breaking the norm

Breaking the Norms When each of us was conceived, we did not have anything influencing our perception of the world. While we were growing up and still do this day, our surroundings influenced the way we think and the how we behave in our daily lives. We get ideas about gender roles from our parents, our teachers, television, books and even subconsciously. As part of a project to break the norms of society and push past peoples thresholds, I needed to figure out what made people feel uncomfortable. I thought for a moment and decided to tackle homophobia. I choose this topic because very few men are comfortable talking about the subject of gay men. It is my objective to better understand why men think the way we do. In order to get started I needed to brainstorm.

After a little bit of deliberation, Juan and some other male classmates decided to hold hands and walk through the student union. Picture four grown men holding each others hands, walking through the middle of campus. As you can imagine, we received a lot of looks. We walked around for about five minutes as if nothing was going on. People seemed to be staring at us for a moment saying to themselves “what are they doing?” This is something that never happens in society. You hardly ever see men holding hands, much less four grown men swinging each others arms. Honestly, my first thought was that we would look so gay if we did this. Others in the group were skeptical at first to do this as well. When we walked into class, the students seem to cringe when they saw us take our seats.

After that day I decided to take my project one step farther and push past everyone’s threshold. In order to break the norms of society and truly make people uncomfortable, I decided to wear the color pink for the entire day of school. I went to the local Savers and purchased several items that were very feminine. I bought a pair of pink and yellow striped bellbottoms and a tight pink collared shirt. I wore the clothes to school in the hopes to witness the students reactions to me wearing clothes completely out of the ordinary. After attending two classes that day, I decided to talk to some friends of mine. They all told me that I looked like a “fag.” I finally had broke the norms of society and at the same time caught my friends stereot...

... middle of paper ...

...ey take it in the rear!” Some of the men I asked even said they felt “homosexuality is like a disease that you might rub off on you if you get too close.” Many of these men felt like their families would disown them. My feeling is that if you are not gay then you have no reason to be afraid of someone who is. I feel that if you have no doubt in your sexuality then you wouldn’t feel threatened by someone who is.

I don’t feel that men are truly independent or confident enough to let go and feel as comfortable as females do. I feel that the social construction of our society needs to be modified. Men need to be taught that it is okay to show emotion and that whatever their sexuality is, it doesn’t matter. To be more masculine we should learn to cope with our sexuality, and not be afraid. Masculinity does not mean without feeling, it means being strong and coming to terms with who you are. Wearing a pink shirt or holding hands with someone doesn’t mean anything then just that. With so many influences changing our perception of the world, its hard to make the right choices. You should not be so quick to judge someone, and in this case, why does it matter?