The Talents of Men and Women

 Hey Folks, 

        Did you like my gender neutral salutation? I am pretty good at those since I have a sister that identifies as not really a woman but not really a man. She is a fun person to be around, and I don't mean that sarcastically. I really do like to be around her. 

        I have been studying gender differences and similarities recently. There are many similarities, but these did not and do not pique my interest like the differences between genders do. Here's the thing, we can talk all day about what makes us equal, but I want to know what makes each gender special. A man's predisposition with protecting family, a woman's fascination with nurturing, or a child's absolute enamorment with learning. I love to learn of these things! I love the characteristics that set us apart from one another.  I love the things that make us ourselves. 

        Some studies were done, and I will spare you the details, about what small children preferred between nurturing and construction/destruction. It was found that the majority, about two thirds, of girl children preferred to choose activities that consisted of nurturing and caring for others. About the same percentage of boy chose to construct and destruct things. Another study was done that asked babies to either focus on relationships or objects. Again, the two thirds number came out that girls focussed on relationships and two thirds of boys focused on the object. I believe the object was tractors or tractor parts. 

        This shows us that there are fundamental differences between what boys and girls are concerned with. Even when raised a-gender, most children will choose to participate in society as the gender they would have been assigned at birth, if such a designation would have been allowed. These differences in interest fascinate me. They are shown in stark contrast in my life and my family's upbringing. 

        I had a little, black baby doll named Chad when I was a child. My sisters had baby dolls as well. I also spent much of my time outside, hiking up the back hill or paddling my grandfather's canoe around. My sisters did this as well. The one thing we did where gender was an issue was playing house, which was a game that consisted of doing the things we saw our parents do. 

        Again, two thirds of us grew up to fulfill typical gender roles in our relationships. I think this two thirds pattern is extremely interesting! I would like to see further and larger studies about this all.  Something else that I find interesting is that I experience some things: emotions, traumas, or thought patterns the same exact ways in which they are described to me by my female friends and family. Other things, like the desire to test myself or to fight, are things that I find I share almost solely with my male counterparts.

         I have a theory. This theory is built around the idea that we all have traits that are stereotypically male or female. These traits exist on a spectrum from no similarity to complete similarity for how we experience the things related to the particular trait. I think that everybody has a mix of these male and female traits and each of us is individually suited for certain tasks over others. These, I would call talents. We can work and grow our talents, or allow them to shrink and wither.  No matter what they are on the male to female spectrum, we should work with our talents to make them the most useful; to do the most amount of good to others that we possibly can with them. 

Grateful for my talents, and grateful to you for reading,

-AR