learning gender

[exterra]

i forgot to write about an incident that happened last month, as i was walking to my gym (have i mentioned that i generally hate gyms and the idea of paying to exercise and the idea of exercising inside, but that given my various physical-conditions, i find myself in a place where i rely on them to get aerobic exercise that doesn't further injure

Comments

[lapartera]

Oh, I can totally relate to responding this way! Your story says such a lot about how important gender is in our culture, (probably all human cultures?).

I have another story about this sort of thing, that I may have told you, but it's worth retelling. It's not as pleasing, however:

When _dkg_ was about 8 or 10 or so he had gorgeous long (below shoulder length) thick glossy dark brown hair. One day when we were out walking in the neighborhood a middle aged woman stopped us and said, "Oh what a beautiful little girl." _dkg_ being the amazingly self-assured person he was and is, responded, "Boy." The woman had the gall to reply to him, "Oh no, honey, you're a girl." Looking at me with sympathy for having a little girl who just didn't want to be one. I of course confirmed _dkg_'s statement. She looked at us, appalled, and started to insist that we were wrong! At that point I really wanted _dkg_ to pull down his pants, but instead we just moved on, leaving her sputtering

[exterra]

You know, many young children (toddler age) don't look particularly gendered to me. Were it not for the gender-signifiers parents tend to put on them to mark/indicate their gender (long vs. short hair, dress & "girly" shoes vs. pants & a shirt with a firetruck print, for example) I have a hard time guessing the gender of a lot of small children

[laverick]

my childhood best friend had very short hair as a young girl and her face was strong-jawed and not stereotypically feminine. I seem to remember people remarking on how alike in appearance she was to her brother. She hated that hairdo, and has worn her hair long and curly ever since. I think she makes almost a conscious effort at times to look especially feminite now as a result.

[laverick]

cute typo "feminite", I meant feminine of course