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Why do we have to fall to socially constructed gender discrimination even in people's leisure time?
I didn't know that men had capital over certain activities. Maybe that's why when a girl plays football she's an empowered women's liberator instead of just a football player. Which would probably explain why there's such a consistant gender division in sports, and why fewer girls would be enrolled in sports as children, therefore leading to fewer women in sports in adulthood, therefore creating this false notion that sports are 'natural' to men and not to women.
The only way to break that gender dichotomy that makes the world of transpeople and intersexed people so hard, is to stop promoting essentialist views that support and reinforce that very gender dichotomy in mass culture.
So to answer the question. I do everything that I'm interested in doing and have not given up the things I love doing. Neither did I take up any activities when I found out I liked being male, because I have always been male and female.
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As always, Wren, you articulate things so well :D I agree - why does any activity have to be allocated a gender? This is why I wasn't going to answer the original question, because the idea of gendered leisure activities is just....UGH to me.
I am unequivocally male, but I refuse to stop enjoying my "female" pursuits just because society says they are not "male" activities (besides, I know a TON of male knitters/crocheters/fashion designers, so I am not alone in my interests!) I can be a stereotypical male with the best of them (beer and football, anyone?) but the amount of times I have been asked if I am gay or read as an effeminate guy because I like to knit and because I make corsets and design clothes for a living is just ridiculous.
I have lost count of the number of times I have been told when knitting on the bus "men don't knit!" (to which I respond, "really? I never saw that memo, and neither did all the other guys I know who knit" and then give the person an impromptu lecture in KnitHistory 101 telling them about how knitting used to be solely a man's profession!).
I don't believe activities should be gendered - this is why I have never followed gender stereotypes in my household and why all my kids regardless of gender have been allowed (and encouraged) to climb trees, play with dolls and wear pink or whatever they like without attributing any activity to a specific gender.
Hehe maybe I should show my stupid psychiatrist this thread, he is locked into some wicked gender stereotypes and expects all his trans patients to conform to those in order to be allowed to transition. Sorry, but I refuse to become a beer swilling, football-playing (can't anyway because of my back) chauvinist pig who frowns on the pursuit of "feminine" hobbies just to fit one person's stereotypical boxes :tongueout
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Woodworking, working on cars, motorbikes, remodeling houses, playing shoot em up video games
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I watch a lot of sports. American football and basketball being my favorites. Die hard Texas Longhorns fan.
I attempt to work on cars, and hurt myself haha. No big deal. I try.
I pick fights. Pick up girls. Cuss like a sailor. Have total disregard for those around me.
Typical douchy guy.
