Writer's Block: Freaky Friday

[tisiphone]

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After I, ahem, tested all the new systems, I'd probably just walk around and interact with people all day, and see what it was like to be a man, in terms of social things.

Comments

[taldragon.livejournal.com]

not having to say things 2053 times to be taken seriously would be fun-and-novel!

[grail76.livejournal.com]

I guess it depends on how thorough you'd test them.

[freeimprov.livejournal.com]

I think what would surprise you isn't the "features"... it would be learning to deal with the testesterone, the constant urge to either fuck or kill almost every living being you meet.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

Really? Given that men manage to live in a communal society without most of them going on rapey killing sprees, I can't imagine that's actually too much of a pressing, day-to-day need.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

Very thoroughly. Probably that would take at least til noon.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

Ugh, I know!

[freeimprov.livejournal.com]

There's a lot of socialization and practicality that goes into that. By the time men are old enough to actually be dangerous, they've usually been pretty well socialized to not do those things.

But the instinct, it's there. Luckily, it gets expressed in less destructive ways, like football or Warcraft or Debate Club.

Think about this, though...would any woman have come up with the idea for nuclear weapons, and then put in the extraordinary amount of effort to actually CREATE them? And build tens of thousands of them? That's male instinct, in a nutshell. Build everything you need to kill millions of people with the press of a button, just in case.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

Male instinct? Nah, that's male socialization to be violent, not to prevent it. Marie Curie's father, Vladyslow Sklowdowski, once wrote:

Separated, divided, we are individual and helpless, each looking into the future with apprehension, with fear, each preoccupied with his own small worries, each pursuing a fainthearted course on a narrow road.

Our hearts and minds are busy, our souls no longer house great emotion. All we are is cold, dark, silent, barren.

But suddenly, the storm roars, the thunder cracks. The foundation of the world shakes. Satan’s powers cringe, agonized, in fear. This is the end of the age of error and of treason.

Let us break this armor of ice that binds our chests Let us begin today, bring stones to build the temple of truth, the temple of freedom. Let our willpower cure our crippled souls. Let our hard work prove to the world, to God, to our country our worth. . . .

“To the future!” Let us lift our glasses, Dear Brother. Let us offer our pain and our lives to that future. Work, love, and live Brothers!


(Citation available on request)

Funnily enough, I don't see "Until my daughter discovers radiation and then we can blow each other to shit" tacked on the end there, nor is it implied. Though I do wonder why this would be an issue, anyway? I'm a grown person - why, if by adulthood such urges are tamed by socialization, would I be subject to them?

[taldragon.livejournal.com]

i'm pretty sure the only thing my partner wants to kill regularly is his computer :)

[grail76.livejournal.com]

One hopes you'd have help for at least part of the test.

[freeimprov.livejournal.com]

It's the urge, not the action. And the urges are real. What matters is how we act on them (or don't act on them).

Interestingly, I was just talking to a friend of mine about this over lunch the other day, a female OB/GYN. She had been watching a medical documentary series about a F->M transgender going through surgeries and hormone therapy, and was really struck by the personality changes. A male hormonal balance led to a huge leap in aggression, to the point of changing his physical appearance in terms of posture and such.

[pretencioso.livejournal.com]

Sex is socially constructed. There is plenty of hormone variation within the category "male."