I'm fairly certain that as Tekla mentioned, some of our lives were never such that it honestly offered any great advantage to miss in its absence, but whatever. Endlessly arguing the point here offers no great advantage either. lol
But what about being female in a "man's world"?
From the unique perspective that we do share, the following are some of my own personal observations as a woman interacting with the public at large, and may very well
not reflect anyone elses personal experience.
However, I have noticed that in general people tend to be nicer, more polite, and more open with women than with men, and
this is especially true when interacting with other women. With men, people are nice enough but there is that sense that it is reserved, that they are holding back, that there is a degree of guardedness. As I said, women especially seem to be much nicer and more open to other women. For one thing, there isn't that unspoken acknowledgment that a man may be stronger, more aggressive, and therefore may present more of a potential threat than a women. I'm not talking about some anecdotal examples that might be given to the contrary, I'm saying that this seems
in my experience to be the general way of things. Today at the doctor's office finishing up my pre-surgery tests (which took about 3 hours), I was well cared for by a female nurse and a female medical technician with whom between the tests I chatted about anything and everything, and I was made very much aware of that natural camaraderie that women automatically share simply because we are women. This is by no means the first time I've noticed this, and I find it fascinating.
Yes, the man on the phone calls me "dear" or even "sweetheart"; I'm quite sure he would never say such a thing to another man. Personally I like it as long as he isn't being too forward or vulgar. I thoroughly
enjoy being treated like a lady, and I'm old-fashioned enough to appreciate a degree of chivalry (not chauvinism). I acquiesce when a man acts as though he thinks I'm dumb just because I'm female, for not only do I know better, but I know that all women know better. And if I can use that to my advantage, then who is really the dumb one here? Women share a common bond that men are completely clueless about, and it has to do with the shared experience of simply being female. Female bonding is something else again to which the male counterpart doesn't come close, what with mens perpetual hangups about being perceived as weak or somehow less than heterosexual. (To any guys reading this, well, present company excluded of course. You
are reading in a transgender support forum after all
)
Male privilege no doubt exists, in a man's world, where women still have to live and compete. But in a woman's world, things can be seen from a different point of view. To me feminism has never meant giving up my femininity to compete with men on their level, on a playing field created and dominated by men, and trying to "out-male" them at their own game. Men and women are fundamentally different, and until the glacially slow progress of social change brings about true equality of the sexes, meantime it is to our advantage as the underdogs of a patriarchal society to learn how to circumvent the silly rules by which men think they control us, and use them for our own gain without ever in any way resorting to behaving as they do.
