Vive la difference

Denmark and Sweden have led liberal social politics for a century, including around issues of sexual freedoms and gender identity.  The Gay Pride festival occurred in Copenhagen in the week before we arrived.  Here’s a photo of a banner promoting ‘Gender Fluidity’.  I fundamentally believe in people being able to define themselves however they wish and have been politically active in New Zealand to support Gay Law Reform in the 1980s when proposed law changes precipitated widespread and vicious abuse of homosexuals by various groups, including some fundamentalist Christians who led the opposition to law change.

As a biologist and humanist, I cannot help but feel sad when our gender differences are submerged by some of the factions in this discussion – dismantling sexism is not about trying to make out we are all the same, instead more about recognising our sexual differences and letting everyone find their place in a gender continuum.  So for me anyway, the differences between men and women are wonderful, powerful, and a rich part of the human condition provided we are gentle to each other and do not exercise power over the other (individually or collectively).