This entry is inspired in part by Hugo’s self-critical post against sexism. In my fight against sexism, it makes sense to begin with the person over whom I have the most influence. As a result, this will be more inward-looking rather than going over the problems of sexism in the grand arena (you can follow the links above to find posts that cover those aspects).
I’m a man of contradictions. I’m a sinful saint, a religious atheist, a sexist feminist. I’m inherently hypocritical.
Let’s focus on that last pair. I think that I’m a feminist in part because I recognize the sexism embedded in my thought, speech, and actions and in my fundamental perception of how societal roles are defined and how individual relationships are structured.
Here’s a few examples of my sexist behaviors and perceptions, and how I am trying to overcome them:
I do fewer chores than Jana.
This is a sore spot, as I grew up in a home where responsibility for living space was divided along gender lines. My mother did the bulk of the inside cleaning, and the men worked in the garage and in the yard. I think I’m slowly improving (Jana would be the best judge of this), but I feel like my house-cleaning paradigm is changing from a task-focused one (e.g. do the dishes) to one where I feel I am responsible for the cleanliness of my home (e.g. the kitchen needs to be clean, so do the dishes, wipe the fixtures and stovetop and counters, rinse out the sink, etc.) Also I am becoming more involved in reinforcing our children’s household responsibilities.
I am not as emotionally intimate with my children as I could be.
Again, I grew up in a home where my dad was very focused on his career and his hobbies. Also he rarely put himself in situations where he was emotionally vulnerable. These stereotypes were reinforced when Jana and I adopted traditional male/female roles in the family early in our marriage. I am trying to counter this anti-social tendency of mine by developing interests parallel to my children’s, like playing computer or board games with my son or knitting and drawing with my daughter. I try not to get defensive when they are critical of my behavior (I’m trying to be at home for dinner more as a result of one of my daughter’s comments). I volunteer in their classrooms, and I try to go on one-on-one outings with each of them as often as possible.
I support standards of feminine beauty that reinforce unhealthy ideals and stereotypes, especially through my media consumption.
This is probably the toughest one for me. Much of the entertainment I like (e.g., Japanese animation) really objectifies women. Part of the appeal to me is probably tied to how women are portrayed. I am still trying to figure this one out, but I think my main contribution is on being cognizant of different portrayals of women, and thinking through what promotes women as strong, active, capable, complex individuals and which present them primarily for their passive sexuality. Seems like this is quite a tangled web. I’d appreciate any advice on this one, especially from men.
I feel threatened by my wife’s successes.
For the most part, I rejoice over her achievements. But I can’t deny that there is a part of me that is peeved that she’s going to get a PhD before me. I’m not surprised to find that this sense of insecurity is common among couples where the woman earns more than the man. I recognize that I shouldn’t feel threatened, and I am trying to build a secure sense of self that isn’t tied to my perceived role as primary breadwinner.
I support sexist patriarchal traditions in my religion.
Mormon culture is full of reinforcements of gender hierarchy. One example: whenever missionaries or other people visit our home in an official church capacity, they always look to me, as the man of the house, to pick someone to pray. I usually defer. Mostly I’m gradually distancing myself from aspects of Mormon culture that I find problematic. I’m also finding ways to subvert the symbols of the patriarchy, such as through addressing a gender-neutral God in our family prayers.
I have a difficult time developing emotional intimacy with other men.
This is another tough one. Growing up, most of my conversations with my dad were rational (or angry), and this has set the pattern for many of my friendships with men. I’m trying to hug my son more (while he’s still letting me), and not just in the manly back-patting way. I am trying to cultivate friendships with men who are willing to talk about their feelings, relationships, and so forth. This blog is part of that effort.
11 responses so far ↓
1 pilgrimgirl // Mar 8, 2006 at 9:29 pm
John:
An honest post. Well done. I appreciate the introspective tone of as well as the sentiment behind it.
It’s hard to trying to unlearn/re-learn behaviors. Perhaps the hardest part is that in times of stress we tend to creep back into the familiar routines and practices of the past. And, since our life is lived with a large dose of stress, I think it’s hard for us to make any fundamentally-deep and long-term changes at all.
I’m glad I’m married to someone as progressive and thoughtful as you are. At the same time I can be incensed with your ability to walk over the same piece of debris in the middle of the floor day after day and you never bend over to pick it up. Grrr…It’s also hard for me that when you do a chore I am supposed to laud you for your efforts, yet I do the same tasks every day w/o any fanfare.
But of course, you are always getting better. And I’m certainly glad that you are trying so hard!
2 PodMonkeys // Mar 9, 2006 at 4:59 am
Hey John. Good post. I did think one part was kind of funny in that to an outsider, when they read that you are trying to be a feminist, but then see “like playing computer or board games with my son or knitting and drawing with my daughter.”, they’ll think: A. John is trying to promote equality. but B. John seperates out activities with his kids by sexist quidelines, instead of saying “playing computer, board games, knitting, and drawing with both your son and daughter.” Of course, thats from an outsider point of view that might not know if its that way just because E likes doing on set of activities, and JC the other. Of course… do they like those different activities because of certain influences?…
For the advice on protrayal of women, all I can say, as a fellow guy is: If you’re image of beauty is mostly based on anime and anorexic super models, you need to grow up. Take a look around at all the beatiful women around you. And I don’t mean the fake ones. I mean the real people who are not brain-dead and banking their future success on using their looks to catch a bread winner. I probably sound harsh, but its “tough love, baby”.
As for cleaning, I know that the majority of chores are done by women, and the majority of men are probably happy to leave it that way. Me personally, I try to help out, but I know for a fact, that my standards of “clean” happen to be lower than Joy’s. I’m not a slob, but I really don’t think theres a need to take the house from tidy to spotless if a friend happens to be coming over. Of course, knowing her level, I try to keep things a little above my own level of clean.
Basically my approach to sexism/racism/discrimination is to think to my self: “WWBBD?” Actually, my method is to try and treat every person equally by asking “Would you treat the person the same if they were a man/woman/straight/gay/black/white/whatever?” If the answer is no, then something is wrong.
3 pilgrimgirl // Mar 9, 2006 at 7:27 am
WWBBD? What would Bugs Bunny do? What would Brian Boitano do? Hmmmm……
4 John // Mar 9, 2006 at 7:57 am
PG: you’re right–I still have a long ways to go. *sigh*
PM: Good points! I thought about the activity breakdown, but you’re right–I’m trying to do what the kids want to do, and I respect their interests. I’ve tried to get The Boy into knitting and The Girl into gaming, but they like what they like. Not sure what the influences are.
Playing Starcraft over the internet has become sort of a male-bonding activity with me, The Boy and a couple of his uncles on Jana’s side. WoW is the only CG that The Girl’s gotten into, and I’ve encouraged that. Thankfully, she’s never been into Barbies.
I think that my standards of beauty are a little more mature than how women are often portrayed in comics, anime, computer games, movies, magazines, etc., but the problem is that I support those standards by consuming the products. I’m trying to change my purchases accordingly.
I’m also making a conscious effort to recognize feminine beauty in places I wouldn’t have noticed it before. I’m trying to break down the barriers of age, body weight, wealth, etc., in my mind.
Brother, you’ve gotta work on the cleaning business. Tough-love, baby.
5 Dora // Mar 9, 2006 at 10:52 am
John, your soul-searching always delights me. Not only because I am happy to see you live at a more enlightened level, but also because it helps me recognize, examine and work through my own contradictions, which at times seem legion. Yes, life is complex and messy and intricate … and that’s one of the many reasons why I revel in it.
6 Starfoxy // Mar 9, 2006 at 7:30 pm
I really like how you describe your house cleaning paradigm shift. That idea would probably solve many problems women have with their husbands, from house cleaning, to child-care to food preparation. I’m sure you’ve heard women and men refer to the husband watching the children as ‘baby-sitting’ for his wife. How would you approach that specifically from a traditional LDS perspective where the wife is ‘primarily’ responsible? (I’m thinking of broaching this idea with my husband and am really curious about your views on this.)
7 John // Mar 10, 2006 at 11:03 am
Dora-chan, thank you. Learning that one *can* revel in the complexity of life is a relatively recent development for me. It’s good to be walking on the same road together.
Thanks, Starfoxy. I rankle now whenever someone suggests that I’m “babysitting” my own children. I’m not sure if that bothered me earlier in our marriage.
Do you think that General Conference might be a good place to start? There are some that focus on the father’s nurturing role, like this moving talk from Elder Holland (in contrast with others that emphasize his presiding role). Some talks have little admonitions embedded in them–I think there was one maybe ten years ago where President Packer suggests that fathers should be the ones to take the crying baby out of sacrament meeting.
May I ask what exactly are you thinking of approaching him with? Are you trying to get him to shoulder more of the housework or to be more emotionally involved as a parent (from your blog, he sounds like he’s very compassionate and understanding with you).
8 Starfoxy // Mar 10, 2006 at 12:50 pm
I’m mostly wanting to encourage him to feel responsible for noticing things that need to be done. He is very emotionally involved with both me and our son, and I love that about him. However he just doesn’t notice some things that he probably should. For example he didn’t have any clean work shirts the other day, and I only found out that morning when he went to get one out of the closet. I would have liked for him to notice when he puts on his last clean shirt. But for some reason he doesn’t notice things like that. I’m not sure if it is because he just gets that distracted, or if it is because he doesn’t feel responsible for it.
9 John // Mar 10, 2006 at 3:43 pm
According to Jana’s comment above, I’m not doing so well in this area myself–I may not be the right person to talk to about this. Maybe I should defer to her.
I think that it’s always tricky to communicate something when it’s really important to one person and not important to the other. I think I’m slowly starting to clue in: “If Jana has to repeat the same request over and over, it must be important to her,” etc. Buy that’s still part of being task-focused, rather than sharing the same paradigm/vision.
Are you both pretty verbal?
10 Miko // Mar 8, 2007 at 8:57 pm
this is before reading last year’s comments: I like to think that I’m married to a super-progressive guy who is my equal in all respects and treats me as such. Unfortunately, he falls prey to some of the same things you do. He’s not perfect and he’s got society working against him, as have you.
Now that I’m not working, he does very few, if any, chores. Because I feel that, since I’m home & not working, it’s my job. When I was working, he did all the chores. When we were both working, well…they didn’t really get done…
My dad was emotionally distant, too, but if we have kids, it’ll be my husband who’s the close one & me the distant…
I don’t know if he feels threatened by my income. He always claims not to be. Incidentally, this tax year, even with me not working for more than half the year, I made much more than he did.
I respect you for bringing up women-in-manga. So often I write it off as just part of the style. I’m not offended by it, more amused. Especially since the men look so much like women half the time. But I may be watching more progressive anime (Samurai Shamploo and Cowboy Beebop have strong female characters, with requisite giant boobs).
11 Miko // Mar 9, 2007 at 3:52 pm
after having read comments, I have little to add except that this article supports your relationship with your kids.
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