[culturehandy]

I pitched this in the Community Forum and it was well recieved.

This thread is all about the politics and cross cultural and societal views on gender.

I started thinking increasingly about gender when the media frenzy about Caster Semenya emerged. It is my opinion that the only reason people questioned Ms. Semenya's gender is because she appeared to be "masculine". That is, she looked masculine according to the ideas of society at large. Had she had softer, more "feminine" features, questions of her gender would not have come up.

So, what is gender? We know that there is sex, your biological sex, but gender is a social construct.

[girltrouble]

ketto, i love that quote! thank you!

beck, i think you make a good point too.

to call it all theater, i thing is the point. we swim in this theater, and don't even notice it till it's pointed out. one person i always admired was this girl i knew. to say that she played with gender and that theater is and understatement. her day job was a stripper, but she was the best damn drag king you ever saw, and she would hop back and forth over the gender fence constantly. she would arrive at a show, in drop dead butch mode, do the show and leave for a date in high femme mode. if i didn't know better i would have thought she was two different people. but i think she is probably the only person who was always cognizant that it is all facade. it is all feigned. most people, even the queer fall into the trap that that costume is them, not a costume. the repetition makes it feel natural, in the same way that all those cutural signals we've consumed have left no tracks.


[eta. posted this at the same time as koffee and culture's posts]
i really think, star, that it comes down to the performer with drag if it is mocking or not. seattle is a good case in point. there are two main camps and then subcamps, but in each case you can divide them into those that adore women, and those that loathe them.

the two basic groups are those that are "pro" beauty, (the camp i came up in) and the anti beauty. the pro are probably the group that most people are familiar with, the emphaisis is trying to be 'lady like', feminine, pretty, etc. and the anti beauty, that work very hard to be, quite frankly, as ugly as possible. i don't say that as a critique, that is just the aesthetic. they tend to be more mocking, although in a few cases, it is done in a lovingly humorous way.

i can think of one rather affectionate anti queen who has her own cottage industry here doing seasonal shows that are always packed. she comes of like your crazy, but lovable old aunt who accidentally picks up slang words, referring to her circle of friends, and the audience as her "peeps." there are others on the anti camp who are much more hateful, being ugly seems to be their honest assessment of women, externally and internally. it's all shrouded in an intellectual veneer, but you don't have to scratch past the surface to feel the disdain.

on the other end, the pro beauty side of things, there are a couple of queens i adore. in or out of drag, they are sweethearts, they don't like to gossip, be catty, or any of the other things some on this side of things do, but more they are more than happy to give their time to women's causes as much as queer ones. then there are the bitches, who spew hate on everyone but to hear them talk about women.... i have seldom heard anyone talk so hatefully about a fellow human being. they delight in talking about women's bodies with disgust to the point you wonder why they would even want to touch anything associated with women let alone dress like one. the thing that kills me is when these queens decide to become transexuals. but then, there is a group of men who specifically date transexuals because they hate women and are so afraid/offended by feminists, that t-girls are a female substitute they can take their rage out on.