{"id":2084,"date":"2014-07-04T08:26:08","date_gmt":"2014-07-04T08:26:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tgr.net.au\/wp\/forums\/discussion\/does-gender-realy-exist"},"modified":"2014-07-04T08:26:08","modified_gmt":"2014-07-04T08:26:08","slug":"does-gender-realy-exist","status":"publish","type":"topic","link":"https:\/\/tgr.net.au\/wp\/forums\/discussion\/does-gender-realy-exist","title":{"rendered":"Does gender realy exist?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I have recently been exploring what the general public understands by gender. My search took me to an article that posed a pretty fundamental and challenging question. Particularly to someone like me who considers themselves to be gender diverse.<\/p>\n<p>The anonymous author of the blog article asks the question, \"does gender exist?\".<\/p>\n<p>http:\/\/yourfeministfriend.wordpress.com\/2013\/02\/06\/does-gender-exist\/<\/p>\n<p>I'll include an extract of the blog article here to stimulate discussion.<\/p>\n<div class=\"bbcode_quote\">\n<div class=\"bbcode_quote_head\">Quote:<\/div>\n<div class=\"bbcode_quote_body\">Growing up, we are taught that there are girls and boys, male\/female, man\/woman.  Boys have penises, short hair and like the color blue and girls have vaginas, long hair and like the color pink.  Before we are even born our favorite colors, toys and other interests are chosen for us based on our genitalia.<br \/>\n......<br \/>\nHere is the interesting part: What is deemed \u201cmasculine\u201d and \u201cfeminine\u201d has changed drastically throughout history, and is different depending on the culture.  Men used to wear dresses and high heels.  In some cultures such as the berdaches, an Indigenous North American people, there are \u201ctwo-spirit\u201d people.  These people take on a mixture of both stereotypical male and female roles and characteristics, and it is 100% the norm.<\/p>\n<p>Most people think \u201cpenis\u201d when they think of the word \u201cmale\u201d and \u201cvagina\u201d when they think of \u201cfemale.\u201d  However, sex and gender are not the same thing.  Your gender identity is how you identify yourself based on cultural definitions of gender, and your sex is biological. In other words, you can be biologically male, but feel as though you are stereotypically female, and still be attracted to females.  The plethora of different gender identities is totally gnarly and fascinating.<\/p>\n<p>So then, it is safe to say that gender roles are made up, and the proof is in how they have and continue to differ drastically throughout history and cultures.<\/p>\n<p>If gender is made up, then does it really exist?<\/p>\n<p>It exists in the way that we, as humans, have created it, therefore it did not exist before we made these silly rules.  Is there, then, no solid base for what constitutes stereotypical maleness and femaleness?<\/p>\n<p>So while you may FEEL that you are \u201cfemale\u201d in spirit, yet you\u2019re \u201cmale\u201d physically (or vice versa), it\u2019s all based on something with no solid base.  This begs the question: Does gender REALLY exist?\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>\nOk - over to you!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"template":"","topic-tag":[],"class_list":["post-2084","topic","type-topic","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tgr.net.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic\/2084","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tgr.net.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tgr.net.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/topic"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tgr.net.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic\/2084\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tgr.net.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2084"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"topic-tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tgr.net.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic-tag?post=2084"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}