Quote:
Originally Posted by Neutral  People are disagreeing about things much more fundamental than Steve's article.
We all probably agree with the definition of a male. It's physical, a quantity.
We have no agreement with the definition of a man. It's a quality.
This conversation quickly devolved into debates over personal definitions of "man". Discussion is impossible. |
A 'man' is an adult human male (aged 18 years in some cultures, 21 in others). The quality of being masculine is what's open to debate. I agree that there are certain characteristics that have been traditionally thought of as masculine. However, I disagree that one should align his own characteristics to these controversial 'masculine' characteristics just because he's a man and wants to be accepted as a man.
edit: Anyway, being masculine just means one conforms to socially constructed patterns of how men are expected to behave. I don't want to be fettered by such social constructs or limit my range of behaviour to them.