Gender & Family Life

What I have learned and gained in insights this week has been amazing to me. 

In our own families, we do things that are different from other families. Some families may put silverware facing up or down in the dishwasher. When we marry, we may have to adjust how we view and/or do certain things. 

My cute nieces and nephews

What I thought was particularly interesting in this week's discussion was realizing that men are more task oriented than women, and how men use their sense of direction. Now women on the other hand use their memory; there was a study on this topic. A woman was put in a room alone, and she was left there for about three minutes. She didn't know that this was the experiment, but she looked around in the room, and touched a few things. She was taken into another room, and told to explain what she could remember from the room. She was very detailed in her descriptions, as to what and where they were located. Next, they put a man in the same room with the same objects. After his three minutes were up, he couldn't describe what he had seen. He referred to objects as "things" not giving them names. 

When men give directions, they use street names, and are very good at using maps. Women, they will refer to buildings and what they recall from their memory. Can you relate to this example? Women have more connections in their bran, making them think of multiple things at once. I have noticed that women like to vent about how their day was, more than men. For men, it is harder to vent because once that "drawer" is shut in their mind, they don't want to recall that memory. 

What makes one a female or a male? It is hard to define gender because society is always changing, but let's talk about it. What do you notice about boys and girls? In class, we discussed that girls are more expressive, passive, cooperative, nurture, and play/interact together socially. Boys are more aggressive, spacial oriented, stronger, protective, and competitive when they play. When you were 8-11 years old, who did you interact with? Well, if you are a girl, then you most likely wanted to please your peers that were girls. They were the ones you interacted with most, generally because as children we don't necessarily think about relationships with the opposite gender. The culture (or units of society) we grew up in has an impact on who we are. When we don't have a good relationship with our family members, we tend to turn to others. 

Possible reasons that some people have same-sex attraction could be from the following. One might struggle with their self-esteem, be bullied, or have their gender identity wounded. They could be hungry for a father or mother. Maybe they got into pornography, or dragged into a situation and didn't know what to do. Really, all these people want is love. From the resources they have, their emotional and spiritual needs are not being met. If they are not getting the love and support they need from their family, they could possibly turn to their same-sex peers. Same-gender attraction people don't necessarily know why they have feelings for their peers of the same sex. Homosexuality is not just because of genetics. There have been studies on twins, and their genetics are 100% alike. You would think that if one twin identifies as gay, then the chance of the other one being identified as gay is high. That isn't necessarily the case. For those people who identify themselves as gay/lesbian, we should still love them for who they are.