A Matter of Gender

[xxAngelOnFirexx]

I was just randomly looking around EC and i glanced at the little sidebar of someones post. the bolded word 'gender' popped out at me. and i thought: its quite odd in a sense for someone to be defined of being thought of in a certain sterotypical way, or to some sort of pre-judging because of their genitals.

i mean yes i have female genitals but really do i feel like a female? or even a male? none really at all. i mean like, i'm just ME. not this nor that. yes i like girls. but really girls? no, a girls body. that is what makes me gay. or 'lesbian' as the gender defined term. its weird how a girl can be gay or lesbian but a guy just gets gay. hmm... my girlfriend didn't even know what the terms meant. when she joined EC she asked me "which one of these am i?" she looks like a guy but i still like her.

i mean its a personality that drives me to a person but when it comes to chemistry i'm attracted toa female body. yet how would a personality fit female? or male? what makes a persons personality strictly "female" or "male". like transgendered person feels like they are in the wrong body. wrong genitals, right? is your personality still the same or is it of the other gender? its just i think it would be sterotyping to say a personality is male or female.

so i ponder? what is the drive that creates a bond making one "female" or "male"? why do people judge us based on our genitals? who says that has to be our personality too? then it comes to people not liking us for liking people of the same gender. but the genitals part. who cares really. a male can be feminine and a female be masculine. but they are still a female and male. its confusing really.

personally i don't get why girls have the "fe" i mean i look at it guys have the extra 'part' and girls don't. why don't they get the 'fe' in the word male. weird science terms i surmise.

just some thoughts?

[Level N Human]

Gender = the biological sex you were born with. XX/XY chromosomes, genitals, etc.
Gender role = the traits and behaviors a certain society expects you to take on.
Gender identity = the gender that you yourself feel that you are.
Orientation = The sex you are attracted to.

All these things are just labels used to try and categorize these very complex things into neat categories that they may not quite fit in. There's a great essay about this by Bernard Cooper called "Burl's".

There are exceptions within each of the terms above. Hermaphroditism is an unclear physiological sex. Gender roles in societies are different (there are societies where the men cook and clean and tend to the children and take on the nurturing role. Also.. seahorses! Yay.) A man may identify himself as a woman, but still have a straight orientation and consider himself a lesbian.

I myself don't believe personality has very much to do with any of it all. When we say a person is male or female, I dont' believe we're saying "this person played with legos and this person played with barbies." We don't exclusively describe personality as male or female. We may say a person is girly or a tomboy, but it's again just an easy way to say "this person adheres to this gender role" - and we do this in much the same way as we say 'that is a table", not "that is a horrizontal slat attached to four vertical poles." because we condense words into prototypes and that is how language happens to evolve.

Those are my thoughts. By the way:

personally i don't get why girls have the "fe" i mean i look at it guys have the extra 'part' and girls don't. why don't they get the 'fe' in the word male. weird science terms i surmise

I did a little research:
The word female comes from the Latin femella, the diminuative form of femina, meaning 'woman', which is not actually related to the word 'male.' The word was probably originally femella, meaning "young girl". In the late 14th century, the English spelling was altered so that the word paralleled the spelling of "male".

[Jim1454]

I did a little research:
The word female comes from the Latin femella, the diminuative form of femina, meaning 'woman', which is not actually related to the word 'male.' The word was probably originally femella, meaning "young girl". In the late 14th century, the English spelling was altered so that the word paralleled the spelling of "male".

Cool!