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Eliminating the Negative and Hurtful Terms Tomboy and Crossdresser 06-10-2004 03:30 PM
I have to say that the term tomboy needs to be eliminated from our vocabulary as should the term crossdresser.
Tomboy implies that only boys are expected to do vigorous activities. This is absolutely not true. Whether you discuss this culturally or biblically there is no reason for boys and girls activities to be different. We give both boys and girls stuffed animals, but only girls have dolls. Perhaps men would be better fathers if we allowed boys to play with dolls and to learn how to care for a doll rather than playing the violent military games that have been accepted up to now.
Crossdresser is another term that defines men by their clothing. Men wore skirts and stockings before any woman ever did. It was the Roman military that first wore short skirts, since long armored skirts were too heavy. The same men decided to decorate their visible legs with stockings. Queen Victoria was the first woman to have stockings made for her and became the role model for women to wear stockings.
The terms that we use come from how we treat each other. It is important to realize that many of these terms were born out of mistreatment. Tomboy is a term of control. Girls are not allowed to participate in male activities, but if they do they are labeled tomboy.
Men are not allowed to wear clothing that women wear because the Puritans defined strict clothing rules. Therefore a man in a skirt is a crossdresser, except of course if he is in a Kilt. The exception already proves the rule to be faulty.
Take care,
Troy
bravenet.com
