benevolent sexism
I ran into this comic about "benevolent sexism" online. Here's a link:
I liked the comic. Benevolent sexism is a concept that I already had a vague understanding of, but it was nice to see more details and example spelled out by someone that has direct experience with them.
My well-meaning-but-old-fashioned parents, who were 39 and 46 years old when I was born in 1985, didn't have any useful information or advice for me about the opposite sex. If I ever expressed that I liked a girl when I was younger, their advice was usually just "well why don't you ask her out?" No real instruction on how to do that beyond calling her on the phone and asking if she'd like to go out some time. Girls had to be treated differently than boys; they were more delicate, more emotional, not as strong physically. That's how, according to my parents, you got them to like you, by essentially using your masculinity to fill in the gaps created by their shortcomings of femininity.
I had to try and unlearn all of this crap by myself. Don't know how far along I am, but I remember participating in both benevolent and hostile sexism when I was younger, and now I'm in a wonderful relationship with a woman and don't feel such an imbalance when it comes to communicating with men vs. women (which isn't to say that I'm great at communicating with either of them, just that my general anxiety about communicating with people isn't multiplied when those people are women).
If I ever had kids, I would feel pretty good about the things I could teach them about interacting with other people. I'd create the most accepting environment I could. I'd do my best to explain that people that are gay, or trans, or masculine women or feminine men or not attached to their assigned gender or anything else, wouldn't be abnormal. Those people are just different variations of humans, and the only reason they aren't as "normal" (i.e. not as common) as cishet people with traditional gender roles is because for whatever reason some people believe it's wrong to be who you are, and try to suppress those feelings in others. I think the advice of "treat everyone like a human being, and then maybe try to be friends with them" would go a long way in helping young children learn how to form healthy, respectful, and fulfilling friendships and relationships. (OK, obviously it's not that simple, but if my parents led with the advice of "treat everyone like they're a human being" it would have saved me a lot of years of struggling with how to bridge some gaps in my communication with others.)
Anyway, one of the reasons I'm writing about this comic is because it's making me really think about this system I've kind of developed to try and parse my own gender identity. Is it still riddled with benevolent sexism? Right now I think women are amazing (that is, in contrast to more sexist views I may have held when I was younger, where I mostly viewed them as adversaries that I felt biologically drawn to). I'm routinely impressed with how strong and beautiful they are. When women say "men are trash" on the internet, it's hard to describe but I kind of get it - I parse it as them saying "men tend to not have the same set of qualities women do that make them appealing to look at, communicate with, and capable of accomplishing useful tasks", and it's really hard for me to disagree.
I look at some of the features that the comic author was describing, that she was being praised for in her workplace that ended up being harmful and sexist, and some of my first thoughts are that I WANT those features. I want to be a more gentle communicator. I want to have a better eye for aesthetics. I'd love it if I could bring a feminine touch to the decoration of any given environment. Being a man and being unable to really explore those things without some kind of judgment or backlash (and also being naturally unskilled at them because my life experiences haven't exactly selected for them) is really stifling.
That's just the thing though - am I overvaluing women too much now, to the point where the idea of being the opposite of a woman (a man, using the traditional gender binary) is wholly unappealing? I'm guessing (hoping?) the answer is no, because there isn't really the driver of being a cost/benefit based reverence. That is, I'm not treating women with reverence because it's of low cost to do so, only to revoke that reverence later when it becomes too costly or not beneficial enough (at least I hope not).
I don't really know the science or the psychology, but if I had to try and describe my current belief, a basic version of it would be something like, "women tend to have the set of features they do (ones we would typically describe as 'feminine') because they are regularly placed in environments and given roles that heavily select for those features and excluded from environments and roles that don't."
I'm not sure how durable this belief is to any serious scrutiny, but I think a lot of basic phenomena can pass the test on some level - for ex. the sexist stereotype of women not being perceived as having "logical brains" (whatever those even are) could be because they're regularly excluded from environments that tend to select for and help develop a "logical brain", like STEM fields. Or, it would make sense that women are perceived as having a better sense for aesthetics, if we're adhering to hyper-traditional gender roles and forcing them to stay at home all day. I'd certainly want my environment to look nice if I was in control of it and spent absolutely all of my time there every day.
But I don't know. I mainly just don't want my current outlook of "I don't want to be a man because I see no value in being a man besides the systems of privilege I benefit from that I'm hoping to dismantle" to be based on an undervaluation of men, that is derived from an overvaluation of women in a (benevolent) sexist manner.
As always, I'd love your feedback at https://curiouscat.me/AlexMajlaton
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