Gender Confusion, Gender Fluidity - One Perspective
Topics of gender roles, gender confusion and gender fluidity are receiving more time in conversations, training sessions, web space and print. We have been learning to appreciate that balance of male and female within our world and within ourselves. At the same time, there seems to be emphasis on being true to being male or female, according to specific cultural stereotypes. It’s confusing and contradictory.
We talk about how men as well as women can be nurturing and women as well as men can be strong. I hear people talk about breaking out of gender role stereotypes yet struggle to name that which is male or that which is female without falling back into those same stereotypes. While we might seek to be in touch with the male and female energy in each of us, if we are operating more strongly out of the sphere opposite to our biological gender, we may be told we are not being true to ourselves. According to whom?
Is a woman who has a broad emotional vocabulary and who processes everything more of a woman than a woman who has a small emotional vocabulary or whose thinking is more traditionally male? Do you see how we apply these gender assumptions? We continue to talk, evaluate (judge) and act as if what it means to be male or female are two polar opposites rather than two sides of one coin.
Sure there are differences between the genders beyond genitalia yet there are also similarities and a lot of fluidity. There are men and women who are color blind with no fashion sense, who have no idea what it means to accessorize. This is also not a difference between gay and straight! There are men and women (gay and straight) who bring together beauty in fashion, art, music, literature, landscaping, and themselves. There are men and women who express creativity in numbers, finances, logistics, mechanics, etc.
I don’t know if “Men are from Mars and Women from Venus” but I do know that ALL of us are from God! I do know that Genesis 1 is under taught when it comes to gender theology. Genesis 1:26-27 says: Then God said, “Let us make humanity in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule….” So God created humanity in God’s own image, in the image of God they were created; male and female God created them.” God speaks of God’s self in the plural – “let us” – and God makes male and female. No wonder there is so much gender confusion in the world for individuals, in relationships and in the workplace. We keep trying to put people in little gender specific boxes yet we don’t fit! At the very least, we will not stay confined by limiting definitions of who we are to be. We are learning that we cannot put God in a little box of our definition. We see by the naming of God in scripture that God is multi-faceted and expansive. We continue to learn more about the characteristics of God. If we cannot put God in a box, why would we want to put women or men into little boxes of understanding? Well, we actually know why. It’s about control. We find it easier to control that which we know!
I believe there is more gender fluidity than we have yet acknowledged. Just we learned with the Kinsey scale that people have a broad spectrum of gender orientation rather than there being two polar opposites defined as heterosexual and homosexual, we are learning that we have a broad spectrum of gender expression and identity. In many ways we are moving more into the fullness of God and all of God’s expressiveness.
We do a disservice to ourselves and to our Creator in saying “that’s not masculine” or “that’s not feminine”. How about simply being more fully human? Individuals might experience less gender confusion and less judgment if we could embrace greater gender fluidity and freedom from the little boxes of our cultural definitions. After all, we all are made in God’s image. Male and female God created us. We carry aspects of both within our very DNA and within our spirits.
Let go of the confusion by letting go of one culture’s stereotypes and definitions. Let’s focus on being more human. Even as we expand our understanding of God, we can expand our understanding of who we are.
I offer this as one perspective to further the dialogue and to foster greater harmony between us all.