Judith Butler argues against the fact that there is a pre-existing gender when we are born, rather that society molds us with the stereotypes of what it means to be male or female. This comes into sexuality a lot because people will automatically assume that women who dress more masculine are lesbians and that men who dress more feminine are gay, although that is obviously not always the case. A quote I really liked from the reading is “The political assumption that there must be a universal basis for feminism, one which must be found in an identity assumed to exist cross-culturally, often accompanies the notion that the oppression of women has some singular form discernible in the universal or hegemonic structure of patriarchy or masculine domination.” 

As for myself, I’m definitely lucky in the fact that my family never pressured me to dress a certain way or made me feel like I had to wear makeup or conform to any typical notions of femininity, rather they just let me figure myself out in my own time. I had a phase of really wanting to be a tomboy, and would refuse to wear pink or dress in skirts and dresses. Now as an adult, I definitely embrace my own femininity and when it comes to expressing myself and through my appearance, I do whatever feels natural. That being said, I’ve definitely noticed that dressing loudly and doing whatever I want with my makeup comes off very performative to others and it’s gained me a lot of negative and unwanted attention from men. Sometimes I feel really bad about it and like I may just be worsening stereotypes, but at the end of the day I’m just being me. Our gender is only as important as we decide to let it be, and should not limit how we appear or how others treat us. Everyone should be free and comfortable to be themselves, whatever that means for them personally.