Gendering of sex and its effects on women
- Part 1 -

ZK Pahrii Pou *

Introduction :

Model Danielle Llyod, who herself experienced a domestic violence, said that an incident of domestic violence is reported every minute. One in four women will be victims—an average of two are killed every week. Ban, UN General Secretary in the same vein revealed that around the world, one woman in five has been a victim of rape or attempted rape, and in some countries one woman in three has been beaten or subjected to some kind of violent act.

In 1991 the male-female ratio was 940 women to 1000 men (Bangladesh), 927 women to 1000 men (India), and 910 women to 1000 men (Pakistan). Today 74 million women and girls are 'missing' in South Asia. Women hold just over 18 per cent of the seats in Parliaments around the world.

Prejudices and cultural perceptions about the role of society are among the greatest obstacles to women's entry. In many ways women are considered inferior to men, sex object, man's property, and are assigned different roles and responsibility with values attached to them.

This is the result of man-made culture and is not natural. It can be challenged and changed. Sensing all these injustices and violence against women, the theme "Women and Men united to end violence against women and girls" is chosen for International Women's Day March 8 2009.

Understanding Sex and Gender :

Everyone is born male or female, and our sex can be determined simply by looking at our genitalia. Sex is therefore natural, biologically determined and hence unchangeable. The difference in sex however is not the main cause of the many differences between man and woman.

The main cause is the word 'gender' that leads to social classification of men and women into 'masculine' and 'feminine'. Gender has no biological origin and that the connections between sex and gender are not really 'natural' at all. Sex is natural and hence cannot be changed. Gender is socio-cultural, human made and can be changed.

Sex is biological and refers to visible differences in genitalia and related differences in procreative functions. However, gender is socio­cultural and refers to masculine and feminine qualities, behaviour, roles and responsibilities etc. Sex is constant; it remains the same everywhere. Gender is variable; it changes from time to time, culture to culture, even family to family.

Every culture has its ways of valuing girls and boys and assigning them different roles, responses and attributes. All the social and cultural "packaging" that is done for girls and boys from birth onwards is "gendering". As soon as a child is born families and society begin the process of gendering.

In many cultures, the birth of a son is celebrated, showered with love, respect, better food and better health care. Boys are encouraged to be tough and outgoing; girls are encouraged to be demure and home-bound. The birth of a daughter is bemoaned.

It is gender not sex which has determined that, (almost) everywhere, women as a group are considered inferior to men. They enjoy fewer rights, control fewer resources, work longer hours than men but their work is either undervalued, or underpaid. They face systematic violence at the hands of men and society, and they have little decision-making power in social, economic and political institutions.

Dress :

Girls and boys, women and men dress differently in most societies. The mode of dress can and does influence the mobility, sense of freedom and dignity of people. Attributes : In most societies women are expected to have perfect qualities such as gentleness, caring, nurturing and obedience; men are expected to be strong, self-confident, competitive and rational.

Roles and Responsibilities :

Men are considered to be the heads of households, bread-winners, owners and managers of property, and active in politics, religion, business and the professions.

Women, on the other hand are expected and trained to bear and look after children, to nurse the infirm and old, do all household work, and so on. This determines their education or lack of it, preparation for employment, nature of employment, etc.

Question of weaker Sex :

In contrary to scientific discovery, many philosophers and church fathers held that women are biologically weaker sex. Aristotle called the male principal active, and the female, passive. For him a female was a "mutilated male", someone who does not have soul.

In his view the biological inferiority of a woman also makes her inferior in her capacities, her ability to reason and therefore to make decisions. Because the male is superior and the female inferior, men are born to rule and women born to be ruled. He said, "The courage of a man is shown in commanding, of a woman in obeying."

Sigmund Freud stated that for women "anatomy is destiny". Freud's normal human was male, the female was deviant human being, lacking a penis, and her entire psychology supposedly centred around the struggle to compensate for this deficiency. Thomas Aquinas held that women are misbegotten male. Their views were held in high honour for long time, shaped philosophy, sociology and religion (theology).

Actually, biologically it is found out that men are the weaker sex and the Y chromosome (found only in men) is responsible for many handicaps. Ashley Montagu in his book, The Natural Superiority of Women found out that at every stage of life, beginning with conception, more genetic males die than genetic females. More males than females are produced and the two facts of greater mortality and greater production seem to go hand in hand.

Although X and Y sperms appear to be produced in equal numbers, between 120 and 150 males are conceived to every 100 females. By the time of birth the ratio of males to females has dropped to about 106:100 in the US and in Britain about 98: 100. More males than females are miscarried or stillborn, and more males than females die of birth trauma; 54% more males than females die of birth injuries and 18% more of congenital malformations.

In fact the life expectation of the female at birth is almost universally higher than that of the male. In Britain, life expectation at birth is 74.8 years for females, but 68.1 for males; in China it is 65.6 for females, but 68.3 respectively; in Brazil, 45.5 and 41.8 respectively.

Ann Oakley has shown that men are much more susceptible to infectious diseases and mortality and this susceptibility has been directly connected with the difference in chromosomal make-up between male and female. Genes controlling the mechanisms by chromosome...the male's higher susceptibility has a distinct biochemical basis.

Biological difference does not determine one's role. If this alone determined our roles, every woman in the world should be cooking, washing and sewing but this is clearly not the case because most professional cooks, launderers and tailors are men. Neither sex nor nature is responsible for the unjustifiable inequalities that exist between women and men.

Like the inequalities between castes, classes and races, these too are man-made; they are historical constructs and therefore they can be questioned, challenged and changed.

Marie Mies, a feminist activist said that "... male-ness and femaleness are not biological givens, but rather the result of a long historical process. In each historic epoch male-ness and female-ness are differently defined...."

To be continued....