Gender Roles and gendered thinking.

[mintogrubb.livejournal.com]

So, what do you really prefer- a safe but modest return on an investment, or taking a huge risk with a much higher pay off if it succeeds?

Which is ' superior' in your estimation, a 'safe pair of hands' or someone who can take incredible risks and succeed against the odds?

I once watched a film called ' Break point ' , in which patrick Swaze played a bank robber who loved surfing - he robbed banks in order to finance his surfing lifestyle ,and got a real buzz out of taking incredible and un neccessary risks in order to pull off a series of hiests , each one more risky than the last.

Most guys I know said "Hey - what a guy! An awesome dude to be sure!"
And yet women were more like "nah - just an ego driven show off, not someone I would want to know".

Maybe it was the fact that the money was stolen - but we as a society seem to like risks and idolise risk takers. Risk taking is heroic, manly, and admirable. Playing safe is for wimps.

Ok, if a building is on fire , or someone is in danger, I am all for taking risks to save somebody, but taking risks for the sake of it - well, it just isn't me, I'm afraid. But worse than elevating taking risks to an art form , we gender the process. let me explain

Think carefully - what is the best way to deal with the situation if a group of criminals or terrorists take somene hostage? Ok, I agree that we should never pay up or give in to let someone go free, but should we
A) send in someone who can cleverly use psychological tactics to persuade the captors to give up and come out with their hands up or
B) send in a SWAT team that will go in with all guns blazing and get the hostages freed when the bad guys are all dead on the floor?

Me - I can see that sometimes, option B is the only one that will work, but I really admire a team that can resolve a conflict where everyone comes out alive.

Yet I have to say that it seems to me that we in Western Society tend to admire sucessful competitors and not successful co operators. And , whereas we hold up an image to women that says "This is what we want you to be like", we also hold up an image to men as well, that is equally false.

I can almost hear women saying "Oh no, not another rant from Minto about how tough it is being a man - listen honey, it is much harder being a woman..."

Well, I am not disputing that women are oppressed and exploited, but i am saying that the " Myth of Male Invincibility" needs to be critically looked at, challenged, and even rejected in the name of social progress.

See, a *real* man is a hard, tough and mean Son of a Bitch. Somebody like Patton or Genghis Khan. Anything else in a man is not just 'different' , it's 'inferior'.

It seems to me that we appropriate logic, ambition , achievement, courage and dominant behaviour and call it ' masculine' and attribute sensitivity, emotions, empathy and vulnerability to the female sex, and at the same time either openly despise it or simply don't like to see it in people we look up to.

I think that patton would have admired General Custer, but the fact is that Custer got himself and his command wiped out to the last man.
maybe Underlankens will dispute this, but my assesment is that people like Bradley, Montgomery and Nelson were truly Great Commanders, not in spite of their concern for the men under their command, but *because* of it.

They could empathise - not only supporting their own men , but also were sensitive to the mood and morale of the enemy, and this was an asset, not a draw back.

Even in civilian life - which most f us are most familiar with , i would liike to point out tht suicide is more prevalent among men than among women. Competing at all costs, being top dog and signing up to the 'winning is what really matters' mindset is not really doing an awful lot of men an awful lot of good.

Many years ago, I went to an all male school.My dad was an alcoholic, so it was the Welfare State that got me sent to this place, not my dad's money. But there, at the age of 12 or so, I learned to play chess. I became part of the school chess team and even the team captain within 3 years. Yet I would describe myself as a competant player, not a great or gifted exponent of the game. I never made it in any national, never mind international, tournament. I just enjoy playing for it's own sake - not because I am bound to win. Sure, i have taught several kids the rudiments of the game and had parents commend me for improving their childrens level of play - but I have to say that i have made them safe and competant players- not shown any imagnative strokes of genius that sets me apart from the mass of ordinary potzers who can set up a board properly. For me, that is enough, all I want from the game.

And I look around and see an awful lot of men who are driven, doing jobs they don't like, being people that get terribly screwed up because they are trying to be something and someone they are not. I want more than this from life for myself.

It is like thay have this idea in their head that says to them "You must not do X or you are not a Real Man". Masculinity for them is a high maintainanace item. You cannot show "weakness" - and weakeness in this context is anything that isn't overtly macho.

Intellect, intuition, compassion, uncertainty, empathy, introspection and anything that else that might get in the way of physically dominating the situation is suspect. And what do we get? A higher suicide rate, vis a vis women.

Just as I question the viabilty of me earning a living as a World Class chess champion, I also questionthe template that society has handed me as a way to make it in life.

In short, I reject the view that in order for me to win , that someone out ther has to lose - why can't we have a situation where everyone wins. I don't see why competing always trumps co-operation. I reject the notion tha nice guys never win - we just have to re write the rules, or at least change our perspective on what life is about and what success really means.

In Chess, what matters is having more Material, gaining Initiative, taking up Space, and gaining Time.

If, after 10 moves, I have got a Queen and two Rooks and my opponent hasn't, then I have more Material, and they have a problem.
If I can force them to react to me and they cannot force me to do likewise, I hold the Initiative and will probably win.
If I can control most of the squares and they are backed into a corner, I can control the Space, and thereby can alter the Tempo at which the game develops. nd of course, if s/he needs 3 moves to force mate and I can do it in 2, I have gained Time on my opponent and can win before they deliver the move to beat me. The game is set up and M.I.S.T. is what we all seek, and hope to deny the opposition.

But, White always goes first. White has Initiative to start with , and Black must simply react and keep pace with White as White develops a plan - all the while hoping to find a way to turn the tables and become the aggressor and initiate attacks of their own.

A most obvious way is the Gambit - offer White a bit of bait. Black may shove a pawn in White's path, hoping that White will seize the advantage. Inexperienced players usually do. the King's bishop's Pawn is usually offered first, and is unguarded.

White siezes the pawn with one of his own , and is a pawn ahead after a couple of moves. yet Black will then counter attack the pawn that took his own pawn.

Now, White must now decide - is it best to defend the slight edge s/he just gained, or simply let the advantage drop? If white elects todefend the attacking pawn, Black now has the initiative and white Dances to their tune.the roles of attacker ad defender have been exchanged.

But the more experienced player will usually ignore such a blatent attempt- other gambits are far more subtle , yet have the same effect of switching roles.

I have to say that Society is pulling a far more subtle game on people like me. we are being offered an *assumed* advantage - be a real mann , be someone what society looks up to and respects. but once you buy into it, you soon find that it comes at a very high price. You end up living life on other people's terms and not your own , and life is not a game with bits of wood, it is more serious than that.

Guys, trust me - you don't have to keep one pawn ahead of the opposition to win the game. You can let that pawn go and still use the initiative to set up an attack that will win the space to set up a winning attack.

Likewise, we as men do not have to take the insane risks with our health and ignore our own safety to ' make it' as men.We don't have to take part in the rat race to be happy - in fact , to be happy, we must refuse to see ourselves as simply rats.

I was told that I could be liked, or be the boss - but not both.
I was told that I needed to be number one , or I was nothing.
I was told that it was only by taking it off of others that i could have anything for myself.

Now, that was the way my dad lived. A hard drinking mining man , he cared only for how it would go for him , and everyone else be damned.

And his wife left him , and I helped her pack. He was never a foreman , a supervisor or a manager, I have been all three. He did jobs he hated doing , and I did one I actually liked and earned three times as much as him in real terms. And yes, I sriously think my relationship with my peers, my staff and superiors and my wife are far better than his were.

Being Number One isn't neccessary, being mean and hard is counterproductive, and focussing on beating other people at all costs is not all it's cracked up to be.

I feel that we need to take a look at the role that society expects men to play and are wise to decline the option to play by the rules.

Instead, we should look to foster co-operation as well as competativeness. We should think of 'win - win' solutions where both parties can gain something from a transaction. We need to aim towards stability, not expansion in our economies. to assess ourselves more by what we are and can do than by what we own and can possess.

In short, we need to be more at ease with ourselves and stop striving to fulfill society's impossible expectations of us. We can let women be more themselves too, and not feel our own security and self worth is compomised if they start driving trains and running companies or earning more than we do.

Comments

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

TL;DR not really sure what your point is, but it seems to me you're mixing up a lot of gender with sex. You talk about the stresses of being male (or at least the stress of being an alpha male), but many women have this now as well, on top of all the female stresses. I would wager that it's harder for the female CEO than the male.

But it really shouldn't be an us vs them mentality anyway. What we need to ask ourselves is do we want to be in a society where being a parent or a carer (or any of the traditional female roles increasingly being done by men) is considered sub-human work. As long as we put the CEO on the top of the heap and teachers/nurses as the scum of the world, we will continue to praise "masculine" characteristics (whether embodied in a male or a female) and deride "feminine" characteristics.


Oh, also, the movie is "Point Break".

[mintogrubb.livejournal.com]

You talk about the stresses of being male (or at least the stress of being an alpha male), but many women have this now as well, on top of all the female stresses. I would wager that it's harder for the female CEO than the male.

But this is the point - being a male should not be stressful.
Many women these days seem to be aping the most harmful and the most negative aspects of male behaviour.

Poice note a rise in girl gangs , of women increasing their consuption of alcohol and other 'traditional ' masculine pursuits.
i don't know that this is doing the women concerned or the wider world any good.

[pastorlenny.livejournal.com]

Most guys I know said "Hey - what a guy! An awesome dude to be sure!"

You have weird friends.

[mintogrubb.livejournal.com]

I have mixed with all sorts, it goes with my job , I guess.

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

/thread over.

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

Apropos of nothing except the post didn't make me think about much except this:

Why is it that the gendered anatomical term for a coward is "pussy"? Think about what that part of female anatomy does in childbirth and then call it cowardly or weak. Now consider male anatomy -- the most abjectly frightened part of human anatomy is the scrotum. It shrivels in cold, wilts in heat and, when under duress, practically retreats deep inside the body. If you want an anatomical slang term for weakness, I'd argue that "nutsack" is far more apt than "pussy".

Okay, I'm done now.

[mintogrubb.livejournal.com]

Why is it that the gendered anatomical term for a coward is "pussy"?
I would argue that this is simply a product of over valueing masculinity.

I hoped to sort of get to the idea that masculinity has got nothing to do with being like Chuck Norris, and the the heavy drinking , high risk sort of guy is not someone to emulate.

liike, we do not have to down copious amounts of vodka to prove we are ' better' than women - we just aren't. We might be different, but start saying that you are better and you start to crumble when a woman does more than you are doing on any particular front.

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

I blame a pro-dog world for the negative association to pussies.

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

Also, let's face it, minto -- men are dumb. That's it. We're dumb fuckers. Often endearing. Sometimes a danger to ourselves, but we're just kind of stupid.

I have a hypothesis -- men invented sexism so we could keep up. On a level playing field from the dawn of civilization until now, men would have never have had a chance. Watch a playground sometime (but not too long -- that's creepy) and marvel at how any of those boys make it out of childhood without traumatic brain injuries. Then look at adult male behavior and realize how many of them DID have traumatic brain injuries.

[blue-mangos.livejournal.com]

Have I mentioned how much I like you?

And yes, you men are very endearing. It's your saving grace really.

[mintogrubb.livejournal.com]

I have a hypothesis -- men invented sexism so we could keep up.

No, sorry , I don't buy that one.
Nore do I buy it that man are any dumber thhan women
(essentialism , I think that one is called)

It is more likely that women had babies - and this was indesputably something men could not manage , and yet the tribe needed to reproduce or die out.

so, what did men do that could match this ?

i suspect that men needed a racket that they could lay exclusive claims on .

So, maybe sensing their own expendibility, men made a virtue of that - live fast and die young , why don't we ?
Let's take risks and celebrate our risk taking capabilities...
get's us noticed, maybe even fancied....

[blue-mangos.livejournal.com]

OK, I've been all over your post being flippant and I apologize for that, I'm in a mood (PMS? :p). So, here is my serious response.

The problem as I see it is you are trying to say men should feel more free to not be defined by 'masculine qualities'. I agree to a point, I feel there are often unreasonable expectations on men in society. However, the solution does not lie in allowing men to embrace more feminine qualities and for women to embrace masculine ones, it is that we need to stop seeing qualities and behavior as either masculine or feminine. That's not going to happen any time soon as evidenced by your own words here in the comments.

[the-rukh.livejournal.com]

i a w t

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

You raise an interesting point.

it is that we need to stop seeing qualities and behavior as either masculine or feminine.

Do we? I'm not totally convinced on this. I agree we need to stop the unequal valuing of masculine and feminine and also that male =/= masculine and female =/= feminine. It's hard to state what I'm trying to get at here... OK. So these labels already exist and I wonder if it is possible to get away from them altogether, so in the meantime is it possible to realign them?

I don't know, I really don't, but it seems to me that "feminine" is more discriminated against than "female", or at least is held as being less valuable. What I don't want to see is a world where people no longer think that raising children is a valuable contribution to society (and it is fast getting that way). I find it disgusting couples who leave a newborn with childcare so they can both go back to work. Contact with the primary care giver is vital in early childhood development terms, yet we seem to have reached a point where it is less valued by society than a new car or a bigger house. To me, this is all kinds of backwards.

[mrsilence.livejournal.com]

it is that we need to stop seeing qualities and behavior as either masculine or feminine.

I think the problem with that is that the very definition of feminine and masculine comes from the sex that they are associated with.

Even if we detach the sense of necessity that males must be masculine and females feminine, you'll never stop people associating certain broadly distinguishing traits in general with one sex or the other.

That's how people work - they discern patterns in the world that make it simple enough to understand and then go about categorising the world accordingly. You can't fault people for that in itself, because people need to be able to comprehend the world in some way just to be able to function.

What I think from a practical perspective we need, is just a far more sophisticated and flexible system of social categorisation that doesn't try to divide everyone along a single axis, rather than a system that lumps everyone together and pretends there is no rhyme or reason to the madness of society.

[geezer-also.livejournal.com]

If I understand your point, you do have one. However, we live in a world where the president of Harvard can get fired because he reported on a study that showed, in fact, men and women brains are different.
I admire your courage, but I question your wisdom :D
A nice quiet Sunday evening was probably the best time to post this.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

It's only speculation that that presentation lead to his resignation; although criticism over his rigour were probably valid considering what he said was "an attempt at provocation" as opposed to "science". Of course losing $1 billion of Harvard money speculating on markets probably had more to do with it. In the end he got his massive golden parachute. All this was over a year after the seminar.

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

People worry about "being a man" or something? I don't know. I don't get it.

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

I wish I was a woman, because my fashion sense is a disaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaasssssssssssssteeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrrrrr

[root-fu.livejournal.com]

Good post.

[lordtwinkie.livejournal.com]

stereotyping, sexism and false dichotomy.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

No, I'd not dispute that Bradley, Montgomery, and Nelson were all good commanders. What I *would* dispute is applying that term to MacArthur or Patton, both of whom understood PR more than they did actual fighting. The idea that women are more cowardly than men ignores several basic aspects of sheer reality that women have had to deal with over the years. The idea that men are always invincible heterosexuals ignores the great degree to which men......haven't exactly been expected to be. Ever.

Too, Patton was a fucking nutbar, dude. Had a Napoleon Complex and frankly should have been receiving psychiatric care, not charge of an army. Fortunately for him the Germans were a bit too busy trying to stop Vistula-Oder to smack him black and blue for his tendency to ignore his logistics.

[dangerduckie21.livejournal.com]

"suicide is more prevalent among men than among women"

Completed suicide is more common among men; but more women than men attempt suicide. Women experience depression more than men (or, at least, are more likely to admit to it).

I do agree with your points on the rat race, and that cooperation should be valued in society. Excessive competition isn't good for anybody, male or female. Personally, I found that the stress of the corporate game wasn't worth it. But you don't NEED to be a "real man" to get respect, or at least among my family and group of friends. My husband is a key example there; I am far more ambitious and risk-taking than he is, and nobody thinks less of him for being his laid back self. I think it comes down to who you surround yourself with, shallow douchnozzle bro types, or real people who understand that people aren't stereotypes?

[rasilio.livejournal.com]

Honestly I think your problem stems from your basic assumption of what societies message of what a "Real MAN^tm" is.

Now it is true that this does vary from culture to culture somewhat but I'm betting given out common heritage that what you get in England is not terribly different from what we get in America.

Lets take Point Break as an example. Swayze's character is the BAD GUY. Not the Hero. Sure we all get a little voyeuristic thrill watching the bad guy be bad ever now and then but the messages that society sends for what is right comes from our Heroes and I cannot recall a single hero being regaled for his recklessness in any story, on the other hand I can recall more than a few whose central character flaw was that reckless risk taking and the whole point of the story was their learning the true meaning of heroism and bravery while learning to love and care for someone besides themselves. The latest example of which is this weekend's #1 movie here in the US Thor, whose entire premise is that Thor is stripped of his powers cast out of Asgard because he is a foolish brash hothead unable to think of anything beyond his own honor and glory and he does not get them back until after he learns that true honor means meekly sacrificing ones self for the benefit of others.

In fact the current popularity of super hero movies can largely be summed up as society looking for places to find the heroic ideals that it values but had lost to changing technology and cultures and finding a way to fit them into a modern context. Yet in absolutely none of these is a need to be first ever considered a good thing, it is always either the pervue of the bad guys or the weak sniveling manipulators who hide behind them or sometimes even hide behind the good guys.

Yes, boldness and competition are valued in our heroes, but they are never valued anywhere near as high as compassion, or self sacrifice and when boldness slips into recklessness or competitive drive slips into a win at all costs mentality it is always treated as a character flaw.

In short your father was not living societies message of what it means to be a "REAL MAN^tm", he was wallowing in his personal flaws, trust me I know, my father was also an alcoholic and from the brief description you mention I suspect in many ways just like yours. Thing is if our lives were turned into movies our fathers would not be the good guys, they'd either be antagonists or at best Foil's used to highlight what we should NOT be like.

[mintogrubb.livejournal.com]

In short your father was not living societies message of what it means to be a "REAL MANtm", he was wallowing in his personal flaws,

I think you have hit on something here that i had not really considered. Ok, my dad hung out a lot with people who were much like himself ( hey, don't we all) - so, perhaps I took his adult peers as a benchmark for what society was like.

Ii have to say ,t hough that I didn't like the sexist , racist bullshit that i go exposed to as a child, but what I really resented was the drunkeness and violence.

I think i will have to watch point Break again , and not with a crowd of my dad's mates who were all pretty much of the feeling that they would just loved to have been in on the bank jobs, but couldn't get hold of the guns so easily.

I might even watch thor as well - iit didn't look like my kind of movie, but perhaps i should give it a look. thanks for commenting here.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

So, what do you really prefer- a safe but modest return on an investment, or taking a huge risk with a much higher pay off if it succeeds?

Safety. I don't gamble, except with things I can afford to lose. That's the clearly superior way to go. :)

Every person has various of amounts of "feminine" and "masculine" traits in their personality. Yes, people should be themselves and not worry so much about what "society" will think of them.

[il-mio-gufo.livejournal.com]

Without worry of what 'society' might think, wouldn't one run a higher risk of becoming a social deviant?

[caerfrli.livejournal.com]

Women attempt suicide more, men succeed more.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

Went looking for more info on this and came across this (http://www.healthieryou.com/mhexpert/exp1030501a.html):


Male vs. Female Suicide
Q.If depression is the main cause of suicides and women experience depression at a larger rate than men, why do the statistics show that more men actually commit suicide compared to the rate of suicide attempts by women (4:1)?

A. The rates of completed suicide are, indeed, much higher among men than among women, by about 3-4 times. However, women attempt suicide more often than men, consistent with the much higher rates of (unipolar) major depression in women (about twice as frequent as in men). By the way, rates of bipolar disorder are actually about equal for men and women. Women are also more likely to engage in various degrees of deliberate self-harm (wrist cutting, burning, etc.) than men, according to some studies.

This behavior is not necessarily suicidal, in the sense of reflecting a wish to die. But then-most people who attempt suicide do not really wish to die. Most, in fact, are clinically depressed. Historically, the higher rates of completed suicide among men (unfortunately, sometimes referred to as successful suicide) probably relate to the more lethal means used by men; e.g., guns as opposed to overdosing on pills.

In contexts where both men and women have easy access to lethal drugs and know how to use them, suicide rates are similar for men and women; e.g., rates of completed suicide among female physicians are similar to those of their male colleagues--and, sadly, higher than rates among women in the general population. (Suicide rates are also higher in other professions with easy access to lethal drugs, such as pharmacists and veterinary doctors). The bottom line: the diagnosis and rapid treatment of depression is crucial in bringing down suicide rates for both men and women.

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

Your posts increasingly sound like a personal blog. Could you cut straight to the point? There's a certain threshold of length and substance beyond which most people don't care to read, and I guess you don't want to miss those potential participants on your discussions.

[mintogrubb.livejournal.com]

Ok, noted.