I would like to tell you guys a story. I was recently at camp, a computer camp. I made a friend there that was really nice, had all of the same interests that I had, and was a very good person. We didn't question or inspect each other much, we just talked and played games. Heh, those nights of devious attacks in Warcraft 3 and shooting each other from raptors in Unreal Tournament 3 were fun. The first week went by without question, I had thought my friend to be a girl, but I never really looked too close, it didn't matter much to me.
At the beginning of the second week we traded stories of our weekends and then traded gaming magazines before we started up a Warcraft 3 match. At the end of the night we had both had a lot of fun and were heading back to our rooms when my friend introduced me to their roommate. Their roommate was a boy. That got me thinking about gender a bit. The next day I went straight out and asked 'Are you a boy or a girl?' My friend said a boy, and we continued on as normal. Now, when talking to my parents I had referred to my friend as she since I didn't look too closely. So I had to tell them that my friend was really a boy. My parents freaked out at the fact that I hadn't noticed the gender that my friend was and teased me about it. To them gender was so important. Neither my friend or I cared all that much.
What is the purpose of gender anyways?
