I was at a meeting the other day where the question of “normal” boy and girl behaviour came up. I mean by this what girls and boys, especially teenagers, take to be normal behaviour for those of their own and the opposite gender. I _don’t_ mean what they ought to do. The opinion was voiced by others present that these norms had shifted appreciably in the last twenty or thirty years. Wearing makeup, for instance, they thought, was far more acceptable for boys today that for boys “twenty or thirty years ago”.
Since I was myself a teenager thirty years ago, I think I can say with some authority that this is mistaken, at least for the UK. Sexual intercourse was, as we know, “invented in 1963”:http://alt.venus.co.uk/weed/writings/poems/plam.htm , and by the early-to-mid-1970s glam-rock in the shape of David Bowie and Marc Bolan had made all kinds of flirting with cross-dressing and ambiguous gender identity acceptable for teenage boys. Punk followed almost immediately afterwards. (I’m told that things were different and more backward in the US, which, for James Miller, in his magisterial “Flowers in the Dustbin”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0684865602/junius-20 , explains Bowie’s initial lack of success over there — until he toned things down.) But my guess is that, in the UK at least, teenagers were more ready to play with mixed sexual signals in the 1970s than they are today (and have been since the advent of “new laddism” in the 1990s).
My reading of the evolution of teenage mores may, of course, be wide of the mark. But my point in making it is just to observe how common is the notion of a “dreamtime” about “twenty or thirty years ago” when 1950s moral and cultural norms are supposed to have applied. Probably such standards didn’t obtain in the 1950s either, but people look on the past with a permanently moving horizon before which things were different, everybody was straight, lived in conventional families and playing with sexuality (and indeed being serious about it) was the preserve of intellectuals, poets and German cabaret artistes. It wasn’t like that.
{ 21 comments }
Mark 02.18.04 at 4:51 pm
How about this for a rule of thumb: Those who speak against/legislate against/deride a certain type of behaviour when in their late forties/early fifties, using as a touchstone their behaviour when they were aged 18-22, are simply pissed off that they didn’t get sex/drugs/rock-and-roll when they were young, and don’t want anyone else having the fun that they missed out on.
Ophelia Benson 02.18.04 at 5:02 pm
Except for the part about the fifties. That does seem to be a real constant. That even now that it has long stopped being the dreamtime “twenty or thirty years ago” – still you seldom encounter anyone, even (or perhaps especially) among people with clear memories of the time itself, who denies that the fifties were a remarkably subdued and conformist period.
And of course notoriously there are the books. Lonely Crowd, Grey Flannel Suit, etc, and Amis, Wain, Osborne and the rest who only underline the point.
Mat 02.18.04 at 5:37 pm
[B]y the early-to-mid-1970s glam-rock in the shape of David Bowie and Marc Bolan had made all kinds of flirting with cross-dressing and ambiguous gender identity acceptable for teenage boys[..]
See the excellent Velvet Goldmine for an illustration of this.
LizardBreath 02.18.04 at 5:40 pm
Boys in my high-school 20 years ago were wearing black eyeliner and poufy ‘poet shirts’ — Duran Duran was big. Not all of the boys were doing it, but a definite subculture.
I’d say that American adolescent culture has gotten noticeably less accepting of ‘feminine’ behavior from straight or mostly-straight boys since the 80’s, although it’s probably more accepting of actual homosexuality.
jamie 02.18.04 at 5:53 pm
I remember the first football matches I went to in the mid seventies. All the hooligans had sprayed their DM’s with silver glitter and were wearing eyeliner, in imitation of A Clockwork Orange, I suspect.
What they did next did not fall into the category of “playing around with gender identities”, however.
C.D. 02.18.04 at 7:01 pm
Well, there have always been subcultures that are tolerant of “feminine” boy behavior (I was fairly into Punk/Goth/New Wave in the 80s), but it’s always been a subculture, at least here in the States.
Goths, punks, glams, etc. were picked on and beat up a lot in the 80s, especially in areas outside of big cities. I actually think that as we moved into the late 80s and 90s, subculture behavior became much more acceptable (as mainstream culture began incorporating these subcultures).
Of course, goths wearing makeup might be distinguished from someone displaying feminine behavior in general. Meaning these days a male goth in makeup is not automatically assumed to be gay (just “weird”). So maybe it’s true that feminine behavior in boys not associated with a subculture is less tolerated today. Of course, the one very effeminate (and ultimately gay) male in my high school was picked on a lot in the 80s. Too bad, he was a nice guy.
Cryptic Ned 02.18.04 at 7:41 pm
I remember the first football matches I went to in the mid seventies. All the hooligans had sprayed their DM’s with silver glitter and were wearing eyeliner, in imitation of A Clockwork Orange, I suspect.
DM’s?
I would say that in the US over the last decade, a boy wearing makeup and poufy hair would be an outcast in any public high school outside of a few in NYC, LA, or SF. I’d be very surprised if there was some document that this wasn’t the case 30 years ago. Different in Britain, I guess.
Miriam 02.18.04 at 7:46 pm
Oddly enough, I never got the pro-1950s moral thing from my own parents; I don’t know the extent to which their social class as teens (both grew up on or well below the poverty line) plays a part. My father in particular tends to associate the 1950s with teenage male promiscuity, accompanied by the usual double standard. IIRC, the Chicago Tribune ran an interesting article around ’95 or ’96 which argued that teenage pregnancy rates had declined noticeably since the 50s; what had gone up were unmarried teen pregnancies. In other words, the shotgun marriage vanished.
jamie 02.18.04 at 7:54 pm
“DMs?”
Dr Marten’s boots, now something of a fashion accessory, originally workmen’s boots popular with footy hooligan types and skinheads
Mark 02.18.04 at 8:02 pm
Scumbag college, your starter for 10. Name the artist, song and television program that the following lyrics appeared in:
Doctor Martens
Doctor Martens
Doctor Martens Boots
Those boots with the Air-Wair soles
That retail for only 19.99
etc etc etc…
Z 02.18.04 at 8:15 pm
Why does Chris hate America?
teep 02.18.04 at 8:16 pm
Dunno why, mark, but that reminds me a lot of The Young Ones, a british comedy with (among other things) a lot of lentils, Dexy’s Midnight Runners, and someone who looked a lot like Buddy Holly hanging from the ceiling upstairs.
Matt McG 02.19.04 at 1:56 am
[rambling anecdote alert]
I walked around a small Scottish town, widely agreed to be a ‘tough’ place, in full on glam-rock make-up and clothes (of the LA dodgy big-hair 1980s variety) in the late 1980s. I can’t say it was approved of but on the whole people were fairly tolerant – as long as you didn’t walk about like a potential victim but did it with a bit of confidence and ‘up yours’ attitude.
I remember one school friend (a conservative farmer type) offering me a lift one night and being shocked that I was wearing lipstick and eyemakeup – but his response once he got over the shock was of the “are you wearing makeup Matt? Aye? Suits ye.”
I did get into some fights but that was much more about being part of a biker/metal/punk sub-culture which clashed with the prevalent football ‘casual’ culture and therefore had more to do with where I drank and the length of my hair than the make-up. Tribalism was rife, but the signfiers of your tribe were less important than which actual tribe you were nominally part of.
I remember some acquaintances from school – who were ‘tentative goths’ (i.e. neatly dressed, conservative haircuts all week, eyeliner and attempts to mess the hair up at the weekend) all coming to the pub one night in drag. They got a few cheeky comments but little actual hassle. The idea that guys could look wierd and still be ‘alright’ seemed fairly common.
People in the council estate I was from were perfectly blasé about it, but then again I’d lived there all my life, had grown up with all the resident ‘hard men’ and was a ‘known heterosexual’ :-). Life was much harder for the transexual guy who lived round the corner (not a joke) he/she got by through being 6ft 3 and about 200lbs (also not a joke).
I’ve never been to America so I can’t compare the culture there. Britain has a pretty massive tolerance for wierdness in my experience – the big problems are binge drinking and the attendant violence that goes along with it, but you’re not that much more likely to be a target just because you look odd.
Chris is right I think that actual homosexuality (as opposed to straight guys messing with their image) is much more tolerated now than it was then. My Dad’s local pub – a bastion of old fashioned rural Scottish Protestant bigotry – now has a fully ‘out’ homosexual couple among the regulars and that would never have happened 20 years ago.
Gretchen 02.19.04 at 2:53 am
But my point in making it is just to observe how common is the notion of a “dreamtime†about “twenty or thirty years ago†when 1950s moral and cultural norms are supposed to have applied.
It could simply that for teenagers “twenty or thirty years” is that mythical time when their parents were young. So perhaps there’s some squeamishness invloved when it comes to thinking of one’s father, or even his peers, wearing make-up and experimenting with gender roles.
C G 02.19.04 at 7:01 am
Two years ago, I was a teenager in Florida, and no guys *ever* wore makeup. Nor was that even remotely considered as an option. If one were to try even once, the stigma would be ruinous and permanent.
TH 02.19.04 at 1:02 pm
Another datapoint: I was wearing make-up in the early eighties, as were quite a few of my friends. (Mostly the usual: eyeliner, nail polish and a bit of lipstick) We also wore formal suits or weird shirts depening on the mood. We weren’t hassled and that was in a franconian (southern germany) small town.
Freaks of all kind were – while not the norm – at least usual enough to not draw even a raised eyebrow.
But from a lot of fiction and talks I guess sexual roles and images are much more “fixed” and “to be adhered to” in the US than in Europe.
ginger 02.19.04 at 2:36 pm
David Bowie and Marc Bolan
Hmm…
Oh well today we have The Darkness.
Nah, it doesn’t really compare, I know…
reuben 02.19.04 at 4:12 pm
Strictly anecdotal, but my British male friends are much more comfortable with their “feminine sides” than my American male friends are. Pretty much all other factors are controlled for: similar interests, tastes, ages and political beliefs, and all are urban (London and New York).
Upon moving, I quickly came to realise that I feel far less pressure to be traditionally masculine here in London than I do in New York. (What a relief; I was never very good at it anyway.)
harry 02.19.04 at 7:02 pm
Despite Chris’s observation about my writing style, I’d second reuben’s observation (though I’m in the wrong place). Its even more noticeable comparing provincial UK with provincial US. I wonder if women notice a difference in the behavior expected from them.
In graduate school (in the US) a (British male) friend and I were shunned by one apparently enlightened (American) male grad student. We always wondered why, and were eventually told (by a mutual friend) that he thought we were gay because of the way we crossed our legs! Mark you, as an undergrad (in London) my best friend was very flambouyantly gay and it was not much fun hanging out near the football team.
marc — I know its Alexei Sayle. Maybe ‘Alexei Sayle’s Stuff’?
Lawrence Krubner 02.21.04 at 12:37 am
I’m in agreement with Ophelia Benson’s comment above, the 1950s remain a critical touchstone. My thought on that is that there is something fundamentally conservative about having children, and the Baby Boom was the end of the period, 1750 – 1958, when the West was clearly pro population growth, and saw a lot of it.
I’ve been thinking and writing about this all day, and will have more to say soon.
Lawrence Krubner 02.21.04 at 1:03 am
“But from a lot of fiction and talks I guess sexual roles and images are much more “fixed†and “to be adhered to†in the US than in Europe.”
I think someone here on Crooked Timber once remarked that America had better legal protections for eccentric behavior, but a less accepting culture, and in England the exact opposite was true.
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