male feminism or female menism
Published 5/10/2006 by bing.
After almost 6 months of inactivity, I'm glad to say that my sprightly blog is up again. I hope you like the new template and title. No explanations needed I hope. I only pray that this dear blogger will help me be a half-convincing Creative Writing major. (I have been just terrible in my writing this past semester)
Anyways, onto my thought of the day. Lately, one of my interests has been exploring feminism through a very male-lens. (How else I can approach it. Shall I grow a pair of ovaries?) I went with Maya and Lindsay to May Day at Bryn Mawr College a couple of weeks ago. It was a really eye-opening experience because I was made to feel very uneasy for being a guy. Just imagine a sea of women, many of very strongly feminist. I felt like I was being judged down upon for being a guy and not a gal. It was an odd feeling, but I guess now I know what gender exclusion or discrimination feels like. (It a very asymptotic manner, I guess)
During college, I grown to rethink and thoroughly challenge the notions of traditional masculinity. By that I mean, masculinity tied to brawn, ability to woo women, ability to "wear the pants", ability to be the main-breadwinner. And such, you know what I mean. (I think of Arnold Schwarzenegger, when I think of this traditional masculinity. Not Fabio, like many of you might think) Perhaps, I have always been a bit weary of this brand of machismo. I don't understand why men cannot be as equally as sensitive or domestic as women, without being effeminized my their relative societies.
I must admit that I feel much more comfortable around women than around men in general. I suppose too much testosterone in one place doesn't make my feel very comfortable. But on a tangent, I think one of the most annoying things guys do is objectify the opposite sex. Perhaps it is a two-way street, but I definitely feel that guys do it way more often and with less coy-ness. Whether it means turning one's head to "check that ass", or to recount "all the ass I got", I feel that these instances of ocular oppression are rather distasteful. I am not sure how we can convince these people to view the opposite sex as more than sexual objects, or to dislink manliness with the ability to "do" women. Perhaps one theory is this: if a guy has grown up in an environment where all his examples of femininity have been very traditional, home-bound, and rather secondary ... does this mean that this is the "woman" figure he carries into college?
Perhaps the solution is not a one-way street either. Perhaps part of the solution lies upon women to objectify themselves less as well. While in a perfect world, all the guys would remain classy and respectful even among throngs of girls with skimpy shirts and loads of boobs ... obviously it's not some normative world. I often feel that girls purposefully objectify themselves in order to gain the favor of guys. Perhaps we call this grooming in general, and none of us can escape it ... but sometimes I do feel it becomes too much ... and becomes rather anti-thetical to the idea of brainpower in general as sexy.
I am not sure where I going with this debate. But as you can see I think feminism offers interesting options to assess the principal divide within societies ... whether they be agrarian, modern, or post-modern.
Anyways, onto my thought of the day. Lately, one of my interests has been exploring feminism through a very male-lens. (How else I can approach it. Shall I grow a pair of ovaries?) I went with Maya and Lindsay to May Day at Bryn Mawr College a couple of weeks ago. It was a really eye-opening experience because I was made to feel very uneasy for being a guy. Just imagine a sea of women, many of very strongly feminist. I felt like I was being judged down upon for being a guy and not a gal. It was an odd feeling, but I guess now I know what gender exclusion or discrimination feels like. (It a very asymptotic manner, I guess)
During college, I grown to rethink and thoroughly challenge the notions of traditional masculinity. By that I mean, masculinity tied to brawn, ability to woo women, ability to "wear the pants", ability to be the main-breadwinner. And such, you know what I mean. (I think of Arnold Schwarzenegger, when I think of this traditional masculinity. Not Fabio, like many of you might think) Perhaps, I have always been a bit weary of this brand of machismo. I don't understand why men cannot be as equally as sensitive or domestic as women, without being effeminized my their relative societies.
I must admit that I feel much more comfortable around women than around men in general. I suppose too much testosterone in one place doesn't make my feel very comfortable. But on a tangent, I think one of the most annoying things guys do is objectify the opposite sex. Perhaps it is a two-way street, but I definitely feel that guys do it way more often and with less coy-ness. Whether it means turning one's head to "check that ass", or to recount "all the ass I got", I feel that these instances of ocular oppression are rather distasteful. I am not sure how we can convince these people to view the opposite sex as more than sexual objects, or to dislink manliness with the ability to "do" women. Perhaps one theory is this: if a guy has grown up in an environment where all his examples of femininity have been very traditional, home-bound, and rather secondary ... does this mean that this is the "woman" figure he carries into college?
Perhaps the solution is not a one-way street either. Perhaps part of the solution lies upon women to objectify themselves less as well. While in a perfect world, all the guys would remain classy and respectful even among throngs of girls with skimpy shirts and loads of boobs ... obviously it's not some normative world. I often feel that girls purposefully objectify themselves in order to gain the favor of guys. Perhaps we call this grooming in general, and none of us can escape it ... but sometimes I do feel it becomes too much ... and becomes rather anti-thetical to the idea of brainpower in general as sexy.
I am not sure where I going with this debate. But as you can see I think feminism offers interesting options to assess the principal divide within societies ... whether they be agrarian, modern, or post-modern.