How to Bring Your Kids Up Gay by Eve Sedgwick - Essay Example

Sedgwick, Eve K. “How to bring your kids up gay: The war on effeminate boys.” Tendencies. Durham: Duke Press, 1993. In Eve Sedgwick’s article “How to Bring Your Kids up Gay”, the author begins her argument by alarming her readers first with the high rates of teenage suicide and then pointing out that gay and lesbian kids are two to three times more likely to commit suicide than their heterosexual counterparts. This is shockingly contrasted with the response a year later that indicated the Department of Health and Human Services should not have addressed the issue at all because it exists outside of the realm of traditional family values. In this way, the author introduces the main question of her research, where is the profession’s greatest responsibility – to support the values of the community or to provide real help and understanding into what is often labeled ‘deviant behavior’. From a diagnosis standpoint, the author illustrates the concerning direction taken in the publication of the DSM III in which the word homosexuality was removed and particularly male patients began receiving treatment for Gender Identity Disorder of Childhood. This distinction forces a split between gender and sexuality that denaturalizes sexual object-choice and renaturalizes gender ideas. The author provides a simple summary of these ideas in the statement “The reason effeminate boys turn out gay, according to this account, is that other men don’t validate them as masculine” (159). This suggests two things: first, that ‘gayness’ can be cured by appropriately conditioning boys according to their appropriate gender at an early age and second, that homosexuality should not exist. Reinforcing this idea, therapy for gay youth is reported in the article to focus on ‘curing’ the child by providing him with more masculine role models and expecting more masculine behavior out of him. Approaches to the subject that offer actual ethical treatment for gay people as real people are described as ‘narrow.’ Having summarized the findings of Green and Freidman in a highly critical light, the author concludes the article with scientific support that suggests a genetic or biologic element to homosexuality and a proven history that nurturing does not fully eradicate the condition. However, even this shift represents a dangerous turn as there are now biological studies underway to see if homosexuality could be prevented in the womb. One example of how this concept is reinforced in popular culture can be found in the TV series “Will and Grace.” The show attempts to given an impression that it is supporting gay rights and gay attitudes, but it is really reinforcing the concept of the gender separation. The character Jack is flamboyantly gay, effeminate to the highest degree to a point where he is more feminine than most of the female characters. Yet he remains morally deficient at the same time, ensuring that he is accepted only as a thoroughly defective individual. The other gay character, Will, is given a more masculine social persona in his conservative profession as a lawyer, appearing often in suits and ties. However, he demonstrates, frequently, his feminine gay side as he strives to keep Grace in balance. Although she is an interior designer, it is Will who has the better fashion sense and helps Grace to sort out her various wardrobe and design issues. Throughout the episodes, Will displays a strong affection for Grace, and the couple even forms a functional marriage for a time as a means of dual support, but moments of potential heterosexual desire are immediately rectified with some sudden and irrefutable instance of ‘feminine’ behavior on Will’s part. This may be a sudden comment about her hair, her clothes, a cute guy passing by or interest in gaining a new recipe. Bourdieu, Pierre. “Structures, Habitus, Practices.” Rethinking the Subject: An Anthology of Contemporary European Social Thought. James D. Faubian (ed.). Oxford: Westview Press, 1995. Within the introduction to this article, the author explains what is meant by the word habitus, “the system of structured, structuring dispositions … which is constituted in practice and is always oriented towards practical functions” (32). This basically boils down to an objectivist perspective in which the world is considered to have been constructed in such a way so that it might be observed as something detached and apart from the society or the group that constructed it. This is a very difficult concept to understand and the author finds it necessary to attempt definition several times. “Objectively ‘regulated’ and ‘regular’ without being in any way the product of obedience to rules, they can be collectively orchestrated without being the product of the organizing action of a conductor” (32-33). The main idea the author seems to be trying to convey about the habitus is that is a certain system of behaviors and ideas that is largely based on historical precedent but is not necessarily written in strict format. As a result, we tend to act on them without thinking, behaving in ways that are appropriate to a given situation or anticipated goal within our society and, in many cases, without even realizing the historical basis or the habitus of the behaviors. A contemporary example of this concept would be the continued traditional gender roles of the family. Although a great deal of attention has been focused on providing children with a more gender neutral environment in which they might more fully explore their interests and identity, this remains largely theory and little practice. Boys are still encouraged to participate in active games such as war and construction while girls are still provided the tools they need to create their own tidy playhouse complete with children to feed, kitchens to clean up and clothes to wash. That children take to these games so naturally, even seeming to prefer them based upon gender distinctions from a very early age, reinforces the ages-old habitus of family roles just as the media environment continues to reinforce them through shows such as Everybody Loves Raymond. In this show, the wife stays at home with the three children, constantly seen working on laundry, cleaning or cooking for the family. She has to put up with a great deal of hassle from her in-laws, as a good daughter should and her activities remain largely centered upon what her husband does. The husband goes off to work, leaves the house to have adventures with his brother or his friends and rarely gets involved in anything to do with the house and kids. He is seen working and playing and relaxing around the house and this is considered to be okay. In the meantime, his wife’s constant complaining about him not contributing around the house is seen as nagging and shrewish rather than justified. This is brought out to even greater extent by the mother, who comes over unannounced at all times of the day and night because she lives just across the street. At each visit, she supports her son’s brilliance and demeans his wife’s every effort at providing him with an appropriate home. Gibbs, Anna. “Contagious Feelings: Pauline Hanson and the Epidemiology of Affect.” Australian Humanities Review, 2001. This article discusses another type of system that regulates how people interact with each other without the actual formation of rules. The author introduces the idea of affect by comparing the spread of emotion from one individual to another to the spread of wildfire from one tree to another. While this is a phenomena that is easily tracked between one individual and another, the article points out the tremendous magnification powers of the media in transmitting these impressions and emotional understandings. In bringing this concept into the open, the author illustrates how the psychoanalyst, despite all attempts at remaining the objective observer, is also affected by the emotions and ideas of their clients and the attitudes of the media they have both been exposed to. Within this process, the individual feeds ideas into the media that feeds ideas back to the individual in a continuous and interlocked affective interchange. The use of a specific media figure, Pauline Hanson, to amplify this affect effect on a mass scale is discussed as it is explored through the use of her face as a means of emotional expression through close-ups and through her use of voice. As the author explains, the close-up perspective of this commentator’s face provides more than the simple ability to focus on the woman’s emotions as she is talking, but provides a deeper psychological amplification of the affect effect in that it is a disembodied head that is speaking to us. The emotions tracing across her face become the entire focus and importance of what she is saying. These same emotions are carried through in the timbre of her voice as it is heard in the background of everyday awareness. As the distress of the commentator grew as a result of opposing ideas, so did the ideas of the people grow into more concrete concepts of what was right and good for the nation. Although the author has provided a modern example of how the affect effect can bring about a great deal of social change as emotional reactions give way to more concrete ideological concepts, there are numerous areas in which this can be seen to occur. I think the most striking example of how affect effect can bring about changes in the way people think can be found in the development of organizations such as Divided We Fail after the rise of news commentators such as Keith Olberman. When Olberman first began his news program on NBC in 2003, he was among the first news anchors to openly express his distaste and outright indignation regarding the actions of George Bush. In his commentaries and his reporting of incidents related to the president, he rarely allows the anger to subside from his face or slip out of his tone of voice. As he discusses the policies of the Bush administration, he does so with a direct glare into the camera that is transmitted even through the shine on the lens of his glasses and demands that politicians be more accountable for the events that are taking place worldwide, from war to global warming to economic recession. As Olberman continued to make his distress known, as in the example provided by Gibbs, organizations began to form throughout the country that also demanded greater political accountability and a means for people to band together in a common cause regardless of political affiliation. This, too, was somewhat instigated by Olberman as he equally criticizes both parties for acting irresponsibly. It is difficult to say where these movements will go in the future, but it is not as hard to trace their beginnings to the same sort of affect effect that accompanied Olberman’s words when he first began telling us about his views. Probyn, Elspeth. “Thinking with Gut Feelings.” Eating Things. Scott McFarlane (ed.). 2004. The author of “Thinking with Gut Feelings” begins her article by exploring a personal experience – a tendency to grind her teeth at night and retch in the morning before she can get on with her day. In trying to find a solution to the problem, she explains that she has historically been told it was ‘just stress’ and to exercise it away but has recently received a diagnosis of Generalized Anxiety Disorder. Considering the possibility that she might have inherited a sort of emotional gene from her father, she then begins to talk about how the stomach is now being considered the body’s ‘second mind.’ This is because it is capable of existing without a direct connection to the brain but its functions are interrelated with the brain in terms of feeling and emotion. This suggests a stronger biological connection between the mind and the body than has been acknowledged; introducing the concept of affects from the context of what the body does when it feels. Distinguishing the affect system as the shades of grey between the black or white dichotomy of the drive system, the author argues for a new system that takes these additional shades into consideration. After identifying the recognized major affect pairings, the author relates them to the gut as the body’s means of measuring the intensity of the affect response, or the exact shade of this present grayness. In addition, there is another element of the ‘second brain’ that the author explores and that is whether or not there is a thought process contained within it – the so-called magic thinking that distinguishes between similarity and contagion based on ideas inherent in a particular object or concept. In attempting to illustrate the importance of research into this field, the author argues that the ‘magic thinking’ of today that only barely grasps a connection between mind and body is, perhaps, today’s version of the miasmas and poisonous vapors that explained the then-unknown effects of germs within the body in ages past. A contemporary example of the fine but important distinctions being made between the mind/body or brain/stomach question as regards the affect system might be traced through the relatively unpopular film The Librarian: Quest for the Spear. The traditional approach to feelings has been that they are completely contained within a sort of hyper-realistic virtual body, thus requiring an extreme focus upon the intellectuality of emotion. In the film, this can be seen in the extreme dedication to knowledge the various librarians demonstrate. All three characters identifying themselves at some point as a Librarian (with a capital L) have achieved this distinction because of their absolute passion for study. However, the stomach, thinking in its own way and existing within its own space, which is nevertheless affected by and influential upon its external environment of the body, is capable of providing a more complete understanding of the realities of the situation, including those elements that the intellectual approach cannot yet define. This is reflected in the film as the mother tells her son the important things in life aren’t in the head, but are found in the heart making a clear distinction in popular culture terms between intellectual knowledge and emotional knowledge. As the film plays out, the idea that a synthesis of mind and body, intellectual and emotional elements is required to achieve success. Although Flynn and Edward were equally qualified to be the librarian, only Flynn is able to use his intellectual knowledge to bring about a more positive emotional equilibrium in others through his ability to hear with his ‘gut’. His ability to understand the importance of both emotion and mind saves him from the type of consuming yet empty pursuits sought by Edward and ultimately enables him to achieve what Edward couldn’t do – translate the original language of Earth and solve the riddle of the spear while capturing the heart and soul of his lady protector. Read More