“The Man Aisle” – On the Masculinization of Grocery Shopping

 — Cross-posted at Femme-O-Nomics

Spatial segregation does a lot of things simultaneously. It physically separates groups while its very existence provides structural (spatial and even architectural) justification for continued separation. Bathrooms are the example that we often use in classrooms to talk about this issue. In Erving Goffman’s work on gender, he found it fascinating that we have designed toilets that make no sense for women to use–urinals. Now, there are plenty of other reasons for bathroom segregation that get brought up when you address that issue in particular, but it’s a great example of how we literally create the infrastructure that perpetuates our belief that men and women must be separated.

A grocery store on the Upper West Side of New York City recently opened a new aisle. It’s just for men, dubbed “the man aisle”–or, as the store prefers “The Man Isle.” The New York Post announced, “Get ready to stock up your man cave!” as the aisle challenges men to consume the right things. I’ve written before about how men were sold the historically feminized activity of consumption by challenging the masculinity of those who failed to consume (here).

Exodus International: Are Chambers’ Anti-Gay Politics Changing?

Exodus International is one of the most powerful forces in the ex-gay movement–a movement aimed at “healing” homosexuals through Christian doctrine, prayer, and “therapy.”*  Similar to the ways that certain groups of Christians promoted teaching “intelligent design” in schools alongside the theory of evolution, parts of the Christian Right have used the claim that homosexuality is not innate to contest legal protections for lesbians and gay men.  The ex-gay movement goes a step further, however, and argues that if homosexuality is not innate then what’s stopping people from ridding themselves of “it.”  Through prayer, ex-gay camps, and therapies designed to “help” gay men and lesbian women (through “sexual reorientation”) lead “normal,” “healthy,” heterosexual  lives, Exodus International–and the many movements with similar tactics and tenets–is a group that has long sought the “cure” to homosexuality through “reparative therapy.”  This is significant, as Robinson and Spivey (2007) note, as “Today, nearly every major Christian Right organization uses the existence of ex-gays to argue that homosexuals can change.  This notion is fundamental to their argument that unlike legal protections based on immutable traits such as race or sex, those based on sexual orientation are unnecessary” (here: 651).

The president of Exodus International, Alan Chambers, recently publicly challenged some of Exodus’ core practices, including questioning whether “sexual orientation change” is truly helpful or even possible (see here for the NYT summary of the alleged “rift in the movement”).  Chambers has been spokesperson for the group as well as president and stated that despite leaving a gay life to marry a woman and have children, he still struggles to “avoid sin,” but also believes that he—and others like him—should not be made afraid to admit this.  In earlier interviews, Chambers had been increasingly hesitant to make a claim surrounding the success of conversion therapies.  Part of this has led Chambers to reject the previous Exodus slogan, “Change is Possible!” (see here for a long panel discussion addressing this among other issues).**

Gendering Women’s Athletic Performances

Women’s participation in athletics has been one of the victories of the feminist movement.  Policies like Title IX demanded equal access and funding (even if that hasn’t yet been realized) in federally subsidized programs.  Though the amendment had to do with much more than women’s participation in sports, this is what discussions of Title IX are often all about.   Title IX stated,

No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance… (Title IX)

The bill says nothing about which sports women would be allowed to play, or how they would be allowed to play them.  There are lots of small differences between men’s and women’s sports.  But, while women’s basketballs are slightly smaller, softballs are much larger than baseballs–a feature that necessitates differences in pitching, hitting, and throwing the balls.  Men’s and women’s athletic outfits also differ.  Consider men’s vs. women’s professional tennis clothing.  But, gendered performance expectations are also lying behind many of the rituals and traditions we hold most dear in many sports.

In watching 2012 Olympic trials for gymnastics, there was one moment during Anna Li’s routine on the uneven bars that caught my attention in the sportscaster conversation following the judging.  We often don’t think about gender performance expectations; we simply don’t have to.  They don’t even typically feel like expectations because many of us are eager to take part in them.  But when gender expectations are disrupted, we know something significant happened, and there is typically a great deal of collective work done to repair the breach.  Anna Li did just such a thing.  I’m not incredibly knowledgeable about gymnastics, so I missed it when it happened, but the significance of the event was not lost on more seasoned fans and commentators.