I will be getting back to this, but for the meantime, please rank the following misdeeds in your mind in order of seriousness or in order of what you would never want others to think of you. Would you rather have someone think you were prideful than a liar? If so, put dishonesty above pride in the rankings.
Sins to rank: Pride, Vanity, External Anger Issues (verbal abuse, physical abuse, etc), Dishonesty, Gossip/Slander, Selfish Ambition, Being Manipulative, Lust
Usually, when I think of sexism or when I hear others talk about sexism it is in reference to women getting the short end of the stick. I definitely think that happens on occasion, and I do not wish to diminish that with what I am about to say. I agree with some of the claims of sexism I that have heard and not with others that I have heard, but that is fodder for a different post.
Usually, people don't think about sexism against men for what I am sure are a variety of reasons. My experiences within some more conservative church culture, though, has been that femininity is equated to holiness. This is perhaps best illustrated by the typical teaching that is directed specifically at women and at men.
Typical Training Content for Women:
"You probably don't like yourself, but God does. He likes you a lot. He wants you to love yourself. He made you beautiful. Love yourself. God doesn't make things that are not beautiful, so you are beautiful. You shouldn't hate yourself. God loves you."Typical Training Content for Men:
"You slimeballs! Statistically speaking, about 98% of you are contemplating cheating on your wives. That includes those of you who aren't married.The above descriptions are exaggerations, but they are not complete exaggerations. Because of this approach within the church culture I used to think that women somehow were naturally more holy than men were. Obviously, if men need to be told they are scumbags, but women need to be told to love themselves, men are in worse shape.
"If you don't have a job, why aren't you providing for your family? If you do have a job, why aren't you spending enough time with your family?
"If you loved your family you would be a leader. Obviously, you aren't enough of a leader, or you wouldn't be in this session. Leadership means realizing every thought you have is evil. Everyone who has had an evil thought raise your hands. The rest of you are liars. Get into an accountability group now!"
Also, it is worth noting that the people who thought I was a good kid when I was growing up always emphasized the aspects of my personality that were not like a typical boy. I didn't roughhouse as much. I had a clean sense of humor. I was more dressed up than other boys at church. Girls were considered good kids specifically if they retained traits believed common to girls.
A final contributing factor to my belief in feminine holiness was the attention that I saw given to traditionally male sins rather than traditionally female sins. Lust and violence were about the worst evils the earth contained. Gossip and vanity were actually encouraged in some settings. Obviously, God cared about punishing the sexually promiscuous and overlooked the wrongs of the people who gossiped about the sexually promiscuous.
I have spent a large part of my life trying to downplay or avoid many of my more male traits because I associated more female traits with the behavior God wanted.
At this previous time in my life, I would have ranked sins I mentioned earlier in the following order. I have marked what I believe are traditional male sins with "M," what I think traditional female sins with "F," and a couple I think are traditionally gender neutral with "N." Just because it is marked with an "M" or an "F" does not mean I think the misdeed is specific to a gender.
| 1. Lust (M) 2. Dishonesty (N) 3. Anger Issues (M) 4. Pride (N) | 5. Selfish Ambition (M) 6. Being Manipulative (F) 7. Gossip/Slander (F) 8. Vanity (F) |
I would by far prefer to have been known as a vain person rather than to have been known as a pervert. Actually, that is still the case. It wouldn't bother me much to be wrongly accused of being vain, but to be wrongly accused of being perverted would be absolutely horrible because of the shame involved. Vain people are usually seen as cool, quirky, or refined. I think this is very telling of church views toward masculinity. This doesn't change the fact that one is not really better than the other, though, and that both types of people are self-centered.
My beliefs have changed in recent years. God does not watch for people to commit specific sins so He can punish those who do the really bad things. People choose God or self constantly throughout their lives and come to a point where they are willing for Him to have every aspect of their lives or they are not. There is no better or worse sin. If you are not willing to give something to Him in the end, that is the worst sin. In this way men and women are no different.
9 comments:
This is so true and probably on of the best post I have read from you.
The book Wild at Heart tackles a little bit about the castration/feminization of men within the church and how we are molded to be more like women, but that is probably a true reflection on society as a whole.
Nice job!
You should send it into relevant magazine dot com.
As I read the post I was struck by how the context (and definition) of the sin/misdeed dramatically changed my ranking. For example, take the sin "Lust"
I defined it as: "an evil desire for gratification - sexual or otherwise".
Dust on the other hand used it synonymously with 'perverted'; which I define as "a non-average level of or focus of for sexual desires".
Neither of these definitions nessesarily relate to actions, only desires. Matthew 5:28 aside for the moment, our ranking of the sin is often (incorrectly) associated with the percieved harm against others. A pervert that likes [insert deviant fetish here] but does not act of the desires ... or does so only with similarly perverted, yet consenting partners is dramatically less "bad" than a one that acts out agressively.
Simmilarly, the external anger issues (and for that matter all the rest of the list)exist on an imaginary sliding scale.
I agree with your premise, but think that to correctly lable the sin (and the associated F/M/N designation) First requires translating the sin into specific examples or categoried os behaviors.
wow .. sorry for the typos everyone ...should have proofed that first.
Forrest,
Thanks for the comments. I was thinking about what you said about Wild at Heart, but I have never read the book.
Dash,
I kind of used some poetic license (so to say) with my descriptions. A pervert is a subset of the group of those who lust. I felt that using "pervert" as an example would provoke stronger reactions than just to say "someone who lusts."
I mentioned some sins that could be described on a sliding scale (specifically, anger issues) purposefully, to some extent. This is because I wanted people to defer to gut reactions regarding labels when initially thinking through how they would rank sins rather than come up with a thought out rationalization. If a person thinks automatically about an abusive husband when I mention anger issues, I very much want that to influence how they decide to rank the misdeed.
That said, I agree that a case could be made that sins that explicitly harm others are worse than those that do not. Determining what counts as harming others could be a fun debate as well.
The women are silent....
I will speak for the women. I agree with the themes of women's classes/retreats/what have you. I think they are mostly lame. I know that God loves me and I am beautiful in His eyes. Yeah, I struggle with gossip/slander/vanity. I think there are a lot of women that do.
I think it should be made clear that the purpose of this is not to pick on women or to make excuses for men.
The point is that I think there is inequity with how male and female traits and tendencies are treated.
along these lines...i hate how even society portrays the division of male/female. Take for instance TV sitcoms and other shows/commercials. If you are a man, you are to be overweight,have a hot wife,no control over your kids,a job that you hate,laughed at by your wife's friends...lack of respect is shown to you by peers,etc..
In all seriousness, men cannot win for losing!
Interesting, I have often felt the church perspective of second class for being female and God will only use you if a capable male does not step up. I don't think this is true, I have felt the idea from others. I do agree too, with the Bad-Men perspective that men are given as you describe. I think too, other than not being bad, the only other thing pushed on guys has to do with Fatherhood. Surely there is more to each man than fighting lust and other unappealing traits and being a good or bad father.
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