Rowan Bell, “Being Your Best Self”

Posted: Mon, Nov 17, 2025

The Problem

At least some of the gender norms that are operative in the dominant social world can be authentic to us.

Authentic: Reflects or expresses who we really are.
Dominant world: The same gender norms may not operate across the board (e.g., politeness and softness in East Asian masculinity, combat boots and flannels in lesbian cultures).

But the idea seems to be in tension with:

The social construction of gender norms: Authenticity seems to require a true, innate, inner self that’s unconstructed, that precedes the existence of both us and the social world.
- Social construction: The way socially constructed things are is not due to nature, but has something to do with us—they are not as natural as they may first appear (socially constructed ≠ not real).
- It seems like sketchy biology to suggest that there is a pants/dress gene, that women just so happen to develop a disproportionate interest in fashion, crafting, gardening, etc.
The harm of dominant gender norms: We seem to have good reason to do what’s authentic to us; but if dominant gender norms can be authentic to us, we may have good reason to do what’s harmful to ourselves!
- Bell: We live in a world “where masculinity is bound up with misogyny and poor mental health, while femininity encourages tolerance of bad behavior by privileged men at a cost to oneself” (2).
- A particularly concerning example: Trans women staying in abusive relationships because it is gender-affirming.

For Bell, this is not a problem unique to trans people, but—

Trans people’s experiences distinctively illuminate it (the example of Carl: trans guy, card-carrying feminist, with a gender studies PhD).
Trans cultures have developed unique tools and strategies for responding to it.

Social authenticity: “Authenticity is a project of constructing an intelligible self out of available materials from one’s social context” (3).

Authenticity isn’t about discovering/uncovering a pre-social self deep underneath appearances; it’s about actively and critically constructing oneself through our reflective decisions.
- The idea of a deep true self untouched by our acquired social roles, desires, beliefs, values, relationships, and commitments seems way too spooky.
- Even if such a deep true self exists, it may not be the self we want to be.
In constructing our authentic selves, we have to start with the materials given to us, in this case, by a dominant, oppressive social world.
- Behaviors vs. actions: Not all behaviors constitute actions; part of the special sauce, so to speak, needed to turn a behavior into an action is social intelligibility.
- Social intelligibility is made possible by shared meanings, terms, concepts, and understandings.
We have agency in this: “I am authentic insofar as I recognize my activities, concerns, relationships, and roles as mine, done ‘for-the-sake-of’ my life project, and insofar as I am willing to commit to and defend them as my own” (13).
- We construct authentic ourselves by owning up to certain parts of what’s given to us and changing or even rejecting certain other parts (e.g., Elon Musk’s trans daughter disowning him).
- But this agency is not unrestricted; we do not always control the social meaning of our actions.

Upshot: There is no tension between authenticity and social construction when the authentic self is itself socially constructed.

Authenticity seems to give us reasons for action, but what kind of reasons? Some options:

Moral reasons: Doing what’s authentic to us is morally good.
- But this is only one moral reason, and it may or may not be overridden by other moral reasons recommending other courses of actions.
  - Pro tanto (“to such an extent”) vs. all-things-considered moral reasons: Promise to pick up a friend from the airport vs. having a medical emergency.
- Revisiting Carl’s case: Misogynistic masculinity is authentic to Carl, and thus generates a moral reason for him to act accordingly. But it may well be overridden by a stronger moral reason not to act in misogynistic ways.
Prudential reasons: Doing what’s authentic to us furthers our self-interest.
- But doing what’s prudentially good may not be morally good!
- Pro tanto vs. all-things-considered prudential reasons: Pursuing a career as a creative writer may be prudentially bad on the whole, even though it is authentic and thus prudentially good in that particular respect.
Sui generis reasons: Doing what’s authentic to us is good for us in a special way that’s not reducible to either morality or prudence.
- No tension: What is authentically good can be morally and/or prudentially bad.

Upshot: There is no tension between authenticity and harm when the authentic can itself be harmful.