by Beth Zak-Cohen
According to an article in the Yale Daily News, Jen Ivers ’10 wants to run for Mr. Yale. She says she’s not interested in politics nor is she an activist. Students from her residential college overwhelmingly voted to have her as their candidate. We’ve all heard stories like this before. Males wanting to run for prom queen, females wanting to make the boy’s wrestling team…often they are are high-profile lawsuits or news stories. But what purpose do attacks like these really serve? I say attacks because ultimately Jen Ivers and others like her are challenging the system of separating gender. The problem is, in some cases, separating gender is not bad or wrong, it’s simply practical. For example, how can a women be judged fairly in a beauty competition with men, when, because she’s a women, her features and body attributes are different? Separating gender, I think, is even, in some cases, empowering. Take sports teams. By competing against each other young girls gain self esteem and are more able to have playing time than if they were on a mixed gender team. This is also the argument of all-girl’s schools where, they claim, girls have more of a chance to gain leadership roles. All these are good things. In this case though, the comments on the article claim there is no Miss Yale pageant, because of fears that it creates objectification of women. A male pageant doesn’t create objectification of men? I see this as a highly relevant inequality.
There’s one last thing that’s important to consider here, and that is sexuality. Jen Ivers identifies as lesbian and says that she doesn’t identify as male or female. This is a real issue; young people today increasingly self-identify as transsexual or asexual. While gender separation can be empowering and positive for those who identify as female, it can be heart wrenching and confusing for those who are gender confused. The solution, I think, is to give them more avenues of their own to express themselves, and feel comfortable with people like them because unfortunately right now, there is not widespread acceptance of transsexuals in the general public.
I do not advocate that boys, girls, and those who do not identify with a gender should be separate all the time, in fact I think they should definitely be together a lot, and given a lot of opportunities to interact and learn about each other. But I also think each group needs places where they can be comfortable, they can be leaders, and they can shine. Because no matter how much we wish gender didn’t matter, there are some ways it naturally does, and we need to recognize those. If we don’t neither women nor men will appreciate the unique skills they can offer the world.
Image courtesy of Yale Daily News
here’s the thing: mr. yale is not a beauty pageant. its not about objectifying anyones body. as jen ivers told “midnight at yale,” it’s a RIDICULOSITY pageant: http://www.midnightatyale.com/2009/11/redefining-mr-yale-after-few-kinks.html
“She says she’s not interested in politics nor is she an athlete.”
I think by “athlete” you meant to say “activist.” She actually is an athlete.
I’d like to clarify some terminology used in the article. You mention that “young people today increasingly self-identify as transsexual or asexual”. Since most of the paragraph is on gender identity, it sounds like you are using “asexual” to mean “agendered”. “Agendered” means someone who does not feel they fit with a particular place on the gender binary, often identifying as genderless. “Asexual” is a sexual orientation. It is defined by a lack of sexual attraction to anyone, regardless of their sex or gender.
Overall, this article was pretty good. I agree that there are situations when gender separation makes sense. Some people try to “solve” the gender issue by acting like there is no such thing as gender, like those people who made news for not revealing the sex of their child, but I think it’s better addressed through acceptance of others rather than rejecting the distinction.