Hi. I ended up looking in on your group due to jury duty for an alerted post - dumb alert, and

[scarletwoman]

it happily failed. Once the jury results were in, out of curiosity I came back to read the rest of the thread to which the alerted post was a reply, and then went on to read several other threads in your group. I have to say that I'm impressed with the thoughtful quality of many of the posts here. I generally avoid all discussions about gender roles and such on DU - which tend to be both too rancorous and tedious for my taste.

Anyway, while mulling over some of discussions I was reading here, I got the urge to throw in a couple thoughts of my own about masculinity/femininity and such. I hope no one here minds.

As my username indicates, I'm a woman. I'm also the mother of two grown sons, an old hippie who was a happy warrior during the so-called "Sexual Revolution", twice married and twice divorced, with several other live-in relationships of varying lengths over the course of my adult life - two of which ended only due to the sudden, unexpected death of those partners. I'm now 63-1/2 years old, and I've been unpartnered for close to 13 years now, since the last of those two deaths in November 2000.

The thing is, I've always loved men, and for the longest time all I wanted was to find a partner with whom I could make a good and fulfilling life - so no matter the break-ups and loss of relationships, I was always game to try again. Until the last loss, when I found that I simply didn't have the heart to take on another relationship - but that's a whole other story and not relevant to what I want to say here.

Sorry about the long lead-up - here's what I really want to post about:

Years ago, when I was in between relationships, I decided to make a list of what qualities I would want in a man in order to have an ideal relationship.

(1) He would be honest and have personal integrity.
(2) He would be capable, intelligent, and skilled in living in the world.
(3) He would value learning and expanding his mind.
(4) He would be affectionate and loving, and open to affection and love in turn.
(5) He would be self-aware and self-loving.
(6) He would be respectful and self-respectful.
(7) Most important of all, he would have honor - he would behave honorably and honor his own self.

The thing is, after I made this list I realized that all those qualities were the same qualities I aspired to in myself. And I honestly couldn't think of a single quality that I would ascribe to as being "masculine" or "feminine". They are all qualities that I ascribe to true human beings - human beings who are being their best selves.

This is why I don't have time for the kind of nonsense that goes on about "men are this" or "women are that". We are all simply human beings. If we aspire to be the best human beings we can be, it doesn't matter what our physical package looks like, whether our genitilia is an innie or an outie.

Let us all behave with honor and the rest will take care of itself.

Thank you,
sw

(edited for typo)