There's definitely a "normal" and "other" attitude towards gender. But I've seen no shortage of insecure cis people obsessed with playing up their roles in one variant or another in an effort to gain social standing.
and on our end we have GNC people torturing themselves to conform and things like denial beards. How do you tell somebody is doing that stuff because they enjoy it and feel good about it instead of doing it because they think they need to or their parents abused them if they didn't?
How would a cis-person or a trans-person all alone in the woods behave, absent any social performative expectation of gender? How would a man or a woman behave, broadly speaking?
you can't engage with semiotics or gender roles if there aren't any. people with gender assert that they'd feel something in the woods or in an alien society with no concept of gender, and i have no reason to doubt them. It's the social context of performance that makes it affirming, not the physical action of the performance.
you can't engage with semiotics or gender roles if there aren't any.
It definitely gets into a confusing space. Reminds me of the Contrapoints line about the Feminine Penis.
If I'm alone in the woods, what gender is my penis? Do I feel natural growing a beard? What is my identity?
Even cis people think about this stuff. Even cis people who don't have other people around to judge them for it.
people with gender assert that they'd feel something in the woods or in an alien society with no concept of gender, and i have no reason to doubt them.
I'd agree, to some extent. But without established social touchstones, I imagine a lot of what gender becomes is ultimately what you personally invent.
You can have a sense of gender that would be utterly alien to a modern American. A person with a beard and a penis who feels right at home, but still conceives of herself as a woman, for instance.
You can have a sense of gender that would be utterly alien to a modern American. A person with a beard and a penis who feels right at home, but still conceives of herself as a woman, for instance.
i'm not sure how our woods woman is inventing the concept without any access to our culture? the labels we use to describe a poorly understood neurological feature only carry meaning because of the cultural context they arose in.
and on our end we have GNC people torturing themselves to conform and things like denial beards. How do you tell somebody is doing that stuff because they enjoy it and feel good about it instead of doing it because they think they need to or their parents abused them if they didn't?
you can't engage with semiotics or gender roles if there aren't any. people with gender assert that they'd feel something in the woods or in an alien society with no concept of gender, and i have no reason to doubt them. It's the social context of performance that makes it affirming, not the physical action of the performance.
It definitely gets into a confusing space. Reminds me of the Contrapoints line about the Feminine Penis.
If I'm alone in the woods, what gender is my penis? Do I feel natural growing a beard? What is my identity?
Even cis people think about this stuff. Even cis people who don't have other people around to judge them for it.
I'd agree, to some extent. But without established social touchstones, I imagine a lot of what gender becomes is ultimately what you personally invent.
You can have a sense of gender that would be utterly alien to a modern American. A person with a beard and a penis who feels right at home, but still conceives of herself as a woman, for instance.
i'm not sure how our woods woman is inventing the concept without any access to our culture? the labels we use to describe a poorly understood neurological feature only carry meaning because of the cultural context they arose in.