Not Man--Only Human (The adjective "Solus" is masculine, that doesn't make "human" refer to men only. All careers are feminine nouns. Do we really want to be less open minded than the Romans about gender, people?)
Could it be that without the fighting between men and women for dominance we'd be too dangerous to other races/countries? Is that why we differentiate between genders in things even those that don't need to be differentiated? Okay, I get the idea of gendered bathrooms, even if I think full length unisex stalls make more sense. I get the idea of dressing babies in different colours just to spare the parents having to constantly answer the question "is it a boy or a girl". (Which is itself a stupid question. A healthy baby is a good enough thing to occur, gender withstanding!) But what the hell is up with words like "man-bag" and "man-whore".
I have grocery bags, shoulder bags, carry-on bags, messenger bags...I don't have a woman-bag. Why is there a need to specify that the bag a man is carrying is not a shoulder bag? It's kept on his shoulder, it carries things that don't fit in his pockets, it frees up his hands. Why the hell is carrying a bag such a negatively feminine idea that "man" has to be put in front of the word to make it acceptable to carry something that from its appearance is not gendered but immensely practical?
And does "whore" really need to have the word "man" in front of it? It's already an insult, isn't it? Do you have to specify that you're only insulting his sexual proclivities and not also implying that he's feminine. Does calling a guy a "whore" really imply he's feminine, anyway? I don't think so. Himbo/bimbo is another one. "Man tart" is possibly the most absolutely ridiculous one I've heard.
Not to say that "man" in front of a word traditionally applied to women is always stupid. Man boobs, for one. Breast implants aside, there's only one way a guy gets these and it's NOT from a distinct inflow of estrogen (notice I say guy, here. I believe MTF trans should be given the label of female as soon as they identify, I don't care what other steps they've taken.) So that one can stay.
But really, I can't help but think there must be some reason that even women use these stupid terms...as if even they agree that it's demeaning for a man to have a non-gender specific word applied to him without first making it "manly".
Simone De Beauvoir...where are you when we need you?
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