Analysis Of What It Means To Be Gendered Me By Betsy Lucal

For this week’s readings, I choose to talk about “What it Means to Be Gendered Me” by Betsy Lucal. In her work, Betsy Lucal identifies the issues that come with the Patriarchal dominance there is in our society. Speaking mostly on her past experiences, the author illustrates the ways her problems in life, reflect the on how our culture has constructed gender. She also hopes to either agree or contradict with the points made by Zimmerman about doing gender. Her situation matches really well to what the issue stands as today. Betsy has the constant harassment and under classification of her gender due to the struggle that she classifies herself as a woman, however, her physical appearance disrupts the social norms that society label as “women”. The author hopes to capture the urgency in abandoning the gender system we

have.
In her essay, Betsy Lucal describes gender as being something that has intrinsically been constructed in every social situations we live by day-to-day.

There are only 2 sides of genders, either women, or man, there is no in between no matter the personal self identify you see yourself as. People no longer have the right to represent themselves in any way they feel best comfortable but instead, they are being forced to be something they are not. In this, Lucal sees herself as a failure because she continues to misrepresent herself in the eyes of the public. She feels that she must be aware of which gender she “gives off” or else there will be consequences and that there has been times when she made awkward situations. Since many people are so used to labelling people by the way they dress, the wear makeup, they speak, how long their hair is, our ideologies begin to undermine the idea that their are women who don’t necessarily have all of these qualities, but they are still for a fact “women”. The patriarchal system has become so embedded including in institutions such as public bathrooms and schools that people like Lucal have trouble fitting

into.
One quote I found interesting in the readings was that “because men represent the dominant gender in our society, being mistaken for a man can protect me from other types of gendered harassment” (page 78). This goes well with the point she made about how women are the ones that are mostly targeted and most likely to be impacted by our gender system. In a way, I find some truth to this. Personally, I consider life’s of women to be much more harder. Women are sometimes obligated to present themselves in public as pretty, full of makeup and jewelry. If a person wanted to dress like one, it would make a situation much more awkward than if it were a girl, dressing like a man. The standard for being a “women” is very highly valued.
Finally, the author concluded with the statement that our actions and appearances are shaped by the gender system. I agree that just going along and doing what is expected for you to do will no help end this oppression of freedom of self identity. People must be willing to widen the gap between what we consider a “man” and a “women”. One concern I have though is something that was brought up in class. In one institutional practice, the bathroom dilemma, people proposed to create a transgender bathroom. Would that really solve any? Wouldn’t that just encourage more gender discrimination, classification, and harassment?