Several years ago, I decided to go back in time and watch hours of childhood home movies. I had just gotten divorced, quit my job, and was living alone for the first time in my life. In a desperate effort to confront my unprocessed trauma, I assumed that these painfully unfiltered, first-hand representations of my childhood might be a good place to start. I closed all the windows, crawled in bed, and nervously hit “play” as if I were preparing to watch an eight-hour slasher movie starring me as the main victim
This is a fantastic piece of writing. Thank you. 🙏🏻
I recognize myself in a lot of your experiences. Always been a tomboy and more comfortable around guys. Have never really known how to talk to, or hang out with girls, (unless they were as weird and nerdy as me.) Never liked "girly" clothes or activities. Would much rather play video games. And yes, I tore the barrettes out of my hair as a kid as well. Didn't make me any less female.
I relate so much to struggling with embracing one's femininity. I'm 38 and still working on that. It's not that I don't want to be a woman, or aren't proud to be. I just don't fit the stereotype very well. A stereotype that only seems to have grown stronger in recent years. It's like there's no room for nonconformity anymore. Instead, it's more black and white than ever. And scientifically proven biology is considered offensive. Which I find so strange. Only internalized sexism would find it offensive that men's and women's bodies and minds work differently. Have evolved differently over millennia. It doesn't make one "better" than the other. Just different.
And instead of celebrating each person's right to their own (fluid) individual expression (regardless of what's between their legs), we are more and more divided into ideological groups that we're forced to comply with. (Or to borrow your brilliant expression: building more cages for ourselves.)
All of this feels oddly dystopian to me, and it's something I read and think about a lot, despite not being personally affected by it. But I'm too scared to write about it at length. So I can't thank you enough for doing so, and for bringing more complexity and nuance to this discussion. It's desperately needed. (And makes me feel less alone.) 🖤
Thank you. This is the most thoughtful, kind and complex piece I have read on this topic. The fact that you are willing to be so personal and intimate about your own experience invites readers (me anyway) to relate and stay open-minded in a way that a straight-forward essay would not.
I have been reflecting recently that the categories of male and female are so profound and complex that it it seems unlikely we will ever fully understand them; rejecting them entirely (non-binary) or deciding we utterly do not belong to one or the other may be a deep misunderstanding of their innate and expansive complexity.
Thank you so much for this clear, vulnerable, courageous, and insightful piece Anya. I've been studying and starting to write about gender from my own (male) point of view for the past year or so, and I've come to a lot of similar conclusions about masculinity. That is, that the advent of agriculture and industry served to greatly narrow both feminine and masculine roles, and that despite the power imbalance that came with patriarchy that has been, no doubt, in favor of men, that same patriarchal power structure served to diminish the value (and power) of both men and women. I also felt alienated from my own kind (men), and gravitated to women not only as lovers but as friends and role models.
I appreciate your point about how the nuclear family left many of us with a sole example of our own gender in the lone parent and how that exacerbated—or perhaps even led directly to—the very common feeling of "I am not you, I never want to become you, and I want to avoid anything that makes me feel associated with you"—and I do imagine that if I had had adult role male role models growing up aside from my father, that I wouldn't have felt so much the very same way, and wouldn't have alienated myself so much from him, for so very long. As so many men do.
Most of all I appreciate your expansive view of gender as one part of cultural expression, and I agree wholeheartedly that we are in a very necessary phase of explosion and redefinition of gender—and also that we are very much overcorrecting, and now in many cases further narrowing just as we are also beginning a great expansion of not-just-gender identity.
One book I've enjoyed a lot on this lately has been Grayson Perry's _The Descent of Man_. Another that comes to mind, not directly about gender at all but very much about the coming explosion of human identity in all sorts of shapes, is Bruce Sterling's classic sci-fi novella Schismatrix, published in _Schismatrix Plus_. This story often comes to mind after first reading it perhaps 30 years ago for the vivid descriptions of all sorts of varieties of people who are very much human while having also incorporated genetic and mechanistic modifications resulting in sub-species adapted for zero-gee flight in orbiting colonies, hitching rides in hard vacuum (the lobsters!), as well as various gender-bending and -multiplying varieties.
Personally, I've come to feel a lot of what Perry expresses in his book, that both masculinity and femininity are "a plurality," and "whatever you want it to be." I've been asking myself and others lately how their "femininity" or "masculinity" is different from their _individuality_, and if so, how? I do think that we carry an archetypal template that comes both from our biological sex and from a cultural inheritance of gender—and, that we can choose quite a lot of how we end up expressing gender as part of personal identity. Or at least be conscious of it. Or at least try. Because I also imagine that, of course, I show up as a man born in 1970, and that a lot of how I am will remain tied to that. I doubt that can do all that much evolving within my own lifetime—clearly, these changes are on a larger scale. I'm happy that the hard lines around gender are breaking down, and I remain a long-term optimist (certainly in part due to reading a lot of sci fi as a young person) while sharing your concern about where things stand in the near term.
A friend of mine suggested recently that the next time I, or you, or anyone is asked about their "pronouns," we respond that instead of preferring a particular gender-related pronoun, we would like to be referred to with a prefixing adjective, such as, who knows, "graceful," "stubborn," or perhaps "delicious," "majestic," "dynamic," or, some days, just "tired."
Beautiful piece of writing. I have so many thoughts and recalled many of my own experiences with women and men in my life. I need to come back, read it again, and share it with my daughter. She and I can discuss your article next time she comes over Thank you!
What a thoughtful and vulnerable piece, Anya. Your brave commitment to your self realization is an inspiring example. Let me, as the father of two daughters around your age, say You Go! Wow!
You are a great writer, Anya. I love how you led with your experience and personal history, and ended with the questions your digging has brought forth. Your writing seems to always encourage others to keep digging, and to do so with as much introspection and compassion as possible. Also, your willingness to end a thread of thought untwined is a telling sign of your commitment to perpetual learning and rethinking.
I hope you heal quickly from COVID, but on the other hand if these articles are what we get in return... :)
Hello Anya and Blessings. Your writing (I'm sure) makes your grandmother so proud of you; thanks for sharing a bit of your family history. Interesting that everyone has a mother, huh? I was taught - in 1984 by The Holy Spirit of The Living God - many astounding, astonishing Truths both in our world and in The Holy Bible. One of those things was gender. This is - exactly as you describe so beautifully - a very complex subject, rather the genders are so complex and by design perform different and coequal important functions.
In Isaiah Chapter 11 there are Seven Spirits named and in Isaiah Chapter 61 are what they each are responsible for doing. These are the same written in Revelations in 1:4 (and many other places).
So in Genesis 1 God (elohim in Hebrew) Said: "Let Us make man in Our Own Image...) and so God Created mankind in God's Own Image, male and female, in God's Own Image, Male and Female. We are EXACT COPIES of our Heavenly Family! Why is this important? OMG it explains everything...read on.
I was the second child of 5 and the other 4 were sisters. I had female pets growing up. My mother was always around. I observed the actions of girls/females all my Life and BOY! are they different from girls.
So when Iexperienced the 1984 experience with The Holy Spirit (when I was taught durectly), I experienced what is in The Holy Bible: The infilling of The Holy Spirit, where the Spirit actually indwells your spirit within your human body. And the Presence within me was definitely Female. The She showed me where to find Her in Scripture, where Jesus Said: "But Wisdom is justified of all of Her Children." (Luke 7:35) She is also spoken of as The Comforter and The Teacher.
She took me to The Book of Proverbs and showed me that Proverbs is actually a Spiritual Conversation between our Father and Mother speaking with and preparing Jesus (Their Son, our Brother) for what to expect and experience when he was made a human and placed into Mary, His Mother. Go and reread Proverbs beginning Chapter1 verse 1 and listen to the Two of Them Preparing Jesus. His human Life (New Testament) is revealed in Proverbs (Old Testament).
Think about a mother comforting a child and teaching a child. Men do this, too, but not at scale and certainly in a totally different manner.
Now think about several phrases: Mother earth, behind every good man is a good woman (lending the obvious when studied/discovered in the real world; Nancy Reagan comes to mind, Barbara Bush, Jackie Kennedy, on and on and on, you can't name all of the great women throughout history and Living today. It's beautiful that "behind" our Great Father is His Great Wife.; She is The Spirit of Wisdom, The Holy Spirit, and Her Name is "Grace". If God is the same yesterday, today and forever, then Jesus is taking His Bride, the True Church, Whose Name is "Faith" - just like our Father in Heaven has oyr Mother.
So the entire Creation is splendid, indeed. There is much more evidence like this in Scripture to discover. And here is The Key: Invite The Holy Spirit to come "into" relationship and She will do so. Just simply say: "Holy Spirit will you come into me and Comfort me and Teach me everything You Want to show me?" It's that simple.
My source of inspiration to share this in a comment came first through you and you excellent writing, then the second Witness is The Holy Spirit; She and you, Anya, work together very, very well. Thank you - Blessings
This is a fantastic piece of writing. Thank you. 🙏🏻
I recognize myself in a lot of your experiences. Always been a tomboy and more comfortable around guys. Have never really known how to talk to, or hang out with girls, (unless they were as weird and nerdy as me.) Never liked "girly" clothes or activities. Would much rather play video games. And yes, I tore the barrettes out of my hair as a kid as well. Didn't make me any less female.
I relate so much to struggling with embracing one's femininity. I'm 38 and still working on that. It's not that I don't want to be a woman, or aren't proud to be. I just don't fit the stereotype very well. A stereotype that only seems to have grown stronger in recent years. It's like there's no room for nonconformity anymore. Instead, it's more black and white than ever. And scientifically proven biology is considered offensive. Which I find so strange. Only internalized sexism would find it offensive that men's and women's bodies and minds work differently. Have evolved differently over millennia. It doesn't make one "better" than the other. Just different.
And instead of celebrating each person's right to their own (fluid) individual expression (regardless of what's between their legs), we are more and more divided into ideological groups that we're forced to comply with. (Or to borrow your brilliant expression: building more cages for ourselves.)
All of this feels oddly dystopian to me, and it's something I read and think about a lot, despite not being personally affected by it. But I'm too scared to write about it at length. So I can't thank you enough for doing so, and for bringing more complexity and nuance to this discussion. It's desperately needed. (And makes me feel less alone.) 🖤
Thank you. This is the most thoughtful, kind and complex piece I have read on this topic. The fact that you are willing to be so personal and intimate about your own experience invites readers (me anyway) to relate and stay open-minded in a way that a straight-forward essay would not.
I have been reflecting recently that the categories of male and female are so profound and complex that it it seems unlikely we will ever fully understand them; rejecting them entirely (non-binary) or deciding we utterly do not belong to one or the other may be a deep misunderstanding of their innate and expansive complexity.
Thank you so much for this clear, vulnerable, courageous, and insightful piece Anya. I've been studying and starting to write about gender from my own (male) point of view for the past year or so, and I've come to a lot of similar conclusions about masculinity. That is, that the advent of agriculture and industry served to greatly narrow both feminine and masculine roles, and that despite the power imbalance that came with patriarchy that has been, no doubt, in favor of men, that same patriarchal power structure served to diminish the value (and power) of both men and women. I also felt alienated from my own kind (men), and gravitated to women not only as lovers but as friends and role models.
I appreciate your point about how the nuclear family left many of us with a sole example of our own gender in the lone parent and how that exacerbated—or perhaps even led directly to—the very common feeling of "I am not you, I never want to become you, and I want to avoid anything that makes me feel associated with you"—and I do imagine that if I had had adult role male role models growing up aside from my father, that I wouldn't have felt so much the very same way, and wouldn't have alienated myself so much from him, for so very long. As so many men do.
Most of all I appreciate your expansive view of gender as one part of cultural expression, and I agree wholeheartedly that we are in a very necessary phase of explosion and redefinition of gender—and also that we are very much overcorrecting, and now in many cases further narrowing just as we are also beginning a great expansion of not-just-gender identity.
One book I've enjoyed a lot on this lately has been Grayson Perry's _The Descent of Man_. Another that comes to mind, not directly about gender at all but very much about the coming explosion of human identity in all sorts of shapes, is Bruce Sterling's classic sci-fi novella Schismatrix, published in _Schismatrix Plus_. This story often comes to mind after first reading it perhaps 30 years ago for the vivid descriptions of all sorts of varieties of people who are very much human while having also incorporated genetic and mechanistic modifications resulting in sub-species adapted for zero-gee flight in orbiting colonies, hitching rides in hard vacuum (the lobsters!), as well as various gender-bending and -multiplying varieties.
Personally, I've come to feel a lot of what Perry expresses in his book, that both masculinity and femininity are "a plurality," and "whatever you want it to be." I've been asking myself and others lately how their "femininity" or "masculinity" is different from their _individuality_, and if so, how? I do think that we carry an archetypal template that comes both from our biological sex and from a cultural inheritance of gender—and, that we can choose quite a lot of how we end up expressing gender as part of personal identity. Or at least be conscious of it. Or at least try. Because I also imagine that, of course, I show up as a man born in 1970, and that a lot of how I am will remain tied to that. I doubt that can do all that much evolving within my own lifetime—clearly, these changes are on a larger scale. I'm happy that the hard lines around gender are breaking down, and I remain a long-term optimist (certainly in part due to reading a lot of sci fi as a young person) while sharing your concern about where things stand in the near term.
A friend of mine suggested recently that the next time I, or you, or anyone is asked about their "pronouns," we respond that instead of preferring a particular gender-related pronoun, we would like to be referred to with a prefixing adjective, such as, who knows, "graceful," "stubborn," or perhaps "delicious," "majestic," "dynamic," or, some days, just "tired."
Beautiful piece of writing. I have so many thoughts and recalled many of my own experiences with women and men in my life. I need to come back, read it again, and share it with my daughter. She and I can discuss your article next time she comes over Thank you!
What a thoughtful and vulnerable piece, Anya. Your brave commitment to your self realization is an inspiring example. Let me, as the father of two daughters around your age, say You Go! Wow!
You are a great writer, Anya. I love how you led with your experience and personal history, and ended with the questions your digging has brought forth. Your writing seems to always encourage others to keep digging, and to do so with as much introspection and compassion as possible. Also, your willingness to end a thread of thought untwined is a telling sign of your commitment to perpetual learning and rethinking.
I hope you heal quickly from COVID, but on the other hand if these articles are what we get in return... :)
Hello Anya and Blessings. Your writing (I'm sure) makes your grandmother so proud of you; thanks for sharing a bit of your family history. Interesting that everyone has a mother, huh? I was taught - in 1984 by The Holy Spirit of The Living God - many astounding, astonishing Truths both in our world and in The Holy Bible. One of those things was gender. This is - exactly as you describe so beautifully - a very complex subject, rather the genders are so complex and by design perform different and coequal important functions.
In Isaiah Chapter 11 there are Seven Spirits named and in Isaiah Chapter 61 are what they each are responsible for doing. These are the same written in Revelations in 1:4 (and many other places).
So in Genesis 1 God (elohim in Hebrew) Said: "Let Us make man in Our Own Image...) and so God Created mankind in God's Own Image, male and female, in God's Own Image, Male and Female. We are EXACT COPIES of our Heavenly Family! Why is this important? OMG it explains everything...read on.
I was the second child of 5 and the other 4 were sisters. I had female pets growing up. My mother was always around. I observed the actions of girls/females all my Life and BOY! are they different from girls.
So when Iexperienced the 1984 experience with The Holy Spirit (when I was taught durectly), I experienced what is in The Holy Bible: The infilling of The Holy Spirit, where the Spirit actually indwells your spirit within your human body. And the Presence within me was definitely Female. The She showed me where to find Her in Scripture, where Jesus Said: "But Wisdom is justified of all of Her Children." (Luke 7:35) She is also spoken of as The Comforter and The Teacher.
She took me to The Book of Proverbs and showed me that Proverbs is actually a Spiritual Conversation between our Father and Mother speaking with and preparing Jesus (Their Son, our Brother) for what to expect and experience when he was made a human and placed into Mary, His Mother. Go and reread Proverbs beginning Chapter1 verse 1 and listen to the Two of Them Preparing Jesus. His human Life (New Testament) is revealed in Proverbs (Old Testament).
Think about a mother comforting a child and teaching a child. Men do this, too, but not at scale and certainly in a totally different manner.
Now think about several phrases: Mother earth, behind every good man is a good woman (lending the obvious when studied/discovered in the real world; Nancy Reagan comes to mind, Barbara Bush, Jackie Kennedy, on and on and on, you can't name all of the great women throughout history and Living today. It's beautiful that "behind" our Great Father is His Great Wife.; She is The Spirit of Wisdom, The Holy Spirit, and Her Name is "Grace". If God is the same yesterday, today and forever, then Jesus is taking His Bride, the True Church, Whose Name is "Faith" - just like our Father in Heaven has oyr Mother.
So the entire Creation is splendid, indeed. There is much more evidence like this in Scripture to discover. And here is The Key: Invite The Holy Spirit to come "into" relationship and She will do so. Just simply say: "Holy Spirit will you come into me and Comfort me and Teach me everything You Want to show me?" It's that simple.
My source of inspiration to share this in a comment came first through you and you excellent writing, then the second Witness is The Holy Spirit; She and you, Anya, work together very, very well. Thank you - Blessings
So why hasn't theology