Stop Defining Masculinity Wrong Part 2
Elaborating on the Day and Night Theory for Freedom of Choice
Author’s note: Please read the first part. It will be important for understanding this article.
Building the Definition
We went over the many changing faces in history that both masculinity and femininity had displayed and how it isn’t as two-dimensional as we once thought.
Now, what really is masculinity and femininity?
We have determined that there were multiple factors that affected the definition of masculinity and femininity today. To start we have the fact that the change in gender-assigned colors caused a slow change in the traits associated with each gender. Second, we have the peak of when the ‘charming type’ was considered masculine seen in the 50s and slowly declined until it took a sharp turn down when the ‘consumer stoic’ type came in the 2010s. Third, we have the rise of the ‘charming type’ seen in women starting in the 1920s when the flappers started. Beforehand, women were expected to be more like the modern ‘consumer stoic’ in order to be feminine.
What does this all lead to? Well, it leads to a three-dimensional definition of masculinity and femininity.
Since the traits of the ‘charming type’ and the ‘consumer stoic type’ are considered both masculine and feminine in different time periods (as well as cultures), we have to look at it from a different perspective. We can start by examining the basic definition on Wikipedia.
‘Masculinity (also called manhood or manliness) is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles associated with men and boys.¹⁵
Femininity (also called womanhood or womanliness) is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles associated with women and girls.’¹⁶
- Wikipedia
By this, we can infer that femininity and masculinity is embracing your womanhood or manhood in order to become more feminine or masculine. In specific, it means embracing the feminine or masculine ‘essence’ created from the parts that a woman or man obtains. This means that in order to define masculinity and femininity, biology must be questioned after the concepts are outlined.
When it comes to the difference between what makes a man and a woman, there aren’t really that many differences to be overly significant. After all, both are human in the end no matter how you put it. However, there is enough to define the two concepts of masculinity and femininity. This can be seen when we look at how comparative advantage creates these two concepts. To elaborate, concepts are formed around repetition so we can conclude that repeated observed actions form both concepts.¹⁷ In this case, seeing the consistent mannerisms between both the ‘charming type’ and the ‘consumer stoic type’ form a specific demeanor. This demeanor is going to contain a certain amount of characteristics to form the concept of femininity and masculinity. For example, we can examine the common characteristics between the two types of men: stern and fatherly. These two characteristics form the concept of masculinity because they are used commonly with men’s biological and behavioral traits forming repetition for the concept. This means it is naturally occurring for the characteristics to appear in men and are generally best used in situations that men attend to better than women.
Author’s Note: It’s not that women can’t do the same tasks, it’s that some tasks are accomplished better by men due to biological advantages. To say that certain things are not done better than men is simply false and takes away the beauty of being a woman since the opposite also applies. Please do not misunderstand or take this out of context.
While a woman can embrace these characteristics to become more masculine, she cannot use them to embrace masculinity since it is on the basis of manhood. In which a woman is not trying to become a man when embracing masculine traits. The same goes for the other way around which implies that masculinity is about coming into age and becoming an adult. This means that while certain traits or objects are more masculine or feminine, masculinity and femininity are not realized until the person embraces coming into age. This is why some traits may appear more feminine or masculine at first when they are not necessarily part of their respective concepts. Such narrow thinking leads to believing such shallow things as certain actions or objects will make a person embrace masculinity or femininity. The reality is that embracing masculinity and femininity is about maturely embracing the traits that turn one into a man or woman.
Since masculinity and femininity are both unique and about maturing into one’s gender, the person must embrace specific traits or actions that are mature. When it comes to maturing, this includes mental and physical processes.¹⁸ This means that the biology of each sex is involved. Mental characteristics like fatherly and stern generally are best used with their respective biological genders. Specifically, since a specific demeanor (masculine or feminine) used by each biological gender helps get better economical results. This is done through comparative advantage meaning that our differing biologies must be questioned next to explain how the economical results are achieved.
Why evolution is the reason we have masculinity and femininity
Since the roles of women and men were based on comparative advantage originally, carrying out these traits was specifically needed for improved specialization. Basically, from an evolutionary perspective, using the traits found in masculinity is best used with biological traits and the roles that are commonly male-compatible. Each sex has its collective parts (abilities and mannerisms) that form its own ‘essence’ to create the two concepts. First, there are minor differences between the two brains making each have its own special and unique signature. They both contain individual components to form a structure characterized as unique signatures. This ‘signature’ in turn, is what is generally used in stereotypes for men and women. Due to their polar nature, each signature could be used to help define masculinity and femininity. In order to achieve the state of being feminine or masculine, one must embrace or embody the ‘essence’ that comes from each gender. This means that ‘essence’ is essentially the resulting tone that comes from the inherent biological traits.
It could be defined as the underlying structure that results from different components and generally has multiple variations that differentiate from the core overt structure (the human). The components that form the ‘essence’, are anything that differentiates the genders from the other. In the brain specifically, the components are the hormones, neural connectivity, gray-to-white ratio, and different sizes of certain brain parts.¹⁹ These components are important for explaining why femininity and masculinity are primarily tied to civility. In specific, why masculinity and femininity are created by inherent abilities that form feminine and masculine essence.
For the female brain, there are different components that create the ‘feminine essence’ that develops femininity. The most permeating components are the hormones estrogen and oxytocin which are primarily produced by female reproductive organs. Estrogen is primarily responsible for stimulating the development of the female body during puberty. It also assists with other functions that are non-feminine development related through its multiple effects. Some effects include helping with memory loss, regulating the production of cholesterol, and preserving bone density. Since the ‘feminine essence’ comes from differentiating components from their male counterparts, this means that femininity inherently comes from the multiple abilities of the female body such as childbearing and nurturing.²⁰ (It’s not the only ability that contributes to femininity of course.)
Oxytocin, on the other hand, is what’s referred to as the ‘love hormone’ and is responsible for behaviors such as sexual arousal, romantic attachment, parent-infant bonding, recognition, trust, and aggression. Its importance for this case lies in three primary behaviors, the emotional attachment that is found between a parent and their child, the romantic attachment, and the aggression towards anyone that threatens the safety of their loved one.²¹ Those behaviors are the reasons that many people attach femininity to taking care of a child and emotional attachment. This means that humans associate the act of contribution to society through inherent abilities, (assisting in familial needs), as what makes femininity.
The same could be said about males when it comes to the hormones that their reproductive organs produce. The attachment to what makes ‘masculine essence’ comes from the effects of what testosterone typically does to the human body. Its primary function is to stimulate the development of the male body during puberty and includes other effects on the body. The thing that primarily makes the ‘masculine essence’ primarily lies in testosterone’s physical effects on the body. Males have a significant advantage when it comes to doing physical labor which is why masculinity is typically attached to doing ‘physical work’. The effects on the brain specifically, include an increase in cortical volume and thickness as well as improved spatial cognition. In terms of behavior, we can see that testosterone causes an increase in competitiveness, aggression, and libido²². These behaviors are commonly associated with what could be referred to as the ‘masculine essence’. It is generally seen that the man is meant to do the work outside of the home in order to bring back goods for the family to live. This gives the idea that men are meant to be outside of the home and protect the family while women stay at home. However, it is a little more complex than just saying that these traits are what make ‘masculine essence’ when it could be seen that these behavioral traits also make ‘feminine essence’.
The reason these traits are also associated with femininity could be explained through the concept of comparative advantage in prehistoric society. If ‘feminine essence’ comes from our contribution to society through our inherent traits, then we can use those traits to explain femininity. First, we can see that since females also carry aggression for protecting loved ones, protecting the home isn’t specifically designated to the man²³. This means that aggression to protect isn’t necessarily a designated job for men²⁴. At first, you might be thinking: ‘well they only protect the home if the men outside were not able to protect them for some unknown reason’. The reason this is extremely impractical is due to the fact that the hunter would not be able to be in front of the home guarding it at all times while they are hunting which leaves protecting the home to the women. Second, we can see that women also have increased competitiveness during ovulation meaning that competitiveness is for women as well. It could be argued that it was meant for mating and while this is true it doesn’t necessarily mean that it was the only thing it was meant for. We can see this through the fact that, in the stone age, women were also hunters and not just gatherers or child caretakers²⁵. Due to the fact that the women fully had the capability to hunt, the ancient female hunter’s mere existence should’ve been the expectation for us, not the exception²⁶. However, in consideration of the economic condition of ‘comparative advantage’, specialization was needed in order to get more of the goods needed for the community. In addition, around this time, the population was fairly low so specialization was needed even more. This implies that the true reason there were more women in the home was more that of demand and not that men were the only ones able to do the physical work. The men were able to do physical work more efficiently due to biological advantages leading to the men doing more physical work in general. The problem is that nowadays physical work isn’t the only work that exists. Moreover, sometimes women end up with a job that pays more than their husband leading to women taking the role outside of the house while he stays home. That’s saying if the couple wants to have children at all. Couples could not have children at all and both spouses decide to work.
Author’s Note: those who choose to have their women inside the home despite not even having children is kind of silly since it’s impractical. It’s more like treating her like a pretty show dog that is placed inside the house instead of a capable being. A good and true king treats his woman like a queen who is capable instead of like a show dog like he is some slave owner. However, if the lady decides she wants to be at the house of her own volition then that’s different.
So where does that leave the place for men? Well, since women have the capability to do both work outside and inside the home, it leaves men with the ability to choose where they want to work as well. Each gender has biological traits that assist them to work a specific job better but since those traits are competent at more than one task and there is a constantly changing environment, it leaves room for choice. The biological traits that form masculinity and femininity are there as a boost for increased economic activity, not as a restriction. The only real determining factor that leaves room for ‘masculine essence’ is essentially in physical work. However, most jobs nowadays lie in mental, not physical work which leaves a good majority of jobs outside the home as gender neutral not gender designated.
In addition to the fact that most jobs are gender-neutral and that women are biologically also made for work outside of the house, there are also additional advantages for each gender in the brain for mental work. As discussed earlier, there are multiple parts of the brain that make ‘feminine/masculine essence’. The other components are neural connectivity, grey-to-white ratio, and different sizes of certain brain parts. Their differences between the two genders are another reason why especially nowadays women are also meant to be working outside of the home. This means that if women are meant to be outside of the home, then femininity is not purely based on housework and family.
To start off with, mental work in jobs nowadays includes anything from written, logical, verbal, mathematical, interpersonal, innovative, or any set of skills that could be added to a resume. A good portion of the jobs out there are primarily mental work or at least a good portion of mental work is involved. This means that a good portion of the economy runs on mental labor from its human resources. For example, the world would only be where it is today with education taught by teachers who primarily use mental labor. In addition to the fact that women are fully capable of mental work in the workforce, we can see that women can excel at specific jobs in the workforce. The skills that are valued in certain work environments such as reading, writing, decision-making, problem-solving, multitasking, intuitive thinking, analyzing, drawing conclusions, and even color differentiation are dominant traits typically found among females. These traits are the other components that make the ‘feminine essence’.
‘women have been found to use more white matter, which connects processing centers… while women are more likely to excel at language and multitasking’
‘In studies examining connections with the brain, it has been found that women tend to have stronger connections side-to-side, which could lead to better intuitive thinking, analyzing, and drawing of conclusions.’
— Northwestern Medicine²⁷
Moreover, there is also the fact that certain parts of the brain are larger and process differently in females than in males. For example, the prefrontal cortex is thought to have a larger amount of blood flow than men, leading to more efficient processing of anger and fear. There are also a bunch of other parts of the brain that function differently for women than men, but for time purposes, let’s move on to the male side.
The part that forms the ‘masculine essence’ would be neural connectivity, gray-to-white ratio, and different sizes of certain brain parts. The parts are essentially the same to its core as women but with the differences making the impact. For example, the neural connectivity in the male side of the brain is stronger from front to back instead of side to side in women. This differentiation leads men to be able to have heightened perception and stronger motor skills. These heightened abilities contribute to the improved physical ability which is part of why men are generally more compatible with physical work. However, men are not suited only for physical work since they have specific mental strengths in comparison to women. For example, on average the inferior parietal lobule tends to be larger in men. This part of the brain is linked to improved time and speed estimation. While it contributes to improved physical activity, it also helps with solving mathematical problems better. In addition, while men have more white matter, they tend to use their gray matter more which leads to improved ability in task-focused projects. This also significantly helps with mental work.
As we can see, according to the biological processes between men and women, the differentiation creates the ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine essence’. It is the summary of the differentiation between the two. These essences give way to biological gender-compatible roles due to better execution through inherent biological processes. The different roles are also more efficiently executed through a specific demeanor. For example, assisting in certain familial needs is best executed through a more graceful touch found in femininity. For men, physical labor requires a certain amount and type of mental strength which is why mental strength for physical work is associated with masculinity. The need for improved efficiency is sometimes required in certain economical situations which is why these two concepts are used for specialization. In order to get the need for specialization made men and women have to mature in order to get the best results. This means that in conclusion, specialization being occasionally needed is the reason why we have masculinity and femininity. We can see this in the cause-and-effect chart below.
The Day and Night Theory
So let’s put it all together and elaborate on the definition of masculinity and femininity.
Now that the definition has been created for femininity and masculinity, let’s look at what embracing womanhood and manhood means. By definition embracing womanhood and manhood is coming into age and letting go of the childish parts. This means the true opposite of masculinity and femininity is childishness. If childishness is essentially associated with hedonism, and hedonism is the opposite of stoicism, we can conclude that femininity and masculinity are part of the original ideals of stoicism.
We can identify this in the chart of the traits of masculinity and femininity below
As you can see in the chart, the parts associated with men and women do not involve being emotional or even emotionless. It is much more complex than such simplicities. In fact, both women and men should achieve true stoicism as part of coming into adulthood, not ‘consumer stoicism’. While it is possible for ‘consumer stoicism’ to be part of masculinity, it is not necessary. Neither is aggression since that would be a more neutral trait that is on the negative side. Coming into adulthood and becoming more mature also procures what resembles more as dominance. This means that true femininity and masculinity have the trait dominance associated with them not just masculinity. Since childishness is the true opposite of femininity and masculinity, that means that childishness procures the trait of submissiveness. However, in a relationship, both sides should submit to each other.
Author’s Note: generally having a head in the house is good for efficiency since it creates less chaos. It’s similar to the difference between a sole proprietorship and a partnership in that a sole proprietorship has more order of the direction headed. However, it’s not really necessary if both parties are very good at communication. Also please note that the reason that dominance and submissiveness are being mentioned is because of the fact that many like to believe that being a woman means being submissive when this is not true. Being a woman in a heterosexual relationship involves being a queen at the side of her king not at his feet.
Since masculinity is not ‘consumer stoicism’ nor just simply embracing things that are masculine, what role does ‘consumer stoicism’ have and what does it mean for those who only embrace masculine traits? Well, ‘consumer stoicism’ is more like a personality that can be embraced as either feminine, masculine, or neutral. ‘Consumer stoicism’ could even be more on the childish side of the spectrum as seen below.
As you can you in the chart above, there is a ‘night’ and ‘day’ personality. The ‘consumer stoicism’ is the night side and the ‘charmer’ is the day side. It can go all the way down into the childish spectrum making these two personalities mostly independent of femininity and masculinity. However, the further down the scale you go, the more it starts to go into the grey zone where it will eventually just become neutral. Too far down means a complete lack of femininity and masculinity. The boxes are supposed to be shaded in blue for boys or men and pink for girls or women. That means if the value is placed too far down on the spectrum the pink and blue shade with just become gray as well. That is why masculinity and femininity are still partially attached to the ‘night’ and ‘ day’ personalities.
Since true masculinity and femininity occur by striving to reach for the top part of the spectrum, what does it mean to only embrace traits that are masculine or feminine? Well in this case since it is not necessarily reaching maturity, it would purely be boyishness or girliness. One can be more feminine or masculine to a certain degree but without maturing into one’s biological gender one resembles more of a child. A woman can come close to resembling masculinity by embracing masculine things but becomes more of just a masculine woman with enough effort. The same goes for a man. They can come close to resembling masculinity but without maturing they are resembling a more masculine man without being a ‘true masculine’ man. They can even become more of a boy than a man if they lack enough maturity. In terms of traits like aggression that are commonly associated with masculinity, are actually just neutral.
It’s already been established that aggression is more gender-neutral making it a negative trait that resembles more of the whole yin and yang concept. The fact that this is more of a good vs. evil trait is the reason why so many like to associate masculinity or femininity in a negative light. It is in fact not true since they are both equal yet different. Similar to the difference between water and stone. Both are useful and powerful elements but entirely different. Negative traits should stay in their place and should not be associated with masculinity or femininity in order for both to be socially accepted and loved for what they are. Two beautiful concepts should be used as tools for things like attraction, expression, or biological gender-compatible roles.
Author’s Concluding Notes:
Since both concepts are used as tools please only use them as such. Do not let the concept of masculinity or femininity become a cage of your own making. The economy treats people like human resources and specialization is the main factor behind what makes masculinity and femininity. Do not let society peer pressure you into a certain mold because of the belief in contributing to society through traditional roles. There is power in choice even if that is becoming more childish and letting go of masculinity or femininity altogether. There is power in even choosing to embrace things that are of your opposite gender. Let go of being in a mold and let it be a choice. That way whatever you choose becomes something beautiful.
Please do not use this article for any purposes that may be detrimental to the well-being of another person or persons. This article is meant to be primarily how I define masculinity and femininity, not a set standard. I am not a doctor or expert for now so my words do not have any substantiality to them. It may be seen that there is possibly usable evidence in this article for later scientific studies, but for now, it is just one person’s opinion. Use my passed-down knowledge wisely. Thank you and have a good day my fellow knowledge pursuer. :D
Personal Theory:
Some people like to think certain features are masculine or feminine when they are really not. For example, some people like to confuse negative actions with being masculine or feminine when they are just negative. This is because masculine and feminine are not exactly polar opposites. They are not like black and white or yin and yang. They could not be polar opposites since polar opposites are supposed to have nothing in common. However, women and men do have things in common making their energies not resemble polar opposites. At least not exactly. It’s more like two different energies with their own resembling elements. This is due to the fact that there’s more to the spectrum than 2 sides. It’s more 3 dimensional since after all humans aren’t 2-dimensional beings. Certain actions do however have negative energy and some have positive but neither can be really defined as masculine or feminine. Otherwise, that would be to declare that femininity or masculinity is bad (like yin is to yang or good to evil) and that’s not the case. They are just unique energies that are used as tools. In addition, it is also similar to saying that the element water or the element earth is negative or positive or yin and yang to each other when they are just unique to each other.
Citations:
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