On the other hand, when I travelled abroad, I did get some feeling of being ‘part of the Australian team’. I was surprised by this, but it mostly came down to finding a common frame of reference for things. I also play soccer, and I identify strongly with my ‘team’, however sometimes it amuses me how tenuous that grouping is - you see girls who have moved clubs for some reason, now identifying themselves with the new team, or you have a bunch of girls from assorted clubs all coming together in a representative team and forming a group bond that transcends the club rivalries. Noticing this makes it very hard for my to join in dismissive generalisations of other groups - sure, we hate $LocalRivals now, but when I play for uni with people from there they’re ok!

Mostly, I think I agree with what FelliniBlank says.

I’m mystified as to why people feel connection with their great-great grandfather. I know it’s extremely common, but I’ve never felt anything even remotely like it. I feel equally connected to my great-great grandfather and your great-great grandfather. (Heck, I don’t even feel connection to living relatives I haven’t met and formed a relationship with. Once, some cousin tracked me down and wanted to have dinner with me. I went out of politeness, but I couldn’t stop myself from thinking, “Why? What’s the point? Why not just have dinner with some random person you run into on the street?”)

I’ve often been told I should feel guilty about what “my people” did to the Native Americans and the African slaves. My people? None of my friends were even alive when those crimes occurred. And I certainly feel they are crimes. But so was the Holocaust, and though I feel terrible that it (and slavery, etc.) happened, I don’t feel connected to the cause of it.

I don’t even get the supposed continuity of America. I’ve heard that “we” are responsible for the 9/11, because “we” armed the Mujahideen in the 80s. I didn’t arm them. The American government at the time armed them. I wasn’t even old enough to vote back then. Nor were any of my friends.

In terms of that, I think that as with all things human, it’s never a clean dichotomy and it evolves over time. I’m white, male, and work in a female dominated profession. When I started in this work, I felt very much a sense of identification with my gender and I felt “outside” the group while at work. I have since gone through many years where I didn’t notice a difference - I felt a member of my profession - and I only noticed the gender imbalance in a room when it was pointed out to me, or certain topics of conversation came up.

Now I’m starting to see some things about my “team” (in terms of gender) from an outsider point of view. I’m far more sensitive to the leers, catcalls, and general boorish behaviour of men towards women than I ever used to be - I am noticing things I never saw before, although I am certain that they’ve always been going on. A great example is with playing sports: I re-joined a hockey team last summer after several years of not being able to play seriously. And while I had fun, I was shocked to discover (or re-learn the fact of) a very casual, off-the-cuff sexism and homophobia that exists in the locker room. I know that it existed before, but because of where I was at with my own identity, I never really noticed it in the same way. I was quite shocked at the anger and venom revealed in chance remarks, and also at how quickly my own mentality started to shift towards acceptance of it. I think that speaks to the pressure we can feel to be part of the group.

And touching on sports teams, I find it interesting that my preference now in life is for individual sports and activity, rather than team based. I work with a great many teams, so perhaps that explains.

One thing I’ve found valuable in discussing some hot button topics with members of the other “team” is to re-frame the issue; for example, when I wind up in meetings dealing with domestic violence, I’m often challenged by the group because I’m a man. It helps to remind everyone that I don’t speak for, or represent, the entirety of my gender, and that the problem we’re facing is a human one, not one that belongs to one sex or the other - solutions can only be found if we work together, not continue a pattern of separation and mis-trust.

Recently I attended a conference on diversity in the classroom, and one session included some exercises in discussing our “cultural identities.”. We had to come up with five descriptor/labels for ourselves, and all the people in my group easily defined themselves as strongly affiliated with many of the obvious sorts of “groups” that spring to mind. I had some trouble — I mean, I know several teams that I visibly or factually am “on,” but most of them don’t register with me daily and consciously as elements of my identity and sense of “me-ness.”

For instance, even though I’m deeply interested in gender issues of all sorts, “woman” has little to do with my perceptions of how I behave, how I relate to others, or who I see in the mirror — when it does register, it typically has more to do with the frustrations of how others perceive or behave toward me, or what they presumptuously expect from me than about my own sense of myself. “Feminist” certainly matters more than “female,” but not in a rah-rah-team way. After some struggle, the self-labels I came up with in the exercise were “dog owner,” “midwestern,” “middle-aged,” “English major,” and “square peg.” I suppose that assigning the labels automatically says there are things I perceive myself as sharing with others who have those labels, but I’m not sure I feel an automatic affinity with people who are those things; it’s just probably more likely than it would be otherwise.

For some other aspects of myself, like nationality, I really don’t feel motivated to take a complex or queer stance. I’m pretty representative of the American experience, for example, and I have lived here all my life, and I am unquestioning of my fit with the designation “American,” though it doesn’t confront me often, and I’m not looked upon as a defector for lacking a bumper sticker or lapel pin advertising it.

So, I think there are some selfish benefits to resolving questions of identity sufficiently to make oneself feel a comfortable part of a team, stemming social ennui, having a pat sense of place, but I don’t think that system is inherently right, because it’s as exclusive as it is inclusive. It’s okay to make up your own team. Go team Me!

It’s funny, even given the examples you give, I don’t automatically think, “Of course! A woman should run a woman’s rape-support group.” It would be a bit odd (and inappropriate) for a man to run it, I’m sure. But it’s not where my mind goes first. I don’t think my mind even goes to WOMAN’S rape support group right away. I’m not saying there isn’t a need for such groups. But once you posit a women’s group, then you’re already deep in team thinking. So naturally a woman should lead a woman’s group.

My experience throughout life has been people EXPECTING me to hang out with other men — or to want to. When I get confused by them expecting me to want to do that, they get confused by my confusion. Yet I’ve never once wanted to hang out with a group of men. Or a group of women. I just want to hang out with my particular friends.

I’ve found the concept of “I’m male but not a man; I’m pale skinned but not white; I was born in the U.S.A, but I’m not an American” almost impossible to explain to people, unless they’re already like me.

I would rather define myself rather than be defined by the group of people I hang out with.

(This probably explains my aversion to sports.)

But I don’t see my lack of affiliation a challenge to communicating with people who are “teamists.” If I’m having a problem, I’ll go to whomever I know that can help without worrying about what team they’re on. If someone else comes to me with a problem, I’ll try to help them. Let them worry about their own social constructs.

Which do you think is more effective? A man leading a women’s support group on rape? Or a woman?

I think much of this stems from the idea that we’re told we have to be in a group, or we’re educated to identify with a specific group. An example is the Stanford Experiment. You were part of the guards or the prisoners. Everyone just ‘fell in line.’

Grouping brings comfort; as a little kid, you had a last name of people who were nice and helped you (your parents.) “Geek” as a group, isn’t a great grouping… - they’re persecuted from outside…and from within the group, often in competitive and/or fragmented ways (few groups are like this.)

Are you sure you don’t consider you and your wife a group when you travel, albeit a small one?