I was reading Fraser Sherman's post about how men enforce masculinity, or rather toxic masculinity. It led me to thinking about how a certain kind of conservative views gender -- specifically, that there is only one correct way to perform a given gender.
I was thinking of a specific conservative I know, who said if their daughter put makeup on their son (the daughter was about five, the son about three) the makeup would be in the trash and both kids would get 'whooped,' to use their language.
Why such an over-reaction to normal play on the part of their kids? Especially since -- according to that kind of conservative -- gender is natural and fixed? If you can't change someone's gender, why do we need to terrorize children into performing their gender properly?
Sherman says this:
As I’ve discussed earlier, part of this is the toxic-masculine insistence that there’s only one way to be a man. Because if there are alternatives, then that concept of manhood — it doesn’t matter if we’re toxic, we’re guys, we can’t help it! — becomes invalid.
That's what's going on, I think. This sort of person has been, themselves, abused into performing gender this one specific way. They've been damaged. They have had a neurosis installed in them by their society or their family or both. This neurosis, this damage, has left them terrified of gender not being performed in one specific way.
What are they doing about this damage? Well, they're damaging their children in exactly the same way. Anything else is just too frightening for them.
It's why they insist on trying to compel everyone else to damage their children as well: because if anyone is performing gender in a way that doesn't match the "right" way, then they are reminded of their own damage. Maybe they are even forced to notice how they're damaging their children. Guilt and terror follow.
Sherman also points out that not being a specific sort of masculine -- or a specific sort of feminine -- terrifies them because they don't have an identity outside of that specific gender. What are they, if they aren't "man" or "woman"? They can't just be a human. They can't just be some self not defined by other people. The neurosis doesn't let them be that.
For example: it doesn't bother me that other people perform gender some way I don't. Like, some people wear makeup and have their nails done. Some people wear their hair long or short. Some people wear skirts and some have earrings. Some people modify their bodies with plastic surgery. Some people spend their lives having kids, and some spend their lives at beauty pageants. I don't do any of that, but why would I care if other people do? I'd have to be neurotic to care about that.
I should feel sorry for the damaged people, I suppose.
But I don't. When you're damaged, the way to react is to that damage is to seek therapy, or whatever else you need to do, to heal your own trauma.
The thing not to do? Damage others in a vain attempt to make yourself feel better.
