Gender Identity: Genderqueer: Breaking the Mold
The gender binary is a form of oppression and hierarchy. There are as many genders as there are people. Gender is a social construct created by people to dictate what sort of life a person should have by what’s in their pants. Most people never think to question their gender, accepting what has been instilled in them from the time they were born. However, some of us do. We are the gender rebels and we walk amongst you. For some of us, the standard model of a reality separated into male and female is unacceptable. I don’t identify as either male or female. I am something else outside of the gender binary. I am genderqueer.
Genderqueer is a term for gender identities other than male and female. Like queer, it means different things to different people. Some genderqueers identify as both male and female, as being neither male nor female, or being outside of the gender binary. For me, it’s being completely outside of the gender binary. There are no words for what I am. I simply exist.
All gender is drag. It’s not something you are born with; it is something taught. Whether you portray yourself as being masculine, feminine, both, or neither is entirely up to you. I am female-bodied, but I tend to dress more masculine to counteract the femininity. I try to present myself as being gender-neutral or androgynous. It tends to work. I get called, “Sir”, “Ma’am”, and sometimes asked, “What are you?”
Gender is not sex. There are only a handful of sexes but there is a rainbow of genders. Sex is what you are born with and can also be changed if desired. Gender is what is taught. No one is born knowing how to be a “real” man or woman. It’s a matter of experience and conditioning.
I am perfectly happy with how I am. I am not confused. I have thought about what I am. However, sometimes my gender presentation makes other people uncomfortable. I don’t fit neatly into the boxes that they have built their life around. To most people, there is only male and female. It is beyond their comprehension to think outside of the boxes they placed themselves in. They can wrap their head around “gay/lesbian” but not much beyond that. I feel sorry for them to live such a black and white existence when the world is full of color.
People don’t understand that gender has nothing to do with sexuality. Yes, I am queer but my gender has nothing to do with that. I know plenty of people who are genderfucks and are straight. Don’t judge a book by its cover.
If you meet someone whose gender-nonconforming—don’t be afraid. We are human too. I personally don’t like being asked by strangers what gender I am. It is more complicated than I wish to get into. Honestly, I’d rather you ask me about the awesome vegan biscuits I made or about the band t-shirt I’m wearing instead of my gender. However, if you feel a need to address the topic, a question that does get me warm and fuzzy when asked is: “What pronoun would you prefer?”
Some genderqueer people prefer she/her or he/him or some combination of the two. Others prefer gender neutral pronouns like ze/hir. Some might prefer something completely different that I haven’t heard of and others might not care. For me, I personally don’t really care since all pronouns are inept to describe me. I usually go with she/her for simplicity’s sake due to being female-bodied.
Sometimes, when I explain genderqueer to people, they say, “I think I might be that too!” which is awesome. The world could use more genderqueers. If you want some further reading, a good book about gender is My Gender Workbook: How to Become a Real Man, a Real Woman, or Something Else Entirely by Kate Bornstein.  Gender warriors unite!
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Have you read Whipping Girl by Julia Serano?
@Hannah No, I haven’t. It looks interesting. Thanks for the recommendation! I’ll check it out.
I don’t know as gender has nothing to do with sexuality, as I think that gender and most identity categories have everything to do with power and hierarchy, and I think oftentimes sexuality has a lot to do with power as well, not necessarily always, but oftentimes and maybe even usually.
I really really enjoy these pieces but you might want to be careful in completely denying commonly made connections in the same way that dominant culture essentializes them.
I don’t know if this went through so I’ma say it again:
I don’t think that gender has nothing to do with sexuality, as I think gender has a lot to do with power and hierarchy, and I think that sexuality oftentimes has a lot to do with those notions as well.
I really really enjoy these pieces but think you might want to be careful in completely denying commonly made connections and correlations in the way that the dominant culture essentializes those connections.
Awesome GQ101 post :D
I agree. Us GQfolx kick gender-ass :D
According to Urban Dictionary, a douche is someone who promotes themselves without consideration of others. I hope that is a constructive criticism as to why this post is douchey.
You use this post to lambaste others who are different than you (I HATE THE OLYMPICS…therefore those who like it have less value). You don’t say it explicitly, you imply it…which, again, is a mark of doucheism. Its like being heteronormative, but the opposite. Genderqueernormative oppression is what it is. Shouldn’t we all have respect for the opinions of others without asserting our superiority? I have respect for who you are. The label of douche doesn’t apply to that. Hell, 86% of your traits are mine. Its the smugness that is worthy of the douche label.
Oh shit…I meant the above as a response to your previous post. So let me lable myself an asshole.
Boy, am I tired of this conversation. I think there, in-fact, essential gender. Gender is not merely a ‘social construct’. It’s just as much biological. Men and women are different. That’s just a truism. Of course there’s a hitch, but it does no-one any good to hunker down and and take purely political positions.
I’m tired of the “all gender – all the time” chatter that gay people are subjected to. It’s a separate issue. I think for gay bio-men the constant focus on trans issues obscures the fact that part of gay men’s oppression is manifested by our being denied access to masculinity. We are subject to regular emasculisation from the all angles. The culprits are everywhere, but it should be noted that much of this comes from feminists who pathologize masculinity and trans activists who have a political agenda around gender.
@Wagnerian No, “male” and “female” is sex not gender. Biology is parts and thus sex- gender is social conditioning of gender roles being a “real” man or women. There’s a big difference.
@ Jess. I disagree with you. I believe male and female are biologically behaviorally different. I think this is self evident if you don’t let political concerns blur yr vision.
There are certainly gendered behaviours – things that correlate to some degree with biological sex – but how those behaviours are prioritised and grouped into genders is a matter of social construction. What it means to be a woman or a man in modern America is not the same as it was in 16th century America or modern-day Nepal.
“Men are men and women are women” is entirely nonproductive, especially when all of us are subject to cultural gender policing. How can we hope to address the emasculation of gay men if we refuse to talk about gender?
Well, we should be talking about modernising masculinity, as opposed to demanding a kind of transgenderism from gay men.
I agree with you that masculinity needs work. I have seen several conversations recently about reconstructing positive masculinities given a conscientiousness of the gender critiques forwarded by feminism and queer theory. Sinclair Sexsmith has started a column on radical masculinity at Carnal Nation, and I’m sure google could spit out any of a number of other discussions.
However… Who’s “demanding a kind of transgenderism from gay men”?
“However… Who’s “demanding a kind of transgenderism from gay men”?”
Matt Bernstein Sycamore and genderqueer activists. Much of Latin America. The mainstream media, often. Queer theorists. Academic feminists, etc…
Without having seen any of the specific arguments you are referencing…
Certainly, MSM does it’s fair share of reinforcing the stereotype of gay men as effeminate (but MSM demands unrealistic crap from pretty much everyone, so…). And I’m sure there are folks out there that will try to demand that EVERYONE be genderqueer. However, the former is not part of, and the latter a tiny minority of, actual conversations about the role of gender in our lives.
But if that’s the kind of thing you’re trying to argue against here, I think you’re argument is somewhat misplaced, as I don’t believe that’s the conversation Jess is trying to have here.
I don’t see most genderqueer activists, queer theorists, or feminists (third wave – let’s not even start on the second wave seperatist stuff) as generally espousing positions that DEMAND identity performance from people. In socially progressive spaces, the conversations are usually about questioning the “givens” (like the “given” that gay men are sissies) and appreciating the diversity.
Well, good for you. I see it everywhere.
I would love to see links, if you have them. If that’s actually a position people are supporting, I would certainly agree that it’s unreasonable, counterproductive, and oppressive.
I don’t have links, but I gave you a short list of obvious places to look if you need to do yr own research.
I started reading the link you posted, but it’s written by an FTM. Which sort of is in line with my point about how gay men’s issues regarding masculinity are getting obscured by trans agendas and politically motivated feminisms. FTM and bio male masculinities are not the same thing. To act like they are is disingenuous.
I’m Ghost. I have an Anarcho-Genderfuck tattoo on My left shoulder and I fly the pink-and-black flag.:] I’m a Pansexual Genderfuck and I usually go with the pronoun “it” and if someone asks My gender, I just quote Mischief Brew: “When you offer pink or blue, I’ll take the blackest!” Never heard those particular pronouns before, though, LOL. I like. I’ve heard “shim”, “squee”, “yarrr” [pyrate pronouns] and others, LOL. I like “it” because IT tends to catch people off guard and makes them think critically about the concept of a gender-binary and the flaws in the English language. And, Alex: I’ll argue that everyone SHOULD be genderqueer. It’s fucking dumb to be anything just because you were told to be.
Also, Jess, you used the terms “male and female” a lot when you meant “,man and woman”. Male//Female//intersexual//transsexual=Sex Woman//Man//Genderqueer=Gender
@Ghost
I suppose that would depend on your definition of “genderqueer”. As I previously stated, I believe there are gendered behaviours (but also a wide standard deviation of occurrence)… I think you can be predisposed to any number of gendered behaviours, and I’m sure there are any number of people who, even upon extensive personal examination, wind up being mostly “conventionally gendered”.
If “genderqueer” means “I’ve really thought about my gender and gendered behaviours”, sure, anyone can (and arguably, should) be genderqueer. But if “genderqueer” means “some arbitrary mixing of the already arbitrary categories of gendered behaviours/markers”, if it means “being asked what gender we are by breeders”, then I disagree. Just because gender is socially constructed does not make it trivial. Constructions are real things.
@ Alex
I’d argue that constructions are real PROBLEMS. Though I don’t know how you’d define “construct”. I’m also wondering what you mean by a “gendered behaviour”. And about the definition of “Genderqueer”…I think one of the most important parts, if not THE most important part of this topic is that there is no single accurate definition of “Genderqueer”. But for someone to have a “conventional” gender means they do what they do specifically to conform to normal society.Genderqueer is any form of refusal of that conformity.
A construct is an organisation of observations and ideas into broader concept. “Gender” is a construct. “Sex” is a construct, as is “sexuality”. “Species” is. “Continent” is. Constructs themselves are not inherently problematic; in fact, I would argue that they represent something fundamentally human – a necessary product of the massive quantity of information our brains take in, process and organise. The problem is the reification of constructs.
Which brings me to gendered behaviours. Our idea of a gender – what is a man/woman? – is made up of a lot of different ideas, and I think most people understand that any one of those ideas is not universally accurate. Some are obviously completely socially constructed – women like pink, men like technology, etc – while some could quite possibly have biologically influenced underpinnings – women are (more) nurturing, men are (more) aggressive – and it is this latter category that I’m describing as “gendered behaviours”. This is not at all to say that every female is less aggressive than any male, nor that this quality is not greatly magnified by the effects of culture, merely that on a population level, males are statistically likely to be more aggressive than females. (As a parallel, while certainly there would be many more people dating people of the same sex were heterosexuality not so strongly culturally preferred, I still think that, entirely absent cultural influences, the majority of people would still be overwhelmingly heterobehavioural.)
If the construct of gender is, as I am arguing, to some degree based on statistically significant observations of human tendencies, then there are going to be people wind up being “conventional” simply by definition. What’s more, those aspects of gender which are purely learned help shape who we are in valid, real ways. For example, while I’m sure there are plenty of guys who feign an interest in sports because “men are into sports”, there are men who truly like sports. While the fact that they may have been encouraged to participate in sports from a young age might be a product of teaching gender conformity, that doesn’t mean that opinions developed through the course of that learning are purely motivated by a desire to conform.
One can superficially “conform” without conformity being a conscious (or unconscious) motivation, and with a full understanding of the implications of enacting apparently conformist behaviours and attitudes in the context of society and the policing of the norms. Encouraging people analyse and appreciate constructs as constructs is great, as is helping people find the courage to defy constructs when those constructs are inevitably found lacking (my “I’ve really thought about my gender and gendered behaviours” definition), but if you’re naming the relevant quality of genderqueer here to be non-conformity for the sake of non-conformity, or for the sake of a political statement, then I don’t believe that’s a reasonable demand to be made of the population as a whole.
/wall of text (sorry >.>)
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Alex:
You didn’t address the 1 point I made.
And by your definition, EVERYTHING is a construct and the word is therefor absolutely meaningless.
And you seem to be claiming that because something is in our “nature”, however you would define that, it can’t be wrong//harmful//detremental//whatever. Which is clearly untrue.
And it is impossible to conform without conformity being the motivation.
Your statement about biological underpinnings was flat-out false, though, that of course is a common misconception, which does fit in with the focus of that statement.
And what you’re calling “gendered behaviors” really have nothing to do with gender. That’s the point.
There is a chapter in The Male Body by Susan Bordo that discusses sex and gender that you MUST read.
I find it interesting that you reject the gender binary but embrace all kinds of other labels (masculine, feminine, genderqueer, ze).
You claim that there are no words for what you are but declare yourself a genderqueer. Using a label (even one that allows for different definitions) encourages homogeneity and narrow-mindedness.
Susan Bordo addresses gender/sex from historical, scientific, sociological, and cultural perspectives and does so in a very accessible way.
I’d be willing to bet money that Kate Bornstein’s book relies more on her personal experiences and observations then anything else as a means of discussing gender.
The Male Body by Susan Bordo
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