Blog Post #7

How would you define gender? Is gender natural, or is it socially constructed and if it's socially constructed, does that mean gender is anything someone wants it to be?

I would define gender as simply the identity that one wants to be seen as- whether this is male, female, or non-binary. I believe gender to be both natural and socially constructed for a few reasons. Gender is socially constructed in the sense that there are clothes, activities, even toys that people consider to be strictly for one gender or the other. Often, when something is enjoyed by both, it is seen as a rarity. There are social pressures for people, especially kids, to act and dress a certain way only because of their biological sex. This is how gender identity has become a social construct. The term for those whose gender identity matches with their biological sex is called “cisgender.” Those who feel that they are the gender opposite to their sex are trans. Due to extreme prejudice in many countries, trans people often hid their identities for fear of being socially ostracized or even physically harmed. This is because of the thoughts of what gender ought to be by many societies.

But I also feel that gender is natural. There is a reason some kids feel different from a young age as opposed to kids who don’t. This is possibly because their gender identity could be different than what their sex is. This is not something that kids make up for games or say because someone wants them too; they honestly feel different, and that’s okay. Gender is not “anything someone wants it to be” because of the social nature surrounding it, but I believe that one can have a different gender identity than the one assigned to them at birth because of their biological sex.