Full Personhood: Reclaiming the lost parts of ourselves and developing our complete potential.

How Full Personhood relates to Gender Equity

Our culture has split the qualities of being a human being into two parts, and labeled them either feminine or masculine. Because of this split, most people are socialized into being only half of what they are capable of. Aggressiveness, being good with numbers, and brave under pressure have been categorized as masculine, for example, while the qualities of being gentle, good with emotions and words, and scared under pressure have been categorized as feminine.

Some people, seeing a problem with this split, have encouraged men to embrace their “feminine side” and suggested that women try being “like a man.” This feeds sexism rather than dismantles it. It perpetuates the belief that to be purely feminine, in other words a “true” woman, one cannot be good with numbers, brave or aggressive, and to be purely masculine, in other words a “true” man, one cannot be scared, good with words or emotions, or gentle.

Full Personhood rejects the labels of feminine and masculine all together and instead calls all qualities “human” qualities. Full Personhood encourages individuals to develop all their human qualities and acknowledge all their emotions, so they can reach their full potential and respond in the healthiest, most helpful way possible to each situation.

Examples of what Full Personhood looks like in an adult.

• Someone who can feel sadness, fear, guilt or anger without shame, hurting others, or hurting themselves.*
• Someone who is able to witness others feeling sadness, fear, guilt or anger without shaming or hurting them.
• An adult who can identify and feel more than fifteen different emotions (and isn’t stuck in merely sad/not sad or angry/not angry).
• Someone who doesn’t need to insult or hurt others to feel safe or valued.
• Someone who can speak up for what they want or need without harming others.
• An adult who doesn’t expect others to take care of them, clean up after them, financially support them, or meet their needs in a one-sided way.
• Someone who doesn’t hand their well-being over to someone else.
• An adult who is able to be as aggressive, gentle, selfish, or giving as any situation in front of them* warrants, and doesn’t have to filter out every option that would make them not “man enough” or not “feminine enough.”
• Someone who allows other people to be whatever they need to be in a situation and would never joke or judge someone as not being “man” enough, “feminine” enough or not a “lady.”
• An adult who pays attention to how they* are feeling, what they value, and their impact on others to guide their decisions and actions.
• Someone who can walk away from an invitation to physically fight and still know they* are a whole, valuable person.
• Someone who can witness someone else walk away from an invitation to physically fight and not shame them.
• Someone who can “cause a scene” and, if necessary, physically defend themselves when they are being harassed and still know they are a whole, valuable person.
• Someone who can witness someone causing a scene and not shame them.
• An adult who can have others be mad at them* and still know they are a whole, valuable person.
• Someone who can be true to themselves (with their actions) even when the status quo says they are “wrong.” Note:  this relates to actions that don’t hurt other people.
• An adult who can witness someone else doing an activity, or express themselves in a way, that is against the status quo and not make them wrong.

Examples of how we can teach Full Personhood to our child.

• Respect all of our child’s emotions, as well as our own emotions and the emotions of others. See more under Emotional Wellness.
• Emphasize the age group of a person, rather than the gender/biological sex, when we feel the need to describe someone. Use terms like baby, toddler, child, teenager, or grown-up.
• Avoid saying any general phrases, such as “Girls are/aren’t…”  “Boys are/aren’t…” “Men are/aren’t…”  “Women are/aren’t…” These seemingly harmless statements are not harmless at all and help sexism grow and thrive.
• Do not equate any qualities, skills or activities with a certain gender/biological sex. View our child as having full, individual potential.
• Spend time and effort on each area of our child’s development:  physical, intellectual, spiritual, and emotional. Help them see their bodies as strong, healthy, and capable and their brains as fully competent.
• Demonstrate how we regularly do all the tasks of managing a family and home, and rotate these tasks with our partner and other capable members of our family. Have our kids see and hear about it.
• Participate in a wide variety of activities to show that our lives are not dictated by gender stereotypes.
• Consider what we would do, buy, or be enthusiastic about if our child was the opposite gender. Include those in our interactions with our child, while remembering to expose them to role models of their same gender.
• Be supportive of others who live outside gender stereotypes.
• When our child starts asking if another child is a girl or a boy, focus on noticing the character of a child. An example answer to “Is that a girl or a boy?” is:  “I’m not sure. What do you think?” [after listening] “Some people really care whether someone is a girl or a boy. For me, it’s not that important. What’s more important to me is if they seem friendly. Then if they’re nice to me and fun to be around. Let’s look for who looks friendly.” For more ways to address gender/biological sex, go to FAQ. 
• Make sure we don’t make any sexist comments or jokes, like “man up,” “don’t be a pussy,” “it’s a girl thing,” “boys will be boys,” “girls are so well behaved,” etc.
• Be aware of how we explain our own choices and never make gender the reason for our choice. Even when gender seems the reason, we can broaden it. “I am seeing the doctor to make sure every part of my body is healthy.” Or “I am keeping the curtains closed at night because I like privacy.” Or “I don’t think it’s safe to be on that street after dark, so I’m going to park my car over there instead.” When our kids are older, we can explain the bigger social constructs behind some of our choices.

*I am using “they/their/theirs/them/themselves” as singular pronouns.