AIBU to wonder how close Mums Netters are to the 'gender norm' ?

[Mellowautumn]

Do you conform to the western 'gender norm' for women? I can do maths, have short hair, never wear a dress and like cars. I am however a Mother and love make up and shopping. I am pretty average among my friends and just cannot connect with the idea that anything apart from my biological woman bits makes me a woman. How do you measure up and is their anything that makes you a woman apart from your biology ?

(Sung to the tune of Megan Trainor's "All About That Bass):

"...Coz it's all about the trans, 'bout the trans, not women..."

It really is beyond tedious that anything that is remotely to do with gender & conformity etc always gets dragged into being about trans.

I saw this thread as being 'how do you fit into the gender mould that is thrust upon us daily as how we should be as women vs how we actually are'.

Mrs Jayy I was raised in the 70's and found it way less gender specific than today.

My mum and her peers were told that they should buy boys dolls and girls train sets, and that they should challenge gender stereotypes. Clothes were mainly brown, orange, red and yellow, for both boys and girls. I remember short hair being normal for girls because "it was easier", both sexes were chucked out to play in the fields, so all wore trousers so as not to ruin their "best" clothes.

It was very different to today's mentality that it's somehow innate for girls to like pink and long hair.

Micah, me too.
Born in '75, so more of a 70s/80s mix, but we were dressed in jeans or cords (which were cut off in summer to make shorts) and were outside playing in all weathers all the time - boys and girls together.
With hindsight I had very few gender pressures at all, if any.

Well I'm not going to pretend that I don't know what the western gender role for people of the same biological sex as me is. I can't watch TV, or see an advert anywhere, or go to the shops or the cinema or listen to music or read books without being subjected to messages, subtle or otherwise, about what all men or women are like and what they want.

Personally, I wear jeans and hoodies mainly, like maths and science, have long hair but don't wear make up, like drinking beer and I don't see the point in killing flowers to put in vases on your cupboard to watch them decompose. So when my husband pisses me off he doesn't feel the need to go to the petrol station florist to buy me some "sorry I'm a twat" flowers. I do like baking cakes though. Mainly for the eating.

I don't believe that gender is innate, or anything other than social conditioning.

HOWEVER

I am still affected by this social conditioning. When my DS was around 10/11 months old, he started taking an interest in watching cars and other vehicles when out and about. My initial thought was "hmm, maybe because he's a boy he likes cars" before mentally slapping myself and remembering that we bought our DD a toy garage for her 1st birthday because she was similarly interested in things that moved.

Maybe feminism and equality didnt reach my house Micah i looked like a 1970sLaura ingills in the dresses i wore sigh

pirate

really how sad.

All my teen dds and their friends are completely different and so are my adult dss.

Glad you just have boys? Mmmm hope you are welcoming yo their GFs

" picked out a DVD and realised I had no idea how to load it, what channel to turn to and had to call my dd. She warbled on about HDMI cables and I sadly realised I am lazy and allow my dh and kids to do s the technical stuff. "

In fairness, you need a bloody PhD these days to work out audio visual systems. In our "entertainment corner" we have TV with built in freeview, below that, VHS player, then turntable, then DVD player, then cable box, then Blu-ray player, then finally amplifier. All connected with about a hundred cables and operated by a similar number of remotes. No frickin' wonder I get confused.

how do you fit into the gender mould that is thrust upon us daily as how we should be as women vs how we actually are'.

Yes, let's go with that, as I think it's what the OP meant and its an interesting question, so for me, where I conform,

• I earn less than DH
• I get a mani-pedi
• I highlight my hair
• I'm a size 8
• I'm not that interested in politics- or rather I like reading articles but hate getting involved in debates internet slanging matches with strangers. Brexit is killing my will to live already.
• Most of my friends are women and I actively enjoy female company.

But on the other hand

• I lift weights (although not sure if that's now mainstream due to all the fitspiration stuff) and do ultra marathons.
• I do a "maths skills" job
• I'm not that into kids. In fact, i only really like my own, and even then.....
• I'm good at technology and mechanics in a layman sense of the word.

A lot of stuff though, is on a "sometimes basis", so

• I sometimes wear makeup but not everyday
• I rarely wear heels but sometimes I do
• I'm reasonably interested in fashion but not massively.
• I have had short hair for about 15 years but now I'm growing it- I'm pretty sure that's cos I fancy a change and not cos I want to pull blokes, but this has made me question that .

-I have some male friends.

One thing I would say is that the urge to conform has reduced as I've got older. My parents totally didn't bring me up in a gender- conformist way, but I still got a lot of outside influence from school where I learned pretty early on that the popular girls were the thin, pretty , "acting dumb" ones.

Op I know what the gender norms are. I am aware of them.

I don't however use that as part of my decision making process

When deciding to cut all
My hair off I thought about how long it would take to do. Not my wether my vagina made it acceptable or not.

Hmmmm
I have shortish hair
I wear trousers all the time
I bought my last pair of boots in the men's section
I do all the gardening and decorating
I am a partner in a construction business
I am not keen on other people's babies
My exam results were better in the science subjects than the arts
I like Top Gear

What am I?

I do a lot of pink jobs. Dh does a lot of blue.
There is some overlap but we have fallen into very stereotypical roles despite being well educated and being aware that we are equal.
Works for us but only because we respect each other and neither tries to rule the roost.

I do drink pints though and utterly believe I am equal to men - despite my pink life.

Absolutely Liz70 i grew up in
A simpler time of 3 channels none of which started until 4pm !

On a serious note as a 70s kid the girls did embroidery whole the boys football.

Yes we played out in jeans but my God thi ha for girls are miles miles better now.

I went to a top girls grammar (you know the type got clever poor kids not crammed middle class kids)and we were encouraged to do secretarial work, nursing and teaching.

I'll be very welcoming to their girlfriends Comeonsummer1

I was recently in Africa and noticed how rarely I was bombarded with images of the 'ideal' female form. It was extremely liberating.

I know this is a contentious issue, but it's interesting, isn't it?

As for me:

I earn quite a bit more than DH
I do anything that requires a drill when doing DIY, and am much better at flatpack than DH
I am very good at navigating and reverse parking (and am confident driving in Europe and driving a van)
I know how to wire a plug, bleed a radiator and connect the blu-ray player
I am quite confident in expressing my opinions and holding lively debates
I love scary films

but...

I love dresses, make-up and have long hair
I love girly playing with DD
I love baking and do all the washing
I have no interest in sport

Whenever I do those 'guess your gender' quizzes, I always come out as male.
For me, those things just make me independent.

Having given it thought I probably conform about 50% of the time. I was better at the arts at school, I wear makeup, have longish hair, am a feminist.

On the other hand, one of my most enjoyed hobbies is poker, I'm currently retraining to go in to a traditionally male dominated field.

And then somewhere in the middle I have a keen interest in current affairs and politics. Which I see as being neutral.

I think this is interesting.

I...

• wear make-up most days
• love babies / children and am pretty maternal
• earn almost exactly the same as DH
• have zero interest in cars
• am incredibly impractical and do absolutely nothing DIY-related whatsoever

• love traditionally male sports, mostly football and cricket both to watch and to play
• am strong and naturally good at most sports I try
• have an edgy sense of humour and am very hard to offend
• am confident and assertive - but hate confrontation with people I care about
• keep very calm in difficult situations and very rarely lose emotional control - I tend to make decisions with head rather than heart
• drink pints, wear jeans
• don't really like shopping
• have zero interest in celebrities

All in all I am certainly perceived by others as a 'blokey' woman but am 100% content with my identity as a woman. As a child I was a massive 'tomboy' (for want of a better word). I do wonder if the current discourse on gender had been prevalent when I was a confused teenager searching for my identity I may have convinced myself that I was something along the lines of 'gender binary'. Without knocking those with gender identity issues I think that it's quite sad that girls like me growing up today might think that they are anything other than a 'proper' woman, just because they don't fit the stereotype.

What the fuck even IS this thread?

This really annoys me. There is no gender norm. Being a woman means having xx chromosomes and a fanny. Within that category, there is huge variation.

pirate of course was only

My dh cooks while I mow the lawn.

Who cares really.

I reject the term gender norm. It's patently bullshit. Apparently wearing a dress and putting on makeup makes you a woman these days, in the eyes of some individuals. As if that's all there is to it.

What does drank the cool aid mean?

It's a reference to Jim Jones

Genuinely horrified that interests such as politics and current affairs are thought of as not gender-norm for a woman.
Jesus Christ.
Short hair???

Agree that it is all complete nonsense, but LOADS of people (in my limited experience) still judge me on this shit on a day to day basis and express surprise that I can reverse park and own a power-drill. It's nonsense, but it's there. So I do find it interesting to explore just how much it is nonsense.