The invisibility of the default....

I came across this in one of yesterdays posts and believe TyphonBlue of Genderratic has posted something in a similar vain:

The problematics of gender stereotypes are not only ripe within organizational policies (Kirby, 2000; Kirby & Krone, 2002); they also are present in the everyday politics and unwritten rules of organizational culture practices (Kirby, 2006/2003; Kirby & Krone, 2002; Levine & Pittinsky, 1997; Medved, 2004). “Work family balance” is a gendered issue (read: a woman’s issue) as many issues that women and men might both be concerned about become gendered by the very presence of women’s interests. Feminists have long held that gender issues are often interpreted as being only about women, because patriarchal interpretations suggest gender is an essentializing category where, put simply, gender equals women. Men are apparently not gendered; they are the norm. Women are “the other,” the second sex, and can only be compared to the masculine normative standard (de Beauvoir, 1952). As Ashcraft and Mumby (2004) assert, women are “visibly gendered ‘others,’ while men are erased as the genderless norm” (p. xiv). Thus, by interpreting the meanings of gender, the essentializing perspective then highlights the categories of “femininity” and “woman” as communicating gender rather than those of “masculinity” and “man.” - - STAY-AT-HOME FATHERS: MASCULINITY, FAMILY, WORK, AND GENDER STEREOTYPES - David John Petroski, Paige P. Edley - 2006

Good for the arguments that actually everything besides women's studies is men's studies.