So I just read an amazing post by a transman (although he is much more than that, believe me) on what queerness means to him, and several words popped up that made me think.
The first is the word queer itself, the second is the word pansexual. I want to talk about both of these words, and why I only use one of them to talk about myself.
Queer, according to dictionary.com means "strange or odd from a conventional viewpoint; unusually different; singular" or "Slang: Disparaging and Offensive . a homosexual, especially a male homosexual."
There are many more definitions than these, but these are the two significant ones. The word queer comes from Scottish, and originally from the Proto-Indo European word twerk* meaning "to turn, twist, wind" related to the modern english word "thwart." And yes, I realize that nobody cares about that but me, but it is relevant.
Queer is a word that is usually used for homosexual males, but that is a very narrow definition. Queer means strange or odd from a conventional viewpoint, and it was applied to sexuality in 1922 back before questions of gender were significant topics of conversation. But let's go back to the meaning of the word - it basically means "other." Let's apply it to gender, sexuality, love and sex (the verbs), and anything else we can think of. Let's make queer a word to describe something that is outside of conventional structure.
As Asher says, "Queer doesn’t mean 'don’t label me,' it means 'I am naming myself.'" Queer is the space one exists in if one is anything other than conventional. If you think that being gay is being non-conventional, then you might identify as queer. If you think that being a woman in a man's body is unconventional, you might identify as queer. But if you do not identify as queer, then nobody has the right to tell you otherwise (though it might be a little bit confusing for them). The word "queer" to me is about establishing a non-conformity of identity, and does not mean any one thing.
I think that is all I want to talk about there.
On to the more important (to this entry) word: pansexual.
I am not going to use the dictionary or etymology on this one because they are wrong. The definition of pansexual actually has nothing to do with the way that pansexual is used in reference to sexual identity.
Pansexuality essentially means that sexual identity is not restricted by sex, gender, or pretty much anything else you can think of. If you were to apply this definition to me, you would see that it fits. But I do not identify as pansexual - I identify as bisexual. But the queer community says "but why, Fenix? Bisexuality enforces the gender binary, which is something as a genderqueer that you by your very existence and identity defy!"
And they are partially right - very partially.
I know what I am and who I like, and I can point to the people I am sexually attracted to, the people I am emotionally attracted to, and the people I am romantically attracted to. I could make a list - and that list is not restricted by sex or gender or anything.
The reason for my identification goes back to my root belief about language. Language is meant for communication - it is meant to convey a meaning from one person to another so that they may understand my meaning.
I would venture a guess that nobody outside of the queer community knows what pansexual means.
I feel no need to define myself by a word, but we have a word for "blue" because it identifies a class of wavelengths that appear to us in a certain way, and we have a word for it so that we may communicate about it. A word is no good unless it is understood by both parties.
True, I could say I am pansexual, and then explain it every.single.time. And then I would have to explain the concept of a gender spectrum, rather than a gender binary. And let's be honest - at a party with a really hot man or woman or whatever, explaining gender theory is not what you want to do. The word "bisexual" allows me to communicate quickly and efficiently (which is the purpose of language in my worldview) that I am attracted to both men and women, to any particular man or woman I might meet.
I identify as bisexual, and for the nitpickers out there, I will define it for myself - because we are allowed to define our own identity.
The gender spectrum exists, I move around on it. But there are clear points on that spectrum when I feel more male or more female (and don't give me that "society defines where these points are" crap - I know what I am, and if I am allowed to define myself, then don't be a hypocrite), and so while it is a spectrum, and not a binary, there are two halves.
There is the male half, where the majority of the male population resides, there are more hypermasculine men, and there are feminine men, but they are still men. They are on that side of the spectrum, and the inverse is true of women. But there are two halves, and of course, there is a midpoint known as androgyny (translated from the greek "man woman" which is inaccurate, but we all understand it). So, when I say that I am bisexual, I am saying that I am attracted to both sides of the spectrum. Because nobody (well, I don't want to say nobody, but very few) is attracted to a single point. Heterosexual women are attracted to men, all kinds of men. True, they may have a "type" but different men have differing gender on the spectrum - some are more masculine than others.
That is what hetero, homo, and bisexual mean to me - which side of the spectrum you are attracted to.
Basically, I assume a gender binary, and then define sexuality based on that.
Yeah, I know this was confusing, and I think this was meant more for me than for you - but I needed to get it out. And of course, as usual, questions and comments are welcome.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Monday, July 4, 2011
A Non-patriotic Denouncement of Anti-patriotic Declarations
So, as every year, because I am involved in something other than completely bible-thumping, God-praising, war-supporting, and blind patriotism America, it is understandably inevitable that on the fourth of July, there are going to be comments made on my social networking sites from people also involved in my culture - and some of them are going to have some pretty negative things to say about our country.
Interesting definition for you guys, though I am not going to write about it:
Patriot (2) a person who regards himself or herself as a defender, especially of individual rights, against presumed interference from the federal government.
So that's interesting for all the people that hate the government and get pissed off when you call them patriotic. Ignorance is not bliss, people.
But I digress. People post angry things about America, people denounce independence day, and that is to be expected. And let's be honest about some things - America has done some shitty things in its time. We did the whole slavery thing, we completely annihilated the Native American culture in these lands, we have started wars for little or no reason at all other than political gain, and we continually think that it is our responsibility to police the world, especially the non-christian world. I say this because I don't want you to think that I have illusions about America being the perfect country.
But did you know - independence day celebrates our independence? I know - weird right. Believe it or not, the fourth of july is not "American Awesomeness Day," it is not the day when we celebrate how cool our country is (of course Thanksgiving isn't the day when we celebrate our ability to consume massive amounts of food either, but it ends up happening as well), it is the day when we celebrate the fact that we are not a colony. This is the day that we think about England, and how much imperialism hurt the people of this country before it was a country, and how awesome it is to be in a sovereign nation, with the freedom, if nothing more, to choose our own destiny as a nation. It may be a crap destiny, it may be an awesome destiny that we are treating like crap and running in the opposite direction from. But it is our destiny to choose. I don't know about you guys, but that is the definition of freedom for me: the right to choose your own destiny. You may criticize our freedoms and say that we are not as free as we think we are, and I would agree with that. I don't think that we as people are as free as we think we are, but I think that we as The People are free. This is macro-freedom here, people - we The People, in order to create a more perfect union. Our declaration of independence was not "we hate you england" or "we are awesome in america, so piss off" it was "to throw off such government, and provide new guards for their future security."
And another thing. Let's just go with it, for the sake of argument, that our celebration is misplaced. Let's look at england. Where was england during the slavery thing? Oh - right, I remember - backing the south. What else - oh right, they are the kings of imperialism. They took over india for goodness sake. England is not the beacon of pristine political conditions or historical mistakes either. All I celebrate on The Fourth Of July is the fact that we are an independent nation, that we The People no longer submit to a foreign authority (if you want to see the specific grievances, go read this) and want to be able to provide new guards for our future security.
So you can say "fuck america. may it burn" all you want, and this is "happy imperialism day" but you are missing it. Say fuck america on flag day to make your point. Say happy imperialism day on columbus day and you are right on the money. But when you say those things on the fourth of july, you are missing the point of what we, as people who are grateful for not being stuck under the thumb of a foreign government, are celebrating.
Interesting definition for you guys, though I am not going to write about it:
Patriot (2) a person who regards himself or herself as a defender, especially of individual rights, against presumed interference from the federal government.
So that's interesting for all the people that hate the government and get pissed off when you call them patriotic. Ignorance is not bliss, people.
But I digress. People post angry things about America, people denounce independence day, and that is to be expected. And let's be honest about some things - America has done some shitty things in its time. We did the whole slavery thing, we completely annihilated the Native American culture in these lands, we have started wars for little or no reason at all other than political gain, and we continually think that it is our responsibility to police the world, especially the non-christian world. I say this because I don't want you to think that I have illusions about America being the perfect country.
But did you know - independence day celebrates our independence? I know - weird right. Believe it or not, the fourth of july is not "American Awesomeness Day," it is not the day when we celebrate how cool our country is (of course Thanksgiving isn't the day when we celebrate our ability to consume massive amounts of food either, but it ends up happening as well), it is the day when we celebrate the fact that we are not a colony. This is the day that we think about England, and how much imperialism hurt the people of this country before it was a country, and how awesome it is to be in a sovereign nation, with the freedom, if nothing more, to choose our own destiny as a nation. It may be a crap destiny, it may be an awesome destiny that we are treating like crap and running in the opposite direction from. But it is our destiny to choose. I don't know about you guys, but that is the definition of freedom for me: the right to choose your own destiny. You may criticize our freedoms and say that we are not as free as we think we are, and I would agree with that. I don't think that we as people are as free as we think we are, but I think that we as The People are free. This is macro-freedom here, people - we The People, in order to create a more perfect union. Our declaration of independence was not "we hate you england" or "we are awesome in america, so piss off" it was "to throw off such government, and provide new guards for their future security."
And another thing. Let's just go with it, for the sake of argument, that our celebration is misplaced. Let's look at england. Where was england during the slavery thing? Oh - right, I remember - backing the south. What else - oh right, they are the kings of imperialism. They took over india for goodness sake. England is not the beacon of pristine political conditions or historical mistakes either. All I celebrate on The Fourth Of July is the fact that we are an independent nation, that we The People no longer submit to a foreign authority (if you want to see the specific grievances, go read this) and want to be able to provide new guards for our future security.
So you can say "fuck america. may it burn" all you want, and this is "happy imperialism day" but you are missing it. Say fuck america on flag day to make your point. Say happy imperialism day on columbus day and you are right on the money. But when you say those things on the fourth of july, you are missing the point of what we, as people who are grateful for not being stuck under the thumb of a foreign government, are celebrating.
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Over-analyzation and Harry Potter
Trust me, they are related. Kind of.
So I was watching some HP movies this week in my extremely successful attempt to get pumped up for the release of the final installment of the eight movie franchise, starting with Half-Blood Prince, following it up with Order of the Phoenix, and I plan to watch Deathly Hallows pt.1 this afternoon.
But I started to notice some things, or more like think about some things about HP and some of the implications that were drawn from it. I noticed that the two main houses are male (Godric/Salazar) while the two houses that nobody really cares about are female (Rowena/Helga) and thought about the message that this sends to our youth. The obvious one, I suppose, is that while it is great to be a woman, and you will do just fine, the battle for good and evil, the battles that really matter, are fought by the male side of the equation. But then I thought about it some more - clearly HP is not a misogynistic series, there are powerful women all over the place, and the fact that Dumbledore was supposedly gay leads me to doubt that the whole construction of the houses is sexist.
So I looked at it some more and posed a hypothetical to myself - what if it were switched, what if the houses were Glinda, Rowan, Harold, and Stephanie? What would the message be there - again, the obvious one is that women are the real power in the world, and that men pretend to matter, but when it comes down to the nitty gritty end, it is the women who power through and fight the final battle. But again, this isn't really a "girl power" series.
What if they were mixed? What if Gryffindor were male and Slytherin female? Oh the horror! Courageous men triumphing over the snake-like women, trying to corrupt them (cite your misogynistic bible verse of choice for this one, and you'll see where this is going) just like it was said to be, that women are corruptors, and more easily corrupted by the forces of evil (see Salem Witch Trials). Or you could take that one the other way, and that women are simply inferior, and men triumph over them. More obvious, but less interesting.
And the other way around? That the red and gold belong to the female and the green and black to the male, that men are insidious and evil and women are moral and pure and need to put them in their place.
But seriously - lets think about it. There is an art form known as "dadaism" that focused on ridiculing what society thought to be meaningless. In other words, dada aimed at creating art that had no meaning - and yet society still placed heavy societal and cultural importance on the significance of the works. Yeah - have you seen the upside down urinal? That upside-down urinal was a piece by Michael Buchamp entitled Fountain and you would not believe how much fuss was made over this thing. We have this thing called numerology - the study of a link (either mathematical or mystical or both) between numbers found in the natural world and our lives. If you've seen "the number 23" that's what I'm talking about. Or if you look at the math behind the rapture, you can see a high prevalence of people taking these numbers and making them fit into their scheme of life. We as a society hate meaninglessness - we must have meaning, we must have purpose. Some would argue that our need for meaning is what caused us to invent God in the first place (of course, I have no proof that there is no God, but at most, only one religion can be right, which means that the other n-1 religions invented a God/Gods). We search for meaning within the stars in the form of horoscopes, we search for meaning within the mathematical (and beautiful, I might add) patterns and numbers given to us by the natural world (the digits of pi put on a musical scale are quite beautiful to our ears for some reason) and we ascribe meaning to art and music. Yes, it is true, some art and music is significant in it's message, and mathematics is beautiful, but it can't all be as meaningful as you want it to be. At some point, we have to look at the universe and ask ourselves "what if none of it means a damned thing?" would that be so bad? We get to live our lives, and enjoy ourselves, and give ourselves our own meaning, without it being defined by God, or the stars, or art, or anyone else. How cool would that be.
So when someone looks at a story and draws conclusions about what the book or piece of art is trying to say to you, look closer. Look at the houses of HP and realize that no matter what the combination is, someone could draw conclusions about what the author is trying to say about men and women in the grand scheme of life. And I would venture that it is possible that they are pulling meaning out of their ass - the gender of the originators of the houses is arbitrary. If you go ascribing meaning to every little thing, you are going to either drive yourself mad finding meaning everywhere, or you are going to delude yourself into believing in falsehoods (like the God/Gods thing) and unless you enjoy lying to yourself - I am going to assume that the majority of people would like to know the truth and not a lie about life - then you should take a look at how many things you unnecessarily atribute significance to. Can we not just admire the beauty of a piece of art, or awe-inspiring mathematical precision that governs the orbits of the planets and stars, or the simplicity and usefulness of integers, without changing our lives or our beliefs because someone decided that these things mean more than they do. An art piece can be beautiful, and you can take a lesson from it, but that doesn't mean that this painting "means" that thing or that an upside down urinal is culturally significant. The stars paint a wonderful picture on our night sky, and some people look at them and see that they are more alone than they thought - some look up and feel more connected than ever before. Some people (rightly) see patterns, but what they are seeing is not God or the universe speaking to them through the stars, or predictions for their lives, they are seeing Kepler's three laws, they are seeing newtonian mechanics, they are seeing large masses exerting gravitational force on them.
And in the words of Tim Minchin
So I was watching some HP movies this week in my extremely successful attempt to get pumped up for the release of the final installment of the eight movie franchise, starting with Half-Blood Prince, following it up with Order of the Phoenix, and I plan to watch Deathly Hallows pt.1 this afternoon.
But I started to notice some things, or more like think about some things about HP and some of the implications that were drawn from it. I noticed that the two main houses are male (Godric/Salazar) while the two houses that nobody really cares about are female (Rowena/Helga) and thought about the message that this sends to our youth. The obvious one, I suppose, is that while it is great to be a woman, and you will do just fine, the battle for good and evil, the battles that really matter, are fought by the male side of the equation. But then I thought about it some more - clearly HP is not a misogynistic series, there are powerful women all over the place, and the fact that Dumbledore was supposedly gay leads me to doubt that the whole construction of the houses is sexist.
So I looked at it some more and posed a hypothetical to myself - what if it were switched, what if the houses were Glinda, Rowan, Harold, and Stephanie? What would the message be there - again, the obvious one is that women are the real power in the world, and that men pretend to matter, but when it comes down to the nitty gritty end, it is the women who power through and fight the final battle. But again, this isn't really a "girl power" series.
What if they were mixed? What if Gryffindor were male and Slytherin female? Oh the horror! Courageous men triumphing over the snake-like women, trying to corrupt them (cite your misogynistic bible verse of choice for this one, and you'll see where this is going) just like it was said to be, that women are corruptors, and more easily corrupted by the forces of evil (see Salem Witch Trials). Or you could take that one the other way, and that women are simply inferior, and men triumph over them. More obvious, but less interesting.
And the other way around? That the red and gold belong to the female and the green and black to the male, that men are insidious and evil and women are moral and pure and need to put them in their place.
But seriously - lets think about it. There is an art form known as "dadaism" that focused on ridiculing what society thought to be meaningless. In other words, dada aimed at creating art that had no meaning - and yet society still placed heavy societal and cultural importance on the significance of the works. Yeah - have you seen the upside down urinal? That upside-down urinal was a piece by Michael Buchamp entitled Fountain and you would not believe how much fuss was made over this thing. We have this thing called numerology - the study of a link (either mathematical or mystical or both) between numbers found in the natural world and our lives. If you've seen "the number 23" that's what I'm talking about. Or if you look at the math behind the rapture, you can see a high prevalence of people taking these numbers and making them fit into their scheme of life. We as a society hate meaninglessness - we must have meaning, we must have purpose. Some would argue that our need for meaning is what caused us to invent God in the first place (of course, I have no proof that there is no God, but at most, only one religion can be right, which means that the other n-1 religions invented a God/Gods). We search for meaning within the stars in the form of horoscopes, we search for meaning within the mathematical (and beautiful, I might add) patterns and numbers given to us by the natural world (the digits of pi put on a musical scale are quite beautiful to our ears for some reason) and we ascribe meaning to art and music. Yes, it is true, some art and music is significant in it's message, and mathematics is beautiful, but it can't all be as meaningful as you want it to be. At some point, we have to look at the universe and ask ourselves "what if none of it means a damned thing?" would that be so bad? We get to live our lives, and enjoy ourselves, and give ourselves our own meaning, without it being defined by God, or the stars, or art, or anyone else. How cool would that be.
So when someone looks at a story and draws conclusions about what the book or piece of art is trying to say to you, look closer. Look at the houses of HP and realize that no matter what the combination is, someone could draw conclusions about what the author is trying to say about men and women in the grand scheme of life. And I would venture that it is possible that they are pulling meaning out of their ass - the gender of the originators of the houses is arbitrary. If you go ascribing meaning to every little thing, you are going to either drive yourself mad finding meaning everywhere, or you are going to delude yourself into believing in falsehoods (like the God/Gods thing) and unless you enjoy lying to yourself - I am going to assume that the majority of people would like to know the truth and not a lie about life - then you should take a look at how many things you unnecessarily atribute significance to. Can we not just admire the beauty of a piece of art, or awe-inspiring mathematical precision that governs the orbits of the planets and stars, or the simplicity and usefulness of integers, without changing our lives or our beliefs because someone decided that these things mean more than they do. An art piece can be beautiful, and you can take a lesson from it, but that doesn't mean that this painting "means" that thing or that an upside down urinal is culturally significant. The stars paint a wonderful picture on our night sky, and some people look at them and see that they are more alone than they thought - some look up and feel more connected than ever before. Some people (rightly) see patterns, but what they are seeing is not God or the universe speaking to them through the stars, or predictions for their lives, they are seeing Kepler's three laws, they are seeing newtonian mechanics, they are seeing large masses exerting gravitational force on them.
And in the words of Tim Minchin
"Isn't this enough? Just, this world? Just this, beautiful, complex, wonderfully unfathomable, natural world? How does it so fail to hold our attention that we have to diminish it with the invention of cheap man-made myths and monsters? But, here's what gives me a hard-on, I'm a tiny, insignificant ignorant bit of carbon. I have one life, and it is short and unimportant, but thanks to recent scientific advances... I get to live twice as long, as my great-great-great-great uncleses and auntses. Twice as long! To live this life of mine, twice as long, to love this wife of mine. Twice as many years, of friends, of wine."
Tim Minchin, excerpt (slightly edited) from Storm
So next time, instead of looking to God, or to your horoscope, or to some piece of art that you think is beautiful, just accept these things as beautiful - they don't have to have significance beyond that, because beauty should be enough for us.
"Isn't this enough?"
So next time, instead of looking to God, or to your horoscope, or to some piece of art that you think is beautiful, just accept these things as beautiful - they don't have to have significance beyond that, because beauty should be enough for us.
"Isn't this enough?"
Monday, June 6, 2011
Contact Improvisation Final Paper
Contact Improvisation (CI) is a class I took this term, and we were supposed to have been journaling. I didn't, and I asked my instructor if I could write a paper on it instead. She gave me the go ahead, so I did it. Writing it really allowed me to think about what I had learned, not just what I had done.
CI was invented by Steve Paxton and was a new idea about the way dancers can relate to themselves and one another, and there is an extensive amount of literature on the subject if you know where to look, so I won't bore you with the details. The basic idea is to use our senses to find a connection with the people around us and to make contact with them and use that contact to construct movement around. That contact need not be physical, or even with another person - it could be with the floor, a lamp, or a thought. But the connection is the basis of the dance, rather than the way dance usually works (we have a move, and it conveys a thought or emotion or idea). This is, of course, my interpretation of CI, and everyone has their own. But I wanted to share this paper with you, because I figured it might provoke some thoughts, and since I already wrote it - hey, free blog entry with no extra work - why not?
CI was invented by Steve Paxton and was a new idea about the way dancers can relate to themselves and one another, and there is an extensive amount of literature on the subject if you know where to look, so I won't bore you with the details. The basic idea is to use our senses to find a connection with the people around us and to make contact with them and use that contact to construct movement around. That contact need not be physical, or even with another person - it could be with the floor, a lamp, or a thought. But the connection is the basis of the dance, rather than the way dance usually works (we have a move, and it conveys a thought or emotion or idea). This is, of course, my interpretation of CI, and everyone has their own. But I wanted to share this paper with you, because I figured it might provoke some thoughts, and since I already wrote it - hey, free blog entry with no extra work - why not?
Introspection Via Interaction
When I enrolled in contact improvisation, I had a goal in mind. It was a simple goal, and a worthy one: I wanted to become a better dancer. I wanted, through this class, to learn how to navigate multiple bodies in contact smoothy and with elegance so that in the future, when and if I was involved in a piece that required contact, or unusual lifts, I would be confident in my abilities not to get myself or anyone around me injured. I think, that over the course of these ten weeks, I have come closer to this goal. I feel much more secure in myself when I am working with another person, and much less afraid of contact. But it would be incredibly short sighted to claim that this was all that I learned this term. The real lessons were so much deeper, and in fact, had very little to do with dance, at least directly. The more I worked with other people, the better in touch I became with myself. When I say “in touch with myself” I don’t mean that I am more aware of my limbs in space, or more aware of my bodily orientation - I learned that from martial arts when I was very young. When I say “in touch with myself” I mean that I am more aware of the movement quality, and of the small little details that show up in your body when you put it in difficult positions. When someone rolls over you, you feel their weight, feel their stomach pressing against yours and you feel their heartbeat in their chest beating against your own. It is the most unique, intimate and pure experience I have ever experienced outside of a sexual context, and it is so much more than two people touching. When I feel a heartbeat against my own, I am made more aware of my own heartbeat. When I feel a hand interlaced with mine, I can feel the blood in my own fingertips. When someone is climbing on me and their hand positions itself on my waist in order to stabilize themselves, I am made aware that I breathe not through my chest, at least not entirely, but through my abdomen as well. When I work with someone, any contact we have, be it physical, emotional, or visual, it not only shows me what they are using to touch me with, but it also allows me to become more closely connected with whatever I am using to touch him or her, be it a finger, a feeling, or a gaze.
During the suspension exercise, over the course of several weeks doing it, and getting used to it and learning how to efficiently move from one person to the next, I realized I was going about it all wrong. As a math major, and circus performer, efficiency of movement and thought is the primary goal in my life. There was a day, in a group of six, where we were lifting each other into the air and I was upside down, laying on someone’s back, hand on someone’s shoulder and someone grabbed my foot. It served no purpose whatsoever - I was stable, I was lifted, and this hand on my foot did nothing - didn’t even attempt to do anything. It didn’t pull, it didn’t move, it didn’t push - it just held. My initial reaction was to ask myself why a person would do that - grab my foot with no intention of doing anything remotely useful for the exercise. But they kept holding on to my foot, even when I flipped over whose ever back I was on, that hand remained on my foot. My feet met earth, and the hand remained, and in order to do this, the woman who has grasped my foot had to be bent over. So I picked her up and she rolled around on me and then moved on to someone else. This small foot grab had a lot of messages to convey. It served no purpose for the moment it was placed, but when it remained and was given a chance, a moment came where it served not only a purpose, but in fact facilitated the continuance of the movement. Contact Improv, it seems, is not like any other kind of movement (which, in retrospect should have been a “duh” moment - it was invented by a person, meaning it did not exist before that invention - of course it wasn’t like any kind of movement in existence, or it would not have needed inventing) because it is a very amorphous form. Any small contact can grow into a larger, more important one. There is no movement without purpose, and there is no movement with purpose - all movement in contact improvisation can be viewed as potential energy. A contact is made and in that moment, it does nothing, but it is the series of choices made by the mover(s) that determine if the contact will remain a potential, and possibly an unused potential, or if it will evolve to become a greater movement.
Both of these concepts, that again in retrospect seem obvious (but that is true of any great lesson - the thing that makes it great is the simplicity of it) both became clear to me on the last day of the class when we had our jam circle. I walked out into the circle and put myself on the ground. I started to roll and to twist and to move and find new ways to touch the ground. I could feel the vibrations of the people around me as they stepped on the floor. I could feel my heartbeat in my fingertips and in my stomach and in my feet. Every touch I made with the floor was a potential, waiting to be explored, some of them were - some were not. Then Patsy put herself quietly down next to me. She didn’t touch me - but she put her hand next to mine is space, and we spent the next few minutes doing nothing more than intertwining our hands. We didn’t look at each other, we didn’t touch with anything but our hands, but in that time, I felt more connected with her and with myself than with any of the people with whom I have been intimate. It seems, that when you open yourself up to feeling not only another person through touch, but feeling yourself through that touch and knowing yourself better, it opens the gates that we as members of such a closed and individualistic society so often find shut, and allows for a personal connection previously unknown.
Contact Improvisation made me a better dancer. I learned some new lifts, I learned some new turns, some new ways to balance myself on a person, some new ways to see and be aware of the bodies around me. I accomplished the goal I set out for myself ten weeks ago. But I am a better mover (not just dancer) because I can move and when I touch things (as touch is unavoidable as long as we have gravity) I feel myself the same if not more than the thing I am touching. Newton third law applies: for every action there is an equal and opposing reaction - for everything that I touch, it touches me, and it astonishes me how much we do not notice that. Every contact is a two way phenomenon. I don’t touch you - we touch.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
The Estrogen Questigen
I have been thinking about this idea for a few months now, weighing both sides of it and putting consideration into it. I have made my choice for now, but that is not to say I will revisit it sometime in the future. But, because I try to put down anything really important that happens to me on this blog, I figured I should write it down - just waiting for the right time for that. I have decided that time is now. So here goes.
For a transgender person going from male to female, the first step in transitioning is taking estrogen and coupling it with testosterone blockers. The next steps are orchiectomy (science speak for castration) and finally SRS/GRS (sexual/gender reassignment surgery) with the optional breast augmentation. That is the normal path to take. But I am not transgender. I live part of my life as a man, and part of it as a woman. I live more of my life as a woman than most people know, and more than I would usually care to admit to myself. I would honestly say that more than 50% of the days I wake up I wish I was a woman and would be seen as such. Then I look down and see my chest and groin, and I am reminded of what I am not, and what I am not seen as. I have been experiencing a lot of bodily self-loathing as a result of this. And you can tell me until the end of time that it isn't healthy, and that I need to learn to accept myself. To this, I answer with the following: fuck you. Gender dysphoria is so difficult to deal with. In some regards, I would say transfolk have it easier than we do - they at least know what they are and have a clear path to take to relieve their dissonance. For genderqueer folks who say that, to them I say: you are not me, you don't know what I think, and if you have found the almighty secret to self-acceptance (also, I want to say I know no male-bodied genderqueers*, so it's not like I really have anyone to talk to on this one) that is great, but unless you want to share it with me - shut up.
*if you are a male bodied genderqueer, please speak up and give me your perspective on this one
Now, I don't want to undergo an orchiectomy, nor do I want SRS. I like my genitalia, it is nice, I have use for it. And to be perfectly honest, I could live with the possible sterility that is possible with estrogen/testosterone blockers. Adoption is a perfectly valid option, and we have to many kids in the world yadayadayada you all know this spiel. But that is not the center of this internal debate. I am not thinking long term on this one, in fact. The long term consequences actually favor taking estrogen and T-blockers so incredibly, it is incredible that I haven't done it already. But it is the short term consequences that frighten me and have caused this long back and forth in my brain.
Estrogen and T-blockers (ETB from now on) have many effects on the human body. Breast tissue will grow over time, body hair will become finer and less dark, fat will be redistributed, and hips widen. Let me say right now up front that all of these things are what I want. Especially the breasts and hair part. I would be so incredibly excited for that, you cannot possibly understand. ETB also causes (in the long run) testicular atrophy, which is also acceptable for me. ETB does not kill your sex drive (not that I have a very impressive one to begin with) nor inhibit your ability to engage in all the sex acts you normally would be able to without them (i.e. does not prevent an erection - however, it does reduce almost to nothing the frequency that unwanted erections occur, which would be a serious plus). So far we have all good effects and no negative side effects. But there is the big one looming on the horizon of my decision. This final effect would effectively make me chose between my public, private and social happiness in life, and my job, which is the source of the greatest happiness I have.
ETB decreases muscle mass.
Something as small as that would not perturb most people - most genderqueers would not balk at this or even give it a second thought. However, most genderqueers are not professional circus performers. As a circus performer, I could live with the breasts - they would allow me to be male (binding is always an option if I want to ignore them for a few hours) or female. I could live with the hips - some guys have feminine hips. I could live with the testicular atrophy - they wouldn't get in the way as much. I could live with the hair decrease - fire would become a lot simpler to deal with. But if I were to lose muscle mass, it would effectively destroy my aerial career. I am a good aerialist. I can compete with many amazing performers out there who are far more flexible than I will ever be. And the sole reason I can do this is because I am incredibly strong for my size. I can do things with my body that nobody else I know can do, and this is primarily due to my muscles.
When I go to school and sit in class wearing girl clothes, everyone looks at me like I am a freak. I can't even go to a dance class as a girl - I have to wear skintight clothes and while I can tuck, my form is hyper-masculine, and there is no way around it. As a physical artist, I am undeniably male. And because the physical art is such a huge part of my life, the fact that half of my gender is excluded from this is incredibly painful.
If I took ETB and grew breasts (even small ones) and got some of my weight redistributed, those problems would go away. I would be able to go to class as a woman, walk into a bank as a woman and have nobody look at me strangely. I would be able to wake up in the morning and put on a bra and not feel like I am being offensive to transfolk and cis-women. I mean that, I have not worn a bra outside of my house in 6 months because whenever I even consider it, I cannot shake the feeling that I am somehow cheating and offending someone. Bras are for people with breasts and people who make their living impersonating women. I would love to be able to put on the clothes that I want without feeling like I am trying to fool someone. I would love to walk into the bathroom with my head held high when I am a woman - actually walk into the women's bathroom because people see that I am a woman. But it would force me to redefine myself as an aerialist. I would all of the sudden be competing with all the women in the world. Right now, I am not competing with them - they are not on the list of people I worry about. There are some women who are as strong or stronger than me, but they are few and far between - if I lose the one thing that separates me from them and puts us on a level playing field, they will win. I am not flexible, I will never have their beautiful form that they grew into having estrogen pumped into their system since early puberty.
I cannot hope to be an aerialist in that world if I lose what I have.
So I have been forced to make a choice between my personal happiness and my professional happiness.
This is not far from the age old question of love vs. career. And I chose career.
I can deal with personal pain. I can deal with feeling ashamed of my body whenever I am a woman and nobody but me can see the pain I am in because my body does not even come close to matching my brain. I can deal with the awkward glances and having to walk into the mens bathroom when I feel nothing like a man. I can deal with never being looked at as a woman in my dance classes, never being able to truly express myself as a dancer because I can only use half of my self. But I cannot, at least right now, deal with losing my career as an aerialist.
So, that is the estrogen questigen, and my take on it. If anything I have said is factually incorrect, feel free (please) to correct me. If you disagree with my opinion on my gender or the way I am perceived, you can shove it. If you have input or insight on what I should do, it depends on what you have to say - if it is going to shed light on an angle of this I have not considered, fantastic - if you are going to tell me not to do ETB because I am a boy, I will call you, and then tell you myself to shove it.
EDIT
I got a huge response to this post (as well as it's sister on facebook) from the trans community that I know, as well as very helpful friends. I had no idea so many people were listening, and that was a revelation all by itself. I was thinking about this problem all day today, and I had several new thoughts as a result of my own ideas and some ideas people proposed to me.
1. I have a lot of muscle mass, and while estrogen makes building muscle very hard, I don't have to build it - I have to maintain it, and I am fairly certain that on ETB combined with my job and insanely active lifestyle, maintaining muscle mass might actually be doable.
2. Aurelia Cohen, my first silks teacher has muscles as big as I do. No, I am not being hyperbolic - she has huge muscles. And it is hot. Being a person with almost no testosterone and a lot of estrogen, she still manages to be that ripped, and I have a head start.
3. I have to thank my friends Cyndi, Ryan, and London for this one. They both had similar views on it, and I wanted to put those into my own words. Yesterday, I had it in my mind that I had to choose between career and life because helping one would hurt the other. These three amazing human beings reminded me that this is not so. If I am not happy in my life, that will actively impede my ability to do my job. "You will end up insane from gender angst." I thought about it for a while, and realized she was completely right. "I personally feel that once you personally feel content with yourself in your own skin, then everything will fall into place" and she is completely right as well. Only after I am content with myself (obviously, we are never complete, but once I am headed in the right direction) can I actually succeed in being myself, including in my work.
4. Something I didn't think about (which, in hindsight, was really dumb) was brought up by Ashley, although she didn't know it. On a comment on my facebook note, she said "small boobs are awesome. and sports bras are amazing, sorry the carie. we could match fenix!!! ;)" and I thought about her body. I am so envious of her body, and I am not afraid to say it. And without realizing it, she had brought up a perfectly valid point that tipped the scales in a very large way.
Despite the fact that I will lose muscle mass, or at least have to work really hard to maintain it. Despite the fact that ETB will be hard on my system and it will take a long time to adjust. Despite all of the negative effects: WORTH IT! I want to look at myself and see a body that reflects my mind. I want to look down in the shower and see the body I see myself with in my sleep (yes, that's right - in my dreams, I am a woman sometimes).
So, I guess what I'm saying is this: I didn't consider all the angles - and that is exactly why I published this. I wanted opinions and voices from people who know what they are talking about, and who know and love me more than I will ever know. Now I have more angles, and with what I've got now - I plan to talk to my parents and get set up to talk to a doctor/therapist to get the ball rolling on this one and find out more.
Thank you all again for your love and support - goodness knows I am gonna need it!
For a transgender person going from male to female, the first step in transitioning is taking estrogen and coupling it with testosterone blockers. The next steps are orchiectomy (science speak for castration) and finally SRS/GRS (sexual/gender reassignment surgery) with the optional breast augmentation. That is the normal path to take. But I am not transgender. I live part of my life as a man, and part of it as a woman. I live more of my life as a woman than most people know, and more than I would usually care to admit to myself. I would honestly say that more than 50% of the days I wake up I wish I was a woman and would be seen as such. Then I look down and see my chest and groin, and I am reminded of what I am not, and what I am not seen as. I have been experiencing a lot of bodily self-loathing as a result of this. And you can tell me until the end of time that it isn't healthy, and that I need to learn to accept myself. To this, I answer with the following: fuck you. Gender dysphoria is so difficult to deal with. In some regards, I would say transfolk have it easier than we do - they at least know what they are and have a clear path to take to relieve their dissonance. For genderqueer folks who say that, to them I say: you are not me, you don't know what I think, and if you have found the almighty secret to self-acceptance (also, I want to say I know no male-bodied genderqueers*, so it's not like I really have anyone to talk to on this one) that is great, but unless you want to share it with me - shut up.
*if you are a male bodied genderqueer, please speak up and give me your perspective on this one
Now, I don't want to undergo an orchiectomy, nor do I want SRS. I like my genitalia, it is nice, I have use for it. And to be perfectly honest, I could live with the possible sterility that is possible with estrogen/testosterone blockers. Adoption is a perfectly valid option, and we have to many kids in the world yadayadayada you all know this spiel. But that is not the center of this internal debate. I am not thinking long term on this one, in fact. The long term consequences actually favor taking estrogen and T-blockers so incredibly, it is incredible that I haven't done it already. But it is the short term consequences that frighten me and have caused this long back and forth in my brain.
Estrogen and T-blockers (ETB from now on) have many effects on the human body. Breast tissue will grow over time, body hair will become finer and less dark, fat will be redistributed, and hips widen. Let me say right now up front that all of these things are what I want. Especially the breasts and hair part. I would be so incredibly excited for that, you cannot possibly understand. ETB also causes (in the long run) testicular atrophy, which is also acceptable for me. ETB does not kill your sex drive (not that I have a very impressive one to begin with) nor inhibit your ability to engage in all the sex acts you normally would be able to without them (i.e. does not prevent an erection - however, it does reduce almost to nothing the frequency that unwanted erections occur, which would be a serious plus). So far we have all good effects and no negative side effects. But there is the big one looming on the horizon of my decision. This final effect would effectively make me chose between my public, private and social happiness in life, and my job, which is the source of the greatest happiness I have.
ETB decreases muscle mass.
Something as small as that would not perturb most people - most genderqueers would not balk at this or even give it a second thought. However, most genderqueers are not professional circus performers. As a circus performer, I could live with the breasts - they would allow me to be male (binding is always an option if I want to ignore them for a few hours) or female. I could live with the hips - some guys have feminine hips. I could live with the testicular atrophy - they wouldn't get in the way as much. I could live with the hair decrease - fire would become a lot simpler to deal with. But if I were to lose muscle mass, it would effectively destroy my aerial career. I am a good aerialist. I can compete with many amazing performers out there who are far more flexible than I will ever be. And the sole reason I can do this is because I am incredibly strong for my size. I can do things with my body that nobody else I know can do, and this is primarily due to my muscles.
When I go to school and sit in class wearing girl clothes, everyone looks at me like I am a freak. I can't even go to a dance class as a girl - I have to wear skintight clothes and while I can tuck, my form is hyper-masculine, and there is no way around it. As a physical artist, I am undeniably male. And because the physical art is such a huge part of my life, the fact that half of my gender is excluded from this is incredibly painful.
If I took ETB and grew breasts (even small ones) and got some of my weight redistributed, those problems would go away. I would be able to go to class as a woman, walk into a bank as a woman and have nobody look at me strangely. I would be able to wake up in the morning and put on a bra and not feel like I am being offensive to transfolk and cis-women. I mean that, I have not worn a bra outside of my house in 6 months because whenever I even consider it, I cannot shake the feeling that I am somehow cheating and offending someone. Bras are for people with breasts and people who make their living impersonating women. I would love to be able to put on the clothes that I want without feeling like I am trying to fool someone. I would love to walk into the bathroom with my head held high when I am a woman - actually walk into the women's bathroom because people see that I am a woman. But it would force me to redefine myself as an aerialist. I would all of the sudden be competing with all the women in the world. Right now, I am not competing with them - they are not on the list of people I worry about. There are some women who are as strong or stronger than me, but they are few and far between - if I lose the one thing that separates me from them and puts us on a level playing field, they will win. I am not flexible, I will never have their beautiful form that they grew into having estrogen pumped into their system since early puberty.
I cannot hope to be an aerialist in that world if I lose what I have.
So I have been forced to make a choice between my personal happiness and my professional happiness.
This is not far from the age old question of love vs. career. And I chose career.
I can deal with personal pain. I can deal with feeling ashamed of my body whenever I am a woman and nobody but me can see the pain I am in because my body does not even come close to matching my brain. I can deal with the awkward glances and having to walk into the mens bathroom when I feel nothing like a man. I can deal with never being looked at as a woman in my dance classes, never being able to truly express myself as a dancer because I can only use half of my self. But I cannot, at least right now, deal with losing my career as an aerialist.
So, that is the estrogen questigen, and my take on it. If anything I have said is factually incorrect, feel free (please) to correct me. If you disagree with my opinion on my gender or the way I am perceived, you can shove it. If you have input or insight on what I should do, it depends on what you have to say - if it is going to shed light on an angle of this I have not considered, fantastic - if you are going to tell me not to do ETB because I am a boy, I will call you, and then tell you myself to shove it.
EDIT
I got a huge response to this post (as well as it's sister on facebook) from the trans community that I know, as well as very helpful friends. I had no idea so many people were listening, and that was a revelation all by itself. I was thinking about this problem all day today, and I had several new thoughts as a result of my own ideas and some ideas people proposed to me.
1. I have a lot of muscle mass, and while estrogen makes building muscle very hard, I don't have to build it - I have to maintain it, and I am fairly certain that on ETB combined with my job and insanely active lifestyle, maintaining muscle mass might actually be doable.
2. Aurelia Cohen, my first silks teacher has muscles as big as I do. No, I am not being hyperbolic - she has huge muscles. And it is hot. Being a person with almost no testosterone and a lot of estrogen, she still manages to be that ripped, and I have a head start.
3. I have to thank my friends Cyndi, Ryan, and London for this one. They both had similar views on it, and I wanted to put those into my own words. Yesterday, I had it in my mind that I had to choose between career and life because helping one would hurt the other. These three amazing human beings reminded me that this is not so. If I am not happy in my life, that will actively impede my ability to do my job. "You will end up insane from gender angst." I thought about it for a while, and realized she was completely right. "I personally feel that once you personally feel content with yourself in your own skin, then everything will fall into place" and she is completely right as well. Only after I am content with myself (obviously, we are never complete, but once I am headed in the right direction) can I actually succeed in being myself, including in my work.
4. Something I didn't think about (which, in hindsight, was really dumb) was brought up by Ashley, although she didn't know it. On a comment on my facebook note, she said "small boobs are awesome. and sports bras are amazing, sorry the carie. we could match fenix!!! ;)" and I thought about her body. I am so envious of her body, and I am not afraid to say it. And without realizing it, she had brought up a perfectly valid point that tipped the scales in a very large way.
Despite the fact that I will lose muscle mass, or at least have to work really hard to maintain it. Despite the fact that ETB will be hard on my system and it will take a long time to adjust. Despite all of the negative effects: WORTH IT! I want to look at myself and see a body that reflects my mind. I want to look down in the shower and see the body I see myself with in my sleep (yes, that's right - in my dreams, I am a woman sometimes).
So, I guess what I'm saying is this: I didn't consider all the angles - and that is exactly why I published this. I wanted opinions and voices from people who know what they are talking about, and who know and love me more than I will ever know. Now I have more angles, and with what I've got now - I plan to talk to my parents and get set up to talk to a doctor/therapist to get the ball rolling on this one and find out more.
Thank you all again for your love and support - goodness knows I am gonna need it!
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Special Note
Been a while since I've posted, not really sure why. I've got the time, and I've got the inspiration of things to write about, I just never seem to get on it enough to actually write them down.
I was reminded this morning as I was woken up WAY too early that it is, in fact mother's day, which is a good thing, because without reminders, I would remember nothing more than Birthdays, Halloween, Christmas, Thanksgiving and 4th of July. Yeah, that's right - I don't know when easter is (but I know St. Patrick's day because it is my aunt's birthday - cheating, I know).
SO! Thanks to my friend who keeps track of these things, I actually know what day it is today! So I'm gonna start writing and then when I come to the end, I will stop.
So I have this Mother. Her name is Rachel. She gave birth to me, which I suppose is self-explanatory given the mother status. But I figured it was worth mentioning. I figured this because it was the beginning of my life. And from that moment (and quite conceivably before hand) on, she loved me. When you think about it, that in itself is impressive. Birth - love - 20 years - still love. All "maternal instincts" and "that's just the way it is" aside, think about it - that is way cool. I gave my mother hell sometimes, and she still loves me. That is some intense love - people. That is love worth celebrating. But I am not just celebrating the love, I am celebrating the woman. I am celebrating the woman who taught me how to talk to people, how to listen and respond to solve problems. I am celebrating the woman who, through her own example, taught me to be clever when in an argument (not a fight). I am celebrating the woman who would rearrange her schedule just to have lunch with me one day, for no other reason than that she wanted to have lunch with me. This is the same woman who took me to movies, read all seven Harry Potter books out loud to/with me (the further along we got, the more reading I did) along with many others, and would dance around with me to music when I was a wee lad. I still remember that dancing, and I still remember the songs that she would play for me when I went to sleep. I remember the songs she used to sing for me - though I cannot remember the words, words which I will have to learn one day when I have children - and how when she was singing to me, nothing bad was happening. I remember she was an expert artist mimic, to the point where she drew sesame street characters on my wall, and if I didn't know better, I would have thought they were done with a stencil. I remember she had a hard time with Tinkerbell - she had an egg-head and we couldn't get rid of it.
I remember when my mom was dating guys after her and my father and her were divorced the second time. I remember thinking to myself that this was gonna be like everyone elses experience - the mother would meet some guy and he would come up to me and go "we are gonna be great friends" but he would try to control me and make me help his relationship out. But that isn't what happened. When my mom had seen a guy a few times, she introduced him to me. Then she asked my opinion. And what I had to say mattered. There was this guy, I call him Robert2. I did not like this guy. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but this guy creeped me the hell out. My mom listened to me, and started to pick up on it too, and soon after, Robert2 was gone. Seriously, how many parents actually listen to their kids when it comes to relationship advice?
I have learned so much from my mom, and have so many amazing memories, and though we have had our rough patches (which taught me things too) I would not trade her for any other mother. And if she wasn't awesome enough - she is coming up to my neck of the woods to dress like a faerie and dance around for 3 days this summer. Jealous? Yeah, you should be - cuz my mom is awesome.
Happy Mother's Day mamadog, I love you.
I was reminded this morning as I was woken up WAY too early that it is, in fact mother's day, which is a good thing, because without reminders, I would remember nothing more than Birthdays, Halloween, Christmas, Thanksgiving and 4th of July. Yeah, that's right - I don't know when easter is (but I know St. Patrick's day because it is my aunt's birthday - cheating, I know).
SO! Thanks to my friend who keeps track of these things, I actually know what day it is today! So I'm gonna start writing and then when I come to the end, I will stop.
So I have this Mother. Her name is Rachel. She gave birth to me, which I suppose is self-explanatory given the mother status. But I figured it was worth mentioning. I figured this because it was the beginning of my life. And from that moment (and quite conceivably before hand) on, she loved me. When you think about it, that in itself is impressive. Birth - love - 20 years - still love. All "maternal instincts" and "that's just the way it is" aside, think about it - that is way cool. I gave my mother hell sometimes, and she still loves me. That is some intense love - people. That is love worth celebrating. But I am not just celebrating the love, I am celebrating the woman. I am celebrating the woman who taught me how to talk to people, how to listen and respond to solve problems. I am celebrating the woman who, through her own example, taught me to be clever when in an argument (not a fight). I am celebrating the woman who would rearrange her schedule just to have lunch with me one day, for no other reason than that she wanted to have lunch with me. This is the same woman who took me to movies, read all seven Harry Potter books out loud to/with me (the further along we got, the more reading I did) along with many others, and would dance around with me to music when I was a wee lad. I still remember that dancing, and I still remember the songs that she would play for me when I went to sleep. I remember the songs she used to sing for me - though I cannot remember the words, words which I will have to learn one day when I have children - and how when she was singing to me, nothing bad was happening. I remember she was an expert artist mimic, to the point where she drew sesame street characters on my wall, and if I didn't know better, I would have thought they were done with a stencil. I remember she had a hard time with Tinkerbell - she had an egg-head and we couldn't get rid of it.
I remember when my mom was dating guys after her and my father and her were divorced the second time. I remember thinking to myself that this was gonna be like everyone elses experience - the mother would meet some guy and he would come up to me and go "we are gonna be great friends" but he would try to control me and make me help his relationship out. But that isn't what happened. When my mom had seen a guy a few times, she introduced him to me. Then she asked my opinion. And what I had to say mattered. There was this guy, I call him Robert2. I did not like this guy. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but this guy creeped me the hell out. My mom listened to me, and started to pick up on it too, and soon after, Robert2 was gone. Seriously, how many parents actually listen to their kids when it comes to relationship advice?
I have learned so much from my mom, and have so many amazing memories, and though we have had our rough patches (which taught me things too) I would not trade her for any other mother. And if she wasn't awesome enough - she is coming up to my neck of the woods to dress like a faerie and dance around for 3 days this summer. Jealous? Yeah, you should be - cuz my mom is awesome.
Happy Mother's Day mamadog, I love you.
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Respect, Offending, and Whining
I just wanna talk a little bit about respect, people who give it, people who don't, people who are offended by offensive things, and people who whine about people who give respect and say no offensive things and still get yelled at. You have met all of these people, and I want to talk about them for a bit.
As with all discussions, let's define my terms, so we are all on the same page.
Respect (v): to hold in esteem or honor, to show regard or consideration for, to refrain from intruding upon or interfering with.
Offend (v): to irritate, annoy, anger; cause resentful displeasure in, often in regard to something which is not politically correct; to violate or transgress
Whine (v): to snivel or complain in a peevish, self-pitying way
(Dictionary.com, my additions)
In my coming out as genderqueer and bisexual, I have discovered many people who respect that and me, and many who don't, just as I expected. That is not what I came here to talk about. That is about the belief held by certain individuals on whether you can, in fact, not belong to just one gender - it is a problem of metaphysics, and if yours don't match up with mine, then it is going to be tough to have a discussion in the area where they don't match up and I am OK with that (I don't like it, because it means you don't really understand who I am, but if you don't want to change, that's your choice). That isn't the point of this blog. This blog is about something much simpler and easier to wrap your mind around. This is about simple acts within daily life that are rude with regard to race, sexuality, and all of the other things that fall under the umbrella of political correctness.
Before I start in on that subject (and I'll even give it a name for you), I want to talk about an experience I had with a man who did not give respect. I was in my improvisation class the other day, and our assignment was to do a blind walk. We would close our eyes, and our partner would lead us around campus and do their best to give us an experience for 15 minutes. My partner was Allison, and we showed each other beautiful smells, sounds, and feelings. The whole experience is based on trust that they will not let us run into a wall or trip on some stairs. She did beautifully - I was completely trusting, even though I had never met her and it went beautifully. But as we all know, a well timed asshole can ruin everything. As Allison tells it, "a guy was riding by on a bike, and he slowed down, I guessed so he wouldn't freak us out or run into us, and I thought 'oh, how considerate,' but as he got right next to us, he reached out and grabbed Fenix' face!" As I tell it "I was walking along, and this douchecanoe slapped me in the front of my face!"
I was there, walking along, with my eyes closed and this girl was leading me along, he didn't know why we were doing this. I could have had something wrong with my eyes and needed help for all he knew, and he just rides up and grabs my face. WHO DOES THAT?!?!?!?
My response: I threw up the bird
What my class wanted me to do: open my eyes, chase him down and stick a foot in his spokes.
Conclusion: dancers take their classes very seriously, and "bros" do not.
Alright, that was just an annoyance I wanted to discuss. But, back to the main point.
About a month ago, I discovered a website dedicated to publishing "microaggressions." For those of you who don't know this word, let me define it for you, according to my own definition. A microaggression is any thing said or done within a day that by itself is not really terrible, but when you hear or see lots of them throughout the day (as, for example, many transfolk do when they, say, get on a bus and everyone starts muttering "is that a guy or a girl"), they start to wear on you. I have experienced them, and so have a lot of you who do not conform to mainstream societal rules.
Here are some good ones:
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IN 3RD GRADE, when asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, I said President. My teacher said “You’ll never be President, you’re a girl.” At the time I didn’t realize how offensive her comment was, but now all I want to do is prove her wrong.
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As with all discussions, let's define my terms, so we are all on the same page.
Respect (v): to hold in esteem or honor, to show regard or consideration for, to refrain from intruding upon or interfering with.
Offend (v): to irritate, annoy, anger; cause resentful displeasure in, often in regard to something which is not politically correct; to violate or transgress
Whine (v): to snivel or complain in a peevish, self-pitying way
(Dictionary.com, my additions)
In my coming out as genderqueer and bisexual, I have discovered many people who respect that and me, and many who don't, just as I expected. That is not what I came here to talk about. That is about the belief held by certain individuals on whether you can, in fact, not belong to just one gender - it is a problem of metaphysics, and if yours don't match up with mine, then it is going to be tough to have a discussion in the area where they don't match up and I am OK with that (I don't like it, because it means you don't really understand who I am, but if you don't want to change, that's your choice). That isn't the point of this blog. This blog is about something much simpler and easier to wrap your mind around. This is about simple acts within daily life that are rude with regard to race, sexuality, and all of the other things that fall under the umbrella of political correctness.
Before I start in on that subject (and I'll even give it a name for you), I want to talk about an experience I had with a man who did not give respect. I was in my improvisation class the other day, and our assignment was to do a blind walk. We would close our eyes, and our partner would lead us around campus and do their best to give us an experience for 15 minutes. My partner was Allison, and we showed each other beautiful smells, sounds, and feelings. The whole experience is based on trust that they will not let us run into a wall or trip on some stairs. She did beautifully - I was completely trusting, even though I had never met her and it went beautifully. But as we all know, a well timed asshole can ruin everything. As Allison tells it, "a guy was riding by on a bike, and he slowed down, I guessed so he wouldn't freak us out or run into us, and I thought 'oh, how considerate,' but as he got right next to us, he reached out and grabbed Fenix' face!" As I tell it "I was walking along, and this douchecanoe slapped me in the front of my face!"
I was there, walking along, with my eyes closed and this girl was leading me along, he didn't know why we were doing this. I could have had something wrong with my eyes and needed help for all he knew, and he just rides up and grabs my face. WHO DOES THAT?!?!?!?
My response: I threw up the bird
What my class wanted me to do: open my eyes, chase him down and stick a foot in his spokes.
Conclusion: dancers take their classes very seriously, and "bros" do not.
Alright, that was just an annoyance I wanted to discuss. But, back to the main point.
About a month ago, I discovered a website dedicated to publishing "microaggressions." For those of you who don't know this word, let me define it for you, according to my own definition. A microaggression is any thing said or done within a day that by itself is not really terrible, but when you hear or see lots of them throughout the day (as, for example, many transfolk do when they, say, get on a bus and everyone starts muttering "is that a guy or a girl"), they start to wear on you. I have experienced them, and so have a lot of you who do not conform to mainstream societal rules.
Here are some good ones:
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IN 3RD GRADE, when asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, I said President. My teacher said “You’ll never be President, you’re a girl.” At the time I didn’t realize how offensive her comment was, but now all I want to do is prove her wrong.
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You’ll be fine! Just talk like a white person.”
A white job-training counselor speaking to a young man of color about his upcoming job-interview.
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heeling down the road in my neat little sporty wheelchair, and a group of men sticking their heads out of the betting shop door to CLAP AT ME and cheer me on. Made me feel patronised and mildly unsafe.
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You must be new, they keep getting such cute nurses! I heard a medical student was coming in to discuss my medications with me, where is he?”
Said to me when (I, a female medical student) entered the exam room of this elderly man to discuss his diabetes.
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(for more, go to Microaggressions)
So yeah, those are microaggressions, and if anyone ever says anything like this around you, it is your duty as an informed person to educate them. It is important to note that most of these people are not sexist or racist people, but they were just speaking and in doing so reflected the unfortunate stereotypes that society has programmed into us. I don't want to say "it isn't their fault" because I hold everyone responsible for the words of their voice, but I am unwilling to pass judgement on a person for that.
However, there are some things listed on this site that just upset me, not because they are horribly offensive, but rather because they are not. For example, the one posted just this morning.
Stranger: Where are you from?
Friend (joking): Tanzania.
Stranger: Woah! Exotic!
Me: ... It's really, really offensive to call a person "exotic."
Stranger: Offensive? I didn't mean to be offensive! It's a compliment!
Friend (joking): Tanzania.
Stranger: Woah! Exotic!
Me: ... It's really, really offensive to call a person "exotic."
Stranger: Offensive? I didn't mean to be offensive! It's a compliment!
Exotic (adj): of foreign origin or character; not native; introduced from abroad
This falls under the category of someone looking for reasons to be offended. When I looked up the definition for exotic, I was actually surprised. If I had tried to define it on my own, I would have included some aspect of rarity. For example, there are a lot of eastern asian college students who are studying abroad, but I would not refer to them as exotic, because it is not an uncommon thing to meet someone from Hong Kong at all on my campus. However, if I were to meet someone, ask where they were from (say, if I couldn't place their accent, which I do to everyone whose accent I don't recognize), and they responded with Lithuania, I would consider that exotic. I've never met anyone from Lithuania (excuse me for a moment while I look up exactly where Lithuania is - alright - southeast side of the baltic sea) so that to me, would be exotic. Will someone explain to me how remarking on the rarity, and non-nativity of someone in Eugene, OR from Lithuania is offensive?
Whoever this person is was whining. They took offense at something that has no business being offensive. Now, the word exotic can be offensive if used in the following context.
Guy goes on a date with a girl, she is of mixed-race, and when he asks about it, she says she is thai-african, and he responds with "oh, wow! that's so exotic. I've always heard that exotic girls are really freaks in bed" that would be offensive on the sexism count as well as the racist count. So don't misunderstand me - it all depends on context, and you have to pay attention to the context of a conversation (no! you have to pay attention? say it ain't so!) before passing judgement.
As someone who take a lot of dirty looks and has faced my fair share of microaggressions, I understand the standpoint of assuming the world is out to get you, and that is where stuff like this comes from. You assume that when anyone remarks on what makes you different, they are being offensive. But most of the time, when someone looks at me funny, and I look at them back, the first words out of their mouth are not "what the hell are you doing?" but rather "that is a great skirt, where did you get it?"
People are not necessarily out to get you, and if you do not give them the benefit of the doubt, you are hurting us all, and more importantly, you are closing yourself off from the world. As someone who is unique in gender or race or ability or whathaveyou, you need to join with the world, become stronger with it and develop a support system. You need to tear down those walls.
On that note: stop whining about things so much. Again, don't misunderstand me, I want you to challenge people when they are being moronic about something. But use discretion, pick your battles. When you want to complain about something, think first if they were actually being offensive, or if you were just looking for them to be offensive so that you could take the moral high ground that as a member of alternative society you are so frequently denied. Believe me, I understand the trouble - you get put down so often, it is so beautiful when you can look a bully right in the face and tell them, completely justifiably "you are wrong." But this is not always the case - if you do that to someone who was not actually being mean to you in any way, you are becoming the bully. You are becoming the feminist that everyone hates talking to because anytime they mention anything to do with men, women, or a job, you bite their heads off. You are becoming the ethnic person who everyone avoids because you always find a way to relate everything to how whitey is putting you down, even if they were talking about something unrelated. You are becoming that queer kid who has no friends not because he is no fun to talk to, but because he bites your head off every time you forget the correct pronouns or the correct name. Don't be that guy or girl- if you want acceptance from society, you have to accept society. You want to educate them to understand you better, let them educate you and show you how their minds work too. You want respect from society, give it first. If you are worthy of respect, so is everyone else you meet. If you do not give respect to those around you, you do not deserve it and I have no sympathy for you.
And, in the meantime, STOP WHINING! IT IS INSUFFERABLE WHEN YOU WHINE AT EVERY TURN ABOUT THE INJUSTICES THIS WORLD HAS DEALT YOU. You spend all your time whining and never bring anything remotely positive to the table. You are doing nobody (including yourself) any good by carrying on like this.
Grow up, figure out what really annoys you, try to fix it or get our of your own and everyone else's way so we can go ahead and improve society without having to play cover up every time you call someone racist for remarking that they havn't ever met anyone from Tanzania.
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