Sinead O’Connor?
I’ve always known I’m a girl, but when I was younger and didn’t fit into the girly-girl stereotype, I thought it might be easier being a boy.
Since genderqueer is an identity and not a fashion statement, you can’t say somebody’s genderqueer just by looking at them. Until someone in the public sphere comes out as GQ, it’s speculation. A woman with an androgynous face or short hair is not in any way less of a woman in identity.
My partner has used the label genderqueer before, but finds it a bit precious and doesn’t really use it much now. If pushed for a label, she goes with androgyne, but doesn’t like that all that much either. For her it’s more a matter of “gender is fucking retarded and doesn’t define me” thing than “I’m searching my soul for my true self”, because she doesn’t think anyone has a “true” gender, since gender itself is just a social construct. Physical sex and brain sex identification are another matter, and since she’s comfortable with her physical femaleness for the most part she uses female pronouns.
No. But there are lots of genderqueer people in LGBT niche culture, whom I doubt you would have ever heard of. How about “Bitch and Animal”?
Sometimes they overlap. More often, genderqueer (like extreme butch) may be a transitional phase for a FAAB individual who eventually comes out as a trans man and is just a man after transition.
Transgender is a word that doesn’t have a real definition, so no one ever really knows quite what anyone else means by it. It’s a big grab-bag into which everything involving unorthodox gender is tossed. A disparate and heterogeneous jumble of many very different identities. I think the genderqueer phenomenon grew out of the general ferment in gender issues that has been associated with various transgender phenomena, but I really don’t see many of the genderqueer-identified people I know copping to explicitly transgender identities.
The term transgender, these days, is most often applied to transsexual people, many of whom don’t want to be called transgender; they just want to be men and women. I’m a woman of transsexual history and I feel this way about it. One of my friends on Facebook invited me to join a genderqueer group, which was a misunderstanding on her part, because I’m about as un-genderqueer as a person can be. I like being a woman and fit comfortably into the female side of the infamous gender binary.
During the long run-up to transitioning, I spent a year or two as de facto genderqueer at the workplace. But I was very deeply uncomfortable being in between genders, and couldn’t wait to complete my transition. It was a tremendous relief once I did!
A key political concept for radical genderqueer revolutionaries is “smash the binary;” i.e., create a world in which there are no men or women any more. Having struggled painfully for many years to be able to live who I am, a woman, such a program is not in my interest. But I do support equal rights for genderqueer and other non-binary identities, not having the binary be this overbearing control of individual’s lives.
I like to think of myself as a “former transsexual.”
Then again, I like to think of myself as a lovely, witty gal-about-town, too, so we all know how tethered to reality *I *am.
You are exactly that, dear. Lovely and witty, absolutely. (Haven’t seen you around town, though, because I’m not in the same town.)
That’s never going to happen. Nothing is as fundamental to what we are as human beings than sexual reproduction and the male/female dynamic. It’s a blasphemous and horrifying idea, like the Nazi ideal of a master race with blond hair and blue eyes. Creating a world in which there are no men or women anymore would be to create a world in which there are no human beings. How would these monsters reproduce? Would they be like single-celled organisms that just divide and divide and divide?
I apologize if that came off a little too harsh.
Yeah, it was too harsh. In radical gender theory, all gender is a form of oppression. They’re not aimed at creating a race of monsters (brother, please). People would still have bodies like always. The goal is a more beneficial world for human beings, with all the inhuman oppression removed from it, like racism, homophobia, sexism. A world in which no one is oppressed by such artificial social constructs. I don’t subscribe to this theory myself; though I agree with the goal of removing all oppression on the basis of gender, I don’t agree that gender itself has to be eliminated. It isn’t a horror movie, or even a Lady Gaga video, it’s just radical academic theory.
I am reminded of Lady’s Gaga’s Born This Way monologue, the Manifesto of Mother Monster. It’s vaguely horrifying. Combined with the video’s imagery it’s high-octane nightmare fuel (especially if you’re heterol). I don’t know what her Little Monsters have in mind as far as Revolution goes. I feel like I should find an attic to hide in. :eek:
Lady Gaga’s video for “Born This Way” was satire on the present-day system of gender & sexuality: it makes LGBT people feel like they’re being treated as monsters instead of humans. A classic essay on this is Susan Stryker’s “My Words to Victor Frankenstein Above the Village of Chamonix.”
I’m also a hetero but non-traditional tomboy woman…yet never have I doubted my sexual identity or orientation.
I’m still confused about the definition for genderqueer, though?
It’s not gay or lesbian or bi, it’s not (necessarily) transsexual, it’s maybe a niche or transitional phase. It’s not really how people identify their own genders, nor about what gender the individual is interested in sexually. And it’s more likely to be a self-identifier label rather than a social construct label. Is that about right, sort of?
I have a cousin in his 40s - I don’t know him well. He has never had any sort of romantic or sexual relationship that anyone is aware of, nor shown any interest in such; best we can tell is he is asexual. He is very socially liberal, bright and quite socially adept, so it’s not crippling shyness or repression or anything like that. He presents very much as a man but has chosen a nurturing/caring female-dominated profession (nursing). I wish I knew him better so I could ask him how he feels about…all this. 
It’s by definition pretty much separate from transsexual, because the latter is based within the gender binary, while genderqueer is a complete rejection of that binary. But the sloppy word “transgender” just sort of smooshes over everything and obscures such distinctions.
Society at large really hasn’t caught onto the concept yet. To live it, you pretty much need a social network of clued-in LGBTQ peoples. So it’s self-selected. Society at large still has no terminology for genderqueer people, except for hateful terms of abuse.
Genderqueer is a theory and praxis concerning gender, so the way it meshes with sexuality is either 1) be attracted to people regardless of gender identity & expression, or 2) be attracted to other genderqueer folks.
Sounds like a regular asexual cisgender person to me. Lots of cis people take up careers in professions conventionally associated with the other gender, without it affecting their own gender identity or sexuality in any way.
I decided by…not deciding. 
I ID as ‘bigender’. Meaning…I change. There are times I consider myself, and prefer to be considered by others female, other times male (though the balance is shifting more toward the female, lately, that’s liable to shift back at some point)…
Why’d I come to the conclusion that I was bigender…because I’d finally found term that described the way my mind has always worked. Heh. I’ve shifted (mentally, though not in presentation) since I was a child…I always felt a bit odd, because while I understood being transsexual, despite being that way myself, I had a hard time with the concept of not having a fixed gender… I eventually came to grips with it, but still had trouble describing it to others, and didn’t let myself shift in presentation (save in RP) for a long while.
Fiction about switching physical sex has always appealed to me…even if the characters it’s happening to think it’s a bad deal, or the people around them think it’s an aberration, the ability to switch back and forth is an amazing fantasy to me - let me go to Jusenkyo, or give me a supply of profem and promen, please, universe!
My reaction to misidentification tends to be coloured by which mindspace I’m in - if I’m feminine and taken as male, I tend to be a bit grumbly (though I try to keep that to myself), if I’m taken as female while masculine, I tend to be a bit embarrassed and confused.
Thank you Johanna, very helpful reply.
The whole “rejecting the binary” concept is difficult to understand for a lot of people, myself included. I have had and have friends who were gay/lesbian (my father was gay, actually) and obviously I’m straight, so I “get” gay or straight - but the…amorphous view that some people have of sexuality and gender is just hard to wrap my head around. I sort of get it theoretically but it’s not an easy concept in concrete terms!
I’ve been in non-traditional (male) jobs and roles much of my life, so I get that part as well. Asexuality does tend to throw me off though.
Well, there’s always the wikipedia page which at least gives somewhere to start.
I’m not political. I’m not familiar with gender debates, except in a general way. I think I only learned the term this year.
Personally I think I prefer the term androgyne for myself. I think just the sense of genderqueer being a neologism and not really parallel to man or woman puts me off. Just my opinion and I have no problem with others using it.
There’s a couple of people listed on the wikipedia page as publicly genderqueer. There are probably others, but I can’t blame anyone for not wanting to deal with the hassle of it.
Tengu this is so similar to how I feel. I talked to a GQ friend last night with the same sort of echoes (except she likes boobs and I like guys).
I like my body. I mean, there are things I’d like to change, like everybody, but I don’t want to be a guy. But if I could add a cock and balls that would be cool! I mostly wear men clothes and I like it that way. But sometimes I wear girl clothes and I like that too. I like mixing the two too. I’ve been described as having a X chromosome with a short leg, and it makes me angry when people say I should act differently. (The last time I went to camp I got in trouble for saying I was one of the guys, among other things. And I was getting annoyed with my last boyfriend because he wanted me girlier) I’m not hurting anyone, why can’t I be myself?
I guess I’m fortunate that my parents are supportive of my dressing habits. I don’t know that they’d be supportive about me coming out as androgyne. (They’re really not happy that I’m into BDSM - mostly because my mom thinks I’m following in my sister’s footsteps, and she makes bad choices). They’re more unhappy that I’m an atheist. They didn’t understand when I was totally asexual either - and I’m often still asexual, or at least a-romantic. Which is why I wonder if it’s worth it, because it’s ‘okay’ for women to wear men’s clothes (although I go pretty far) and I like guys (afaik - I haven’t had the chance to test it much).
It would awesome if somebody mistook me for a guy. It hasn’t happened yet.
I think I’m going to go with it, with the people who are cool with it. And those that aren’t, well, they don’t know about my furriness, or kink, or the majority of my hobbies, either. (I don’t want to be that obnoxious person who has to throw everything in people’s face - read, my sister - but sometimes it just feels like everybody just sees a shell of me that’s only barely real. But if I say anything people get upset or misunderstand, and I get tired of explaining. I shouldn’t whine, I suppose.)
Chiroptera, asexuality I can explain! You know how sometimes you don’t want to have sex? And those times when somebody is talking about how attractive someone is and you don’t see it at all? Imagine being like that all the time. That’s asexuality.
I’m away from that a lot now; I have a libido now, but generally I’d rather deal with it myself than try to get someone else to do it right. And half the time a fantasy is more satisfying than an orgasm.
It’s certainly true that I have a lot of the traits generally accepted by my family as “masculine.” And the older I get the less interested I am in displaying a gender one way or the other. I often buy shirts and shorts in the men’s department - because they are cheaper and more comfortable than what is available on “my” side of the aisle.
If I were interested in dating, I’d be looking for a man to date, but given the trauma of the past four years I sincerely doubt that will ever happen again. If I were capable of “deciding” to become lesbian I would do it in a heartbeat, but I’m just not wired that way.
So, Genderqueer. Does it mean people who accept the traditional definitions of gender and find that they fit into both? I’m really good at knitting, crocheting, cooking, Mothering, and also negotiating, making hard decisions, running a business, and kicking ass when absolutely necessary. But I perceive that as more of an indictment of the old definitions than an indication of my gender-state.
I am physically female. I am taller and stronger than most females, but hormonally I actually have higher than the usual levels of estrogen as well.
Female can mean much more than we used to think it could. Male, also, can mean much more than we used to think, or allow. If that’s the political definition of GenderQueer then maybe I am. I certainly think it’s time to fix our language such that we can have a simple conversation about the work or ideas of a scientist or artist or colleague without having to define their gender in order to finish a sentence.
And I think there needs to be room for the development of hermaphroditic children without forcing a definition one way or the other. The fact that this is such a difficult way to grow up that parents actually have infants physically gender-assigned makes me want to puke.* The first question we ask “Is it a boy or a girl?” is decidedly the wrong one IMHO.
*Meaning, I’m disgusted with society at large, not with the parents making difficult decisions and doing the best they can for their children.
I don’t know how to explain it well, because I can’t imagine being sexual. It’s like explaining how it is to be black. It requires being able to imagine not being black, which is awfully hard to do.
The way sexual feelings have been described to me is having a “tingly” feeling in your genitalia when you see or think about someone. I have never experienced this, although I have experienced a tingly feeling all by myself. I like people alright, but not in any way that registers a physical response. This, and the fact that I don’t desire physical or emotional intimacy, is why I consider myself asexual rather than simply a maiden-in-waiting.
I think I can sorta-kinda get romantic feelings and how they are different from sexual feelings. There are asexuals who identify as romantic, but maintain they have no interest in having sex. I can also imagine the opposite: desiring sex but wanting to skip over all the romantic stuff. For someone such as myself, I desire neither.
Gender is heavily behavioral. From an early age, we learn to carry ourselves a certain way. Our brain wiring also plays a big role in how we will bend. But for some people, for whatever reason, the brain wiring is diffuse and/or the social learning just doesn’t stick well. I don’t know if this describes me. It makes me a bit sad to think that I never had a chance to come out “normal”. When I see pictures of me as a small kid and compare them against my twin, I frequently see someone who doesn’t quite get it, even at that young age. But I wouldn’t want everything to come down to psychological issues either. I’m working on accepting myself as I am; the idea that if I just worked harder on improving my personality impedes this process.
I don’t feel like a guy in a girl’s body. I am not unhappy being a woman, and also I know enough to blend in (though I get called “sir” on a routine basis, having short hair). It’s just I think defined gender roles are kind of dorky. People should do what’s natural to them, not what society says they should. I think that’s why “girly girls” and “macho guys” irk me. They perpetuate the social rules that don’t make sense to me. Most aren’t following rules as much as they are doing what they want to do, I realize this, but it’s like watching people of a certain ethnic group perpetuating a stereotype. You don’t want to judge, but you can’t help but think they are trying too hard.
(Interestingly, it’s for this reason that transsexuals puzzle me. I know what it feels like to feel fundamentally wrong and alienated from yourself as well as from others, but I can’t imagine wanting to fix this by eschewing one set of social behaviors and customs for a completely different set. My solution would be to say “fuck ya’ll” and do whatever I want to do, eschewing the dumb labels and the idea of “fitting in” all together. That’s why I completely get genderqueerdom.)
Well, that’s how it is for me. Half the time everything in this society is absurd and meaningless to me, so take what I say with a grain of salt.
Color me confused since this seems to me to be completely normal and well within any current gender stereotype, as does most of what is posted in this thread. Maybe in the 1950s you might have gotten flack, but now? I’m starting to think that perhaps it is the people in here whose perception of gender is straight-laced and rigid. I know boys who wear pink (I know boys who wear friendship bracelets and even-gasp-eye liner). I know girls who do traditionally masculine things and nobody ostracizes them.
I have no doubt at all that hazing and verbal abuse takes place daily in schools and the like–for anyone who is deemed “different” by whatever odd system the popular kids in middle school live by (and of course this can continue into adult life). I do not condone such behavior at all. I fail to see how a woman who prefers comfortable dress is somehow seen as either oppressed or radical. Women have been wearing menswear for decades.
Silver_Tyger and Monstro - yeah I can sort of get that. Do you think part of the…curiosity, or “exoticness” of asexuality is a side-effect of the pervasive cis-sexuality accepted in our day-to-day living via media and advertising?
In other words - the overwhelming normative stance is not just hetereosexuality, but hyper-heterosexuality. It permeates so much.
Well damn, I also want to say I feel sad for anyone who doesn’t feel like there’s a “place” for them in society, or who feels too far out of the gender norm to be comortable. That has just got to suck.
I’ve never noticed a curiosity or exoticness about asexuality, though I don’t doubt it’s there. It’s just not something I talk about with others because I’m kind of private (moreso in real life than I am here). And even if I felt comfortable enough to talk about it, I wouldn’t. Because people love to argue, for some reason. An asexual person is hard for people to figure out. They often say stuff like:
- You just haven’t found the right man.
- Are you sure you aren’t a repressed homosexual?
- You’re fine. You’re just thinking too much.
- You need to go to the doctor and get your hormones checked out.
I once told a couple of co-workers about my asexuality, and as good-natured as they are, the above was what they threw at me. I instantly regretted being so open about myself. I still wish I could go back and take away my confession.
Even my therapist didn’t believe me at first. During the first year I saw her, she would occasionally remark that if I engaged in a social hobby or attended a certain event, I might just meet Mr. or Ms. Right. I don’t know what made her stop doing this, but I have to say I’m glad that I no longer have to defend myself anymore.
You have to remember that being an adult virgin still carries with it big stigma. It’s one thing to say you don’t have sex; it’s quite another to say you’ve NEVER had sex. People aren’t just curious. They will express sentiments of pity and sympathy, which–for me–are not wanted.
eleanor, I for one don’t feel stigmatized because I’m not very womanly, which is why I don’t identify with the term “genderqueer”.
Genderqueer is quite often a political stance opposing gender essentalism. The irony inherent in people using gender essentialism to describe themselves as genderqueer is…odd. The struggles my partner has had and continues to have are a bit deeper than fashion and hobbies. It’s a fundamental disconnect from the concept of gender.