Toni's Synthesis Essay: The Perception Of Womanhood

There was a certain type of pressure that came with being a woman in high school. “The status of womanhood caused pressure amongst the girl groups to evaluate their friendships… it was pressure to their looks, their personality, and their associations” (Simmons, 156). This was not much different from the set of standards that women in my high school were expected of. In fact, they allowed women, “…the maximum access to the booty of womanhood” (Simmons, 154). One can only imagine how damaging this perception of womanhood would deteriorate the self esteem. My insecurities were being validated by a number of things that I was unable to change about myself, and it only caused me to become more susceptible to pressure of becoming the epitome of the ideal female. On the other hand, Toni …show more content…
One of which stated, “No sissy stuff!’’ Being a man means not being a sissy, not being perceived as weak, effeminate, or gay” (Kimmel, 45). Toni explained that as a man one of the most frightening things to be confronted with is having your masculinity stripped away. Being exposed as anything lesser than a man would be no different than social suicide as he put it. Toni’s attempt to dodge his affliction with gender identity was to create a false social identity. He was captain of the football team, kept up with the usual work out regimen, and by doing so he was maintaining the orders of “the guy code.” The comparison of the identity amongst myself and Toni is extremely different as his situation at the time was still the identity of a male. However, a few expectations remained the same for the both of us. It was the unifying emotion subtext mentioned to which Kimmel defined as, “The face you must show to the world insists that everything is just fine, that everything is under control, that there’s nothing to be concerned about.” I deprived myself of many great things in high school to reach the status of womanhood, while putting on an indifferent