GIST

I was intrigued during our class discussion about how almost all of the groups decided to keep the often polarized categories about biology and sexuality even though almost everybody agreed that these categories were flawed.  Despite their flaws, I dont think a utopian society where these categories will be eliminated would be a good thing.  Overall, it raises the question: what is the best way to accept diversity?  Do we ignore it or do we embrace and celebrate it.  

Our discussion reminded me of a Newsweek article, "Is Your Baby Racist."  

 I've been thinking about our discussion on categories. There were arguments supporting both sides of what to do with categories. Most of the class seemed to be on the side of keeping these categories, however there was still some discussion on 'how' we could get rid of the categories. What occurred to me, however, is that we can't get rid of categories. Our nervous system is based on pattern formation. On a purely biological level we work by making categories. I was discussing this with my group and that is partly why we argued for keeping categories. We couldn't get rid of them even if we wanted to, it's in our nature. 

After thinking about our conversation in class and reading some of my peers comments online about how to deal with categorization- I've had a slight change in heart.

 Since Wednesday’s discussion I have been thinking about the subject of gender diversity particularly within the context of education. Over the summer I worked at a camp. One of the younger children was gender diverse and often not treated like the other kids. The counselors were rather split on their opinions. Some counselors felt that because the child was so young it was the parents’ responsibility to instill a sense of standard gender expression while others thought it was great that a kid so young was able to express himself without the parents or any other influences attempting to condition the gender norms into his self-expression.

From the discussions we have had so far, I can’t really get a good feeling about the category abolition argument. It seems like every ‘solution’ is too easy to shoot down, especially with the all-encompassing ‘Well how are you going to implement it?’ Any modification to an existing system is going to cause public outcry or be difficult to physically apply and even creates new polarizing categories (those in favor and those against.)  

In class I said something about not going for the ‘extremes’ of the argument, but after thinking about it, this is garbage- we already live in that kind of society, based on class systems that have probably caused irreparable damage and make total acceptance impossible. The gray area here still applies polarizing categories in some way.

Our discussion in class on Wednesday displayed a general discomfort with gender & sexual binaries, yet there was no single, effective plan of action presented. To be honest I don't think there is one way to solve the problems presented by these binaries. It is impossible to encourage every member of our society to be on board with a new ways of thinking about gender and sexuality. Even if one found a way to do it, there would still be many people who refused to embrace this new world of blurred boundaries. However, I do believe that education is vital. Perhaps humans require labels to make sense of the world, perhaps labels are evil and only serve to divide us; either way I think it is too radical to attempt to eradicate them altogether.

I'm going to start off my saying that the term 'identity strip poker' was coined by my theatre professor. Although it was in a slightly different context, I think that it comes in handy explaining the things that I will highlight in this post.

Day Five
Classroom: we’re stuck here, so we will cope.

Our celebrations and resistances of Haraway and Clark’s boundary blurring:

Let’s pay attention to these other points of view. Concerns about control, machines vs humans, humans vs other humans through machines…conflicting views about our connections with machines. Still questioning if we are intrinsically technological or if that’s something we could, or should separate from. Does technology change us? Physically?

Group presentations of discussion:

Just in case, I figured I'd post my reading notes on Roughgarden if any of us should need them.

Joan Roughgarden. Introduction and Part One: "Animal Rainbows." Evolution's Rainbow: Diversity, Gender, and Sexuality in Nature and People. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004. 1-181

Introduction