I think we are poised at a very interesting point in time, where we are really starting to question and talk about what things MEAN. One of the topics that is coming up a lot, for many people, is what does it mean to be a Woman. So, in honor of International Women's Day, I figured I'd talk a little bit about this today.
We are raised to think of things as being gendered, especially animals (which humans are!). But many people also anthropomorphize things (give them human like traits), which means they tend to gender other things as well...especially if you speak one of the languages that uses gendered words for just about everything.
But for many years, we didn't really question many of our gendered associations. Baby girls get dressed in pink dresses with lace, are gifted dolls to play with and are taught that when they grow up they will be mommies. Some of these associations are SO strong, that people kind of freak out when they are broken...if your boy plays with a doll or wears pink (seriously, since when is a color gendered???) then he is somehow 'less' than the other boys (though I do love when people point out that boys playing with dolls would just make them good fathers).
In Pagan circles, there is often a clear male and female line drawn even in ritual. We call upon the divine masculine and feminine, some groups pair up in 'opposites' (by gender), we also tend to split up into gendered groups, for women's circles and men's circles.
I've never been terribly comfortable in groups of only women. I've always been a tomboy, and most of my friends are men. I'm learning how to be friends with women, and how to interact in women's groups. And even as it's becoming more familiar to me, and even sometimes a desired thing (I swear, the first few women's groups I ended up in I was equally baffled as to how I got there and to what I should do now that I was part of it!), I still often feel uncomfortable or as if I am excluding people by being part of a female exclusive (or centric) group.
Now, most of the women's groups I am part of are not exclusionary. They are just women-focused, and so they draw in more women. Some are exclusive, and men are not invited to join. And here is where it gets tricky for me. We have definitions of what is female and what is male, but I feel that, in many ways, those definitions are outdated.
The most obvious issue comes to transgendered people. If you were assigned male at birth, but identify as female, where do you fall? You wouldn't be comfortable in a men's group, and some women's groups wouldn't accept you. I've actually seen some groups say that you have to have ovaries (or any other of the female reproductive organs) to be a 'real' woman (which, by the way, I think is utter bunk). But this creates even more issues, because there are many women who were born women, who identify as women, and who have lost their reproductive organs due to different circumstances. Are they any less of a woman?
From there we go even further down the rabbit hole. If we center out definition of womanhood on reproductive organs, are you only a 'real' (going to be using the quotes here to indicate my disdain of this usage of real....read with full ironic tone!) woman if you have bred babies? If they survived to make more babies? If you breast-fed them?
It seems a little ridiculous (at least to me) when put this way...but how many women have been treated as if they are less than if they don't have children? How many have been asked, point blank, by absolute strangers, when they will be having kids, or why they don't have them? There is this assumption that all women will have babies and become mothers, and I think this is a really harmful stereotype for many reasons.
Obviously, some women medically can not have children. And how heartbreaking is it to be constantly reminded of this fact, especially if you deeply desire to be pregnant (yes, they can still adopt, but for many women, that time of pregnancy is particularly sacred).
On the flip side, I am a mother (though my son is grown now), and I'm sure you've heard me say before that as much as I loved him, I never really embraced the role of motherhood. I was not someone who adored pregnancy (I had to pee...all the time....thank goodness I was spared morning sickness though!). I had very mixed feelings about breastfeeding. When both of those were done, I have had almost no desire to ever experience them again. So, for me, when a women's group is so focused on these aspects of being a woman, it makes me feel very excluded.
When I was younger, my best friends were male, so I never had those girlfriend experiences that are in every movie and tv show in existence. I had friends who were girls, but my close friends, the ones I talked to late in the night and shared my deepest fears, craziest ideas and crushes....they were all guys. I was also not into the 'girly' stuff (like makeup, dressing up...yeah not really sure what else to clump in here) when I was younger, so I sort of watched the other girls as if they were another species...they were interested in things that didn't appeal to me.
One of the things I found particularly interesting, as I grew up and started to realize there were outliers to the stereotypes, was that women who acted not very 'womanly' were often called out as being lesbians. It was one of those things where if you were loud, tough, or 'manly' in any way (dress, behavior, likes/dislikes), then obviously you must like women. And the same worked in reverse, a man who displayed 'womanly' traits must like other men. We have entwined the ideas of gender and sexuality in ways that I just think are a bit crazy. I mean, if I like things that men like...wouldn't that just mean that I have more things in common with the guys, and therefore have more to relate to them, if we were in a relationship?
It goes back to the gender idea though. That we associate traits with a gender (man=strong, woman=passive), and people who are attracted to those things must just be confused (aka lesbians like 'butch' women because they actually like men *boggle). It goes back to trying to force people to fit into these black and white molds of what society says we should be.
But today, we are starting to see more and more broad definitions of what it means to be a woman. We are seeing women's groups that are embracing all aspects of womanhood, and it is glorious! Many of the groups I am in are very open, and when I speak up about how I feel about things (and how unconnected I am to certain aspects of being a woman), not only do I feel welcome and supported, but often there are other women who say they totally feel the way I do...and that is super cool.
What I find even more exciting is that we are starting to see more and more broad expressions of womanhood in everyday society. We are seeing very different expressions of being a woman in the media...and while some people still fuss about it, the appearances are getting more common and more varied, and the people fussing are struggling to fuss about it all!
Now, this leaves us in a sort of limbo though, when it comes to what exactly we define as womanhood. I have always been of the opinion that we each define what 'being a woman' means to us...and that our individual expressions of womanhood are perfectly valid. It is one thing that I have always thought about in regards to feminism too....if we are fighting for female rights, than my right to WANT to stay at home is legitimate, even if another woman thinks that it would feel demeaning to her. It works for me, and I should be free to do it, if that is what I want.
This is one of those topics that I don't feel has 'answers'. I think this is a discussion that needs to be had, with an open heart and mind...with the intent of finding new ways to embrace our differences, to allow each individual to blossom in the way that makes them shine, and to accept that my womanhood may express itself very differently from yours....but we can still sit together and appreciate the things that we share as well as what sets us apart. And I think that if we had more discussions like this, the world would be a better place.
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