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Originally Posted by Altair
In the future, we'll have a world where being ''man'' or ''woman'' has become an unimportant part of life.
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I think lots of Western hostility towards the concept of gender identity comes from the Christian past, where gender identity was associated with male dominance and strict, inflexible gender roles. In the Christian universe, God is masculine, Jesus is a man, the only woman in the close proximity of the cool kids was virgin Mary. It's a very unbalanced symbol universe, very male-heavy. I sometimes feel very sorry for the women who have to grow up in that symbol universe....
I have some past with Neo-paganism and I use the pagan pantheons as more balanced sources for gender archetypes: There are gods and goddesses, different kinds of gods and goddesses representing the many ways to be a man or a woman. I believe it's a much more balanced universe than the Christian one, when it comes to manhood and womanhood.
Personally I have rejected both, the old school, male-heavy Christian gender roles, and the new school gender nihilism. I think the pagan pantheon is a good third way: Strong gender identity, strong sense of manhood and womanhood, while not having strict, limited gender roles.