Introduction
Gender is a socially constructed phenomenon, which has no relation to the biological sex of a person. Today, gender is regarded as a vast spectrum, and the global community tries to treat people of all genders equally.
This was not always the case. Gender issues have a long history, and the present paper is aimed at exploring the assorted problems about the perception of gender and how society treated it at varying times.
Gender discrimination: History
The Ancient world
The historical timeline of gender-related issues shows several contradictory tendencies. Today, humanity can trace them through early art depictions of sex and gender, as well as what is left of documented history. Overall, the artifacts and documentation create an impression that humans were generally regarded equally as persons, with some minor exceptions.
There were some occasions that archaeologists interpreted as spanning the boundaries between sexes. For example, some Neolithic to Bronze Age art items represents humans with both male and female sexual characteristics. Later, they discovered some remains of males buried in female clothes in about 2900-2500 BCE (“Grave of stone age transsexual excavated in Prague” n.pag.). The Etruscan Tomb of the Bulls is a well-known piece of craftsmanship illustrating a pair of bulls watching humans having intercourse, both heterosexual and same-sex. From that, they conclude that gender fluidity was an important motive in ancient cultures. Perhaps, the motive originated from pagan religious convictions.
In literature, especially in the works of Greek philosophers, there is a striking discrepancy in the perceptions of women’s place and homosexuality. Such thinkers as Phaedrus, Eryixmachus, and Aristophanes defended romantic feelings between males and stated it was the purest feeling a human was capable of (Sheffield 22). At the same time, they regarded intercourse with women as a necessity to produce offspring. The male relationships were regarded as being higher than male-female, and many Greek aristocrats were known to be in such relationships openly. The word “pederasty” did not mean a bad thing because the practice was quite common. Traces of such practices were noticed in historical accounts of Ancient Egypt where some of the pharaohs were known to be openly homosexual. The same tendencies were present in Ancient Chine, with some of the leaders being in same-sex marriage. Therefore, while the ancient societies tended to regard homosexual relationship positively, women were seen as mere utility designed to produce children.
The Middle Ages
The Middle Ages put an end to sexual self-expression for non-binary people and further enforced female discrimination. The Roman Church, in particular, was extremely misogynist and homophobic. Considering that it was given a right to subject people to capital punishment, the situation of homosexual people and women was regrettable. Islam and Judaism were also explicitly against homosexuality and enforced female oppression.
These are some examples drawn from the Roman Catholic experience. During the infamous witch hunts, many women were slaughtered. The Church allegedly executed those who were guilty of witchcraft but it only takes to have a look at the notorious “Malleus Maleficarum” (“Hammer of Witches”) by Thomas Aquinas to see how deep the misogyny was. Women were regarded as the devil’s seed, and the criteria to classify a woman as a witch were very vague. It meant that just about any woman could be prosecuted as a witch. Apart from being in constant danger of being accused of witchcraft, women were given little to no rights to education or choice of marriage partners. As for homosexual people, the Church subjected them to anathema and death if they were ever found out.
Enlightenment to modern times
The world’s history knows many occasions in different cultures when women were represented in politics and social life. Catherine de Medici, Elisabeth I, and Catherine the Great are some of the remarkable women reigning their respective countries and gathering great power in their hands. However, no real efforts were made to improve women’s position in society until the early 19th century. Women’s place was at home. Depending on the class and social status, women’s obligations differed from raising children and doing household chores to acting as companions to their husbands on secular routes, but not much more (Wiesner-Hanks 54-70).
Marriage, in particular, was where women experienced the most oppression. For example, until the 20th century, the English legal system had a system of coverture. It regarded a married couple as one person under the law, with all the decisions being made by the husband. It meant that women, legally, were not considered persons. The same applied to the U.S. legal system, which denied women the status of persons until 1875. The main implication of it was that women had no control over their bodies, property, or occupation while married – husbands had full legal authority over them, which often led to abuse (Wiesner-Hanks 94).
As for non-binary and homosexual people, the public perception of such behaviors was mostly strictly negative. Secular society heavily influenced by institutionalized religion regarded them as criminals against nature. Homosexual intercourse was punished by death in many countries, and by imprisonment in most, until the 19th century. Some attempts to defend homosexuals were made in publicist writings by activists like Jeremy Bentham, but France was the first country to decriminalize homosexuality by adopting a new penal code in 1791. The 19th century saw a wave of legalization of “sodomy,” but it did not mean that they stopped being discriminated against and marginalized. Non-binary people did not have a rights group until 1897, and were subject to raids and lambasting well into the 20th century (Imbornoni n.pag.).
Response
The 19th and early 20th centuries saw the first wave of feminism. It was introduced as a set of ideological, social, and political movements fighting for women’s rights. These included the right to be regarded legally as persons. Suffrage was first introduced in 1893 in New Zealand for women to acquire the legal right to vote and spread out over Europe and the U.S. It was the most important aspect of the first wave (Imbornoni n.pag.). The second wave starting in the 1960s was (and is) concerned with gender discrimination and sexism. It relates to occupational sexism and the wage gap, which produces the glass ceiling effect, property control. The third wave (since 1990) tackles female sexuality and sexual expression and is partially concerned with the equality of all genders as a spectrum (Anderson n.pag.).
The U.S. and Europe have been decriminalizing homosexuality during the second half of the 20th century (Stevenson 180-187). The 1970s started the most active response to LGBT discrimination in history. The first pride parades were held in New York, the first Australian gay rights establishment was formed, and Sweden made sex reassignment legal for the first time. PFLAG also took its origin in the 1970s as the first union of parents and friends of LGBT people. The subsequent years brought further recognition and diversity embracement.
Moving forward
To love one another and embrace diversity may sound like a utopian thought. Some can argue that love of humankind is impossible because every individual human being puts a strong moral value in the concept of love. It means that a person cannot love more than a few very close people, usually the immediate relatives.
On the other hand, “love” used in the sense of acceptance, tolerance, and kindness is the main postulate of humanitarianism. Even as the name implies, it is a moral promoting benevolence to all humans regardless of their sex, gender, race, etc. It is the moral that helped such countries as Britain and America to abolish slavery and torture, make a prison reform, and start to treat the mentally ill with respect. Humanitarian conceptions were at the baseline of feminism and difference feminism – the movement that acknowledged the differences of genders and makes a stronger emphasis on gender equality than on the power of women. They put a special emphasis on avoiding bias and point out that all prejudice is unreasonable (Gill and Schlund-Vials 190).
Humanitarian ideas have become very important in the modern world, mainly because of globalization. Contacts between different cultures and diverse people make humanity realize that we all belong to this world on an equal basis. Humanitarian concepts make it easier to understand and treat all humans with respect. At this, gender simply becomes one of the variables that add up to each person’s unicity.
Some research states that the majority of the Millennials generation accept diversity by gender. It is the first generation where such ideas are mainstream. It also proves that the perception of gender has significantly changed during the last several centuries – not least because humanitarian theories sprang up.
Present-day
The modernity strives to recognize the human rights of all people regardless of their gender. Women are given the right to control their bodies and express their sexuality, be in charge of their property, and make careers – something that was unheard of just a couple of centuries ago. About LGBT rights, at present, most of Europe and the U.S. legalizes same-sex marriage. Some of the well-known political figures (Jared Polis, Sean Patrick Maloney, Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir, etc.) are openly gay. Moreover, as the wave of transgender rights activism has emerged, transgender and transsexual people started to be represented in the media (e.g., Laverne Cox, Caitlyn Jenner). However, multiple issues still exist that need correction.
While women have got the right to have a property and generally be considered a person in the modern world, quite a lot of injustice takes place based on their gender. Women’s leadership and participation in politics are restricted. For instance, women constitute only 22.8% of all parliamentarians (“Facts and Figures: Leadership and Political Participation” par. 1-3). Although this figure is twice as big as in 1993, the increase is still slow. Only 10 women are presently serving as Heads of either States or Governments, and 4 chambers of parliaments in the world have no female members whatsoever. Research indicates that women, when appointed to administration positions, tend to adopt the humanitarian approach. It means that they try to design policies that best account for the needs of the marginalized and underrepresented. They continue the struggle for the equality of genders in terms of legislations that regulate gender-based crime, sex crime, family issues, wages, pensions, and benefits. Their political leadership is aimed at improving the life quality of all persons, and still, the representation ratios are not in their favor. In business, as research indicates, companies with more women in the Board of Directors experience faster and more profitable growth and larger return in the revenues. Yet, the challenges related to gender often prevent women from being appointed to such positions, let alone earn the same wage: over the last decade, male employees and leaders were earning about 20% more than women holding the same posts (“Facts and Figures: Leadership and Political Participation” par. 3).
Maternity leaves and related issues are a major point of concern that deserves a special place. It would seem that, despite the feminist and human rights activist struggle, society is still operating with a prejudice against working women, especially working mothers. The statistics in Britain, for instance, show that women tend to earn 86p for every £1 that men make. With the child care costs at a steep incline, the financial conditions experienced by working mothers tend to be rather harsh. The injustice seems to be ingrained in the corporate culture as working mothers rarely receive support from their employers in terms of working hours’ flexibility.
While the injustice faced by Europe and the Americas can be characterized as the “glass ceiling” issue, other pressing issues exist in the developing countries. These are related to the views on women’s position in society, their ability to control their bodies and express their sexuality. Some of the cultures still practice female circumcision, which may seem an atrocious practice in the 21st century. Apart from that, the culture of corrective rapes exists: rape is used as an act of punishment or to correct undesirable behavior (Smith n.pag.). Such behaviors usually include having a non-conforming sexual orientation. Although rapes and other forms of violence can be applied to male victims as well, women tend to be more subject to it, especially in strictly patriarchal heteronormative communities.
Conclusion
It would be wrong to assume that humankind has made no progress in what concerns gender discrimination. The values of tolerance and justice for all humans have transformed the world beyond the point of recognition. The Middle Ages were the darkest for people of gender: women were massively prosecuted and executed for witchcraft, and homosexuality was regarded as sinful. During the period of Enlightenment, some social concerns started to arise but it was the first and second waves of feminism, as well as the flurry of LGBT rights activism of the 1970s, that made the most radical improvements in how women and LGBT people were perceived. The people who were not afraid to express and defend themselves have made the world a better place to live.
The societal biases are still degrading for women and people who do not comply with the rules of heteronormativity this society imposes. The wage inequality and the “glass ceiling” effect are still very common around the world. Sadly enough, some countries are not devoid of physical violence and abuse to control women and LGBT people. Which only reckons us as humans to face the problems and join our efforts to correct them.
Works Cited
Anderson, Jennifer Joline. Women’s Rights Movement, Minneapolis, MN: ABDO, 2014. Print.
“Facts and Figures: Leadership and Political Participation.” UN Women. UN Women, 2016. Web.
Gill, Michael, and Cathy J. Schlund-Vials. Disability, Human Rights and the Limits of Humanitarianism, New York, NY: Routledge, 2016. Print.
“Grave of stone age transsexual excavated in Prague.” Archaeology News Network. The Archaeology News Network, Web.
Imbornoni, Ann-Marie. “Women’s Rights Movement in the U.S.” Infoplease. Sandbox Networks, Inc. 2016. Web.
Sheffield, Frisbee C. C. Plato: The Symposium, New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Print.
Smith, Lydia. “Corrective rape: The homophobic fallout of post-apartheid South Africa.” The Telegraph. Telegraph Media Group Limited, 2015. Web.
Stevenson, Bryan. Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption, New York, NY: Spiegel & Grau, 2015. Print.
Wiesner-Hanks, Merry E. Gender in History: Global Perspectives, Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2011. Print.