So in this example consciousness raising is when we realize that these thoughts aren't our own, and that thats not really what makes a person worth knowing or not. Something that I often take for granted that people will be aware of is the idea of gender as a social construct. The reason I take it for granted is that at Grinnell most people are aware of it. I'm going to write a little paragraph about it as well. First, the distinction between gender and sex is important.
Sex is just about what body parts one was born with.
People can be female, male, or hermaphadidic. Gender is different, the terms man and woman and masculine and feminine describe gender. When we say women are more emotional or like shopping or are nurturing or like chocolate and men likes sports or drinking beer or having sex or driving fast cars or can't express their feelings, we are describing gender. Basically anything people tend to draw up as a difference between the sexes that is not biological, is gender. Okay, so I don't believe that little baby boys are born with an inherent greater interest in sports, sex, and cars, while baby girls come out ready to go shopping and gossip about the neighbors.