It's one thing to say that we're a school that accepts students who don't fit into the gender spectrum. It's entirely another thing to show that in our actions. If, for example, queer students at our school who more or less otherwise fit into the gender binary in appearence and behavior are able to go about their lives without much disruption from their peers, but a female-born person can't dress and act as a man without getting lots of pointing and staring as he goes about his day, then we are not living up to our boasting of equality.
Let's make something very clear. If you find out that someone doesn't fit into the gender binary in some drastic way, which could mean that they're gay/bi/whatever or that they identify as a gender they weren't born as or that they identify as no gender at all, and your respone to this is to go, "HEY, BUDDY THAT'S REALLY AMAZING, I'M GOING TO GO OUT OF MY WAY TO MAKE A BIG DEAL OUT OF THIS REALLY INSIGNIFICANT THING AND SHOW EVERYONE JUST HOW GREAT I AM FOR NOT LITERALLY BEATING YOU UP FOR NOT FITTING IN EXACTLY, HEY EVERYONE COME LOOK AT THIS *DIFFERENT* PERSON AND SEE HOW *DIFFERENT* THEY ARE ISN'T THAT REALLY GREAT THAT THEY'RE SO *DIFFERENT* AND AREN'T I SO BRAVE FOR STICKING UP FOR THEM????" then I'm sorry to inform you, but you are part of the problem.
I've talked to a lot of people who were like "Well the gender binary doesn't really affect me or any of my close friends like all that much honestly, so it's not that big deal and people are just freaking out over nothing." Think about that for a second. That's kind of the equivalent of going, "I have plenty of food to eat and a house to live in so poverty isn't that big of a deal," or "I'm not dying of cancer so therefore we should defund cancer research." Just because it's not happening to you doesn't mean it's not happening.
There have even been some women that I've heard say stuff like, "I don't really feel any negative effects of sexism, so we don't need feminism." Well, how can you speak for the millions of women/girls who are:
- Constantly endagered by a deeply imbedded rape/domestic abuse culture in our society?
- Sold into child marriages and forced to have children at the same age you entered middle school (often dying in childbirth or being beaten so severely by their husbands that they have misscarriages)?
- Cheated out of work or equal pay because of their gender?
- Unable to control their bodies or the choice to have a child because male legislators are deciding what they can and can't do with their uteruses?
- In constant danger because they weren't born female and have to suffer from transphobic violence and legislation, or are forced to be treated as men because they can't afford or access transition treatements?
The list goes on and on. The point is, just because you personally don't feel the effects of the patriarchy that doesn't mean that millions of other women don't as well. Saying things like this is downright ignorant, especially if you're a man - you're one of the people who benefit from the patriarchy, so of course it wouldn't negatively affect you as much.
The first step to helping *smash the patriarchy* is just to listen to other people who have been through things you haven't. Listen and understand them and you just might learn something new.
I found your analogy between poverty and sexism a little irrational. Same goes for cancer research. How is somebody who is genuinely not hurt by the gender chart (the vast majority of people) supposed to "fund" the cause of gender fluidity? While I don't discriminate, I can't tell other people how to live their lives, just like those people can't tell you how to live yours. That's why I think this is a pointless cause. Nobody is stopping anyone from living however he wants. Only the individual can determine the way he lives (excuse my grammatically correct sexism).
ReplyDeleteBecause life is not as separated as you think it is. Even if you realize it or not, we ALL contribute to the way gender is treated within our community. We all need to change the way we think. Even the way you talk about gender can affect other people. Even if you don't directly contribute to poverty, the way you talk about poverty changes the way the community thinks about poverty, which in turn changes the way poverty is directly treated - so the way you feel about poverty does indirectly affect the thing itself. Gender is the same way. While you say you don't discriminate, what you probably mean is that you don't openly tease people for their gender expression - but discrimination is much more subtle than that. We can't separate ourselves from the issue of gender, because we are constantly affecting it and living it.
Delete"Nobody is stopping anyone from living however he wants." Are you sure? Do you really and truly believe that if you had one friend who completely fit the gender binary, and another friend who didn't at all fit the gender binary, you would treat them exactly the same way? Just because you're not physically stopping them from doing something, the attitude you treat them with could make them too uncomfortable to express themselves the way they want, or too scared, etc. And there actually are people who are trying to stop them from acting the way they want. By ignoring the problem, you are assisting the discriminating party.
Meanwhile, just a side-note: your "grammatically correct" sexism is not entirely grammatically correct. Since the subject of the sentence is supposed to be gender neutral, using "he or she" or "they" as a singular pronoun would have been correct (as a recent revision of official American English has recognized "they" as such). Using "he" as a gender neutral pronoun has recently become archaic and would no longer be considered appropriate for the sentence. So no, it's not "grammatically correct" sexism. It's just sexism.