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Recently I had a discussion with my younger sister about her issues with her class schedule. She just started her senior year in high school and already she is encountering issues with what is so commonly utilized in the educational system to separate the "smart" kids from all others: Categories and Labels. As she revealed her story about not being able to enroll in the class of her choice because she was not a 'magnet' student also known as the"smart" kids, I wandered back to a class discussion on the role that categories play in gender and sexuality. I found myself thinking, 'why is it that categories seem to be a wall between a so called 'normal' group of people and the "abnormal"'?--Why is it that magnet is somehow put on a pedestal, or heterosexuality made to look like the 'normal' thing in society. I mean, If gender were specifically made to be male or female, then why do all the rest exist, and if being smart was normal and not being smart was not, then why is it that 'magnet' does not encompass all students. My answer: categories are not there to be a wall amongst people, but rather to emphasize the unique characteristics of all types of people. However, having lived in this patriarchal society for centuries where even male is dominant and all others inferior, we cannot help but to use categories as separators that label people and force them into a minute descriptor of who they truly are.

P.S.

I do not know if this relates to what I am stating in my comment, but to quote something I said in a group discussion, "we forget the heterosexuality is also a category."