To me this depiction of gender is much more accurate, and allows us to label ourselves anywhere on an infinite spectrum. Instead of putting ourselves on fine lines whilst calling anything off the line abnormal, we can be labeled anything therefor allowing any form of gender expression to be considered normal.
Interesting model for viewing gender.
Ok. I’ve thought about this long & hard. & I guess when it boils right down to it, I’m still technically “questioning.” But only barely. I pretty much know I am genderqueer. Actually, “genderfluid androgyne” seems more accurate. “Feels” right.
Maybe you have never questioned your gender identity. You feel comfortable identifying with the gender you were assigned at birth, & it is something you’ve always taken for granted. Well, that’s great to be you. But not all of us are so lucky.
Growing up I was always a “tomboy.” I didn’t like “girly” things, I considered myself one of the guys.Of course, this in & of itself didn’t really mean much. Many girls go through the same/similar phase in their life. It eventually snowballed into an actual hatred for women, as well as a hatred for all things feminine about myself. Misogyny was how I expressed my masculinity, as I was taught that “being male” = “NOT being female.” I’m glad to say I am no longer so ignorant.
At several points I even questioned whether or not I was actually fully transgender, or even transsexual. I grew up knowing I’d been born in the “wrong” body. I found males sexually attractive, but more & more, I found myself being attracted in the sense of wanting to BE them, rather than WITH them. Eventually, I kinda just tried to ignore it all. I knew I didn’t want surgery, in spite of how much I have always loved to modify my body. What if I changed my mind? What if this, as with my sexuality, was not a stagnant thing, not set in stone? I put these thoughts on the back burner, & there they stayed. Until I heard the word “genderqueer.”
I never knew one didn’t have to choose between male or female. I never knew it didn’t have to be black or white. The weirdest part about it for me personally, however, was discovering this word while pregnant. Being pregnant, I have never felt more feminine in my whole life. It has actually been an overwhelmingly awkward experience for me. But the more I read & researched the genderqueer identity, the more I knew that was how I’d always felt, my entire life. I was a gender chameleon, able to switch practically at will. I never completely identified with femininity, yet not completely with masculinity, either. My gender identity is totally fluid. For the past few months of pregnancy, I *have* identified as mostly feminine, but something in me knew I would shift back. I can feel it in my bones.
Whenever I fill out a form that asks for my gender, my first instinct is to answer “N/A” (non-applicable) because I DO feel that those other 2 boxes DO NOT apply to me. When I ask myself whether or not I am trans*, my first instinct is, “I am ‘trans’ in the sense that I transcend the gender binary.” Beyond that, I don’t have an answer.
So I guess that is that. I don’t expect certain people whom have known me forever to respect this part of my identity; I probably don’t respect you, either. But this has been a LONG time coming.
(via startingfromhere)
Source: transissues101
Excuse me while I throw this down, I’m old and cranky and tired of hearing the idiocy repeated by people who ought to know better.
Real women do not have curves. Real women do not look like just one thing.
Real women have curves, and not. They are tall, and not. They are brown-skinned, and olive-skinned, and not. They have small breasts, and big ones, and no breasts whatsoever.
Real women start their lives as baby girls. And as baby boys. And as babies of indeterminate biological sex whose bodies terrify their doctors and families into making all kinds of very sudden decisions.
Real women have big hands and small hands and long elegant fingers and short stubby fingers and manicures and broken nails with dirt under them.
Real women have armpit hair and leg hair and pubic hair and facial hair and chest hair and sexy moustaches and full, luxuriant beards. Real women have none of these things, spontaneously or as the result of intentional change. Real women are bald as eggs, by chance and by choice and by chemo. Real women have hair so long they can sit on it. Real women wear wigs and weaves and extensions and kufi and do-rags and hairnets and hijab and headscarves and hats and yarmulkes and textured rubber swim caps with the plastic flowers on the sides.
Real women wear high heels and skirts. Or not.
Real women are feminine and smell good and they are masculine and smell good and they are androgynous and smell good, except when they don’t smell so good, but that can be changed if desired because real women change stuff when they want to.
Real women have ovaries. Unless they don’t, and sometimes they don’t because they were born that way and sometimes they don’t because they had to have their ovaries removed. Real women have uteruses, unless they don’t, see above. Real women have vaginas and clitorises and XX sex chromosomes and high estrogen levels, they ovulate and menstruate and can get pregnant and have babies. Except sometimes not, for a rather spectacular array of reasons both spontaneous and induced.
Real women are fat. And thin. And both, and neither, and otherwise. Doesn’t make them any less real.
There is a phrase I wish I could engrave upon the hearts of every single person, everywhere in the world, and it is this sentence which comes from the genius lips of the grand and eloquent Mr. Glenn Marla:
There is no wrong way to have a body.
I’m going to say it again because it’s important: There is no wrong way to have a body.And if your moral compass points in any way, shape, or form to equality, you need to get this through your thick skull and stop with the “real women are like such-and-so” crap.
You are not the authority on what “real” human beings are, and who qualifies as “real” and on what basis. All human beings are real.
Yes, I know you’re tired of feeling disenfranchised. It is a tiresome and loathsome thing to be and to feel. But the tit-for-tat disenfranchisement of others is not going to solve that problem. Solidarity has to start somewhere and it might as well be with you and me.
Source: asawomanofsubstance
FEMINISM! What? Yeah.: Anonymous asked: How do you feel about people who abuse government assistance? People who use their food stamps to buy...
Abuse happens, period. It doesn’t matter what, some people will do anything to get an “advantage” in the world. But since such abuse is statistically uncommon, while it might be aggrivating, you don’t rip out the safety net from everyone else benefiting…
THIS.
Source: abaldwin360
Source: victoria-van-violence
click through or click here to buy one of these gender justice prints from the awesome Talcott to support ICATH (Informed Consent for Access to Trans Health). Each print is 18x12” and SO AWESOME. Proceeds will offset training costs as well as advocacy and therapy session fees for those who demonstrate need. More info at www.icath.org.
Talcott says, “This print: “I’m Not Trapped in Anything But Your Strange Sense of Binary.” refers to the compulsive feminizing or masculinizing that non-binary and/or genderqueer, gender different people often face. When I’m not being incessantly Sir-Ma’am-ed, I’m expected to present the narrative that I am “trapped in the wrong body, etc”…While for some people this experience is true and valid, for others there is a much more fluid and non-binary gender experience.”
Please reblog and snatch one up, if you’re so inclined!
(via artoftransliness)
Source: chubadubdub
GENDERQUEER IDENTITIES: 30 Day Genderqueer Challenge, Day 8: An unpopular or unsure opinion about the GSM community
gqid:
See full list of challenge day descriptions here (list created by gender-queer). I’m tagging my responses with 30 Day Genderqueer Challenge.
Hmm, I don’t think I could (or should) make a generalized opinion about the array of gender and sexuality minority (GSM) identities as a…
A million times YES. I personally am hesitant to come out even within the trans*/genderqueer community because I am in a so called “heteronormative” relationship and I guess I appear cis. Nowhere is safe, I do not belong anywhere.
Source: gqid
Here’s the thing: For most of us, cyborg ends at the human-machine hybrid. The point of the cyborg is to be a cyborg; it’s an end unto itself. But for Clynes, the interface between the organism and the technology was just a means, a way of enlarging the human experience. That knotty first definition? It ran under this section headline: “Cyborgs — Frees Man to Explore.” The cyborg was not less human, but more.
Homophobia: The fear that another man will treat you like you treat women.
We were discussing homosexuality because of an allusion to it in the book we were reading, and several boys made comments such as, “That’s disgusting.” We got into the debate and eventually a boy admitted that he was terrified/disgusted when he was once sharing a taxi and the other male passenger made a pass at him.
The lightbulb went off. “Oh,” I said. “I get it. See, you are afraid, because for the first time in your life you have found yourself a victim of unwanted sexual advances by someone who has the physical ability to use force against you.” The boy nodded and shuddered visibly.
“But,” I continued. “As a woman, you learn to live with that from the time you are fourteen, and it never stops. We live with that fear every day of our lives. Every man walking through the parking garage the same time you are is either just a harmless stranger or a potential rapist. Every time.”
The girls in the room nodded, agreeing. The boys seemed genuinely shocked.
“So think about that the next time you hit on a girl. Maybe, like you in the taxi, she doesn’t actually want you to.”
Source: andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com
Why I am Pro-Choice.
One of my more ignorant FB friends asked me last week why I was pro-choice. This was my response:
I will say right off the bat that being pregnant has only re-affirmed my pro-choice stance. I don’t think anyone can form a *completely* informed opinion on this subject until they HAVE been pregnant. A woman should ALWAYS have the right tochoose, no matter the circumstances. When I learned of my pregnancy, I had several options open to me. I *choose* to keep my unborn fetus in the hope that it will one day become a newborn baby that I can love & nurture into adulthood. It is only by having this choice that I can accept full responsibility for my actions & commit to my own, very PERSONAL decision. I do not have the right to tell another woman that she MUST make the same CHOICE that I made. Neither does anyone else. Just because the pregnancy may not have been due to rape or incest, doesn’t mean there may not be other circumstances which may lead a woman to choose an abortion. Even if all it boils down to is that the child will ultimately be unwanted; what kind of life is that for a child who never ASKED to be born in the first place? You can argue that the mother could give the baby up for adoption. That’s a viable option which she has the right to choose, but also consider the fact that many if not MOST people are looking to adopt healthy white babies. Think of how many unwanted children there are in the world. We have an already overburdened foster care system in this country ALONE. This is why, not only should a woman always have the right to choose, but birth control needs to be included as a medical necessity. It’s a fact that birth control leads to less abortions. Safe and effective family planning is the transformative social justice accomplishment of the 20th century. It is an irreversible truth. But even so, birth control can fail. & that brings me back to my original answer: a woman should ALWAYS have the right to CHOOSE.
A wise man once said...
RE: What can you tell a young man looking for motivation in life itself?
The problem, often not discovered until late in life, is that when you look for things like love, meaning, motivation, it implies they are sitting behind a tree or under a rock. The most successful people recognize, that in life they create their own love, they manufacture their own meaning, they generate their own motivation.
For me, I am driven by two main philosophies, know more today about the world than I knew yesterday. And along the way, lessen the suffering of others. You’d be surprised how far that gets you.
RE: what advice do you have for highschool students who are aspiring scientists?
Hang out with others who are also aspiring scientists. That way the huge supply of interstitial time in your life is spent not on watching American Idol, but on geeking out on things like memorizing digits of Pi, or testing each other on obscure science trivia. The most successful people in life are those who recover all those lost hours per day and use them for enlightenment.
RE: How did you become such a powerful orator?
Thanks for the compliment. I pay close attention to the body language of who I am communicating with. While I am speaking, are they bored? excited? indifferent? curious? If you don’t take notice of all this then you are just lecturing. If and when you do, then you are empowered to discover the conduits of contact that can maximize the value and meaning of what you are saying to others.
— Neil DeGrasse Tyson
Source: olena
Tattooed, pierced, genderfluid, pansexual transhumanist, feminist, atheist, ARTIST.
