*blinks* Wow. Someone just took my blinders off, and I wasn't even aware that I was wearing them.
I'd long since come to terms with the idea that I wasn't particularly feminine -- not that I was particularly masculine, but the ideas and ideals that my mom had tried so hard to indoctrinate in me had never stuck, and I just never felt any of that was at all important or relevant.
It had never occurred to me that by that statement, I was reinforcing someone else's power to define me, in terms of what they felt should be my defining characteristics. Because even if I didn't feel the label applied, I'd never questioned their right to measure me against that label.
But of course, when we say "feminine" we really aren't talking about traits that have anything to do with being female... we're talking about traits that the larger percentage of females have chosen as the best coping strategy for enhancing and exploiting their status within the male-dominated heirarchy.
And once we see that, we don't have to play that game. Words have power. "Feminine" is what we make it.
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momijizukamori
no subject
Date: 2007-09-14 09:55 pm (UTC)Wow. Someone just took my blinders off, and I wasn't even aware that I was wearing them.
I'd long since come to terms with the idea that I wasn't particularly feminine -- not that I was particularly masculine, but the ideas and ideals that my mom had tried so hard to indoctrinate in me had never stuck, and I just never felt any of that was at all important or relevant.
It had never occurred to me that by that statement, I was reinforcing someone else's power to define me, in terms of what they felt should be my defining characteristics. Because even if I didn't feel the label applied, I'd never questioned their right to measure me against that label.
But of course, when we say "feminine" we really aren't talking about traits that have anything to do with being female... we're talking about traits that the larger percentage of females have chosen as the best coping strategy for enhancing and exploiting their status within the male-dominated heirarchy.
And once we see that, we don't have to play that game. Words have power. "Feminine" is what we make it.
Heady stuff. I think I like this knife, too. :-)