Male/Female Roles | IsabellaValentine.com

Male/Female Roles

Mind Reading: Male/Female Roles

Male/Female Roles by Opposing Viewpoints

ISBN: 0-7377-2240-1

Published by: Greenhaven Press

Page 42-43

Some transsexual organizations have begun to support the concept of transgenderism, which constitutes a more radical re-visioning of sex and gender. Whereas traditional transsexuals might describe a male transvestite – a man dressing in women’s clothing – as a transsexual on the road to becoming a complete female, transgenderists accept “kinship among those with gender-variant identities. Transgenderism supplants the dichotomy of transsexual and transvestite with a concept of continuity,” [according to sexologist Alfred Kinsey]. Earlier generations of transsexuals did not want to depart from gender norms, but rather to blend totally into their new gender role. Today, however, many argue that they need to come out as transsexuals, permanently assuming a transsexual identity that is neither male nor female in the traditional sense.

It is so unreasonable to ask that we focus more clearly on variability and pay less attention to gender conformity? The problem with gender, as we now have it, is the violence – both real and metaphorical – we do by generalizing. No woman or man fits the universal gender stereotype.

Page 134

For masculinity was never much to do with being a man, any more than femininity was much to do with being a woman. Each has only ever been a complementary construct for the other. With the erosion of traditional ideas of femininity, the old ideas of masculinity have also been exposed. Traditional ideas of masculinity are as outdated as the idea that the wife should vote, not just gratefully, but also as her husband tells her. A masculine man was once head of his household, even though he didn’t know how many sugars he took in his own tea. Which is, of course, absurd.

It’s absurd really as well, to talk about a “crisis” in masculinity. Masculinity isn’t what it used to be, that’s for sure, and as an identity to hide behind it no longer works. Whether or not this amounts to a crisis depends on how willing people are to adapt. The problem, as I see it, is that men and women are both adapting like mad, but to new models that both of them are extremely stressful.

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