Performative Acts And Gender Constitution, By Judith Butler

In one scene all the members had their parents over for family therapy. This was when they were at the third step called discovering your root. They each had to mention a moment in their life when they realized they were a homosexual. This concept indicates the nature versus nurture argument, or more precisely, the inkling that homosexuality is a choice rather than a genomic character. Mary Brown requests to identify what turned each pupil gay, as if such an immense notion can be secluded to a definite point in time. Megan mentioned that maybe it was when her dad was unemployed and her mom became the provider which made her get the wrong idea about the roles of men and women. Mary fully agreed with her reason and said, “…your father …show more content…
If not, they could be judged or ridiculed by society. This shows why these young individuals in the film were sent to True Directions, they challenged the ‘norm’ by acting in ways that seem to be non- heterosexual. In “Performative Acts and Gender Constitution,” by Judith Butler she says she sees gender “as a strategy for survival…with clearly punitive consequences,” stating further that “those who fail to do their gender right are regularly punished” (903). Socially constructed gender roles are very apparent in this film and they are used as a solution to homosexuality. For example, boys were to maintain their masculine traits for girls to fall for them at the camp. They also engaged in tasks related to their gender. This included girls being taught on how to change a baby, how to make a house clean, how to wear make-up, how to sew a wedding dress and how to look beautiful as a young woman. The male is also taught how to change a car tire when it has a puncture and fixing a car engine, how to chop wood and how to play football (Talburt 17-39). The main reason for this was that if both the females and males would learn how to perform these tasks then they will be alleviated from homosexuality. The campers are also given card showing gender roles that should be imitated by them. We see this when Megan shows Graham a card of a woman who was taking out the trash. This shows that women play a greater role in the society. By performing these gender-specific roles given by the society they were to behave, dress and act like grown-up men and women. In the last step of the program the group is required to simulate heterosexual intercourse, but this degrades heterosexual relationships to just one of intercourse. This scene could imply that heterosexual relationships are just for reproduction. This was not natural or