During our marriage, my ex-wife and I peaked at three cats. We divided custody after our divorce; Tucker lives with me, and Cassidy and Fusser stayed with my ex, as she came into the relationship with them.
Cassidy was smart, which as any animal owner can tell you is a bad thing; she got into trouble, managed to find cheese whenever and wherever it existed, and generally lived a feisty life until she died last year at the ripe old age of 18 or so (my ex got her from a shelter, so we’re not exactly sure). Fusser ran away for a month last year, and she’s an old 16. So while she wasn’t sure it was a great idea, about two months ago my ex adopted an orange tabby kitten from a friend of her sister. My ex and my daughter named him Cheddar.
Cheddar was and is an intrepid little cat, quite able to get into trouble, whether walking the railing at the top of the stairs, or climbing the curtains, or harassing Fusser until she gets annoyed. Cheddar’s also quite sweet, willing to put up with my daughter’s smothering of him. Still, it was pretty evident to my ex and I that Cheddar was a pretty typical boy cat — always getting into scrapes, poking his big sister, and generally acting like a maniac.
But Cheddar had his first vet visit last week, and it turns out that Cheddar isn’t a boy at all. She’s a girl. She was from the start, in fact. And the behaviors that we saw as “boyish” were anything but — they were just Cheddar being who she was: a rambunctious, playful, fearless-to-the-point-of-stupidity cat.
Now, understand that my ex-wife and I are both strong feminists. I think my writing speaks for itself; my ex is if anything to my left. Both of us believe that the gender differences we are taught exist are overstated, both believe that a person’s — or cat’s — behaviors are shaped by things other than gender. And yet both of us (and our daughter, too) saw Cheddar’s behavior through the prism of “his” gender. We noted her hyperactivity and willingness to, say, dive into the bowels of a couch with no real exit strategy as “male” behavior. It was risk-taking, courageous, intrepid, and stupid. And while Cheddar was and is a sweet cat (she actually seeks out my daughter to be man-handled), her sweetness seems intensified knowing she’s a girl.
Of course, Cheddar doesn’t know we thought of her as a boy, nor that we now think of her as a girl. Her behavior hasn’t changed. Only our perception of her gender has.
Gender is a social construct. Boys are supposed to behave in one way, girls in another. And because we are taught that, from birth, we see the actions of boys and girls through that prism. Human boys and human girls both can be rambunctious, selfish, feisty and fearless; they can be sweet, kind, passive and nurturing. And yet when we deal with boys, the former behaviors pop out at us; when we deal with girls, the latter do. Why? Because that’s what we’re taught to expect. And even those of us who know better still, in the base of our thinking, expect to see the behaviors we’re told to expect.
It is no wonder that our society loves to divide men and women into separate categories, with one completely different from the other. If you want to see men as aggressive, then you will see aggression, even from men who are aggressive rarely –for all humans are aggressive sometimes. If you want to see women as caring, you will see caring, even from women who aren’t usually caring — for all humans are caring sometimes. And so it is easy to divide men and women according to the behaviors we expect. It is far harder to recognize that those behaviors exist among men or women because they exist among menand women. And so when someone says that men are lazy, people nod — because men, like women, can be lazy. And when someone says that women care about emotion, people nod — because women, like men, care about emotion.
But the truth is that all of us, men and women, are just ourselves. Like my ex-wife’s cat, we are who we are. But like my ex-wife’s cat, people see us through the prisms that society tells them to. And only by being aware of them can we remove the filters, remove the lenses, and see our fellow humans as the creatures they really are, and have been all along.
My family used to breed Irish Setters and Cocker Spaniels — both energetic dog breeds. But I observed, over about 8 litters/80 puppies, that although all the dogs had their own personality type (leader/follower/digger/sook, etc), male dogs tended to be more ready to please and more willing to obey, whereas female dogs got into much more trouble, explored more and pushed boundaries. ie, the female dogs were the risk-takers, and the male dogs were the people-pleasers and often got separation anxiety when away from their most-loved human.
Now I ascribe this to gender, but it may well have been the breeding, or my own gender perceptions overlaid on the dogs, but it’s almost the opposite of yours… which I admit to finding fascinating. I now find that I expect male dogs to be big softies, and female dogs to need a firm hand, which is definitely me ascribing gender-based stereotyping of their behaviour.
lovely post.
Yes, pretty interesting post.
This was true of my parents. They magnified their view of “male behavior”, diminished their view of “female behavior”. The result? When I came out about wanting to transition, both were astounded that I dare thought I had the least bit of feminity in me, and both thought I was clearly making a mistake / going into more trouble (I spoke to them separately, as they were not living together anyways). This reaction was true also of my extended family in general (except very few).
As some philosophers have said: Perception is everything. We could be brains in a jar dreaming we are really living. But to us it wouldn’t matter, our perception is that the physical world is real, our only reality.
I really relate to this post. Because I am bold, stubbon and determined, pple often tell me that I am supposed to be born a male. Just imagine, I do explain to them that that isn’t true. Is all bcause we have be constructed to think so.
The few female warriors of note in Nigeria have been referred to as women with men’s strengths. It’s all boils than to what we are told to expect of both gender
I was curious and made a search yesterday on “hit a girl”, on google. Apparently, one of the widespread ideas of when it’s okay to even fight in self-defense against a girl or woman (for a boy), is when she “looks like a man”. I couldn’t say if this answer was in jest or serious, but it came up often on different forums. The rest of the time, most boys or men were confident they could stop her from hitting them without hitting her.
I think this speaks of socialized over-confidence, because a girl, or woman, who knows how to fight or a martial art, could easily give them “enough for their money” in a fair fight whatever she looks like.
When I was a child, my mom heard that a mother cat and her two kittens had been abandoned in a park close to our house. We set out traps to capture them, and we named the mother Juanita. When we took her to the vet for a check-up and vaccinations, they informed us that it was not Juanita.
No one expected a male cat to stay with his kittens, but Juan was a very devoted father.
I don’t know how common it is for unneutered male cats to act fatherly, but you certainly see that behavior in neutered males. Our most recently adopted cats are a former street tom and a kitten, now neutered; when they’re snuggled up together being quiet he starts grooming her in the same way that a mother cat would. Very cute behavior in a fourteen-and-a-half-pound monster orange cat.
I see that with my two cats, male and female siblings. They are both affectionate, but Rupert is the one who wakes me up every morning, sleeps with me every night, and comes when I call him. Anya is the one who tears around the apartment, picks fights, and chases things. Of course, Rupert is also very clumsy and falls off things and is generally known as “the stupid one”. He also bites. And while Rupert loves affection, Anya is the only one who will tolerate being held. So they both have stereotypical “male” and “female” traits.
We have two adult cats here. The female one just gave birth a month and a half ago, and has had very motherly behavior since. But she generally shies away from being pet, hates being held (and will show you with her claws, though not in a very violent way) and is generally very independant. The male one loves to be pet, actually *begs* for attention at night time (howling), doesn’t fight or use his claws, and doesn’t mind being taken (and won’t claw you even if he wants off…unless there’s water nearby). Neither of them growl. The female one doesn’t howl when in heat, she’s actually very quiet.
Though neither of them have been in contact with cats from outside, so this is “apartment” behavior.
this feels like a good post for the Feminism 101 files (for the education of the masses).
always good to get a mirror for our own behavior; we tend to feel so enlightened that our instincts fall below the radar. have had some comeuppance in this department on race in the past…
Excellent post, Jeff.
It’s like confirmation bias writ large. And it’s applicable to more than just gender issues…
Which goes to show just how entrenched and insidious some of our most hated “isms” really are.
Categorization is a necessary tool to understand things on a gradual basis. For example, rather than be completely overwhelmed with the vast array of tools of various sorts my father had, I’d just put them all in the category “tools”, which I might later refine to “metal tools” and later again to “metal tools made by Mastercraft” and later again to “a screwdriver with x head, made by Mastercraft, with a plastic grip”.
The more I refine my category, the less objects it designs, but the more precise it is. Categorization and the following refinement is a necessary component of the memory to organize ideas, especially new ones. Society simply promotes the keeping of the larger category and considers any sort of refinement as “PC” in a derisive way. It’s also the route of least resistance (it involves less work, even if it’s less accurate).
The problem also occurs when someone introduces so-called mutually exclusive categories. Men and women are considered mutually exclusive in many things, but are not mutually exclusive at all. The idea that men and women are irreconciliably different and/or only of a complementary nature (they shall never have the same traits) fits the paradigm to keep gender roles in place, and ingrained as they are.
Intersex and transsexual people disavow the notion that men and women are mutually exclusive even in the “usually safe” (to consider exclusive) notion of child-bearing. Which probably is part of the reason why transsexual people are asked to be sterile to change documents, and intersex people operated against their will when minors. Ambiguity would be the death of the system in the long term.