Beth-Lock
05-31-2009, 03:53 PM
I read an interesting article recently by a psychotherapist who says that body image issues are increasingly obvious in psychotherapy, (from anorexia through gender identity disorder), though the old theorists like Freud made a strict division between mind and body which is not helpful in handling these issues in therapy. (I think the article was in the New Scientist.)
My own feeling is that Freud's object choice and distinction between primary and secondary relationships of identification, (liking a person and so wanting to be the person or like them, versus, liking a person and wanting to be their mate), is useful after all in understanding this. For a primary relationship of identification is what a lot of gender identity disorder syndromes seem to revolve around. And, it even explains, when women want to have the powers and privileges of men, why current women's fashions revolve around pants, the latest being so-called walking shorts which seem to be a compromise between feminine showing of leg, and masculine trowsering.
Or to paraphrase the prophet, 'Where a person's heart is set, their bottoms shall follow." (And perhaps their choice of a tops to wear too.) So there would seem to be an element of transgendered thinking that has got into the mainstream of women's culture. What do you think? Has the wearing of pants by women got any significance?
My own feeling is that Freud's object choice and distinction between primary and secondary relationships of identification, (liking a person and so wanting to be the person or like them, versus, liking a person and wanting to be their mate), is useful after all in understanding this. For a primary relationship of identification is what a lot of gender identity disorder syndromes seem to revolve around. And, it even explains, when women want to have the powers and privileges of men, why current women's fashions revolve around pants, the latest being so-called walking shorts which seem to be a compromise between feminine showing of leg, and masculine trowsering.
Or to paraphrase the prophet, 'Where a person's heart is set, their bottoms shall follow." (And perhaps their choice of a tops to wear too.) So there would seem to be an element of transgendered thinking that has got into the mainstream of women's culture. What do you think? Has the wearing of pants by women got any significance?