Ok, quick, what does this photo represent to you?
Alas, it is yet another example of a gratuitous dichotomy that only feeds stereotypes. A woman is either a whore or a virgin, right? (oh, maybe there's a 3rd choice: a whore, a virgin, or she's gone legitimate, that is, she's married - to a man.)
Uh Oh, this post has remnants of my lesbian feminist exegesis from college; run the other direction!
Seriously, we so often break down the world into 2 categories. For example:
- man/woman
- gay/straight
- rich/poor
- smart/dumb
- black/white
- liberal/conservative
- us/them
- Bill O'Reilly/Bill Maher
- Believer of God/atheist
WHY WHY WHY do we insist on creating and fostering these gross and rudimentary categorizations?
Well, the answer is, because it's the first step in making sense of the world. We want to categorize and name the parts of the world all around us, so that we can begin to understand the world. Putting people and things into nice and neat little buckets helps us process the world. The problem is, this is just the FIRST step; we have to MATURE and realize that the world is much more complicated, subtle and nuanced than these mere dichotomies might suggest. Dichotomies serve a purpose; they help to orient us; they provide us with a frame of reference. That said, dichotomies are inherently limited, because they don't accommodate the wide variety and overlap within and amongst these categories. Acknowledge dichotomies, but be sure to pull the thread and explore the nuances and ambiguities that dichotomies might expose, if only we would bother to do so.
1 comment:
Excellent post.
Another way to put it is this:
"Keep your eyes upon the prize, forsake the inward gaze;
You've learned the truth: that those who doubt cast worlds in shaded grays."
I think many who call themselves conservatives dislike the very concept of nuance for exactly the reasons that you outline: admitting to nuance deprives them of the easy answers and black-and-white world they need to feel secure.
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