Growing up (with two brothers) meant that being a man involved two simple rules: short hair cut and shaving every day. Whenever my hair got too long my mother would alway tell me to go to a barber shop. If I forgot to shave for a few days (out of laziness) my father would say (every day) "I see you did not stand too close to the razor this morning!" It's so old fashioned! But even at college I encounter the same things, like if I get a really short haircut (if the weather is hot) other students (girls especially) will say "oh it looks well..." in a real casual way. These patterns seem like little things --like a little joke, but we know in the back of our minds to behave and dress in a certain way to keep society happy. This is what it means to have a gender (behaviours) versus just a sex (physical/biological aspect). In terms of the history of the sexes, we have had this 'two sex model' since about the 1800's... but before that there was a 'one sex model', where the sexes were conceived of a s being essentially the same -physically that is. For example, the vagina was thought of as an inverted penis. A man was thought of as higher than a woman only because he was closer to god (whatever that means)... but it is only in recent centuries that there has been this obsession with the sexes looking physically different (guys working out in the gym to beef up, while women starve themselves to near-death to be uber-thin). But culture is as complex as ever... with emos and metrosexuals... but then again c. 1700's men might well wear long exotic wigs, tonnes of make-up and colourful, exotic clothes. So the struggle continues... but it has always been this way. I have to laugh when we see an emo boy or even a transsexual walk by and people go "what is the world coming too!" But of course, the men of the 1700's also wore make-up etc. A few centuries ago, in, Italy, little boys had their testicles removed so they would keep their boy-voices and look very feminine --women could not act on stage... so they needed eunuchs or pre-adolescence boys to play the parts of women! In ancient Egypt, a eunuch could gain (by virtue of their proximity to royalty) great political power --some of them were feared for their cunning. And today, in Thailand or China... this 'one sex model' versus 'two sex model' debate is quite real.
So what has changed? Lot's of superficial changes, sure... but the craziness will always be there!
Another example of how little we change...
In ancient times we would find a very pretty girl, give her access to great wealth and privilege, adorn her with fine jewels and even worship her
en mass. Then... we threw her off a cliff or into the lion pit! And Today? We worship celebs. We give them great wealth and status, and build them up... they 'arrive' on the world stage (this world stage could also be termed a world alter!) and then what do we do? We watch them disintegrate, overdose, commit suicide... and gobble up everyone hurtful word the papers print. Their 'fall from grace' taps into our most primitive needs. The corporations, PR agencies and media are well aware of these old patterns and tricks. So, really, what has changed?
