I feel this in my own life, as an European grown up mostly around my mother, sister, and younger female cousins. My father lived abroad for long periods of time.
Women nowadays keep assuming I'm gay due to my mannerisms.
https://notalwaysright.com/a-gender-fluid-household/157967/ . Short version: 11 year old living only with women picked up practices about how to wear at towel, what to shave, wearing mascara, etc. that his mother's boyfriend both supports and gently points out they are typically gendered.
How did the mom not realize that her kid was shaving his legs and wearing mascara? I guess it would be one thing if the kid was doing it with intention, but he clearly wasn't. How did she never talk to her son about that?
Don't forget bias error. The linked-to site gets contributions from around the world. There's 45 million mothers in the US, so source population of about 100 million mothers. If 0.1% of families have no other male presence that's 100K families. If 0.01% of these mothers don't notice [1], that's still 10 families.
And it's the unusual which make it to sites like these. ("When dog bites man, it's not news. But when man bites dog, now that is news!")
[1] Or it could be the mother didn't know how to bring it up, or thought she was being supportive of her son's choices.
I feel like if the boy went to school with male students the other boys would make fun of him until he conformed to the standard behavior, or until he decided he didn't care if people made fun of him.
... yes. Which is probably why the text says "She laughs and apologizes after [Stepdad] tells her I am lucky I've never showered at school or I'd be a laughing stock" and "I'm SO GLAD he was around before I started high school; I can't imagine that would have been a pleasant experience doing things the way I'd always done them."
Could other 11 year olds spot a boy using mascara, a differing from one with thick eyelashes?
Or tell that someone is shaving his legs when there isn't yet even peach fuzz on his chin?
I couldn't, but I'm pretty oblivious to such things.
Well, there's a growing trend against bullying. Personally, bullying toughened me up, and it affected me in ways that I am glad for. Of course it could have gone wrong, too.
eh, i think i am largely glad the whole bullying + male chauvinism thing is slowly dying out.
i think the next step is recognizing that this is a problem that needs to be confronted for both men and women. "toxic masculinity" among men is frequently nowadays talked about and criticized, but i think women are given a bit too much of a pass in holding pretty shitty gendered/trad expectations of men.
I couldn't use chapstick in elementary school because of the relentless bullying it inevitably triggered. Not just toward me, but any male that dared to hydrate his lips. That sort of reaction made me super averse toward any sort of preening-type of behavior, lest I be perceived as feminine.
Even now, I'm more comfortable if I look at least a little unkempt, as if I work outside with my hands or something. I consciously know it's dumb, but my wife expresses preferences for that unkemptness in me as well.
I wonder why this comment is getting down-voted. I am talking about my own experience, and I also acknowledge that it could have gone wrong. What exactly is down-vote worthy here?
Sure. But this story is clearly labeled "Australia", and Pakistan and Afghanistan have their own gender-based customs. So your point is .... that gender practices are not universal?
I mean, growing up in the US I heard about how French women didn't shave their armpits. As an Italian example, Sophia Loren - https://fineartamerica.com/featured/sophia-loren-on-a-poster... . So it's not like these have been universal Western practices even in my lifetime.