. Like with me - I'm transsexual (female, born with a male body that I'm in the process of female-izing), but I have a pretty strong butch streak in my womanhood. I wouldn't describe myself as very feminine, but I consider myself very much female nonetheless.

If there's one thing I've learned from years of talking to and reading the writings of and about various sorts of transgendered people, it's that things are far, far more intricate and complicated than you'd ever imagine without getting really into it. The closer you look, the more subtle-yet-significant distinctions and variations you find. There are more identities in sex and gender than are dreamt of in your philosophy... no matter what your philosophy is, as far as I can tell. Learning not to try to make sense of everything with some kind of general theory has been a difficult but valuable lesson for me.


edit: My first post in months and it's about transgender issues. I guess I'm kind of predictable.

[voxelectronica]

If there's one thing I've learned from years of talking to and reading the writings of and about various sorts of transgendered people, it's that things are far, far more intricate and complicated than you'd ever imagine without getting really into it. The closer you look, the more subtle-yet-significant distinctions and variations you find. There are more identities in sex and gender than are dreamt of in your philosophy... no matter what your philosophy is, as far as I can tell. Learning not to try to make sense of everything with some kind of general theory has been a difficult but valuable lesson for me.

But isn't that the case in biological women as well? A biological man and women can both have both masculine and feminine traits. Butch lesbians don't lop their tits off and buy a strap on.

What i am saying is that there is something that is identifiable of female. I believe in the proven fact that there is a difference in the female and the male brain. There is also a noticeable difference in the Transgendered brain which is why i support the ideology of a third gender. (more prevalent in Eastern cultures).

I'm not saying that transgendered has anything to do with stereotypical roles of femininity. If that were the case it would be almost unheard of to see lesbian transgendered which is not the case... at all. I am saying that there is a mental state of female and a mental state of male. You can be a butch girl. I'm incredibly "lady like" in my day to day comings and goings, that doesn't mean i can't shot a gun, clean a fish, swing a sword etc. I don't think that being a butch girl negates having to accept that there is a difference in gender.

[gloombunny]

But isn't that the case in biological women as well? A biological man and women can both have both masculine and feminine traits. Butch lesbians don't lop their tits off and buy a strap on.

Well, except some of them do. The line between butch and FTM isn't always so clear. I didn't mean to restrict anything that I said to only transsexuals - I was talking about anyone whose gender identity or expression is atypical for their anatomical birth sex, if they even have a clearly identifiable sex. (Some people don't.)

What i am saying is that there is something that is identifiable of female. I believe in the proven fact that there is a difference in the female and the male brain. There is also a noticeable difference in the Transgendered brain which is why i support the ideology of a third gender. (more prevalent in Eastern cultures).

There are differences between average male brains and average female brains, but individuals vary widely. And the studies I've heard of have indicated that transsexual women have brains similar to cis women, and same for men, not that there's a third kind of brain.

(And why stop at three? There's at least one culture that recognizes five genders. Just be careful not to push anyone into a gender they don't want - I identify strongly as a woman, not a third anything, for instance.)

I'm not saying that transgendered has anything to do with stereotypical roles of femininity. If that were the case it would be almost unheard of to see lesbian transgendered which is not the case... at all. I am saying that there is a mental state of female and a mental state of male. You can be a butch girl. I'm incredibly "lady like" in my day to day comings and goings, that doesn't mean i can't shot a gun, clean a fish, swing a sword etc. I don't think that being a butch girl negates having to accept that there is a difference in gender.

Sounds like I misunderstood you at first, then. I agree that there are definite mental states of male and female that are independent of one's physical sex. Julia Serano, who I admit to being a bit of a fangirl of, calls it "subconscious sex" - the sex of your mind at a fundamental level, which matches the physical birth sex for most people, but can cause great distress when it doesn't match. But just as there are intersexed people whose physical birth sex isn't clearly male or female, there are people who seem to have a subconscious sex that doesn't cleanly fit into male or female either.

[gagged_Louise]

Actually the ideals of an attractive body - in both men and women - have been so different over time that you'd be hard pressed to find any deepset matrix of what straight bio males, lesbians, straight women etc would appreciate. And for most older ages we don't have a lot of firm evidence of what body types women appreciated in men - only what they were supposed to like! Art works and books were mostly created or commissioned by males.

The taste for sun tanned skin and sleek, lithe, muscular bodies is a 20th century thing; in Victorian England - or France at the same time - it was pale skin and for men, rounded, firm bodies, for women fine-boned and slim frames (as you pointed out, Oz). The Romans seem to have appreciated muscular, angular women to judge from statues and coins. And so on. I'm with voxelectronica: even the same person may appreciate quite different things in body shapes, just as in music. Trying to strap it onto biological sex or straight/gay won't work.

And looking for a chemical basis to this isn't useful. It's like saying you could make a robot appreciate Beethoven's Eroica if you run the right chemical reactioins through it.

By the way, if we're talking of subconscious appreciation of the junk that is useful for bedding and procreation, the other day I asked a lady I trust a lot on this forum if she felt that women in general see cocks as objects of beauty or if their eyes are drawn to the crotch of a dressed man to try to figure out "has he got a big hard one down there?" Both men and women have that kind of "art appreciation" for nice breast shapes, even under a sweater, and even when they are not dreaming of getting intimate with the woman (so it's "appreciation without selfish interest") The answer I got was a firm no, she felt nipples (on men) were a lot sexier, and didn't see women spying out the aesthetic shape of dicks on strangers or in movies.

[voxelectronica]

Agreed on all points W/gagged_Louise. My gay male friends go for my breasts every chance they get. Stranger gay male's will do the same. One gay male has even said "I love you're breasts because they're like an ass that i can play with at a natural level for my hands". Everyone has their own reason for what they like and what they're comfortable with. Attraction is not an easy game to play.

There are countless biological reasons why one mental gender will find this that or another attractive.

For the record I don't find the male crotch to be a pleasing area at all. It's utilitarian... period. I'd rather it all be tucked away and a strap on be used. If I'm to be penetrated at all.

[tusayan]

Like with everything, attractiveness is going to vary among indivduals. But if you sit a group of people down in a room and show them images of different body types, facial types, etc. general patterns do emerge.

I agree, though, that this is filtered through social conditioning, etc. and individual tastes. Which provides for the variability that seems to be infinite. I don't think it's an either/or subject.

[gagged_Louise]

I get what you mean gloombunny, but isn't this about having the choice how one wants to shape one's femaleness too? Someone who is physically born (biology) and raised (social mores and codes) a woman has, in some ways, more of a choice how to "be female" - and that's not just equal to being tender, caring, graceful and nurturing - because she has a firm foundation: no one can take away her female body and her knowledge of 'living in a women's realm' and feeling natural with it. But to others who identify strongly with some kind of female attitudes and qualities, or could see themselves being in a girl's position sexually - we both do that, though in different ways - this is not a foundation we were born with, a learning process is involved, and getting to be an in-the-flesh female may seem the ground needed to get there - and also, in order to get other people to accept this side of you on an everyday basis. Without having to explain "I'm not a freak or a cracked actor, this is me". You're absolutely right that trans behaviour and transgender reality is a very multi-faceted phenomenon.

For an analogy, middle-class kids with a secure home base, money from home and a good education opt to dress down and act like working-class outsiders/punks some of the time. It's not the working class kids you most often see showing off that kind of rebellion cool or style warfare. Many of them would shy away from dressing in a "sloppy" way for a party, a reception, a night at the theatre. Why? Because the middle class kids have the money and the security to indulge in playing colourful white trash, and then return to their elite college or PR bureau. They have the freedom to choose, even when that means choosing to deny the normal ways of the middle class - and having the freedom to say "this stuff is important to me/to us and that stuff isn't much to care about" (in a general sense, not just talking style and music here) and backing it up with being a man/woman/student/black immigrant/media personality etc is part of the freedom to express yourself, but it's not a right we are born with. Think of all the instances when person X is able to say something for which person Y would have been booed off stage and branded an idiot, because X is, more or less consciously, reckoned to have "the background" that makes it a viable or permissible thing to say.

[voxelectronica]

Think of all the instances when person X is able to say something for which person Y would have been booed off stage and branded an idiot, because X is, more or less consciously, reckoned to have "the background" that makes it a viable or permissible thing to say.

This reminds me of Thai LadyBoys. They were born male but because they have become female they have this odd... station. They are able to act in what society would consider a raunchy way for a female. Very in your face female, in a society that values demur hidden women. If a biological women had attempted this she would have more happened to her than just booing.

They get to us their masculine status to enjoy being a woman. (let's not believe that I'm saying that conditions for all MtF in Thailand are great).

[gloombunny]

I get what you mean gloombunny, but isn't this about having the choice how one wants to shape one's femaleness too? Someone who is physically born (biology) and raised (social mores and codes) a woman has, in some ways, more of a choice how to "be female" - and that's not just equal to being tender, caring, graceful and nurturing - because she has a firm foundation: no one can take away her female body and her knowledge of 'living in a women's realm' and feeling natural with it. But to others who identify strongly with some kind of female attitudes and qualities, or could see themselves being in a girl's position sexually - we both do that, though in different ways - this is not a foundation we were born with, a learning process is involved, and getting to be an in-the-flesh female may seem the ground needed to get there - and also, in order to get other people to accept this side of you on an everyday basis. Without having to explain "I'm not a freak or a cracked actor, this is me". You're absolutely right that trans behaviour and transgender reality is a very multi-faceted phenomenon.

Honestly? Nah. If a trans woman feels confident enough in her femaleness, and it can take a while for that to be the case, she can act just as non-feminine as any cis woman. Worst case scenario, she runs a higher risk of being "read" as male, but ultimately... to me, at least, I feel that it's worth that downside if that's what it takes to act like myself instead of trying to mold myself to some ideal I don't subscribe to.

[gagged_Louise]

I don't think there is anything strange either about a woman acting in a forthright, rough butch way - or, as Vox pointed out,a ladyboy showing that side. I never subscribed to that all women have to be lilies. But I do think there's always some fields of expectations of within what range a woman does act/should act, and the idea of what is normal/what in fact happens and what is "natural and fitting" mostly gets blurred in these issues.
So gender ideas, male and female styles is something that happens between individuals and the people around them, and their culture. It's not feasible to act like you had never heard of, or thought about, what women and men are expected to be like in the time and country where you happen to live, unless you have inherited money and can afford to live without adapting to anything. Now that doesn't mean that women or mtf trans girls always must bend to the mainstream ideas of femininity - of course not!

[blythe spirit]

gloombunny, that is priceless.