Nerd is my Gender
What's yours?
-
Gender terrorists are not the drag queens, the butch dykes, the men on roller skates dressed as nuns. Gender terrorists are not the female to male transsexual who’s learning to look people in the eye while he walks down the street. Gender terrorists are not the leather daddies or back-seat Betties. Gender terrorists are not the married men, shivering in the dark as they slip on their wives’ panties. Gender terrorists are those who… bang their heads against a gender system which is real and natural; and who then use gender to terrorize the rest of us. These are the real terrorists: the Gender Defenders.Kate Bornstein, The Transgender Studies Reader (2006), page 236
-
Gender Interview by Kate Bornstein
-
» What’s your gender?
-
A:
Nerd! Woohoo!
-
» When did you decide that?
-
A:
Um... well I've kinda always been one, and I can't pinpoint a time I first started claiming it out loud.
-
» How much say do you have in your gender?
-
A:
I don't have any say in how I feel, but I do have plenty of say in what I do about it.
-
» Is there anything about your gender or gender role that you don’t like, or that gets in your way?
-
A:
The genderqueer role can get in the way of me being able to translate the way I interact with LGBTQ issues into English that everyone can process on the same level. Let's face it - our language didn't evolve to handle nonbinary issues, so it's far simpler for everyone to pretend like they don't exist.
-
» Are there one or two qualities about another gender that are appealing to you, enough so that you’d like to incorporate those qualities into your daily life?
-
A:
I'd love it if everyone were to suddenly take me very seriously the way they do whenever men they open their mouths.
-
» What would happen to your life if you did that?
-
A:
I'd actually have to be less aggressive, insistent, and (paradoxically) emotional in order to get the same amount of attention men get. I could relax and focus on perfecting the content of what I have to say. I could actually engage the public at large as an equal, thus opening up the door to multiple venues of cultural dialog.
-
» What would your gender be then?
-
A:
Oh, my gender wouldn't have changed one bit from what it is now...
-
» How do you think people would respond to you?
-
A:
... but my gender would have changed in the minds of others. See, the reason they treat me as "less than" now is because they do not see me as the default gender (which, incidentally, would free them to look past the gender and see the person I actually am).
-
» How would you feel if they did that?
-
A:
I would be concerned initially that now they simply see me wrongly as a man instead of wrongly as a woman. But then if people actually were treating me the way I described, I'd finally feel like I fit in to society as myself, and I'd have a increased sense of self-actualization.
-
» Have you ever been teased or baited by reason of acting outside your assigned gender role?
-
A:
Yes. Now that I'm genderqueer, I have people occasionally note that I'm relating to a male or female experience, then point it out to me rather loudly in front of everyone: "but I thought you said you aren't a woman!"
-
» Where do you think the sanctions for that teasing or baiting come from?
-
A:
Everywhere. We're constantly gendering things to the point of being unable to stop.
-
» Would you like to meet other people who feel the same way you do about gender?
-
A:
Would I like to meet people I can actually trust? Hell yes!
-
» Would you like to hear you’re not the only one?
-
A:
Finally someone I don't have to explain anything to for them to "get it"? Hell yes!
-
» Would you like to know you’ve got a history in this world?
-
A:
A story worth telling and a tradition worth celebrating? Hell yes!
-
» Do you think that might make you smile?
-
A:
Where do I sign up? :D
-
Questions by Kate Bornstein, taken from The Transgender Studies Reader, pages 240 and 243.
-
-
Kate Bornstein said "It Gets Better" years before it was cool.
Considering that Bornstein’s book actually says “It Gets Better” on the back cover as well as numerous times within the text and it came out a whole 4 years before Dan Savage started the “It Gets Better Project,” it’s a little weird to me that I’ve never heard Hello Cruel World mentioned in reference to the project’s history or mentioned by Dan Savage, even though Savage must have read her book— probably way before he ever had the idea for the “It Gets Better Project”.
Every time Bornstein uses the phrase “it gets better,” which is now cemented in our culture as the thing to say to suicidal queer kids, but lacked that legacy when Bornstein wrote her book, I wonder why Bornstein never got any of the credit for that. Not that it’s about credit—I’m sure Bornstein is actually pretty thrilled about getting the message out. The thing is, this is a great book and people should know about it, so it feels really unsettling that Dan Savage’s project–which was so successful that Google tried to take credit for it in one of their ads (totally successful advertising, btw, it makes me cry and feel loving feelings for Google, even though I hate Google!)–never mentions or gives credit to Bornstien or tries to promote Hello Cruel World. It’s not even mentioned on their website as a resource.
Why is that? Well, obviously I have a theory. I wonder if it’s another way that the LGB(t)q rights movement is trying to push out trans people and other weirdos or outlaws in it’s mission to gain widespread cultural acceptance.
Why am I not surprised? Oh yeah, because Dan Savage is a douchebag whose only redeeming quality is that he knows how to get attention focused on QUILTBAG issues.
-
MSNBC'S MELISSA HARRIS-PERRY HIGHLIGHTS TRANS, LGB INEQUALITIES
Kate Bornstein (swoon) is joined by Mara Keisling and Mel Wymore as they discuss desperately-needed rights and protections for the trans* community. My favorite part was when Kate pointed out how there is no legal option for genderqueer people. I, as who I really am, am a non-entity to the state and am therefore forced to vote and live my life under a false identity.
-
'Gender outlaw’ asks students to question binaries
Kate Bornstein preaches it like it is:
In a presentation about gender and sexuality laced with humor and profanity, Bornstein asked the audience to imagine a perfect person with “perfect everything” — the perfect gender, race, class, sexuality, etc. — at the top of a pyramid, and everyone else falls to the bottom, wanting to be as much like that person as we can, or at least be liked by that person.
“That’s how hierarchies retain their grip on us,” she said.
These binaries remove the need for our imaginations, triggering immediate ingrained reactions, she said. For example, when we see someone whom society has taught us is attractive, we immediately react with desire.OH YES SHE DID!
BAM!
-
Kate Bornstein is a Queer & Pleasant Danger by sam feder — Kickstarter
If you’re in a Kickstarting mood, throw Kate Bornstein a little love!
-
Morning Musings
Hopefully this is at all inspiring to someone out there. But it probably is the opposite of help for someone else, so do feel free to completely ignore anything I have to say.
There are all sorts of hypotheses to explain away trans existence. “What if genderqueer people are just compensating for hating all gender roles!” “What if trans men are reacting to internalized misogyny?” “What if trans women are fetishizing women’s bodies!” …SO? No really, who gives a flying fuck if this or any other reason explains trans existence? If we truly believe that all genders are equally valid and deserve equal rights, we don’t get to police why anyone would want to be a gender. It’s OKAY to want to be a woman for any reason at all. It’s OKAY to want to be genderqueer for any reason at all. It’s OKAY to want to be a man for any reason at all. Unless we think there’s something wrong with being a woman, or being genderqueer, or being a man, or being any flipping gender or none at all.
I’ve seen trans men turn around and be the biggest shitheads I’ve ever met, rolling in male privilege. And that still has nothing to do with that they’re legitimately a man, because it’s the Patriarchy that’s fucked up, not being a man that’s fucked up. I’ve seen trans lesbians be absolutely in love with their bodies and getting to experience female sexuality on themselves and with other people and do sex work flaunting their hot sexy selves. And that still has nothing to do with that they’re legitimately a woman, because it’s the Patriarchy that’s fucked up, not thriving within one’s womanly sexuality. And guess how few shits I give if some genderqueer or agender people think they’re special snowflakes that just want everyone to give them shiny star stickers for showing up.
Cuz you know what? After we smash the Kyriarchy, being gender-unique won’t be rare or outstanding at all. It will be part of the richness of humanity. And it already is - we already are legitimate people, and we already are getting a voice, and we already are seeing a world in which gender roles are being stretched ever wider every day. And if someone doesn’t get that? If someone ever thinks that we’re going away or can be explained away? We’ve already outgrown them.
The single greatest inspirational quote for me (and I hate inspirational quotes most of the time) is when Kate Bornstein said the secret to her living a genderfree life is that “you look for where gender is, and then you go someplace else.” And I didn’t realize the impact it had at the time, this being several years ago. At first I was like How, Mama Bornstein, how could I ever accomplish such a thing? And I can’t, not 100%, not perfectly.
But after a while, I realized that I’m not aiming for perfection - I don’t want perfection, because I don’t want to live a life without gender, I want to live a life with all the genders. I look forward to each and every moment when I get to live as woman, man, gender-confusing, androgynous, gender-fucking, nerdy, genderqueer me at any time and every time and no time. Obviously it still sucks when someone tells me I “have” to be any one of those things! But when I get to be? Phenomenal.
Because this is my life. I have 50 more years of this ahead of me (based on my grandparents’ longevity). I don’t have a choice - I have to make peace with myself and my approach to life, or I don’t get to live.
Genderqueer with a touch of happy humanism.
