When I was a kid, I noticed that the insults directed at me, and any other male who wasn't popular tended to involve how feminine we were - "fag", "sissy" or even being called a girl.
I didn't understand it then, but I see it now. To those boys, being a girl was to be a lower form of life, and therefore the worst insult you could give a boy was to compare him to a girl.
I wonder how many of those boys ever stopped feeling like that, how many girlfriends and wives suffered because of that attitude, and how many taught that same feeling to their sons.
Comments
Feminism 101
Yep! Male superiority is ingrained in the language.
Homophobia and transphobia have their roots in misogyny.
And it gets internalized by all these forced fem fans as erotic self-loathing,
which I suppose isn't the worst way to deal with it. Or so it seems, but then what do I know
I am just a veak liddle guuuuuuurlyman
Veronica
What borders on pure insanity?
Canada and Mexico.
.
all depends on who is talking
I've been complimented by being called a bitch.The term has also been used as an insult. I've seen boys called a bitch, sissy, fag, and other names in the same way. Some times it is a compliment, others use it as a derogatory term. Name calling never bothered me for some odd reason, even when they were being hateful. Precious, snookums, princess, hunk, muscle bound, pretty boy, pretty girl can all be used both ways. on one job the guys hung Gidget on me. It started as a put down. I was too small to be worth anything. Before the job finished everyone wanted Gidget working with them.
Words are empty blanks until the one it is directed at gives them power. No ONE can take from you what you aren't willing to give them yourself. I know most kids don't understand this. Maybe I was too busy on the farm to care what other kids said or did? I sure wasn't that smart.
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
re:bitch ..
as one gg friend defined the term it is an acronym.
Babe In Total Control of Herself.
b i t c h
Stupidity is a capital offense. A summary not indictable.
It Doesn't Matter
It doesn't matter how much you explain or rile or rant, a child cannot help being tormented by what torments him. He can't just stop being tormented. It doesn't matter how much you tell the child that they'll torment him only if he lets them. That's a blatant falsehood.
-- Daphne Xu (a page of contents)
Tell a child long enough....
loud enough with enough reinforcement they will believe what you tell them A young child was picked up by the police, four or five years old. When asked her name, she replied 'idiot'. And it only gets worse as they get older. Children are cruel, vicious creatures when they find someone they believe is weaker.
Well, even if you ignore it
Its never just you and them, its you and them and everyone else around. If Y calls X a bad name, even if X ignores it, if everyone else picks up the refrain and treats you like you are actually what Y said then you do have a major problem. No matter what you actually do you have been branded and its unlikely anything you do will actually change that.
"Life is not measured by the breaths you take, but by the moments that take your breath away.”
George Carlin
As we now strive to...
Embrace the message. One question to ponder, did they actually see something we didn't understand was there?
*Huggles* Dottie! Loving Hugs Talia
Never fit the male mold
Even as a tot I was beaten because I was never masculine. Finally, I found that speaking filthily and sounding aggressive, there was at least some doubt though was frequently thought to be gay. Now in later life I can be me ... and no one seems to challenge that.
That is a very inciteful
That is a very inciteful observation. How many of theses boys are now married, and have daughters?
Is their attitudes still the same?
Karen
.
Huh?
She is not trying to incite anyone.
Some might say she is male bashing but she is certainly not trolling.
Insight
Karen meant insightful, just an auditory misspelling. :)
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
I prefer Erin's excuse, an
I prefer Erin's excuse, an auditory error. Yes I meant insightful. Ang is not trying to start a revolt. wish spell-check worked on what I mean, not what I write.
Karen
From very young,...
I always took exception to this, claiming it was insulting to girls. Make of that what you will. Then again I usually would also state that calling a person some type of animal, was an insult to the animal. Of course my earlier proclamations were some what crude, "That's not fair to girls!" etc.
~Hypatia >i< ..:::
A giant step down.
My mother viewed my transition as a giant step down.
She couldn't understand how I could ever even imagine giving up male privilege. It seems she was very envious of men. She made her way in the world of men... a professional driver and heavy equipment operator she dressed like a man and partied like a man. She wanted desperately to be accepted amongst men but her size marked her as a woman. I think she got fat just to improve her ability to be manish... but she never managed it as the added bloat made her breasts HUGE.
I do believe that women consider calling a man a girl a bigger insult than their BFs do.
Dayna.
Disagree
I think your assumption is totally wrong.
It was not that a girl is the lowest form of life. It is that any male who does not want to express his maleness or even appears to want to be a female (in other words, a TG) is regarded by many as the lowest form of life. Calling a male a sissy is not degrading women, it is degrading men who are like women.
Others have suggested evolutionary reasons why males are antagonistic towards TGs, which is basically that boys who play with girls have far more chance of impregnating them than the males who go off to hunt or to fight wars or play football, or any of the other mannish things which "real" men do.