Looking into the thought of why girls should act and behave a certain way. It seems like it is an ideal that was sold in the 1950s by men. So it doesn’t really say anything about their true nature.
Now the question is why do men want girls to act in that manner. The hypothesis would be that it has some kind biological roots. That men need to feel like they are the protectors of weak and innocent.
Assuming a fraction of this is true, then I can understand the #feminism movement to ridicule the #propaganda apposed onto womenkind to suppress their nature.
@trinsec the only one that doesn’t really work is clothing, since we all have different body types
@barefootstache Well, that kinda depends. I’m more about the … well why do girls have to wear pink frilly dresses and boys don’t?
When little girls want to wear normal clothes, the choice is very limited. Almost always pink and all that stuff. Kinda as if little kids are already forced into certain roles.
And for little children, body types don’t matter at all yet! At least until the age of puberty!
For adults, it should be normal to wear whatever, but of course adjusted for your body type, makes sense. That’s just biological.
But the difference between dresses and pants is not biological but cultural.
Back then, men wore dresses/robes too, or even skirts. And it is only recently that it was acceptable for women to wear pants. The 1950’s-60’s was kinda a revolution in dress styles. But it kinda seems like we’re regressing, online it looks like that women are only interested in makeup or something, or at least the influencers try to convince us of that. Wtf?
Annoys me a lot. Sorry for the semi-rant.
@trinsec color coding boys and girls is a weird practice we as a society adopted. One could choose a neutral color like yellow for both sexes, but it is very stressful for the parents to enforce this decision onto their peers. Since the peers will default to the societal standards.
If we dressed according to our physiology then men would wear dresses and women pants. The Scotts knew something about comfort…
And makeup, depending on the circles you travel in, you will see everything from men/women wearing or not wearing makeup. Anything regarding hairstyling could be considered as a form of makeup.
Makeup as a tool for enhancement is fine, though for cover ups for natural beauty is a big no-no. This is a very thin line.
@barefootstache Male / Female difference can follow some patriarchical template or tendency (or other things deliberate by man) but I would say behaviour or tendency exists in female at birth and it's not just influence of man, but the female nature itself is what I've come across before (in my limit experience and talking to my partners, parents, everyone lots about why they /others felt something in a situation...).
So my limited experiences tells me there is feeling regardless of man.
Your first paragraph ending seems to kill most of that and just put nature of women on men in 1950's...! Quite sure it's not going to be so or so simply the reasons (perhaps you were never claiming it to be but there wasn't enough doubt in the writing, no probs).
So without trying to be patriarchical-looking the female has different traits, behaviours and tendencies... pretty much because of their biological form and abilities (though not only that but mostly I'd say since when you exist as something therefore "you are" somewhat that).
The question is not just the taking advantage but existing construct at birth which is stronger than any man (if you ever lived with 1 or many!). Tendencies are around house-keeping or cleanliness are not just a stereotype but related to themselves.
Same goes for man but in other ways which might compound things for women on the other side but my experience is that women and men will anyway throw themselves in the mix and women will have feelings in equations relevant to them or not (they are almost unstoppable as emotions or interference overpowers them and brain is much more active / wondering / needing to help / wanting to assist / provide care for everyone / wanting to be felt worthy / self-sacrificing / providing service)
I could say more as they are not just x or y, but I believe in a simple way if you give different organs or abilities then this does determine certain things - quite similar to men given more muscular skeleton or construct who are more prone to use them or be orientated so... and those that don't feel equivalent in that trait will have certain feeling about that or simply 'need a man' as life needs those things too as a compliment (the same man needs many parts of a woman for functional or other reasons).
This is endanger of offending but honestly with experience think there is a difference between one type and another by nature and birth of that type.
I think also man / woman complete or compliment each other so it's not only looking at gender (although we need to reference it somehow). A natural yin-yan is there so it's not about just man or woman... though temporary focus is not a problem for me... and ideally humanity gets along no matter what their ability and puzzles it into other people's life.
EXTRA READING / PSYCHOLOGY
A little bit of story about a lady or female telling me herself so shows a slice of what I mention above.
@freeschool well the question still needs to be answered if tendencies align with nature? Or if it has been propagated onto them?
@barefootstache No doubt in my mind that you are born with many things and can have it trained in or out / enhance it too (but the aforementioned is stronger or starts first).
If you are starting from something / born that then you are that (to some extent or to start with) while you can become something else and can choose as you go (you are growing and changing)
I get the feeling you're seeing it as one or other or slightly binary this or the other - the consideration of growth has lots of variables but you start from x or y mainly (not only).
So bit of both *but* you can't change very easily your biological self or existence - and after existing / bring born then you can start working on anything else.
(I'm not sure why you have any doubts to be honest..)
So I'm not asking but perhaps explore in yourself why not the above or points... or what makes you doubt it more than support it.
I think the base of this is solid while you can be other possibilities or avenues of development, it's on top of being born first :)
@freeschool this sounds like a more elaborate way of saying “nature vs nurture”.
Maybe an example might help to understand my original post. For example that girls need to be pretty and act a specific way to enforce their innocents.
Afaik this is propagated feature and has little to do with nature.
@barefootstache
In my experience a girl / lady would anyway have such things in mind... and man just enforced or exploited their nature... and that I feel that is also part of nature as man somewhat... but sticking to topic much like a flower or something that needs to give birth needs to attract a pollinator or mate (or male) then one acts or is accordingly (as well as feeling the biological urge to reproduce or take care of another, or have a man do the defending work).
So while there is patriarchy and everything anyway everywhere, you might find girls / females playing with more female things and role-playing female things anyway according to reproduction or finding a mate (fairytales / finding a prince / caring for kids / taking care of the house / cooking / cleaning) all because they also want to (and not limited to that) and have natural affinity towards what they do. You couldn't stop them same as it's hard to stop yourself working your other muscles!
Maybe I have veered off topic or it's more different with everyone nowadays but I believe / have seen consistently and ask... so I'll accept limited defeat here saying some things (such as your self) are much less inescapable or without major work if you would decide to change.
@freeschool well the hard thing is to observe a natural state in a civilized society that has propagated ideals all over the place.
The question might be more appropriate in a hunter-gatherer tribe. If your list of examples still hold up?
On the aspect of attraction and comparing it to a flower, really doesn’t work. Afaik flowers don’t go out of their ways to become more beautiful, they take what they have and do their best based off of the environment they were handed.
People can apply the same principles and attraction would still exist. The part that diverges is that people go out of their way to enhance certain aesthetically pleasing features in the hope to get more mate options. This aspect can also be found in the animal kingdom.
Maybe this has answered my original question.
@barefootstache I believe expectations placed onto men and women are a product of the common beliefs in their society at the time rather than a biological function.
In my opinion, the reason why many of these beliefs seem to be the same in many different cultures is because men and women have a discernible physical difference, which means one sex is often better than the other in certain activities.
For higher efficiency, men and women adopted the roles that they were good at. Men excel at strength, which was necessary to survive in the tribal and later the agricultural world, which means men possessed more utility and thus more authority. Women stayed home and cared for children, since children required their mothers, and because a lack of strength made women useless for physical labor in harsher areas. Eventually, people started to affix tasks to the sex that practiced them.
We do have empirical evidence in this regard. Descendants of societies which required a higher amount of physical labor due to their harsher climate tend to have strict gender norms, whereas descendants of societies with agricultural endowments due to which planting and harvesting crops did not require heavy physical labor have less strict gender norms.
@SeekingBlood do agree that society is the biggest factor. Though from what I see, men have the majority say in what it should be.
Let’s say we take the example that women should be pretty or aesthetically pleasing. This seems like a marketing gimmick.
Or the idea that women don’t fart, but rather shoot rainbows and always smell good.
I can understand that the majority is cultural or societal standards, though some of it has a biological component.
@barefootstache I’m all for unisex activities/clothing/culture.