Tired of gender.

Don't really care if you agree with me or not, its my vent. I'm not trans or non-binary and I don't have a problem feeling 'man enough'. Literally just a pretty normal 21 year old heterosexual cis-man. Even fortunate in some ways that lend themselves to my perceived masculinity, I just don't really care for them much.

People only ever talk about the negative gender roles, as if they exist separately from the ones most of us are tolerant of. As a very obvious example: why is "toxic masculinity" seen as some separate thing to "healthy masculinity". You treat it like it's some malignant cancer but it's really just all part of one organism. You're comparing an arm to a leg. I kinda think that you simply can't have concepts like masculinity or femininity without them having a shadow. Bleak.

I'm not suggesting that we get rid of those concepts, partly bc it would be genuinely impossible I think. People like them, which makes sense. Your gender is a huge part of the context with which you live in the world. Gendered traits are how we identify people we're more likely to be safe with, and how we identify people we want to fuck. I'm not going to act like thats wrong, bc I'm attracted to women and am therefore attracted to the tertiary sex characteristics which I've been told signify a woman. I also dress in a masculine way bc it just feels default to do so. But always, always that lingering shadow which worries me. I'm worried the shadow is unavoidable

Additionally I'm tired of my male acquaintances claiming to be avid femininists but basically wanting their girlfriend to be a maid & a hole and I'm tired of my female acquaintances lamenting about gender roles but cherrypicking exactly which feminine traits are permitted in the men they associate with. I'm tired of seeing the strong women in my life be perceived as 'cunts' because they don't submit to peoples' every desire and I'm tired of seeing men with warm souls be perceived as weak just because they're quiet. I'm tired of the enforcement from both sides. Whatever you desire, you reject its opposite in equal measure.

Additionally I'm tired of this inherent tension being manipulated so well by grifters online. I fear the day I might have children and I'll have to work out how to stop them falling for that bullshit. Every online space you go there's someone trying to get you to hate yourself so much that they can profit off of you when that hatred eventually turns outwards. There is genuinely blood on their hands. Literally no one except them is in any way better off for having consumed any of that shite.

Tbh I do sometimes wish that we were all biologically identical, so that there wasn't this huge fault line. But wouldn't that be so boring good lord.

Whatever. No clue