Is Your Sexual Identity Hard to Define?

[inmymind]

Pigeon and AnxietyGirl,

Thanks for sharing and expressing yourselves. I too am not what others would consider normal, and its nice to know there are women out there who are like me, but coming from the opposite gender. I often felt it would be perfect to find someone like either of you to be open with. I think there are many who feel as you two do, but we don't share who we are in the real world, and how ironic is it, that when were are anonymous with no risk, we are able to share who we really are, but in real life we end up not finding deep satisfaction because we are afraid to show the ones we like who we really are?

[bigeekgirl]

It's my son who's the brony. I think it's very cool.

While I'm an unabashed Pony fanatic just because the show is so enjoyable, I can't help but point out how relevant the phenomenon of Bronies is to the topic at hand. The culture at large and the Brony community has never been so ready to accept the idea there is nothing inherently wrong with enjoying something traditionally associated with a gender other than your own. It doesn't hurt either the show isn't written with traditional (lame) little girl themes and 2D character portraits. Nope, everypony is all out there having adventures and emotional growth just like in shows geared toward boys. Just because they happen to be pastel colored tiny horses ruled by an alicorn princess with an unnaturally flowing mane doesn't make them any less cool than whatever it is geared towards little boys these days.

Now, my husband is a tad older than your stereotypical Brony at 41 and my nine year old niece finds the Brony thing a little weird but has a "whatever floats your boat" attitude, but it's still pretty amazing progress since I was a kid.

[meh]

I haven't really dipped my toe into FiM yet. I'm more of a Doctor Who geek. But the boy likes both.

I see in my daughters' experiences how girls are ushered into more 'girly' activities in the elementary schools. Even in so-called liberal New York, there's a clear bias.

[bigeekgirl]

I'm sad to hear even in the big cities these things are still so much an issue.

I can't even imagine caring about the gender appropriateness of a kid's clothes and behavior. I am far more of the mindset that little boys ought to have dolls to love on and play kitchens to bang pots on; girls should have Tonka trucks and miniature plastic tools in a tool belt. What they prefer comes in later and how they choose to play is up to them, but I loathe the pinkafication of girls and the exclusion of boys from "homemaking" play. If the goal of play is to learn how to be a human being, nothing ought to be gendered or off limits.

My niece's father - my best friend's ex-husband - has gotten on this kick of waiting their daughter to dress more girly. It's the influence of his girlfriend and her daughters which is even more annoying, but I've written part of it off to the fact they live in the rural Midwest. She's nine and has been raised with the ideals that you like what you like. She's annoyed and baffled at his sudden controlling ways. Sometimes she dresses girly and sometimes not, but she's always been allowed to wear what she wants, play with what she wants. Thomas the Train was a huge part of her little kid years and Barbies, too. She's had Spider-Man sneakers and loves Minecraft, but refuses to even consider cutting her waist length hair short and her favorite outfits are these little plaid skirt numbers with button down shirts and matching ties.

We're huge Whovians all around. My husband got me started with the 9th soon after we started dating. He'd proudly tell you Tom Baker was his Doctor thanks to the four years his family lived in England. I got my best friend watching and the little one naturally knows a good thing when she see's it. Star Trek is my primary fandom and brought both my best friend and my husband into my life along with informing so much of my value system. But Doctor Who is something magic and almost religious in the the intensity of emotion it brings. Such joy!

You know The Doctor had a pony regeneration? Doctor Hooves is a fan favorite even if Hasbro calls him "Time Turner."

[meh]

Did you do a silent squeee when Tom Baker showed up at the end of Day of the Doctor??

I know all about Doctor Hooves. My son has him on a t-shirt.

And to bring this back on topic... what does that tell children about appropriate sex roles and sexuality when toys and activities are divided up into boys' and girls'? A boy can play with dolls and a girl can play on the baseball team and both could end up 100% straight but they'll get some seriously mixed messages growing up.

[bigeekgirl]

My squee was not silent.

We also watched the docudrama "An Adventure in Space & Time" about how the show got started done as part of the 50th celebration. I was so excited to learn the show was the first BBC show to have a woman producing and an Indian director. The BBC didn't take it seriously but those to certainly did. Just from that hour or so fictionalized producer Verity Lambert has become one of my heroes. She went on to a hugely successful career at the BBC and smashed the heck out of the glass ceiling. Without women like her dreaming a big dream and fighting to be given the same opportunities as a man, we wouldn't be having this discussion today.

I think when kids are taught traditional (Western) gender roles it limits their development of their own unique identity. While I do believe there are tenancies on average for males and females, it is not useful or productive to limit the individual based on statistical averages. Men are, on average, taller in our species, but that doesn't mean all men are taller than all women. The same can be said for any traits.

Children naturally look for patterns and ways to identify, group and label their world and themselves. It's natural. It those early developmental stages if they are taught the world is divided along gender lines, they will be ridged in that thinking and only a few will grow up to ever question why they believe blue is for boys and pink is for girls. It is the parent's job to teach kids what labels are important and why, because kids will come up with their own ideas if differences aren't discussed. I wish I could remember the name of a book I read about kids' development - might also have been in SuperFreakonomics, come to think of it - which gave two amazing examples of studies I found so mind blowing. The chapter was about how to talk to kids about race, but I think it illustrates just fine for the topic of gender norms. The first study basically interviewed parents on how they approached talking to their kids about race then talk to the kids about what they believed about race. They found the parents who elected to NOT talk to their kids about it AT ALL in an effort to make kids colorblind had kids who made assumptions about people who looked different than them ALL ON THEIR OWN and assigned negative traits to, say, classmates, who were of other races and assumed positive traits of kids who looked more like them. Without specific parental guidance explaining skin color and other outside factors do not mean anything about who a person is on the inside, kids sorted the matter out in a childlike logical which doesn't match what parents want to teach at all. The other experiment put a classroom of little kids - kindergarten or first grade - in blue shirts or red for some weeks. At the end of the experiment, they asked the kids questions about how they thought of their classmates and they thought better of the kids in their same shirt color and much worse of the "other." With all the focus on boys and girls being so different, no wonder grown men and women have trouble understanding each other!

For the statistical majority, it might not even be overtly harmful to their sense of self to be taught strict gender roles except for those "little" things like only girls talk about their feelings or cry and only boys should be assertive or aggressive even when threatened. No matter how often in later childhood and in adolescence you then tell those same kids they can do or be anything they want, they have already been socialized to fit into gender roles which say nurses are female and doctors are male, for one classic example. If you're a person who "fits" the role 85% or whatever, it might not be harmful to miss out on a few things in life because you thought they were off limits because of your gender, but it does seem a bit pointless to deprive men of musical theater and women of football.

We thus perpetuate a cycle and the kids who have it the worst are the outliers on various traits which may make them statistically outside of the norm for their gender. Girls who are gifted in math. Boys who love to read. Girls who are competitive. Boys who are sensitive and empathic. Kids who don't identify strongly with the gender of their own body or either gender, well, I don't have personal knowledge, but I can only imagine how damaging it can be to have been socialized to believe one thing and not feel that way about yourself. Same thing goes for teaching kids about romantic love as "boy + girl" in this enlightened age. If we even half-heartedly believe homosexuality and the other LGBTQ letters are not choices people make, it is so important to kids to teach them it's okay not to fit into traditional roles. Even if they turn out straight and cisgender, they will be more open minded about all the other choices in life which shouldn't have a god damned thing to do with gender or sexuality but somehow in our culture even in 2013 clearly seem to be drawn along pink and blue lines.

I think in the end, it is up to the parents and other caregivers of each child to make better choices then have been made by our parents. Every kid who grows up knowing it's okay to be themselves and they are not limited in their choices for something as silly as gender or sexual identity is a win. I do have my own worries about raising my as-yet-non-existent kids in the conservative South and keeping them open minded, but I do believe it's doable just by teaching them from an early age they are okay as they are and nothing they are or feel is worthy of shame. If they believe that about themselves, they will give others the same empathy.

[meh]

Thank you for expressing that better than I could.

[bigeekgirl]

Thank you for the wonderful question

[Raggedy Brandi]

I don't think it's hard to define, but I guess to mainstream people it would be. I believe I am a hereroflexible female. In my mind that equates to being attracted to and having sex with females, but emphasizing on being attracted to, sex, and having traditional relationships with men. I don't act on my interests in women, it doesn't fit the F-M relationship I am currently in. I don't know if I ever will. But I have had a few experiences in the past. I am currently a sub in a 24/7 D/s relationship. It has its struggles, but overall it is something I love and fulfills needs I have.

Raggedy

[bigeekgirl]

Raggedy Brandi - I hope it doesn't sound patronizing, but I find the D/s dynamic incredibly attractive as does my husband. It sounds even worse in a post-50-Shades world, but I've followed enough lifestyle blogs to know that's not anything close to the real thing. Nor could I get past the first few pages of spectacularly bad writing.

We've never really *done* anything about our interests, but it is a huge part of our joint fantasy life. For me, it's all about the idea of being both protected like I'm the most precious thing in the world and simultaneously used as he sees fit. It's not primarily a sexual desire, so I understand the appeal of a 24/7 D/s relationship. For now, our vanilla sex and our emotional connection hits the notes I need to feel both safe and of use, but it has been wonderful to read about and enjoy pictures of D/s stuff as I come to understand my own sexuality more