It’s perfectly fine to be a “feminine” man. Young men do not need a vision of “positive masculinity.” They need what everyone else needs: to be a good person who has a satisfying, meaningful life.
I don’t think anybody should ever “perform” a gender!
“Perform” in a sociological sense doesn’t mean inauthentic. It simply means to fulfill a societal role. We perform constantly. I do. You do. The author does. We perform as spouses, parents, children, siblings, professionals, leaders, followers, etc.
This performance is a huge burden for me, and also for so many other people. I do very poorly, and because of that, I am not as well respected. My life would be way better if this sort of pressure didn’t exist. It makes no sense to me that I have to fulfill a specific societal role because of the gender I was born into. So I’d say yes, it very much means that performing a gender is inauthentic for a lot of people.
“Perform” in a sociological sense doesn’t mean inauthentic. It simply means to fulfill a societal role. We perform constantly. I do. You do. The author does. We perform as spouses, parents, children, siblings, professionals, leaders, followers, etc.
This performance is a huge burden for me, and also for so many other people. I do very poorly, and because of that, I am not as well respected. My life would be way better if this sort of pressure didn’t exist. It makes no sense to me that I have to fulfill a specific societal role because of the gender I was born into. So I’d say yes, it very much means that performing a gender is inauthentic for a lot of people.