Gender isn’t that simple

It really bothers me when people object to the idea that people “just know” their gender. A lot of cis people try to turn gender into something diagnosable, getting annoyed at the idea that gender is just something you know, that a man is someone who knows himself to be a man.

It bothers me because I almost never see this argument for sexuality, or other similar things. Most people are willing to accept that a woman knows she’s a lesbian because she’s attracted to women, which is basically saying that she knows she’s attracted to women BECAUSE she’s attracted to women.

I realize that there’s the argument of physical response- but that’s not all there is to attraction. It’s possible to think “I would like to have sex with this person” without immediately getting physically aroused, or to be around someone you are attracted to without constantly being horny. Physical arousal is part of it, but it’s more than just that. You know you’re attracted to someone because you’re attracted to them, it’s tautological but true. It’s the same with other parts of identity.

There are indicators. Dysphoria or a lack thereof, what causes the dysphoria, what alleviates the dysphoria, etc. And, yes, it is based on social ideas of what a man and a woman is- however, it can be based on very broad ideas of what each gender is. Women who wear pants and play football and cut their hair short and do stereotypically male things are still women, men who wear skirts and bake and wear their hair long and do stereotypically female things are still men.

I see a lot of cis people who make this complaint seem to expect that the answer is “transgender men are just women who want to be more masculine, transgender women are just men who want to be more feminine”- which just isn’t true. Gender isn’t something that can be wrapped in a nice little bow because of the way we see it, it’s complicated primarily because we’ve set such narrow constraints on it and now that people are pushing against those constraints, our models and language for gender are just not enough.

Doing a Workshop at a Trans Conference

A dream of sorts

Right now I’m taking a figure drawing class. Basically, we draw nude models. It should come as no surprise that some of the explanations of the figure are cissexist. But every day in that class I get thinking:

I really want to have a trans figure drawing class.

Trans people predominantly (both students and models), cis people have to prove that they’ll be okay and will be kicked out the first time they say something bigoted. Trans models of all genders and any stage of medical treatment and non-treatment, I suppose the occasional cis model if I can’t get a trans one but, again, they have to prove they’ll be okay. For each model, give all the artists a paper with what kind of body the model has (self determined), what pronouns to use, what gender the model is, and (if the model’s okay with it) any medical transition information. Try my best to pay the models more than is usual for this, try to make sure that any who really need the money are definitely comfortable with doing it, even if that means having parts covered up. Major sliding scale, hopefully also getting donations so that for people who can’t afford anything and want to be there anyways I can give them all the materials. Do my best to make sure it’s in a place that’s completely accessible and to make sure that anyone who has issues with standing up for long periods of time (model or student) or whatever else is accommodated.

I don’t know if it’ll ever happen. But I would really like to have a place for trans art students to be able to learn to draw the body without having to deal with cissexism. And I would also really, really, really like to have a place where ideas about the body are thrown out the door to help with detangling every lie we’ve been fed about the body.

I give up.

I give up on trying to learn East Asian Languages at this school. I cannot take a class with that teacher, I’m not nearly neurotypical enough to, so Japanese is out. And the Chinese teacher…

Over the break before the semester started, I emailed him about pronouns. As I do with all my teachers. After an interaction that ended with him failing to get back to me, he decided that while he “understood my view” he wasn’t going to do it. In class, not only have the students used the incredibly triggering “she” for me, so did he. One girl picked up on all of it and corrected someone to “he” once. It should tell you the state of the world that that was probably the most heartfelt thank you anyone has gotten from me.

Mandarin, which is just spoken*, has a neutral 3rd-singular pronoun for all. “ta“, with a high flat tone. Should be ideal, right?

No. I know that the people using it think I’m a girl, so it’s now triggering. I’ve never been in favor of only one pronoun, but times like this remind me of why I want gender-implying pronouns. Or even if not gender implying, respect implying. And I don’t give a damn if cis people think they’re being respectful when they smash my identity under their heals and pour salt into wounds that may never heal- they aren’t. I don’t know how to fix this, I realized it one day and wanted to throw up.

I don’t have the spoons to try again with him. I’m finishing this semester, and that’s it.

The way the class is being taught, I should be able to teach myself well enough after it’s over. I have a few people I could get to know better who speak Mandarin Chinese way better than me. I would say natively, but I know one hasn’t been from birth and I don’t know when it counts as natively. Better than me, at least. I don’t know how well I can keep in contact if they go back to China over summer, but I’ll try.

This is upsetting for me. I would’ve liked to minor in one of them, I’m not very good at teaching myself (although at least with Japanese, my partner intends to become a Japanese teacher). This world doesn’t believe you can teach yourself. I’m going to try to get the school, specifically that teacher (apparently, for some reason, she’s allowed to make all decisions when people try to go to Japan), to let me go to a University that has a program specifically for people who have little to no knowledge of Japanese (and also teaches Latin, Ancient Greek, and Chinese) for my year abroad so my partner and I won’t be half a world away.

*the written Chinese language, if you can read it, can be read no matter what dialect is spoken by the writer. There are probably differences in writing style, but the words are the same because they’re characters. I think simplified vs traditional isn’t as easily understandable, although not all characters effect.

The Chinese language has 3 written 3rd-singular pronouns- one for men, one for women, one for inanimate objects. I am totally okay with being called the inanimate object one if it’s done with respect.

Pronoun Hierarchy- Updated

Slight changes made to the old one.

(text version:)

Best: Nin, nim, nims, nimself; they/them/their/theimself

Acceptable: he/him/his/himself; Thon/thon/thons/thonself

Activism-only*: it/it/its/itself

Not good: Other invented pronouns

Just don’t: sie/hir/hirs/hirself

There are easier ways to get me to stop talking to you: she/her/hers/herself

Number fail: they/them/their/themselves

Nin is based on a German suggested pronoun that I have no idea if anyone actually uses but I actually really like.

Privilege 101 ish

(I’m not entirely sure I’m qualified to talk about this, but I’ll give it a go.)

Privilege doesn’t often come up around people who have it, and when it does it’s generally knocked down with privilege denying and people not bothering to find out what the terms mean before getting offended by it. If you start looking into people who talk about privilege, then you’ll probably see words like “supremacist” and “oppressed” that push quite a few buttons and make people want to deny. But most of the words aren’t quite as harsh as the kyriarchy wants you to believe. So, what is privilege?

First, you have to know that there are groups who are privileged by society and groups who are marginalized by it. This doesn’t necessarily mean that there are laws in place that support or even allow this to happen, but the way society is set up it does anyways. One example is that heterosexual people are privileged over people with any other sexual orientation. Even if all the laws were made so that you can’t fire or otherwise discriminate against someone for not being straight; if most relationships in the media are straight couples/only portray other sexualities as tokens and not people in their own right, straight people would still have privilege because their sexuality would still be treated as more normal and natural and acceptable. No one has to say anything against other sexualities, but subtle othering still makes it clear which one society feels is right. People who are privileged by society have privilege.

Trans People and binarism

I’m really sick of trans people being binarist. Since the second I stepped into the trans community I’ve had binary-privileged people telling me what I was and wasn’t allowed to identify as, that my gender is wrong and doesn’t exist and that I can’t have it and be human at the same time. I’ve been patronisingly told that I’m lucky because I “can be comfortable in any gender role” (I can’t) and other ridiculous, baseless claims.

And what’s REALLY busted about this is that so many justify their actions  because being associated with non-binaries makes them “look bad”, so it’s okay for them to mistreat us. Oh, I’m terribly sorry, was my desire to be treated as a human getting int he way of your desire to be treated as a human? Ha, silly me! Why, it’s completely understandable that you’d smash me under your heal just to avoid being smashed under the heels of other people as badly as they’re already smashing you and then turn around and whine about how the LGB treats you like a red-headed stepchild while expecting your support.

Seriously? It just needs to stop.

To Parents

The point of this post is to make people think, so, please, only read it if you’re willing to think about it long and hard. This is a post that will upset some cis people. Maybe most. Maybe all. I suggest you read the advice on how not to be defensive when called out on transphobia before you go on if you haven’t already. Actually, just read it, it’s good advice. If you don’t think you have privilege for being cis, don’t think you could POSSIBLY be transphobic, feel that cis is offensive, or are simply unwilling to read this with an open mind- just don’t bother reading it. It’ll be a waste of your time.

Pronouns

Singular they, as I’ve probably mentioned, is starting to bother me. Unfortunately, I still haven’t found any pronoun I like better. This came up because I sent an email to a teacher asking him to use singular they for me, and he replied with “did you have ‘s/he’, ‘it’ or any other form in mind?”. I don’t know what he would’ve said if I gave another pronoun, but it definitely suggests he’s open to the idea. How often does that happen? And it aggravates the hell out of me that I can’t respond with anything but an explanation of singular they because there isn’t any pronoun that I feel comfortable asking people to use.

Thinking about this more

I am an introvert. I don’t do well with people in person. I can’t keep up a conversation with any regularity, mishear things all the time, mess up my words, and only remember the gist of things rather than the exact words- so in a later conversation I always get the me: “you said _____” them:”No, I said ____” aggravation. I get overwhelmed in crowds and prefer to be able to control when I get faced with bullshit because my mental health isn’t good enough to be able to handle it on demand.

The internet is pretty much my home for those reasons. And I forgot that. I forgot that that’s okay. I forgot that, through the internet, I’ve helped a few multiple systems come to terms with themselves. I’ve helped people who never heard the term “asexual” feel less alone. For awhile I was a sort of vigilante on an incredibly binarist forum, saving non-binaries from their clutches by saying “Hey- it’s okay to be you, whatever that means”(before it got to be too much for me to handle). Which would have been damn helpful for me to hear before.