Subjects of conversation according to gender.

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I practically don’t talk with anybody except shopkeepers and movie cashiers. I am a furious eavesdropper and observer of people in the street. I realize (perhaps this should be obvious, but I am some kind of an anthropologist on earth, of martian or venusian origin) that conversations between a man and a woman are completely different from conversations between people of the same sex. Further there is one fact that irks me a lot. In cross gender conversations many subjects (mainly about sexual affairs, but not only these) are banned or treated with great caution. I know that this is because I am a martian or a venusian, or anyhow autistic, but I would like, in an utopian society, the dropping of this conversational discrimination.

Gender is a social construct. Women talk about crap, men talk about crap.
I think age has a lot to do with it. When I was in college people talked about sex, regardless of the gender of whoever they were with.
I don't talk much, but as I regard another persons sex as none of my business, what I do talk about to people would not change depending on their gender. I would discuss the same things with a man as I would with a woman.

I used to think gender was a social construct, but I don't anymore. Some of it is, and some of it isn't, and there are always exceptions to the rules. But men and women are very different biologically and in how they think (for the most part--talking about averages here, as I said, there are always exceptions to the rules.) THe different hormones in our bodies affect the way our bodies AND minds work a great deal.

That's sex, not gender.
Someone can be biologically male, but there gender doesn't necessarily have to match that.

yes, but a lot of our gender ideas come from the basic differences in the way men and women think b/c of their biology. Gender isn't completely a social construct, a lot of it is based on sex.

But what I'm saying is sex and gender are two different things. Gender itself is a social construct - it doesn't have to be linked to someone's biological sex.

Yes, of course there are differences of cultures and epochs. Now the conversation about sex has gone through a great deal of emancipation or liberation. But there remain great differences of nuances and language. Among same gender the language is still much cruder. If you are a male you normally wouldn’t use the expression, referring to a third person, “I f***ed her (or him), talking with a woman. There is also here this gentlemanly convention, I don’t know if good or bad, forbidding to talk about women seduced. And there may be some serious problem here. An extreme case on vulgarity a and indelicacy can be found in the last book of memories of the Nobel Elias Canetti, where he treats in detail his one year affair with the fellow novelist Iris Murdoch (who was sick with Alzheimer when he was writing).
There is one further problem. Between man and female there always lingers the idea of a possible reciprocal seduction. So there is some of this music (in chatting) even when there is no realistic expectation of reaching the goal. And this is not cultural.

So what about gay/transgendered people? These things don't apply to everybody.

I think this problem appears also for gay people. I have had a friendship with a gay. Conversation with him was sometimes akward, because you never clearly knew how much there was some element of attraction for me guiding his conversation. Some one remembers the scene in "American beauty" when Spacey is misunderstood by the ex-marine?

I know I have input to this thread.

Please wait while I turn it into words.

Thank you.

I've found the opposite, in my
own experiences. I don't talk
about sex seriously EXCEPT
with women.

The one place that I've noticed a
serious difference is in flirting.
Even if there is no interest,
flirting with the opposite sex
seems to be more intellectual,
while the same sex variant is
much more crass.

Most people's conversations
are so inane that I have little
inclination to remember them,
but those that I do note, tend
to be somewhat similar to
my own experience.

Last year I met someone that was introduced to me as a male and ended up being female, which I found out after I had exposed some of my "guy chat" to her about a mutual friend. If the outcome of that scenario told me anything, it's that there is a huge difference between what I can say to a guy and what I can say to girl.

nor does it apply to older people, whom most younger folks believe are sexless and too steeped in gender and the gender of a different age no less! hence no reciprocal seduction sparks to the younger person's mind.
Not only does it not apply to older people bu t it doesn't apply to the abstinent celibate either, nor the asexual.

Merle

This brings to the fore a huge problem (there are no adjectives adequate to define it). Are old people really sexless? Devoid of interest for sex? I doubt it. Sex is perhaps not the most important thing in life: besides hunger, thirst and the need of a secure environment there is the need for attachment. But certainly sex lurks in the mind at a very early age (so the interactions of toddlers of different sex are already pervaded of sexual mannerisms). An this is also true of old people, even if they are justly shy about it. Old people generally do not pretend to seduce (least they are very rich and powerful. But this is not seduction, is a shameless exercise of power, Hefner style).

But sex is in their mind tragically, and when it becomes unattainable it is very much the end of decent life for many, moreover so if they are cut out (as happens most of the time) from a sophisticated cultural consumption and by a role of seer (in contemporary society the only accepted seers are specialists, scientists).

There are also some good novels on the subject: Richler’s Barney’s version, Roth’s The dying animal.
Anyhow this subject is very important in itself and particularly for people in the spectrum, I think.

Do you find it easier to "eavesdrop" from a distance in Europe? At least the Italians I know tend to speak alot with their hands, to accent the spoken. It also seems to be if they are speaking in the home or in public, the amount being used. I mean it's here in the states as well, but to a lesser degree I think. Some I don't understand well, but tend to think it's more because I haven't been around it that much, it seems a little more subtle here. My first wife was Italian, not from the old country, but raised by her Grandparents that were. She spoke with no accent or should say with the differance in only the regional sense. Her mother, bless her wicked heart, well, lol, I don't speak the language, but it didn't take too long to know when I was being discussed and what it really ment.

I too, love to observe people. I also think it comes from being much more of an outsider.

Discussion of sex. Well I do and don't hold back on any of it, no matter whom I think it needs to be discussed with.

Absolutely true. As fo Italians relying on hands and jestures this is true for people from Naples who are some real artists of body language and very amusing and nice for that. Never seen the late lovable Massimo Troisi (an actor)?
But Italians do not exist, as stereotypes would like to represent them. A Piedmontese may be a frozen fish like a londonese former Eton pupil.