Gender Roles Associated With Male And Female Sexuality

Alike gender, sexuality is also a social construct, especially when looking at the period before the 18th century, when one’s sexual orientation did not matter, hence there being no need for justification, just as pointed by Foucault: “Sexual practices had little need of secrecy; words were said without undue reticence, and things were done without too much concealment; one had a tolerant familiarity with the illicit.” (3). And the 19th century came and brought with it a big change, and not only did people become engulfed by social norms, whom they should abide at all costs, but they also had to keep their sexual preferences under lock and key: “But twilight soon fell upon this bright day, followed by the monotonous nights of the Victorian

In this Ted talk, Mr. Norman Spack talks about a very sensitive issue prevalent in the whole of the world, an issue which affects a substantial population of the world yet people find it difficult to address it. He talks about how sometimes when a child is born the doctors find it difficult to specify the sex of the child because of either the discrepancies among the externals or between the internal and external organs of the body. I agree with his statement that many times our feelings and sexual orientation differ from our gender identity. We also feel something which is not a normal thing for our gender but is a common trait with the opposite gender. The speaker rightly points out that whether the sexual orientation is in harmony with

With the establishment of these gender identity clinics, and the financial backing of philanthropist Reed Erickson, a transsexual man, the health care needs of transsexual people gained increased attention and support. Despite this new attention, the clinics used Benjamin’s model of “true” transsexuals. This differentiation between “true” transsexuals and other gender variants became a serious and highly important diagnostic decision as gender affirming surgeries were irreversible. This resulted in many transsexual individuals to be denied access to hormones and surgery. Specifically, transsexual men encountered difficulties, as transsexuality was primarily seen as a male-to-female only transition. In fact, during the late 1960s the United States leading UCLA Gender Identity Research Clinic debated whether trans men should be considered transsexuals. Many trans men themselves did not label themselves as transsexuals as they only knew about other transsexual women (Meyerowitz, 2002; Beemyn, 2014).

People with gender Identity crises do not feel their genitalia reflects who they are inside. They may feel a powerful drive to have their genitalia match their self-image opting for sex reassignment surgery. Gender expression is far more relaxed than it has been throughout our history in America, but it still poses a problems for some on a daily basis. Gender expression is one area where women have a social advantage over men. It is far more socially acceptable for a woman to dress masculine than for a man to dress feminine; although neither are without predigests.

The problem today is we as humans choose what we believe a person should do rather than allowing them to what they desire. No one wants to be tied to what think they should do, only what they the see fitting for theirself. Many believe women should do the cooking because it’s feminine. While men should work because it’s viewed as masculine. However, isn’t it ridiculous to impose gender roles on couples? Today many gay couples are victims of people imposing gender roles upon them, and if you answered yes to the above question. Isn’t it still ridiculous to do this within a same-sex relationship? In this point in time, we as humans are struggling with redefining positions in history, such as; gender roles upon gay couples, and author Stephen

Sexuality and gender identity issues have had a long history in the fields of mental health and public policy. There has been much debate surrounding the inclusion of issues related to gender and sexual identity in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual since its initial stages of development (Drescher, 2010). Debates in this field of interest have been fragmented between several stakeholders (Ehrbar, 2010). This fragmentation has created complications in the process of developing United States policies that are inclusive of individuals with gender identities that do not match the gender to which they were assigned at birth. Specifically, policies surrounding gender reassignment surgeries have been difficult to develop and

Through examining the ways intersex individuals are treated in a medical setting, one can see how science only allows binary bodies to be created. Crawley et al. (2007) discusses intersex individuals and the standard treatment of intersex children, being to alter their ‘abnormal’ genitalia to resemble one of the two genders. This has become the normal treatment as if this is necessary, but the only threat the child is in danger of is not fitting perfectly into the heteronormative standard of correct genitalia. Because surgical intervention proves we alter and change one’s sex, it becomes difficult to claim that sex and gender are solely biological, when clearly one’s gender and sex becomes largely altered the moment they are born into society. Anne Fausto Sterling, outlines her concept of the five sexes, explaining that intersex is a term used to describe any individual that doesn’t fit into the narrow categories of male and female. She explains that the same process that was in play in the Middle Ages is

First, it is shocking that some people will not even know if they are intersex. There have been occurrences where people have lived their entire lives without knowing they were intersex. Another interesting point on the site is that men can have “aphallia”, which means that they are born without a penis but have typical male anatomy (http://www.isna.org/faq/conditions/aphalia). Lastly, it was very surprising that in the past, doctors operated on children without consent to make them either male or female because they felt it was “necessary”

Due to social conformity, along with the advancement of technology and surgical procedure intersexed persons are aimed to be "fixed" at birth.  Although otherwise healthy, there is a need to perform surgery on the baby in order to remove certain sexual organs that don't fit with the perfect idea of what a girl or boy should look like.  This often leaves scars, and the psychological and emotional confusion along with it.

Gender identity, as defined in Webster’s Dictionary is, “the totality of physical and behavioral traits that are designated by a culture as masculine or feminine” (Webster, 2014). The first words said in the delivery room are often “it’s a boy!” or “it’s a girl!” Intersex children, who fall in between the scientific gender spectrum for male or female, are put through genital mutilation surgery and hormone treatment to abide by one of the two categories. Children who are born with an intersex condition where reproductive or sexual anatomy that do not fit typical females or a typical male’s norms should not have sex assignment surgery performed. This should be decided by the child when they are mature enough to make that decision for themselves. This is morally wrong because the social and cultural need to place intersex individual’s into the category of one sex or the other can have negative impact on their mental and physical health and many of the surgeries done on intersexed infants were done more for the benefit of parents, healthcare practitioners, and society, than for the infant. In the long run, this surgery done at such a young age can cause an unstable quality of life filled with shame and a feeling of exclusion from society along with the possibility of losing sexual functions. I will be mentioning evidence of cases that demonstrate that it’s impossible for intersex individuals who have had sex reassignment surgery that it did not help them identify with the rest

The American family has continuously been changing over the years and has been shaped by changing ideas about gender, sexuality, race, and class. The institution of the family has changed but it has also remained the same in some aspects. Society’s acceptance of changes in gender and sexual norms have reshaped representations of the family. Betty Friedan, Barbara Ehrenreich, and Dorothy Sue Cobble have written articles that pertain to the changing of the institution. As the American society changes its views on gender and sexual norms, sometimes through movements, it has informed representations of the family.

Parents often go through a period of shock when they learn that their new baby is neither boy nor girl. Most doctors suggest that "corrective" surgery should be done as soon as possible. There is a vast amount of controversy over whether a baby should be surgically "fixed" to look normal. Uprimny suggested, "surgery makes parents and doctors comfortable, but counseling makes people comfortable too..."(2004). Everyone can agree that parents always have their child's best interest at heart.

Intersex Society of North America’s principle is that “one’s genitals are primarily for one’s own use, not for the comfort of others.” therefore, the patient should be allowed to choose for their own body and not have to stand by their parents preferences. There have been numerous cases, where an infant was given unnecessary surgery to "normalize" them to fit society’s standards. The family of the children were told to keep their condition a secret, sometimes even keeping the condition a secret from the child as well, just like Davis’ story. Today Intersex adults stand up against the medical treatment they were given as children to say the treatment they received was “harmful, lead to sterility, ongoing pain, scarring, and incontinence, loss of genital sensation and sexual function, and depression.” (The Interface Project) Through support groups members have discoursed their views and opinion of surgery performed on infants through their own personal experience advocating that child should be able to have a say in their

The choice to perform surgeries on intersex bodies are not only violent but continue to institutionalize gender roles and norms. 1 in 1,500 children are born with atypical genitalia (“How Common Is Intersex”) and about 10,829 children are born each day, causing 7 intersex babies to be born daily (“How Many Babies are Born Each Day”). As doctors continuously choose to implement surgical procedures to “correct” intersex infant’s genitalia, doctors are also choosing to further marginalize the intersex population. Many children who undergo gender corrective surgeries are never told about the procedures, with the idea that it will help the children more easily conform to their newly assigned gender. However, by decreasing the population of intersex

To begin with, it is essential to identify the difference between ‘sex’ and ‘gender’. ‘Sex’ is biologically classified according to the presentation of an individual’s genitalia. In most societies such as the Western society, there are only two sexes that are recognized (Lorber, 1993, p. 569). Males are said to have XY chromosome (testes and a penis) whereas women are said to have XX chromosome (vagina and ovaries) (Fausto-Sterling, 1993, pp. 40-41). However the concept of labelling genitalia as ‘male’ or ‘female’ is problematic. This is because it completely disregards the individuals who are intersex. Anne Fausto- Sterling went on to suggest the five sex system in order to have the individuals who are intersex recognised in society. This stated that in addition to males and females, herms (people born with both testes and ovary), merms (people born with testes and