By Romana 08/13/2014

We can’t change our sexual chromosomes, and we don’t wander through life thinking much about them, or showing them off.  Our gender is part of our identity; it is part of the sum total of who we are.  It is not fixed and can change as we move about, and as we age.  It includes our biology, who we want to partner with, what we want to look like, how we want to dress, and how we relate to others. It is way more complicated than quantum mechanics.

I. Conception to birth

It all begins when a sperm meets an egg; then an embryo starts to develop.  This starts a chain of parallel developments that create a fetus.  As human beings, we all start out as female.  If a male is to develop, there has to be as Y-chromosome. 

This expectation of childbirth is the product of millions of years of evolution.  We are a sexually dimorphic species.  We are naked apes, so we have a lot of visible secondary sexual characteristics.  Since our ape and monkey cousins are fully-furred, there are often fewer secondary sexual differences.  As our ancestors expanded throughout the world, they had to develop clothing that covered up their naked bodies.  So a lot of clothing acquired the attribute of gender, to prevent confusion.

When a child is born, there could be a surprise if the ultrasound was not accurate.  An even bigger surprise can send doctors into a huddle, if there are ambiguous sexual characteristics. Fetal development is a series of parallel events that produce a large number of children who are sexually accurate, but as many as seven percent of children may be born with a wide variety of intersex conditions, some of which will not be identified at birth.  We live in a world that wants children to fit a fairly strict gender-binary, so exceptions cause a lot of concern.  The dash to perform corrective surgeries has abated in recent years, since time has shown that many intersex adults are not happy with those early medical decisions.

II. The acquisition of gender

The majority of children born can be accurately sexed.  Next, a child develops an identity during the first years of life.  Children develop individual identities, which may or may not resemble those of parents and siblings.  Some of this is genetic, some cultural, and some environmental, but a large part of it is from none of these sources.  Buddhists call it karma; others describe it a instinct, spirit, soul, or intuition.    Every child develops some kind of an identity.  I and many of my friends think everyone has both a male-identity and a female-identity.  This means that practically anyone could learn how to bend gender; however, very few people would ever be interested in this kind of exploration.

For most children, what gender they will first pick really isn’t optional; luckily, most children want to be standard. This means that boys will be encouraged to align with their male-identity.  Testosterone will dominate theirs lives for several years, and most will become interested in girls.  In turn, girls will be encouraged to align with their female-identity.  Estrogen will govern their lives for many years, and most will become interested in boys. 

Everyone one associated with children can pressure them to conform.  Almost any adult will scold children who bend gender.  Many people think current cultural dress and deportment are the only way things should be, so those who vary from this plan are often accused of being defiant or perverted. 

Children can actually be a mix of masculine and feminine qualities.  I think children readily show this, until they are told not to.  What is masculine and what is feminine can vary from culture to culture.  Some of it is genetic, since boys and girls have obviously different reproductive roles.  Some of it is identity, as a measure of who we are: a spectrum of personalities that include mixtures of masculine and feminine.  And, some of it is cultural: some things can arbitrarily be assigned just to boys, and others just to girls.  Boys and girls often resent being boxed in, but a variety of pressures can arise if they resist.  This can come from parents, peers, and school.  When they grow up, employers and other institutions can restrict people by creating only one way to fit in and make a living.  In marriage, husbands and wives can become the gender role enforcers for each other. 

A lot of people will fret about children who deviate from gender standards.  Many will be labeled non-conforming, defiant, rebels, marching to a different drummer, non-respecting of authority, queer, gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and so forth.  While such children are no longer viewed having asocial behaviors, this was not the case in the past.  The odd children were often sent to psychiatrists, given electric shock therapy, or even institutionalized.  Attempts to change these children have been like arcane punishments.  All children have a measure resistance to indoctrination.  Forced transformations that were once labeled successful are now considered bogus.

There are actually no cookie cutter people.  Everyone comes into the world sensing the infinite and divine.  We grow, and gain insight and experience.  Nearly all of us want a life partner, and want our relationships to include intimacy and sex.  Much of what we feel can’t be written down.  The wealth of wisdom and knowledge possessed by just one individual can be astounding.

III. The gender-binary

I am only talking about the Western form of the gender-binary.  The term gender-binary has an unknown origin, but it has been adopted by transgender communities, as part of the belief that present gender biases are quite unfair, and so make life harder for transgenders. There is a hope that, if there were to be total equality between men and women, transgenders would be treated better.  This idea is not testable.

The gender-binary is about sexism.  I think sexism is culturally forced differences, between men and women, which go beyond reproductive roles, sexual dimorphism, and natural dating and mating scripts.  In a recent survey of gender in Western Europe, the Mediterranean, and North America, the United States came in number one, with the most rigid gender roles.  Discrimination goes all directions, so both men and women are subjected to unfair straight-jacketing. 

In our current culture, boys and girls don’t seem intended to grow up equal.  Gender identities are not really black and white, but there is little allowance for variation.  Men seem expected to be masculine leaders, and women feminine followers.  Women have gained more equality over time, so they can carefully stray into the masculine.  Men are not supposed to stray into the feminine; it is taboo.  A few husbands and wives even think they own each other, but this is simply not true .

Women can be emotional, nurturing, loving, sharing, peaceful, and compassionate.  Women tend to treat each other with respect as equals, take interest in each other’s lives, and develop good social skills.  They get to wear a variety of clothing, some of which is called sexy.  Women traditionally are not supposed to do things that are assigned to men, such as technology, mechanics, administration, and protection; so they are often told they need a man to do that for them in their lives.  If women become divorced or widowed, they readily learn such masculine skills.

Men can grow up with a limited emotional vocabulary.  Men build things and run the world, and they are traditionally not supposed to worry about home-making, child-rearing, social skills, sharing, and so forth.  Men often do not treat women respect as equals, and can mistreat them publically in ways reserved for bedrooms, referencing them as hot, making outlines of breasts with their hands, and unwanted touching, such as pinching their butts. 

Men often don’t treat each other as equals, so they end up maintaining territory and fighting for a slot in the pecking order.  The three-piece suit has been a trademark of male power, but it is being phased out.  Being a man can be frustrating, especially for men who can’t play the game.  Men who can’t compete become runners up.  Life can be tough.   Finding a mate is more difficult, because traditional dating urges women to hunt for the men who can best provide the masculine things in their lives.  Being standard is almost impossible for a man who has Asperger’s syndrome or some other atypical personality.

Turnabout can happen when women become high-powered players in law, government, and business.  Some of these women can overdo the masculine side of their personality, and end up not treating other women very well.

Women are too often treated as sex objects in the media to sell products.  Unless movies have some science fiction or fantasy content, women seem to have secondary roles, or end up being characters for men to rescue. 

When men and women meet, they often have a traditional courtship where men check out a woman’s femininity, and a woman checks out a man’s masculinity.  After they marry, they may have to face reality, since they might not have investigated each other as proper partners.  Men may have trouble treating their wives with respect as equals, who have important lives of their own.  Men can be reluctant to communicate.  Many wives do not know to manage husbands, so they may devise schemes to work around the communications barrier.  Frustration can lead to anger, causing fights break out.  Most couples find ways to work around gender differences, but others can end up with life-long issues, as wives fight for equality and communication, and men struggle to defend themselves using masculine power.  Some men really get into a bind, when they have to stray into the feminine, which is taboo.  I remember the early arguments with my wife, where I always hung up at my concept the masculine-feminine boundary.

A few wives do not even want to be equal.  Relying on a husband for major decisions can be good for some such wives, and disastrous for others.

When marital problems don’t get managed, the frustration can be taken to the public arena.   Partners may get angry, skip counseling, and go directly into divorce proceedings.  Anger, violence, and revenge never solve any problems, but men especially, and women, may not see any other way out of their predicament.  The gender-binary is only one of a large number of possible cultures, but its dark nature feeds back and drags everyone in.  Life can seem hopeless. This is a generational problem, which most of us are working hard to resolve, but solutions may take several generations.