Trans/Genderqueer/Agender/Questioning Thread

Congratulations?!?! I mean, on reaching that point of feeling "transitioned" rather than "transitioning" - that feels like something worth celebrating. Is it a good shift? Do you feel more comfortable, more rooted, more bodied on the other side of that shift? (Or indeed not - something I think we don't talk about enough is that it's OK to feel bittersweet or have mixed feelings.) But I think that perspective shifts are p much inherently good for you. :)

It's nice news to me, that there *is* a state of "feeling transitioned" on the other side, because I feel like, for me personally, "transitioning" is this endless process that will never feel done. Like, honestly, I have at this point made all the changes I am ever going to make (at this point in my life). Internally, I feel like "there, that is done! I have Socially Transitioned" and that has brought me a lot of comfort and confidence.

But there's this weird combination of both... partly, I feel like because of what my identity is, it's like I've tried to build an island to live in the middle of this treacherous fast-flowing river, and every time I think I've got one part of the island buttressed and reclaimed and done, a flood comes along and sweeps it away. I think it was actually you who reframed the idea of 'coming out' for me - that it's never a one-time thing, it's just this endless process of constantly re-asserting yourself. That never feels done. :(

I'm sorry your spirit feels so weary. What are things that lift and re-energise your spirit?

FGTI, I've thought about replying to this for a couple of hours now, and I don't think I'm going to feel peace until I do, so I'm going to bring it here, in the hopes of having an insider-conversation with a bit more lassitude and feeling free to speak. (If people want to brand me a transphobe or FP me for what I'm about to say... well, they were always going to do that anyway. If this goes at all clusterfucky, I'm out of here.)

It was recently proposed to me that the best way to resolve TERF/trans conflict is the normalization of, and education of, penises as being "normal" on women. I've never felt anything weird about "a woman's penis" personally; the "eureka" was really that other people should be invited to have the same attitude, rather than allowing any concessions whatsoever toward obsolete and incorrect essentialism

I've said it before, and I'll say it again - the term "terf" is not helpful, it does not describe a unified or consistent philosophy or even group of people, it has come to be a gunny-sack that just means "female transphobe" and draws no difference between the various concerns / prejudices driving that transphobia. That there are distinctly different strands of female transphobes, some of whom can be reached by different methods. (And others of whom can not.) I have some criticisms of this suggestion, which I hope you will take constructively - based on conversations I have had with women who have been exposed to trans exclusionary feminism. (Most of whom I was able to reach, and bring them "on side", and the ones I couldn't - well, at least I got them to stop expressing it in public/around me, which felt like progress from where they'd been before.)

1) I've said this to you privately the last time we talked about this, and now I'm going to say it publicly. Why do you always frame this as "some women have penises" and never as "some men have vaginas"?

This may seem like a semantic quibble, but honestly, this gets right to the heart of the matter for many feminists. Why is it always "woman" that is the contested identity, the contested space? Why is it not "man"? CONTEST THE SPACE OF "MAN" FFS!

Many women, especially older femininsts, report having started to feel like ~trans issues~ are something that are being "forced on women" - and *exclusively* on women. The perception is that the conceptual space of "Woman" is being forced to change to accomodate trans women - rather than the bigger truth that all of gender is being widened, changed, altered, expanded - including the gender of "male" and "man". Make it clear that ~Trans~ is not something being done exclusively to women. Trans men exist. Men with vaginas exist. That the category of "Man" is undergoing as many changes as the category of "Woman" is undergoing - or rather, it should be in a fair world!

There is this vast double standard, that "Woman" has been a contested space since the Year Dot of Feminism - hell, since even before the invention of feminism, in fact this belief is part of what drove the creation of feminism to start with - that the category of "Woman" is always up for debate and requiring of definition and redefinition. In a way that the category of "Man" is not a contested concept, but seen as axiomatic and self-evident. These things are not separate - that the constant contesting and challenging of the space of "Woman" is the result of "Man" being uncontestable, the constant against which and in opposition to which "Woman" is defined and re-defined - and that these challenges and squabbles and "TERF/trans conflicts" all taking place in the contested category of "Woman" and only "Woman" actually feeds and supports and enables the categorical uncontestability of the space "Man" - which is a pillar of male supremacy.

If you want to reach feminists, do everything you can to show that the category of "Man" is as constructed and contested and as open to debate and ~trans-ing~ as the endlessly fought-over category of "Woman". That goes double if you have the authority of a name that is read as male, or if you are in any way read as "male" by the people around you. Contest maleness as much as you can. (If you're a cis man lurking on here, that means you too - talk about some men having vaginas!) Because a ton of old school feminists feel like "Womanhood" is under attack from ~penises~, in a way that "Manhood" is exempt from ever being disputed. Dispute and contest and trouble "Manhood" if you want this to look like fair play!

2) which brings us to penises. That it comes up again and again, this idea that what transphobic women and/or trans exclusionary feminists are afraid of is *penises*. I've never had a deep-level conversation of this type, where "Penis" (or "testosterone", which is the other bioessentialist fall-back) didn't turn out to be a metonym for something else. You have to understand that the conversation is almost never about the actual genitals, but about what genitals are understood to *mean*. That what most women are afraid of - terrified of, with good reason - is not penises, but male violence and male entitlement. If you don't recognise that *that* is the conversation you are really having, you just sound silly and obsessed by going on about genitals all of the time. You cannot wave away the deep female fear of male violence and male entitlement with penis-talk, in fact this often reinforces it. (Remember, Flashing is a form of sexual violence.)

For me, the tack I take on this - which I've found usually very effective - is to build solidarity, by talking about the ways in which trans people - especially trans women - are almost always far *more* exposed to male violence. Do not downplay or handwave away women's fear of cis men, but you can use *shared* fear to build empathy.

Almost all of this depends on the idea that you are actually talking to the *feminist*, in trans exclusionist feminists. (If you just use the word "terf" to obscure differences between trans exlusionist feminists, and transphobic women who aren't really particularly feminist because they are still themselves deeply invested in male supremacy and *upholding* the gender binary because they *get* something out of it, these tactics are unlikely to reach the latter at all. This is why I do make such a big deal out of not being lazy about the term, and really specifying who you are talking about, and what their motivation is!)

Sorry this is so long, and that I go over obvious stuff multiple times. I never know what is obvious to other people, and what isn't! I've read this over four times now, and it hasn't got any less contentious, but I'm going to hit post and go to bed.

I've never really questioned my gender identity until recently (I always thought I was a cis male) but over the last few months I've been wondering if I'm non-binary or genderqueer. The main thing that I'm wondering about is whether I'm NB or GQ enough to really go all the way and identify as such.

I think the main reason I'd want to do that is for what I guess you could call political reasons - I think gender is bullshit and it would be great if all that gender role stuff just went away so we didn't have separate pronouns, different clothing sections in shops etc, so I sort of want to be the change I'd like to see and step outside of all of that. In terms of what I actually do/how I present there's not much that I do or would like to do that wouldn't really be classified as 'normal' male behaviour - except for wearing makeup, which I would totally do more of if that was more accepted. I think I'd like to use they pronouns but again I'm just not sure.

Like a lot of people, I've thought that gender roles and what have you are awful for a while so I'm not sure why this is coming up for me now. It could well be because I'm asexual and a lot of the other aces I'm friends with are NB/GQ or trans, so maybe that's been giving me ideas. One of the reasons that I'm wondering whether I'm NB/GQ enough is because it's not like I've been questioning my identity since I was a teenager or anything like that.

My understanding is that nobody can really tell you that you're NB/GQ and that it's just something that you've got to work out for yourself, so if you feel that you are then that's fine. I'm not really asking for anyone to tell me what I am here but I'd be interested to hear how other people have come to realise that they don't fit in the gender binary. Also my understanding is that NB and GQ mean pretty much the same thing and when it comes to deciding which one applies it's about which label people feel more comfortable with - is that right?

imo being nonbinary for political reasons is rad as hell and u should go for it if you want to

I sympathize with the feeling of not being genderqueer enough, but the fact that it’s weighing on you at all is a pretty big hint that you’ll be happier if you start sloughing off the dead skin of your received gender

imo if ppl tell you you’re a man or a woman and you ask yourself “wait am I a man?” and get the answer “no” from yourself, congrats you’re nonbinary, here’s a coupon for a stupid haircut

silby is extremely otm

happy and exciting for your journey paolo <3

also re: becoming nb for political reasons: a lot of my tiny steps toward identifying as nonbinary were like... me walking through a hair products store, wondering why hair products, of all things, were gendered, like wtf

I mean, I probably had less reason than you did to identify as NB (I just started seeing something that wasn't quite as female as I expected in the mirror, but it was enough). Good luck with your journey.

also to your last question, i use nb and gq interchangeably... maybe i shouldn't? idk. i maybe slightly prefer genderqueer bc it's a portmanteau of two words i like, whereas non-binary feels more functional, but i've only actually started thinking about this now lol

I think most people go through the "am I x enough" self-doubt process, but you're absolutely right that if you feel you are, then you are. It's nice to receive external validation sometimes, but there's no test you have to sit.

Having said that, I've been retreating from publicly identifying as NB after making several strides toward it. I believe that gender roles are bullshit and that I don't fit in to standard ideas of gender, but labelling myself as anything makes me uncomfortable, and I've found identifying as NB has been another label with expectations attached rather than a rejection of labels. I don't identify with myself as a body-in-the-world at all. I don't want to be seen *as anything*. There's also the issue of feeling like I failed at being a woman, whereas most of the people I know who are trans/NB find joy in their identities - I want it to be a joyful proclamation, but what I find is that it's another admission that my existence is bad and wrong somehow. I mean, I guess my problem is that my mental health issues are worse than my gender issues, and I'll never resolve the latter unless the former get sorted, and that will never ever happen. So, uh, I guess I'm "not on a binary" but not necessarily "non-binary"? Does that even make sense?

It makes a lot of sense!

it really does <3

It is uh a logical necessity I guess that the people who are most loud about being nonbinary shape perception about what it means to be nonbinary the most, but it’s okay to be quietly and resentfully nonbinary instead of loudly and joyfully, gender is a fuck and finding joy in it is maybe too tall an order for the melancholically inclined. It can be more like a truce, or a defensive position against the prevailing cis hegemony.

imo “genderqueer” and “nonbinary” do not point to third categories in the gender system nor do they indicate the midpoint on a male-female spectrum, but are broadsides against the idea that the supposed categories have any referent in the first place. Not so much a subject position to identify oneself with but a denial of the very terms of the argument.

it’s okay to be quietly and resentfully nonbinary

This is my new mantra. Thank you. (Not even kidding, it's perfect for me)

hell yeah

imo “genderqueer” and “nonbinary” do not point to third categories in the gender system nor do they indicate the midpoint on a male-female spectrum, but are broadsides against the idea that the supposed categories have any referent in the first place. Not so much a subject position to identify oneself with but a denial of the very terms of the argument.

― Canon in Deez (silby)

This is how I approached it, and why I started identifying as NB in the first place. But I feel like it is becoming a third category, and "they" is becoming an indicator of a third category, and I'm just like, no no, singular they should be nonspecific, not picking out a member of this new category. I'm aware that my perception of this might be skewed by a whole bunch of things, but it definitely feels this way a lot to me.

Would agender or nongender work for you?

these anti-categorical moves keep becoming identity categories i don't know how to prevent it and feel bad wanting to do so if people seem to get things out of it

the not (gender)queer enough thing is relatable and extremely common. sometimes i feel frustrated that a even lot of LGBT discourse seems to ask for a level of certainty i've never had (as well as upfront disclosures about genitals and sexual behaviour i'd rather not to make right away)

i always hated being gendered but didn't realise it was about gender for way too long. i mostly keep it to myself because few people I know take it seriously or would do so unless i made a big thing of it and then i might be taken seriously in the wrong way. i don't know if agender or nonbinary is the right word, or both, or neither

i feel like among my queer friends there is a lot of pushback against any solidification of nonbinary as a "category," i.e. there is not one specific way to be nonbinary, that goes against the whole purpose of the idea

so i do not personally encounter this idea of what a nonbinary/genderqueer person *should* be even in passing, and boy do i prefer it that way

I guess my problem is that my mental health issues are worse than my gender issues, and I'll never resolve the latter unless the former get sorted, and that will never ever happen

Haha ... definitely feel you on that (sorry for Americanism) ... I think, for me, they definitely go together, like, tied together participating in some existentially draining 3-legged race ... but there's incremental progress, sometimes? Like, I am very far from resolving this stuff for myself, but I feel like I have a better sense of who I am/how I want to express that vs. the assigned gender of female than I did 10 years ago, 15 years ago ... and I have made progress on the mental health stuff too ... but definitely, nowhere near sorted and resolved for either.

xp i have often encountered the idea or implication that nonbinary people should only present in ways deemed to be androgynous or gender-neutral, which is bullshit. or that they(we) should stop messing around and just be binary cis or trans which they/we obviously are anyway (sometimes similar to stuff you hear about bisexuals)

Thanks for all the replies, these are very helpful!

I sympathize with the feeling of not being genderqueer enough, but the fact that it’s weighing on you at all is a pretty big hint that you’ll be happier if you start sloughing off the dead skin of your received gender

the not (gender)queer enough thing is relatable and extremely common. sometimes i feel frustrated that a even lot of LGBT discourse seems to ask for a level of certainty i've never had

I hang out with other asexuals and quite often hear people wondering whether they're ace enough to identify that way, and the answer is that if you're wondering about it then you're probably on the ol' spectrum there. So maybe I should take my own advice and not doubt whether I really belong.

also re: becoming nb for political reasons: a lot of my tiny steps toward identifying as nonbinary were like... me walking through a hair products store, wondering why hair products, of all things, were gendered, like wtf

― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson), Wednesday, 17 February 2021 16:42 (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

So if you don't mind me asking, does that mean that it was a gradual realisation for you rather than something you'd known since you were young?

it was very gradual! there are things i can point to in my personal history that are like very loud and enormous signposts but.. for instance i wrote a personal essay that is in retrospect very obviously about being non-binary a few years before i felt comfortable identifying as such

The “knew all along”, “this has always been who I am but I suppressed it” trans narrative is widespread but not universal, and you needn’t measure yourself against it.

I understand why people might want to think of nonbinary as a "third category" but it's not a category at all, it's an umbrella. An umbrella that includes the third category, the fourth category, the fifth, and also identities and people that are mixtures of multiple categories, and also identities/people that fit none of the categories, and in fact defy categorisation at all.

(It it not, however, *solely* that last thing. It's an umbrella that contains multitudes.)

I'm feeling a bit prickly about that right now, because I've seen a ton of discourse recently inside the community, dunking on people who are nonbinary, but do not claim the identity of "trans". Which just rely on the same old tired arguments about "doing it to be fashionable" or "doing it to be different/interesting/whatever". (I think this very common experience of "not feeling trans enough" is driven by this type of discourse. Which is so common inside our own communities! This is one of the weirdest glitches in queer culture, that often it is *other queer people* who will be far crueller, far more exclusionary, than actual transphobes. It's weird like that. Just be prepared.) Trans/Cis is another binary it is perfectly legitimate to be outside of. (And binary/nonbinary is *also* a binary it is... really worth interrogating.)

This idea, of taking on an identity "for political purposes" is kind of fraught? But I think there's a historical reason for that, in that it conjures up shades of Political Lesbianism, which was Very Bad, for reasons outside the scope of this discussion. I come back again and again to the much-misunderstood Butlerian idea that ... ~identities~ (in the queer sense) aren't things you ~are~ in the Scientific Certainty Proveable kind of way, so much as they are things you *do*. Queer as a verb. Are you queering gender? Sure, you're genderqueer.

How do you know for certain, for really-really-real, if you're trans or nonbinary? No one knows for certain, at least until they give it a go. If you try *doing* it, and it makes you feel better, it makes you feel more like *yourself*, if you experience the capacity for Gender Euphoria when you give it a go? That's a sign you're on the right path, and keep going.

I grew up without any particularly direct pressure to perform my received gender in extreme or explicit ways, i had some attraction to the word “genderqueer” as a teen but either was afraid of it or didn’t have the right world around me to explore it, eventually I was in my mid-20s and realizing that if I didn’t feel any particular attraction to my received gender, and in fact felt like it could be hurting me to even pay it lip service, I could simply stop.

But I don’t really think that there’s a truth-of-the-matter as regards what my gender is, including being genderqueer or nonbinary, that was unknown to me and then discovered by me.

However, I do want to add a pretty important caveat, about this idea that "if you are wondering about your gender identity, you're probably trans." This is one of those places where experiences really diverge with assigned gender.

It is very, very UNcommon for cis men to question their gender or gender identity. I know only two people, who went through the process of exploring their genders, and came to the conclusion that they were cis men.

It is very, very COMMON, for cis women to question their gender or gender identity. I cannot think of a single cis woman I know, who has not, at some point or other, doubted their femininity, struggled with gender roles that were opposite to their sense of self, or gone through questioning as to whether they were woman (enough).

Why it is really, really important, to note this? Because this experience - cis woman doubts/struggles with their gender, eventually comes to the conclusion that they were cis all along, therefore concludes that trans people must have got it wrong - is one of the most common paths of cis feminists into the ~Gender Crit~o-sphere. That is the background of many of the Gender Crits, from JK Rowling to Kiera Bell.

Please allow cis people the right to question their genders, explore their genders and interrogate their genders. This process has to become more normalised. It hurts trans and nonbinary people, to deny that this is the experience of many, many cis people, particularly those who were raised as female under patriarchy. And I genuinely think it would be a good, positive, wonderful development in the world, if more cis people *did* question their genders - if that were just a normal thing that cis people did. I think the world would be better for it.

The “knew all along”, “this has always been who I am but I suppressed it” trans narrative is widespread but not universal, and you needn’t measure yourself against it.

all gender is drag, you can try on different ones or make up your own, take them in or let them out or tailor them. no right or wrong way to decide what you want to wear or be, this year or tomorrow or forever.

these days nonbinary is a fairly broad category, to the point where someone just saying they're nonbinary doesn't really explain very much on its own, other than not directly identifying with male or female, but how they actually navigate that is quite varied and ranges from just using different pronouns, presenting in some sort of gender non-conforming way (of course, you don't need to identify as nb or trans to do that), to medical transition etc.

with gq vs nb, the main distinction is really just that gq has fallen out of fashion as a term, it was more popular around the start of last decade but has largely been superseded by nb in popularity since then.

for paolo my advice is instead of first wondering what your identity is, i would suggest instead focusing on wondering what you want, as you've started to do, - do you want your body to be different, do you want others to use different language to refer to you, do you want to be perceived by others differently, do you want to change how you present, etc. - and then going from there. gender roles are obviously frustrating bullshit but just chafing up against them doesn't necessarily mean you have to identify differently, but it's worth thinking about of course

keira bell is actually an interesting case as she's on record as stating that the reason she detransitioned was for ideological reasons after falling for transphobic fear mongering about trans women in changing rooms etc., and that her biggest issue with medically transitioning was that it didn't make her pass well enough as a man. pretty bleak really

hi paolo i think this is where i am now too

finish "him"

xp how's it all going for you?

I would like to finish 'him'. If I could wave a magic wand and live in a society where gendered pronouns, clothes etc just weren't a thing then I totally would.

Ack, I'm sorry, I'm doing that thing again, where I get so caught up in the details (and especially trying to warn people, "ack, try not to make these terrible mistakes that I made...") that I forget to say the basics, like "hello" and "welcome".

Hello! Welcome!

Paolo, I think you're already doing one of the most important early steps, which is to ask yourself those questions: "In a perfect world, without using the pronouns and gender-words, what would YOUR gender (or lack thereof) ideally look like?!??" That's a brilliant question to start with, and it immediately leads to the second question, which is, "OK, then... what does your ~Perfect World~ look like, where you could be that gender?"

Super helpful questions! Amazing, door-opening questions! And exactly what we mean when we talk about "questioning your gender" or "interrogating your gender".

You mention being ace, and it does seem like there is some correlation between being ace, and also being drawn to the agender / nongender / ungender family of genders (but also to the pangender family of genders?) That makes a lot of sense to me, because in the allosexual world, so much of the work that gender expression DOES, is sending out visual signals about what sort of partner one might desire. (That's not ALL that gender expression does, but it is one of the big ones!) So if you do not experience desire for a partner, then WTF is so much of that... *display* aspect of gender even for?

But this is where I kind of flail and go "danger! danger! don't make the mistakes I did!!!" In making this a political statement, there is a danger of universalising your specific needs, wants, desires around gender, in a way that conflicts with the needs, wants, desires of other People Of Gender (that is a shit term, yes, but until someone comes up with a better way of saying "not cis men", that's all I got.)

For many people of gender, especially the ones with identities involving the Femme family of genders, being able to be and express and *DO* that gender is as important to them, as "I want to live in a world completely without gender" is to the a/un/non-gender folks. And that's valid, too.

Just try to bear that in mind? Like, I completely understand and support the exploration of "if I could wave a magic wand and .... X" That's an amazing and important thing to be able to do, in your personal gender journey. But learning not to universalise that is a big part of surviving in THIS world. (And wow, do I tell you this from painful personal experience!)

Also, for any people who are travelling under the nonbinary or "people whose genders are not adequately described, expressed or encompassed by the restrictive gender binary" - it's annual census time. Details here: https://gendercensus.com/

Jump directly to the survey here:

https://www.smartsurvey.co.uk/s/GenderCensus2021/

This year, in particular, they are looking to collect information on people over the age of 30, and ILX tends to slant older than their usual publicity channels, so... you know what to do if that is you.

felt emily's post in my bones - though I take note of both branwell and silby's debunks of NB as an actual category.

I reckon I would've identified as NB if I was much younger and that had been a term available to me then but at this point in my life, I very much prefer not identifying as anything as all.

I also weirdly don't really mind being seen/present as a cishet woman now, despite never having felt like a cishet woman my entire life (still don't), which maybe has something to do with my age, or being married to a partner who is equally sceptical of any kind of gender roles or expectations, or having a first language that has no gendered pronouns (although google's algorithms disagree! ugh!). Or all of the above, idk.

Caveat to a caveat to a caveat...

I think it's worth interrogating what the word "identify" means to different people, because it's one of those extremely slippery weasel words that means so many different things in so many different circumstances. Like, what are other people meaning, when you're using "identify"?

Went back and re-read emil.y's post and I also want to caveat what I mean by "feel better" and by "gender euphoria" too, because "joy" is not always what that means (even though euphoria is a synonym for "joy" most of the time, gender euphoria means *not* gender dysphoria, rather than specifically "joy"?) Feeling "better" is a really relative thing. Sometimes one means better, in the sense that horse shit smells marginally less-bad than dog shit?

(I'm reminded of that cartoon about coming out of depression, where after a long period of no emotions at all, they started to feel... rage? Anger? Fury? And no one in their right mind would think that RRRRAGE was a "good" emotion, but boy was it an improvement on the horrible no-emotion of serious depression?)

And gender euphoria, wow, like... people hear that word and often visualise skipping through clouds of rainbow hearts and unicorns, but sometimes gender euphoria feels more like standing on the edge of a cliff that really scares you, and screaming FFFFFUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKK YOOOOOOOOUUUUUUUU!!!! into the howling wind and waves?

Also yeah, I've heard similar sentiments from a friend who speaks Taglog, like, "WTF google translate, why are you gendering my ungendered language?!" Google is cisheteropatriarchy because Google is capitalism.

I am extremely appreciating this discussion, great posts all around.

Googled "allosexual", marvellously useful word, thank you Branwell

For me it’s closely linked to the word “identity” and I think I just don’t find gender to be necessary or relevant or important to my identity at all? Like it feels way more affirming for me when someone recognises me as a music nerd than when someone accurately senses that I’m queer or not-not-a-woman lol.

Caveat to a caveat lol - that said, part of the reason why that might be is growing up AFAB and being continually dismissed as a music nerd due to being perceived as a cis woman and therefore cannot possibly be a music nerd who should be taken seriously. (ILM for all its flaws (and how!) was a breath of fresh air for me nearly 20 years ago in that it was the first place that didn’t completely alienating for a teenage female music fan.)

Re: “identify”

and

This blasé-ness about gender btw is also prob the reason why I’ve never really participated in these threads or discussions before - I don’t really feel or behave like a woman but it doesn’t bother me if people perceive me as one.

I was just compelled to post today because the part in emily’s post, about how even calling oneself non-binary feels too much like labelling something one doesn’t care to label, really resonated with me.

Hi, FGTI! How are you?

I totally get that, Roz - like, for many years, "music geek" was something that I felt was way, way more integral to my personality and identity, than a gender that had just been doled out at birth, and I'd had no choice in? Like, man, I had to WORK at earning my music geek status! But I slowly realised that "interested in gender and its complaints" was moving up and up the level of importance for me. (While "music geek" was waning, in part due to horrible experiences on music messageboards.)

Trying to think of how to do this without being proscriptive/prescriptive: but I believe it's worth exploring the ways in which "I find the gender binary restrictive and wish to live outside the constraints of cisheteropatriarchy" and "I am trans and wish to be read and treated as a gender other than the one handed out at birth" are NOT a perfect circle as a Venn Diagram. Nor should they have to be!

(Also something about ... the ways in which cisheteropatriarchy is a systemic problem, like capitalism. And just as it is extraordinarily difficult to just "opt out" of capitalism by individual personal choices - (though it *feels* as though it should be easier to do so, the more you belong to class(es) which capitalism favours) - individual, personal choices are unlikely to dismantle cisheteropatriarchy as a whole. That requires systemic solutions. What a "systemic solution" might look like depends on one's position with regards to the different, often weirdly conflicting, power structures of cisheteropatriarchy.)

xp how's it all going for you?

― paolo, Thursday, February 18, 2021 3:06 AM (five hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

still working through it! trying to figure out how i fit and dont fit into masculinity other than feeling more feminine/softer than the average man. i did buy a couple of tops from the women's section of the thrift store, but they still code p masculine aside from the colors. so nothing groundbreaking, just a lot of self-questioning and imagining other possibilities.

Like it feels way more affirming for me when someone recognises me as a music nerd than when someone accurately senses that I’m queer or not-not-a-woman lol.

Ha, I get this SO MUCH. Though I think because I've been read as cishet most of my life there is a keen desire in me now to be recognised as a queer person who has some kind of non-binary relation to gender - sometimes I do get that anger of "I'm sick of passing, rarrrgh smash it all up smash smash smash".

Lots of posts since I was last on the thread but I did want to circle back to: I understand why people might want to think of nonbinary as a "third category" but it's not a category at all, it's an umbrella. An umbrella that includes the third category, the fourth category, the fifth, and also identities and people that are mixtures of multiple categories, and also identities/people that fit none of the categories, and in fact defy categorisation at all.

(It it not, however, *solely* that last thing. It's an umbrella that contains multitudes.)

I've been trying to pick my words carefully here and saying stuff like "gender roles are bullshit" when my heart deep inside wants to say "gender is bullshit". But I do know people who genuinely feel gendered, and the fact that I can't comprehend that experience does not invalidate it. I also know people who love gender play in all its varieties, and people who are v stereotypically NB-androgynous. So yeah, I'm not advocating for non-binary to solely be "uncategorisable", or anything like that. I just find that our old friend ~~the discourse~~ has kind of made it tougher for the uncategorisable to avoid being categorised.