Things I have learned in life about being female

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I remember my dad telling me to do things like a lady when I was a child. It was very tiring. I wanted to tell him that I didn't want to be a lady when I grow up, but I couldn't do that. That was during the early to mid 80s. I had a strange way if eating where my elbows would stick out. One night at the dinner table, my dad said "You're going to have a boyfriend one day and you can't be seen eating like that if you're out on a date with him." I piped up and retorted, "As if that's ever going to happen. I wish to remain single my entire life so I can do as I wish!" My dad said, "You never know....it could happen." I said, "I'll make sure it doesn't." My dad never talked to be about dating and boyfriends ever again. Having said that, I did learn to keep my elbows to the side while eating when my dad started making up stories about eating with the Royal Family.

Thank you. You're a Sweet Pea.

If its not because of my height, could non verbal messages be at play here? How I carry myself?

I'm learning a lot from this thread. Please keep it going (and on topic)!

Men are always told to act in certain ways, no gender is truly 'liberated'* therefore there is nothing to be jealous of.

Who taught you this? It's wrong and not something found in any Western civilization.

-the definition of liberated in academic/socialist philosophy seems to be
-having no responsibility whatsoever

I'm trying to "unlearn" a lot of this stuff I've learned about being female. It isn't easy. I didn't even know I had internalized some of these ideas until I really started thinking about it. 10-15 years ago I probably would have said no way do these things really affect me that much. I certainly would have noticed people doing things or acting towards me in ways that made me feel uncomfortable, but I think I would have attributed it to being young or probably more so something about my appearance. I was also probably naive to the meaning of a lot of behaviors, or simply oblivious to them.

I used to be very thin and got a lot of criticism for it and I felt that people treated me very negatively because of it. So say if a guy brushed by me sort of rudely I assumed it was because of how I looked, because I didn't look substantial enough to be seen, or because I wasn't attractive enough to be considered worthy of basic respect. Also, like many other people here, I've always been assumed to be younger than my actual age and felt like that had something to do with it too.

Then after I started my current job as a sales rep, about 9 years ago, it seemed like I started getting a LOT more comments about my size from people out in public, sometimes from women but mostly from men. A lot of it was flirtatious but really didn't make me feel good at all. To be blunt I felt like they were talking to me as if I was a prostitute. It's hard for me to write this, I feel sick just thinking about it and I am having a strong physical reaction.

Since then, I forget what I weighed when I started but I've gained probably 30-40 pounds. I quite consciously wanted to gain weight yet at the same time I loathed myself for doing it, for giving in to the criticism and the fear and all these people putting pressure on me about my appearance. I thought if I gained weight, it would change the way people saw me and treated me. I thought that extending the parameters of my body would somehow give me more space, not just in a literal physical way but in a social sense, that I wouldn't be bothered as much. I also thought that gaining weight would make me look older or more mature.

Most of all I thought, since most of the comments and behavior were so focused on my body size and shape, that the unwelcome comments and other harassing behaviors might stop if I changed my size and shape. Instead, it continued, and took on even more surprising forms of behavior. A lot of the comments have been focused on my most female attributes, my sex life and/or relationship status, and also my child-bearing status. It does not seem to make much difference how large or small my shape is, but rather that my shape is female.

A variety of life experiences of being treated this way have taught me this. And I live in Western civilization, so clearly I found it to exist. But I am far from being the first woman to discover it. I agree it's wrong, if you mean in the sense of being ethically or morally wrong. But if you mean wrong in the sense that these things don't happen, where did you get that idea?

It's interesting how many guys are having a hard time refraining from posting in this thread to tell you that your lived experiences as a woman are "wrong" and untrue. One can't help but wonder how they would know better than you do what your experiences as a woman have been and what messages you've received from other people and from the culture where you live. Do they have more direct access to your experiences than you have, somehow? It's fascinating to ponder.

It occurred to me just as I was sitting comfortably in a safe place that it is more comfortable for women, too, to sit with their legs apart.
I think I will start sitting this way in public and see what happens.

Indeed, it can seem as if they have far greater knowledge of my experiences than I do, practically omniscient really.

I was thinking about putting that one on my list, but it's such a bigger and deeper issue for me, I'm not even sure how much I associate it with being female. I think I just associate that one with just being "me."

I means its ethically wrong so whoever taught you that was wrong to do so.

If you made it clear in a public place that a man was in your personal space I think other men would help you out.

What has taught us this? The way some men behave towards us has taught us this. Dianthus is definitely far from the first woman to experience this.

I'm gonna be honest, I think that some men think that they are meant to act this way, that it's somehow manly. That they are exerting their manliness, putting it forward so that you notice it, so that they can boost their self esteem.

I live in the UK and us Brits like our personal space, so it tends to be the odd creepy guy whom I found to behave like this, certainly not all men, but those types seem totally oblivious to the fact that we don't want them in our space and I genuinely think that it has a lot to do with no one teaching them any better - well, apart from the creeps who are arrogant and won't be told otherwise anyway.

Yes this seems right, I dont think many women are taught that this is normal though....and if they are..... most people would agree they had a weird nontypical childhood.

Learned through life experience, not taught.

Why do you insist on telling women in this thread what their lived experience has been, that what they are telling you about their own experience is incorrect somehow? It's ironic (but very fitting of the OP) how intrusively tone-deaf your posts are.

Things like politeness seem pretty gender-role free where I live. Holding open doors for people carrying stuff (at stores where the doors aren't self-opening) is something that comes naturally to most people. I am taller and larger than many other women, so I think I'm the one who takes up too much space.

I don't live in a major city where I have to wade through crowds of people on the sidewalk, though, so it's not usually a problem.