The discussion in class for the past couple weeks has been focused on sex, sexual orientation, and gender, and how they contribute to a person in society. Many people see sex and gender as the same thing and or they correlate with each other, but really they are completely different from each other. Sex refers to the “biological characteristics that define men and women” (World Health Organization, 2011), and gender refers to the “socially constructed roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for men and women” (World Health Organization, 2011). Therefore, the terms male and female are different than masculine and feminine. Throughout history we have been taught that the norm is that females are to associate themselves with feminine activities such as cleaning and nurturing, showing emotions, and being interested in tangible items such as esthetics and dresses etc., and the norm for males is that they are to be the dominant, strong, and courageous breadwinner, that has little or no emotion, and are not to associate themselves with anything feminine that could deviate away from the normal masculine traits. I am going to talk about how sexual dichotomy is expressed during the childhood development which can lead to either homosexuality or heterosexuality.
