Doc ImpossibleHoly shit. I just talked a cis guy on the internet down from "Let kids be kids" and got him to see why gender-affirming care for teens absolutely cannot wait.
This is one of my greatest achievements. I have a legitimate urge to take a victory lap.
Marcos Dione@Impossible_PhD I'm a cis man so feel free to ignore this question. OTOH, I'm asking this question from the point of view of a parent that might need to face this in the future if their kids start feeling that way.
Would be an endgoal a society were we're not longer man and woman, but just people? Would also help if people would not care how other people dress?
Context: I'm trying to raise my kids so they don't think in terms of 'this is an activity for men, this other one for women'.
Jaddy@mdione @Impossible_PhD „No men and women“ no. „Less pressure from others“ yes. More self-determination. More options. Maybe think of it as „gender-styles“. It’s okay to stick to „traditional“ roles if that makes them happy - unless they press other to comply.
My main problem as a nonbinary person is, that others categorize me by sight and insist on their (binary) judgement, which is especially bad in german because of our totally binary gendered language.
Second problem, somewhat related: Too many places have two and only doors - real and metaphorical -, where a broader entrance made for all would be better for everyone.
So, let people find their gender (style). Find your own and enjoy the diversity. Don’t assume their gender (be neutral until they tell you) and don’t let them press you into their roles. Don’t build unnecessary categories and make rooms open, safe and suitable for all.
That would be my perfect (gender) world.
> "No men and women" no.
> Maybe think of it as „gender-styles“.
I would just leave it as "styles". I think that all the current clasifications (LGBTQ+ and, yes, C[is]) are still clasifications that not necesarily reflect every body.
I have a she friend. She had a boy friend. Then she dated some women and men, so she was bi. Then two guys, so bigamous. Now back to one guy, and now a kid. What is she? What was she?
@jaddy @Impossible_PhD Damn character limit.
To me, just a person, my friend.
I understand that this sounds like "all lives matter", but again, I'm talking about the utopia I want.
@mdione @jaddy no, it doesn't.
It sounds like a white person saying "I don't see color."
These facets of ourselves are central to who we are and our experience in the world. Many, probably the significant majority of us, find a LOT of joy and vibrancy in our identities. I *like* being a lesbian, beyond just liking women, and neither you nor anyone else gets to take that away from me.
Especially as a member of the dominant group, it's not okay for someone--you--to try to collapse those things.
👆 this!
@mdione : The point is, it's not about you, it's about them. If you reduce your friend to "just a person", you probably ignore the facets that define (to them) who they are as an individual.
What I meant above is the opposite of that ignorance. It's positive acknowledgement and respect for diversity and individuality.
So, if you want to know "what" your friend "is", ask which facets are important to them and respect them.
@Impossible_PhD @jaddy that's exactly what I'm trying to understand. I hope nothing I say here is taken as an attempt to negate what you want to do with yourself, maybe it's because I've been 'formatted' in a culture that does not have other words for this.
On one side it looks like you want to have a label for yourself. Ok, yes, naming things make them exist... maybe I should go and read... philosophy? epistemology?
I'm not sure anymore. It would be an interesting chat over some beverage.
@Impossible_PhD @jaddy Two things to note, if it makes any difference: I'm not from US, and I don't live there. Black people to me are just people with a culture at first sight quite different to mine.
Again, I understand currently some positions have to be taken strongly just to defend a space for them to exist. I just wish you didn't had to.
Ah! Now I think I get your point. You'd like to free all beings from the (internal/external) burden/pressure to find/have/build an identity (and labels) by making the differences disappear, right?
But wouldn't that make us like drones? Not being seen as individuals, interchangeable.
I guess it would deny most basic questions all humans ask: Who am I, what's the purpose of my life, what am I good for? And ultimately: Why should I live?
But that's just academic. A society without noticable differences is simply not possible. See Intersectionality. We are not interchangeable, because in certain aspects, we need different things than others.
Trivial example: "Everyone likes and eats pineapple" - "Ah sorry, I'm allergic to that. Please don't give me anything with pineapple". So, in a way, allergies kind of define this person.
In a society where pineapple stuff is thought to be common, they must take care of themself, inform others of their special needs, rely on their acknowledgement and respect or they will suffer, get ill or die.
Meaning: There'll always be a norm, a mainstream, a kind of common majority, therefore there'll alwys be some who don't fit, can't fit, suffer, get ill or die from it.
Every difference to the (non existent) "norm" comes with some burden, because of the difference. (you scrape along the norm simple by being yourself)
I agree that we should lessen that burden, but denying or being blind to it won't help. It would only make being different harder.
So, the best way to make life easier is to embrace diversity, rsp celebrate infinite diversity in infinite combinations 🖖
HTH
> You'd like to free all beings from the (internal/external) burden/pressure to find/have/build an identity (and labels) by making the differences disappear, right?
Au contraire, you can have any identity you want. I think what I would like is no judgment. I have a conflict with labels and I think that is the cause of all this thread, which I find awesome.
1/2
Nobody is interchangeable, none of my friends are. If they change, I change with them. I was just remembering I do have a trans friend¹. We never met in person after they transitioned.... "they". I used that because I don't know their preference.
I also have an internal conflict with names/deadnames. I live in a country where people can't properly pronounce my name, much less my daughter's. [oh, crap, again]
¹ Yes, I know, "I have black friends".
She thinks she has a Spanish name and a French name.
At the same time, that first friend I mentioned, she changed her name. She had an unusual name and created a conflict. She has a new name (and an Italian name, and a French one), but I still call her by a nickname based on her old name. And I still have the reflex of calling my trans friend by their deadname... I said I change with them, but change is hard :(
So it seems we are not very far apart in what we want.
I agree, that change can be hard: Ask people who transition(1).
And I acknowledge, that it may be sometimes annoying to remember the name changes, pronouns etc. Most of us are not (yet) used to this, therefore it's irritating, makes things more complicating. Also for "us".
I understand that e.g. cis people would sometimes like to cry out "don't make such a fuss about it" - as long as it's not meant for real.
There're many times when I want to shout the same, with the reverse meaning.
Because in the end, cis and trans suffer from the same purely cultural system aka social construct called hetero-cis-binary normativity we were trained and which exists all around us.
You sound like a person with good will and a true ally and you have your own experiences with "being the problem" for others.
Maybe a different mindset could help lessen your burden. Instead of focusing on labels and why they are so important for some people, target the system that forces us to emphasize labels and names and pronouns. It's our common enemy.
(1) I started at 52, because nonbinary wasn't an available or "thinkable" label before. And like @Impossible_PhD wrote: "We cannot live a life we cannot imagine, and we cannot imagine a life we cannot describe." No words: no image: no life.
@jaddy @Impossible_PhD not sure irritating. SOmetimes it's awkward when I talk about them with a 3rd party that might know them from before, but might not know of the change.
You also previously mentioned people from the fringes of normal. I have two celiac friends. Once I invited one of them to a barbeque. It took me 5 knifes to remember not to cut meat with the same knife I cut bread. After that we only bought celiac bread for such occasions.
Finally, I think I can get even closer. I have recently separated/divorced. Right now I'm "alergic" to my ex, so the less I see her the better. Maybe it's similar to what you feel about your pre-transition self. Maybe once we'll get over it and be at peace.
@mdione @jaddy in general, any attempt to collapse complexity of identity is just a veiled attempt to force minorities to conform to the dominant way of being, sometimes with small accommodations but often not even that.
Identities like trans or lesbian--these words with distinctions--are how we come to understand *our own experiences*. I didn't realize I was trans until I was 35 *because I thought people like me couldn't be trans*. It was only through expanding and exploring that identity--
@mdione @jaddy
--that I could recognize and embrace one of the most important parts of who I am.
So, yeah, when a cis, het guy talks about making that all go away? What I hear is a world where I would've been trapped in manhood forever, with no way out, because there weren't words for me to describe who I am. And saying "oh, we can just do/be whatever" is an absolute fairy tale in a world where prescribed gender is *everywhere*.
And even if it weren't, that's not a resonant experience for me.
> saying "oh, we can just do/be whatever" is an absolute fairy tale in a world where prescribed gender is *everywhere*.
Right, this is the crux of the thing with me. I try to live in the world I want, and I almost lost job opportunities because of that¹. Maybe I should try to hand down a watered down version of that.
¹ Just wearing sweatpants to an interview because they're warm and comfy in cold weather.
@Impossible_PhD @jaddy so an ideal world would be the freedom to try new experiences, and adopt (or not) things from them, without being judged?
It's interesting because I used to label myself as a geek and hacker, but now I feel like I outgrew those labels. True, cis mostly white but poor male¹, I had many advantages that you probably didn't.
¹ Part of the reason I want to outgrow labels comes from my origins. I was born in South America, but I have mostly European 1/2
... European blood, apparently with a touch of Black blood. I came to Europe as an immigrant and had to share our/their precarity until I obtained my Italian citizenship (via those European ancestors). Now I'm administratively treated differently and I kinda hate it, I'm the same person.
Also, while filling up form for US/UK border, what am I? Latino? White? I can't say Black, but c'mon!
@mdione @jaddy yes, and growing out of labels is a normal thing--as is growing into them.
Labels and identities, self-made, are ways of describing ways of being. To destroy the way of describing how you are a thing is to destroy your ability to be it at all. We cannot live a life we cannot imagine, and we cannot imagine a life we cannot describe.