RANT: I hate how gender stereotypes are being reinforced

submitted by Agodachi from self.GenderCritical

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[–]fuckingsealions 48 insightful - 4 fun48 insightful - 3 fun49 insightful - 4 fun -  (4 children)

I know I'm one of the "old woman yells at cloud" types here, but I remember in the 90s how it was suddenly cool for men to wear nail polish and eye makeup. I loved it! I know it goes back to punk/Bowie and there's been historical periods where men are the fancy dandies. It's such a bummer that boys and men can't just do this now without making some kind of identity politics declaration.

I was just thinking about how when my daughters were little in the aughts kid clothes started getting crazy gendered. There's a ton of pictures of me in the 1970s and 80s wearing red, plaid, plain t-shirts. I tried to give my girls that option but once they got to be school aged my older daughter got extremely pink and princessy, I think in part from peer comments and conformity. My youngest stayed in funkier stuff from the thrift store (I remember she had this badass camo T with a scorpion on it. Aaaaand she's a lesbian now, lol.

Point being I wonder if these super hard splits in culture are affecting young trans/NB people now.

I like these catalog snaps: http://15minutelunch.blogspot.com/2007/10/strap-in-shut-up-and-hold-on-were-going.html

[–]our_team_is_winning 38 insightful - 1 fun38 insightful - 0 fun39 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

I know it goes back to punk/Bowie

From 70s glam to late 70s punk, early 80s New Romantic -- loads of "genderbending" as they'd call it, androgyny, men in makeup and sometimes skirts -- and some were gay and some weren't. Pretty young crowd here I think but look at early Duran Duran, or even the Los Angeles hair band scene of the early 80s -- those guys wore so much makeup, unlike teenage female me who didn't wear any. Guys who weren't into that music scene would call them insults for gay, but in reality most of those pop stars in heavy makeup were getting a lot of women. And NOBODY, I mean NOBODY ever suggested they were really women trapped in men's bodies! Everyone was just playing dress-up and having fun. I almost feel bad for this Tumblr generation because early 80s young people liked all sorts of crazy fashion and makeup on a lot of teen boys and girls as well as the 20-something popstars, it didn't matter, and you could be straight, gay, or bi, it wasn't tied to your fashion, and nobody made up these silly "I'm pansexual genderfluid nonbinary transqueer" or whatever "genderspecial" names they've got, and NOBODY talked about switching sexes. Because it is not scientifically possible to do that. Ever.

[–]MarkTwainiac 10 insightful - 1 fun10 insightful - 0 fun11 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I agree with your overall points, but just wanna point out that "gender bending" goes back even before 70s glam, punk, and 80s era Duran Duran and hairbands. Before those acts a number of performing artists such as the worldwide supper club sensation The Incomparable Hildegarde (Loretta Sell), Liberace, Little Richard and Tiny Tim did their best to send up rigid sex stereotypes and expectations.

Here's macho Mick Jagger sporting long hair, red lipstick, eye makeup, velvet trousers and pink top in the 1960s: https://youtu.be/Ef9QnZVpVd8

What's more, during the 1970s gender bending went well beyond Bowie. Check out the early 70s incarnations of groups and performers such as Roxy Music, Marc Bolan/T Rex, Sparks, NY Dolls, Suzi Quatro, Sweet and Jobriath as can be seen on YouTube.

https://youtu.be/306ZNNuW4Kg

[–]Oof_Too_Humid 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Yeah, I grew up in the seventies. The whole environment of the time made me a little baby feminist. (Though mom wouldn't have necessarily called herself a feminist, she definitely wasn't shy about pointing out the shit women had to go through that men did not.) Anyway, I was surprised, offended & saddened by the return of the princess shit for little girls in the nineties. I think part of the reason why it was so big was that by then, so many items were being made cheaply in China. People could suddenly buy so much more crap for low, low prices at Walmart.

[–]Comatoast 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Ehh, I think they were hot because of what they stood for. The rebellious man who wouldn't live by the rules, the bad boys. Maybe I'm wrong.