Social constructs are theories and understandings in which society operates and functions under as a derivative of human interactions. The cognitive capacities of humans makes us build on these constructs from our first experiences and our reactions to them. This reaction then sets the norm. These norms are the foundation and anything outside of it is seen as abnormal.
Social constructs have been around since the start of time and in many ways have benefitted us. Social constructs have helped us set norms in society under which we adhere to and help keep us in order. In many ways, social constructs are the only way for us to fully function. But there comes a time in every generation in which you must question your past order and deviate from the path in which you were afoot.
As stated earlier social constructs are derived from our first interactions, which sets the tone of our perception of the theory. And if that first interaction is negative, what is the outcome? The best example of this which I’m sure you’re probably already guessing is race. Before the slave trade, it was perceived that Africa was, in fact, one of the richest continents in the world. While they had not reached the progressiveness of the Spanish, Italian and Portuguese who were the leaders of Europe pre and post-renaissance, they still had wealth due to the gold in West Africa. Many scholars have perceived how the trade began in numerous ways and I’m not here to say which way is accurate but what I believe and what many others do is, during the age of exploration explorers discovered nations opposed to theirs, different countries with different cultures, climate, and geographical features and associated them with their biological differences. They had more melanin. Had the explorers discovered these nations and the inhabitants of them had been white, would they have begun the enslavement of them or the colonisation of them? The point is that what they encountered threatened their way of life and their norms and they coupled it with the colour of their skin, this then set the tone that those of a different color were inferior and thus building the social construct of race. 400 years later and we’ve discovered that the colour of one’s skin is simply just a genetic trait the same as having ginger hair or blue eyes etc. but why do we still use the term of race? Why do we have to put our ethnicity on job applications, dating sites, online gaming and so on? Without sounding too repetitive, the construct of race has had zero benefits to society, it has separated us as people and placed us in categories down to a genetic feature. The concept of race should be deconstructed and will be deconstructed once we identify the problems it still causes today, we could eventually pair having a different skin tone to having a big or small nose. While it may be naive, this is possible if we break our norm.
Another social construct we encounter daily is one of gender. The question of gender today is widely controversial but slowly making its way to becoming obsolete. To understand gender as a social construct we must first understand it as a term. Gender in simple terms is the classification of sexes, but what are sexes? Sex refers to the biological differences between males and females, mainly the genitalia. These biological differences brought forward what we today recognize in social environments as masculine and feminine. Historian Joan Scott has stated, “gender is the social organization of sexual difference”. Tendencies and habits of each gender we’ve linked to their sexual differences i.e a woman would tend to be a better parent to a child as they carried and birthed the child. But this is completely false and there are no proven studies to state this as accurate. The patterns identified between genders we’ve come to understand draw no correlation to our sexual differences. The fact that women wear makeup isn’t linked to them being female but rather the norms we’ve set. My main question is, should we deconstruct genders? No.
From my viewpoint, I believe there is nothing wrong with genders, to be quite frank I believe they help shape society. It helps give males and females an identity in which they can conform to, whether its a male identifying as a woman or vice versa. But what we must acknowledge is that they are not equal. While we strive for a fairer, more egalitarian society, gender inequality is still a struggle women face. This is simply due to the system that we have adopted since the beginning of society, patriarchy. Patriarchy is a system used by men to oppress women, today we still see this oppression, with women still having less economic and political power as men. The fact of the matter is the construct of gender was built on a poor foundation, one that favors men and disservices women. We as men have not done an adequate enough job to acknowledge this and improve it, today women are still victims of sexual harassment/assault, unequal pay, fewer opportunities, tougher access to education and less economic independence. Should we address these variables and fix them, I believe there wouldn’t be a question of deconstructing genders but rather embracing them.