Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Brilliant blog about what "being defined by your vagina" actually means

25 replies

QuentinSummers · 03/09/2017 22:37

I love this post
transwidow.wordpress.com/2017/08/30/on-being-defined-by-your-vagina/amp/
Think it should be required reading for all men.

OP posts:
JigglyTuff · 03/09/2017 22:52

Yes! Read that the other day. Really excellent piece

SoldMeDownTheRiver · 04/09/2017 01:15

Wow that article is great.
I was thinking similar. That perhaps the reason some transwomen don't realise there are things about womanhood that no biological male can experience or appreciate is that there is nothing very special about manhood. Everything that men experience, women experience the physiological equivalent of. E.g. Men get erections but women get the physiological equivalent (arousal in our vulvas). Men ejaculate but women get the physiological equivalent (ovulation and orgasm).
I can't think of anything that men experience with their bodies that women don't have the female equivalent of. But there are so many things that women experience that men don't have the equivalent of - menstrual cycles, menstrual problems, pregnancy, labour, birth, breastfeeding, menopause, miscarriage, hormonal birth control etc etc. And these are all things that women don't talk about openly with men so they just have no clue!
So it seems like perhaps transmen can actually experience manhood (if they take testosterone and have a full hysterectomy) since there isn't really anything terribly special about manhood (not that i can think of anyway). But it doesn't work the other way round because women's bodies really do define our lives in a way that biological males can't imagine.

BertieBotts · 04/09/2017 01:23

Eh? There's only "nothing special" about manhood because the default position is assumed to be male. Women are literally considered a special interest group because of this, rather than just being half of the population.

SoldMeDownTheRiver · 04/09/2017 01:47

"Special" was the wrong choice of word. I meant that men don't have any "particular" things that they experience that women don't have the equivalent of. So they don't understand that women have lots of things that men do not have the equivalent of.

TheCountessofFitzdotterel · 04/09/2017 08:59

That is very good.
Most women aren't on the pill though.

Datun · 04/09/2017 09:14

Very good points in that article.
Excellent article.

I'll add to this though.

To men, it doesn’t make any more sense to be defined by your dick than it does to be defined by your elbow.

Many men are defined by their dick in terms of getting it into something.

Which actually adds to their lack of understanding about vaginas. Vaginas being defined by them as merely something for their dick.

CaoNiMartacus · 04/09/2017 12:41

"It’s probably pretty hard for a male to imagine living with the responsibility of having a vagina. With the knowledge that if you’re not ever-vigiliant, 24/7 for the thirty years in which you are fertile, an entire human being might come out of your body and demand every resource you have or can acquire for the next twenty plus years. Yes, even infertile women, who generally don’t know they’re infertile until they try to have children. And yes, even sexually inactive women and lesbians, because rape exists and is common."

This. Absolutely this.

ItsAllGoingToBeFine · 04/09/2017 12:50

I'm ashamed to say that I had never really thought about it that way before - great article, thanks OP!

ChattyLion · 04/09/2017 13:17

Wow- Excellent article. This should be required reading for everyone. Thanks for sharing.

QuentinSummers · 04/09/2017 16:34

That was my favourite para too cao. Sucker punch to read that!

OP posts:
Backingvocals · 04/09/2017 16:40

Yes it's very good (can we have a like button please MNHQ )

OlennasWimple · 04/09/2017 19:33

I don't think about my vagina nearly that much, and I'm not ever vigilant about it Confused

Datun · 04/09/2017 19:42

.OlennasWimple

I don't actively go around thinking like that. But it is an acknowledgement, always. Something that crops up, when it has to.

QuentinSummers · 04/09/2017 21:37

I don't think about my vagina all the time. But contraception, worrying about being pregnant/not pregnant, menstrual issues, thrush etc etc have all taken up way more of my time and energy than I would like (and doctors trips). That's true for most women I think. It just isn't the same for men at all.

OP posts:
BertieBotts · 04/09/2017 21:47

Which actually adds to their lack of understanding about vaginas. Vaginas being defined by them as merely something for their dick.

Yes.

SummerflowerXx · 05/09/2017 22:18

This may be the argument, but the point of patriarchy is that vaginas are more than penis receptacles. But also that men know the power their penises have - rape is about control; domestic abuse gets worse when women are pregnant; etc. The power works precisely because women do not tend to think about their vaginas, they are too busy living lives defined by social norms built on biological difference. But I don't believe men don't think about their dicks, of course they do. Abuse and inequality works because it is intended to. It is not a mere accident of social conditioning. And it is predicated on biological difference.

Women have historically been defined as other because of reproductive biology - weaker, unstable, unclean because of the flux of menstruation. Otherness has seen women excluded from jobs, education, public society. I don't think it is a coincidence that when women started winning the argument that biology was not destiny (to take from the Fawcett Society), and that gender norms were socially constructed, men started to erase biology and shore up gender norms.

The whole point is that the existence of transwomen reinforces ideals of masculinity (otherwise there would be greater flexibility in how one presents as a man). It asserts the dominance of the penis holders - both in the exclusion of feminity from being a man, and the co-opting of femininity by trans women (regardless of whether they still have a penis or not).

Datun · 05/09/2017 22:21

men started to erase biology and shore up gender norms.

Bloody hell. I thought there was nothing fresh to hear about this issue, but that snippet has definitely given me food for thought.

cheeseknight · 07/09/2017 17:40

Forgive me, I don't know a lot about this.

SummerflowerXx are you saying that as women become more powerful in society that men are jumping on the bandwagon and choosing to become women? To gain power?

And at the same time other men see it as important to continue to show women as 'other' and therefore downplay this increase in power?

I hadn't considered it that way before.

SummerflowerXx · 08/09/2017 06:15

I think that is a really good question, because the idea that women have power jars with me so I need to try and think through what I mean. I think the second part of what you say is true, but not necessarily the first.

So, second wave feminists argued that sex and gender were different. So sex was biological difference and gender was a social construct. Being born female did not mean that women should be confined to more of the domestic tasks or be paid less; these were differences which were socially imposed because of gender norms (women were seen as more nurturing and caring historically). In other words, gender norms were built on biological difference, but second wave feminists argued that the foundations of this were false. There is no biological reason why a woman cannot do the same job as a man, or be paid the same, there are only social reasons.

At the same time, second wave feminists laid bare other factors of women's oppression such as rape and domestic violence, which were based on biological difference, but also social conventions which saw men as the head of the household and women (still) as his property (physically).

These things meant that for second wave feminism the root of women's oppression was in their biology.

Addressing these issues has meant women have more equality and more choices to leave abusive relationships and be self-sufficient, yes. But I would say that is agency, not power, because structural inequality is still there.

The second part - the shoring up of gender norms - is more complicated. Because I think it comes from neoliberalism (third wave feminism combined with capitalism) as much as men - so it does not work in the same way as second wave feminism sees men as the oppressor class. The technologies of power (the way power works) are less obvious and more insidious. So third wave feminism was about performing gender, embracing female sexuality as a form of empowerment and one's gender identity as something one could create and own. I think (and I am not an expert) it started off as a way of exercising agency but was co-opted by neoliberal capitalism as a way of making money (femininity could be packaged and sold). What we saw in the early 2000s, if not before, was a very clear gendering of lifestyles and products.

So whereas in the 1970s things were much more gender neutral, e.g. children's toys/clothes etc, by the 2000s, they were clearly gendered. This extended to adults - at one point, I realised my bathroom was a sea of bright pink.

The third thing was then what I call the erasing of biology. The trans argument that being a woman is external and an identity one can choose; in fact, referring to periods and pregnancy is seen as transphobic (despite the fact that these things were the reasons women in the past were confined to narrow social roles). This is the antithesis of what second wave feminism argued and why the TRA argument is with second wave feminists. However, the root of trans I think is about escaping one's socially imposed gender role, not biology. But the way to escape gender is configured as taking on the gender norms of the other sex, not by dismantling gender norms.

It works to shore up gender because the confines of what it means to be a man have narrowed - if men want to wear make up or do more socially-constructed female things, they must be trans*. It enforces a much narrower view of masculinity (shoring up gender norms) than was apparent, say, in the 1980s when men could wear make up and be more androgynous. And correspondingly, the idea of what it means to be a woman is narrowed down to external ideals of femininity (it is no accident that Caitlyn Jenner was Glamour's woman of the year, a trans woman can be a better ideal of a woman as she is essentially being created)

I don't think it is about women's power, because transwomen don't give up the power they had by being born male. That is not possible as male privilege (the way boys are treated differently from girls) is inscribed from birth by society. I don't think they get women's power either, as women don't have any (they just have agency, which is the ability to negotiate structural barriers and cultural norms as individuals; power would be the ability to create those norms).

In fact some transwomen are exerting power by very publicly defining what it means to be a woman.

Which comes back to the point that (natural born as oppose to hormonally or surgically constructed) biology is being erased as (socially constructed) gender norms are shored up.

SummerflowerXx · 08/09/2017 06:22

Sorry, if that makes no sense, I woke up too early and I can't really get my own head around it.

QuentinSummers · 08/09/2017 07:31

That is a brilliant post Star

OP posts:
Datun · 08/09/2017 07:46

That makes perfect sense. I think you've nailed it SummerflowerXx

Quite apart from the trans issue, your clear distinction between agency and power is very interesting.

It might account for the often vehement disagreement between feminists over things like prostitution and pornography (where the women might indeed have agency, but that doesn't translate to power).

But the way to escape gender is configured as taking on the gender norms of the other sex, not by dismantling gender norms.

Despite women everywhere, telling them that the gender norms they fondly imagined, are just that, fantasy. And, they don't take on the gender norms of women, they take on the presentation of women. They aren't suddenly raising the children (quite the opposite), doing the school run, making the sandwiches and taking care of elderly parents. Irritating.

In fact some transwomen are exerting power by very publicly defining what it means to be a woman.

Totally. Ugh.

This is interesting:

It works to shore up gender because the confines of what it means to be a man have narrowed - if men want to wear make up or do more socially-constructed female things, they must be trans

Because I suddenly thought, if there are any guys who fancy a bit of guyeyeliner (as in the 80s) and a spot of gender busting, they won't do it now lest they be considered trans.

On the other hand, they were willing to try something typical female, but not something typically 'male identifying as female'. Why is that worse, if women are considered less than men?

Fascinating post. Lots to think about.

As an aside, do you have any theory about autogynephilia? From what I can tell, there is no one theory to explain it, I suppose much like any other fetish.

ISaySteadyOn · 08/09/2017 10:21

Brilliant post, Summerflower.

cheeseknight · 08/09/2017 12:11

Thanks for replying so fully summerflowerXx. It will take a bit of processing for me but what you're saying makes sense. I get the distinction between power and agency.

SummerflowerXx · 09/09/2017 07:30

Yes, Datun you are right, transwomen are not taking on the gender norms of the other sex, they are taking on the external presentation which can be bought (by them) and sold (by pharmaceuticals, surgeons, lifestyle brands). That is a crucial distinction, which I think fits with my argument about neoliberal capitalism. I was thinking about gender norms in terms of lifestyle, external feminine identity products as a result of the 'pinkifying' of the market, but socially embedded gender norms affect every aspect of women's lives.

I will come back to the other points. DS wants attention.

I appreciate the kind wordsFlowers

New posts on this thread. Refresh page
Swipe left for the next trending thread