Is it age?

[susandennis]

While on hold this morning, I got caught up in an LJ trail this morning - going from my friends to their friends, etc. What I discovered was two fold:

1) I really do appreciate a company that keeps the volume low on their hold music.
2) A lot of LJers hide their gender.

If the userpic is a photograph (that isn't perfect - like Hugh Grant) of a person, I generally think the writer could be the same gender as the person in the photograph. I've learned not to bet money on that. Some usernames help - ruralrob or susandennis

But, most journals do not have userpic or userename clues. And most do not clarify the question in their bios. Checking a friends list may help a little - if there are lots of lesbian clues, I'm going with female. If there are lots of bear references, I'm thinking male. Otherwise, unless the gender is specifically spelled out, I'm not assuming nothing.

My 60's liberal soul wants so much to believe it doesn't matter. But my 54 year old female head knows it does. I can't get comfortable reading a journal for very long if I don't at least know if the writer is male or female. It matters to me. Their race, sexual prefrence, religious persuasion - all of that is interesting but I can glean that, generally, from their writing. Their gender... because these writers assume I know... remanes a total mystery.

Do peple do that on purpose? Are they screwing with me? Would you make them stop? Thank you.

Comments

Just for you .....

[melodysk.livejournal.com]

White English (with Irish Grandparents)
Hetero
Catholic

;)

[emjaybaxter.livejournal.com]

In case you were wondering, male, 5'6" 150, greying - also hints to age(57), blue/hazel eyes, mainly smooth, average build, attached, NS, NDD, friendly, also have all my teeth except for one. (hee hee).

[art-thirst.livejournal.com]

57yr old? Damn, you look good. I assumed you were late 40's. I guess, never assume. Several people mentioned my Dad looking young. He's 81 and looks 60's, and handsome I'll admit (something I would do as a teen) :-)

[emjaybaxter.livejournal.com]

Hey I like that. You can come to my place anytime.

[art-thirst.livejournal.com]

Have some of those cheese biscuits warmed up, I'll be right over! I'll bring some of my peach cobbler I made tonight!

[emjaybaxter.livejournal.com]

The cheese biscuits are always avaliable, and I sure do like Peach gobler, er I mean cobler.

[suifu.livejournal.com]

I think some folks do purposely remain ambiguous (or anonymous). I suppose it's an easy way to maintain an alter ego. :)

[drood.livejournal.com]

I've had a few people on the list with gender-indeterminate names and non-photographic icons of whom I've made incorrect assumptions. One had a lot of female fairies whom I assumed was female and lesbian when, in fact, he was male and traditionally married.

It kind of freaked me a little, too. I didn't care either way, but having to interpret the journal from an entirely different perspective was a lot of work.

I think I'll put a woman's face in my icon for this reply, just to screw with you.

[minimac.livejournal.com]

Let's just refer to the non-gendered as "Pat".

It does matter...but why?

[spiritgirl.livejournal.com]

I don't have a huge friends list, and I think I can identify all of them by gender. By the way spiritgirl is female (go figure!!)

There seems to be a lot of communities on LJ for the transgendered or "other". I saw somewhere that a petition might be started to have a other added to the male/female categories when setting up an LJ account. Either the small community is getting loud or the community is larger than I think. It's a wierd phenomena to me...one that I would hate to personally be in just because of the social trama. However, gender seems to be blurring in popular culture. I'm not sure if it's a trend, a growing acceptance of sameness, or what.

I'm plain vanilla, but I do want to be accepting of all people...however they identify. It's a wierd thing though...sometimes the same and sometimes totally separate from the hetero/homo thing which still has it's own stigma.

Oops.....guess you touched on a subject of interest. Made my wheels start spinning on my day off!!!!

social trauma

[kosseferal.livejournal.com]

My identity is larger than any social trauma ever invented.



And yes, I think the population is much larger than anyone thinks. We blend in, in many places. Online is a way for people who live many miles distant to band together. We've never had that before, in the history of the planet.

[waning-estrogen.livejournal.com]

think mine's pretty clear by journal name, username, and bio/profile information.

btw, the 'born female' in the bio refers to the estrogen waning and the tubal ligation. even though I've been slightly altered by choice and by nature, I still consider myself female o+ -not male- o->.

8)

asumptions

[kosseferal.livejournal.com]

I think people relish being able to play with assumptions, online. There aren't many palces one can do it quite a freely as online.


Are you comfortable reading my journal? Bored is probably more like it.

I have often wondered why it vexes people so much to interact with someone without being clear on the gender of the person. I find it matter less and less to me all the time, but I suppose that is because I've had plenty of time to crawl around in the vagaries of gender.

My recently estranged GF and I have been having a lot of high octane back and forth on the gender thing. I asked her to define a transman in terms other than "not a man" and "not a woman." She wasn't very successful at it.

[androkles.livejournal.com]

To quote from Some Like It Hot:

I'm a boy. I'm a BOY!

Well, nobody's perfect.

[cloverbee.livejournal.com]

I see what you meant by your other post now... too funny.

I can't imagine having a gender-neutral persona on LJ. But like you, I've encountered my share and had to guess a few times. Mostly those have been people that aren't really sharing life experiences on LJ but people who are using it a means of expressing art or poetry or only a particular side of themselves that maybe is neutral in age, sex and gender.

For those of us that just write about our dailies, it seems like it would be really difficult to keep yourself 1) honest in your postings, 2) engaging enough that people were interesting in your daily events and 3) at the end of the day - people feel that they know you. How could you do that and not release your age, sex and gender along with a lot of other social cues that are normally picked up instantly when you meet someone irl.

It would be an interesting experiment to see if a "Pat" could survive longterm. Hmmmm. I just know that was the most frustrating skit on SNL and I still hate it.

Now I know WHY!!!!

[vaneramos.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's annoying not knowing whether to flirt with them or just read them!