I have a bunch of hobbies, which range from female dominated to a solid mix of participants. However, for a hobby that has a good number of both men and women involved, there seems to be a gap in the participation and achievement levels in a way that mostly alings with gender. A friend of mine mentioned we would have to look at how men engage with hobbies.
Do you feel that the ways men and women engage with hobbies generally, but especially when they share the same hobby still differs?
the women who do hobbies don’t engage in any different ways than the men do.
the difference in engagement is more about personality type. whether you are vain or not for example, will go a long way to how you engage with a hobby and others in said hobby.
men and women however, do engage in different hobbies and activities, mostly due to gender bias about what is an ‘appropriate’ hobby for their gender to have. how many straight men do you know who tailor their own clothes for fun. Age/resources also have to do with it. many hobbies are financially unattainable until later in life how many single 22 year old women do you see at the open track day vs single 50/60 something men?
and in a hobby in which there is unequal participation or one that requires certain physical strength/skill, there will be a big gender disparity due to the level of participation and play.
which is precise why the USA sucks at men’s soccer, but is great at women’s soccer… because relative to other countries our men don’t participate much in soccer and our women do. but we are getting better at it as soccer has become more popular over the years, esp with boys.
and there are other hobbies, like running or pickleball or watching TV, which have a lot of gender/age/etc parity, because they are so accessible and are not gender-normed.
but more broadly, women are more social than men, and their hobbies are often more an excuse to socialize, than men, who socialize less and focus more on the activity itself.
This is the part/steorotype that is tripping me up. The hobby pretty naturally contributes to an accumulation of skills. However, generally women are the more skilled participants. Like significantly more skilled. Like there are whole competitions where the finals are entirely women.
What hobby is this?
There is no doubt a history that would explain why this is. Perhaps it was simple more popular with women over a longer period of time, etc. Hobbies wax and wane over time, and sometimes are also regional, cultural, or age-specific. Certain kinds of dancing, for example, only really are practiced among certain cultural groups and genders.
I mean, there is a reason the WNBA only became a thing 5 years ago, when technically it existed since 1996. And that thing is star-power. Personally I never knew the WNBA existed, until Kaitlyn Clark became a celebrity.
It’s a type of partner dancing. For the most part, people don’t tend to participate longer than about 5 years, and the pandemic was a built in radical reset. Prior to the pandemic there was a (fairly successful push) to de-gender dance roles. We’re still seeing people choose dance roles that align with traditional gender norms. It’s just wild to me that even if you look at skills that both roles should be gaining (musicality, body control, solo dancing within the style) followers are significantly ahead.
dancing is overwhelming woman centric and has been since forever, especially in the USA. it’s also largely limited to more affluent people.
very very few young boys are encouraged in dance. so yes, women would basically have huge advantages because of gender and institutional pressures.
ever dancer i have ever known was a very affluent woman. I’ve never known any male dancers. the only guys i knew into dance were the super uber nerds into contra dance, and yeah, they were not people who were physically coordinated in any way.
but dance has so many styles etc. the ratio of female to male ballet dancers is like 20 to 1.
the reason men don’t dance is because it’s considered effeminate.
The ratio of competitive hip hop or breaking seems the opposite of ballet?
That’s interesting. Is it followers of all genders that get ahead, or women get ahead andthey are mostly following? What dance (if you don’t mind saying)?
I do mind saying.
So this is where it gets hard to talk about. The people who do the best best, generally end up doing both roles. Most of them are women who follow either primarily, or in majority but also lead. Some are men that primarily lead but also follow. I know some women who primarily/exclusively lead, only one (cis) man who primarily follows (but he has had competitive success in other dance styles following, so maybe yes)
I mean, as a general rule, you learn better in low pressure, reactive scenarios. High pressure scenarios where you must make descisions tend to be bad for learning intuitive skills. I wouldnt be surprised if mostly following is the best way to improve at dancing.
Anyway, to your point - as a guy, my desire to engage with partner dancing of any sort as a hobby would be driven by a desire to have fun and meet hot girls to sleep with. Competitive dancing might be kind of fun to watch sometime, but I simply don’t have any interest in competing myself. If I can dance well enough to have a good time and flirt with hot girls, my goal is accomplished and I’m not going to put huge amounts of effort into improving. I have rocks to climb and a motorcycle to fix instead.