In Europe, the typical "gender roles" are often swapped. Some men can be very "flamboyant" and many chicks over the internet act like what is considered "manly". Which there is nothing wrong with. This is much less prevalent in the US. If masculinity and femininity are genetic as homosexuality or heterosexuality, then it should be the same everywhere. I mean at least 80% of the US are descended from Europeans and you can tell just by looking at their skin! Therefore, I conclude that they are society-based principles and mean bupkiss.
The sociological categorization of people into homosexuals and heterosexuals is also a 'society-based principle.' The idea of sexual identity never really existed before the twentieth century. What we would now categorize as bisexual or homosexual males were once described as 'sodomites' or something similar. Moreover, while genetics obviously have a large role to play in the development of sexual orientation, enough studies with monozygotic twins have been done to compellingly conclude that environment is also an important determinant. This isn't really surprising. Very few things are locked and unchangable from birth. Even if you have a genetic tendency toward something, this can be expressed, or not, depending on what kind of environment you develop in. Nobody is 'genetically gay,' so to speak. Although, to be fair, one must include the mother's body as an environment before the child is born. There have been some interesting studies done on the effects of variable levels of hormone exposure on brain development. As to gender roles, there are always going to be sex-based patterns in behavior that play out in all societies (and being flamboyant cannot reasonably be described scientifically as either a more masculine or feminine trait). If one thinks of gender expression as a spectrum of traits, though, it is no surprise that there is such a diversity of gender expression. One would NOT expect to find the same expressions of masculinity and femininity everywhere. This does not, I'm afraid, change the fact that biology plays a huge role in gender.
Society says that girls must like "girly" things and boys must like "manly" things. The model male is this extremly tough guy that's unfeeling and isn't afraid of anything. That is society based. No tv show is feminine or masculine. No video game. No movie. Nothing is feminine or masculine. They are ideas. Not things. They are society's way of putting restraints on what you do. I mean come on. We only have one life to live. Why not enjoy it?
That is, indeed, society-based. It is also, however, rooted in statistical facts about how men and women everywhere tend to behave. Society tends to end up reinforcing what it perceives as healthy gender behavior, but the behavior doesn't come out of a vacuum, and children aren't born as blank slanks who only end up reflecting society's ideals. Let me give you an example. If I say that a tendency toward increased physical aggressiveness is characteristic of human males, and is rooted in facts about how humans have evolved, I am not saying that society plays no role in this behavior. I am also not saying that you will never see physical aggressiveness in women, or that you will always see it in men. What I am saying is that men have evolved a greater tendency towards physical aggression, and this, combined with society rewarding males for aggressive behavior, allows for this tendency to be easily expressed. I am not saying we SHOULD reward this behavior, and I will never defend unhealthy gender norms, but one must deal with reality as it is. Little boys are simply more physically aggressive, on average, than little girls, even when the parents attempt to remove all gender enforcement cues from their parenting style. We shouldn't demand that boys act more feminine, or even deny that such differences exist. We simply need to find healthy outlets for aggression, competitiveness, etc. so that they do not become positively linked in boys' minds with violence. Society makes this a bit difficult, but it is definitely possible. My suggestion is to closely monitor what media they consume, among other things.
You think this is the only video of a non-brony saying bronies have a good point? There's countless videos like this and they never changed anything for us. And most of them will never change.
That is not society's fault. You can blame that on sex hormones. High amounts of testosterone can cause aggression. When children are younger, true, they have very little sex hormone in their system, but they are much more affected by it. Hormones are some serious stuff. Estrogen can cause sadness. Transsexual men, for example, can show more aggression than they ever did as women simply because of hormones. Hormones are also responsible for things like breast development, deepening of the voice, facial hair, and higher amounts of acne in males than in females. They can even change the chemistry of your skin. All that you are suggesting comes down to hormones. Not "how they were born". The only thing genetics does in determine what genitalia you have at birth.
Question: If genes only determine one's genitalia, how on Earth would they affect something as complex as sexual orientation? Genes code for proteins. As a result, they indirectly affect EVERYTHING about humans, from hormone regulation to the shape of your nose to basic human behaviors and instincts. What you're suggesting about the role of genetics in human development is simply far from the truth. Here is a short and very basic introduction to behavioral genetics: http://www.ornl.gov/sci/techresources/Human_Genome/elsi/behavior.shtml
Oh please. Don't get me started on Homosexuality being related to genetics. I think, 90% of the time, it's just who you are as a person. Not determined by your genes. The other 10% (This is just an example) could be genetic due to them being transexual. Take it from a pansexual guy. I'm not pan because my genes made me pan. I'm pan because I feel that you love the person and not the gender. Some guys just don't like women and vice versa. I think the entire idea that homosexuality is caused by genetic mutations is ridiculous and should be purged from any and all science textbooks.
I guarantee your genetic make-up had some role in your ultimate sexual identity. However, I don't think one can reasonably say "you're genetically pansexual," so much as "your unique genetic make-up allowed for the possibility of you being able to develop a sexual appreciation for members of both sexes." It is quite possible that, had your life experience been radically different than it was, your sexual identity might have also been different. Obviously, I have no proof of this, but it would certainly make sense. I am bisexual myself. Or, at least, I call myself that because I can be attracted to persons of either gender and I don't feel the 'hetero or homo' dichotomy can reasonably be applied to me. It is perfectly possible that if I had radically different life experiences, my resultant sexual identity might have changed in some way. Of course, the problem with saying this is that it superficially seems similar to the fundamentalist Christian claim that homosexuality is caused by some specific set of environmental factors. Of course, this is complete nonsense: even if one's resultant sexual orientation is 'molded' by the environment from the clay of genetic potential, there is no way of knowing what factors cause it to take any particular form, so to speak. Moreover, a mature and fully realized sexual orientation can't be 'unmolded.' There is a reason mental health organizations warn against 'pray away the gay' institutions. More than likely, it is millions of little factors throughout one's life, perhaps combined with a few bigger ones, that lead to the development of a sexual identity. That is my suspicion. PS: Transsexuality does not cause homosexuality. Indeed, if a man is born who is attracted to men but identifies as female brain-sex wise, does this make him a 'gay' man or a 'straight' woman? It really is easy to trip ourselves up in our hasty labels.
I think you know what I meant. Of course genetics are responsible for things like hair color, eye color, skin color, personality, etc! And I know very well how genetics work, thanks. The point still stands that femininity and masculinity are society-based and are really just ideas.
How would I know what you meant? What you just said is entirely different than what you said in your last post. Should I assume that if you say one thing, you actually mean something entirely different? Forgive my snarkiness. I understand mixing up one's words. I do it all the time in spoken conversation, especially if I am impassioned. However, you can hardly blame me for the confusion here. If one understands, say, "masculine traits" to be personality traits or ways of interacting with one's environment that are shared much more widely statistically among men than among women, and this statistical disparity is a cross-cultural phenomenon, isn't it irrational to insist that they must have no biological or genetic basis? I'm not disputing that much of the time what we call "masculine behavior" is purely a reflection of the effects of life-long social indoctrination.
Ballin' and it's related to V sauce. Oh yeah. For that 5 minutes it felt like september. YaY -- Sent from my Palm Pre using Forums
Hey, I know that guy on the PBS show! Iiiinteresting. http://sphotos.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash4/319553_2244202182291_876143045_n.jpg I must tell him right away. xP
