I hope I would.
Someone wrote…
I sometimes wonder if, had I been born a girl, I would still fight my gender as fiercely as I do. For some reason I hope I would.
What’s your experience?
Posted by julian on December 13th, 2010 at 08:00 am
Category: your voice 22 comments »
December 13th, 2010 at 10:11 am |
I often daydream about, if I were born as the opposite sex, all the ways I would step across and around gender norms. Kinda makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside… :)
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December 13th, 2010 at 10:40 am |
What I always hated was being tarred with the gender brush. I am perfectly certain that I’d have complained just as loud regardless of which brush I was being tarred with:
* You’re a girl, so you must be…
* You’re a boy, so you must be…
* Real men don’t do that.
* A Lady would never do that.
* As a white man, you’re a privileged oppressor
* As a white woman, you’re a victim by choice
In the immortal words of Colonel Potter: “Horsehockey!”
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Samson replied:
December 16th, 2010 at 3:56 pm
I’m with Jessica. I’d had sort of the same thought, except “Would I be more comfortable if I’d been born in a male body?” I decided I probably wouldn’t be, because for everything that rubbed me the wrong way about being seen as a girl, and being expected to -be- a girl, as I grew up, there would’ve been other things that would’ve bothered me just as much growing up as a boy.
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December 13th, 2010 at 4:41 pm |
Same here. <3
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December 13th, 2010 at 7:58 pm |
My ex girlfriend once told me that she thought I would be about as comfortable (and as rebellious) if I were born a boy as I am now (as someone who was born female and tries to transgress that when s/he can). It was one of the sweetest and most insightful things anyone’s ever said to me, and extra special coming from her: she’s MTF and very female-identified, sometimes to the point of defensiveness.
I do hope that she was right about me. :-)
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Jessica replied:
December 13th, 2010 at 8:51 pm
I sometimes wonder if some people I meet who are aggressively transsexual – ie people who were born sex A and want no part of A, but want to be wholly and exclusively B – are like someone who grew up in and has a bad experiences in Chicago. They move overnight to Denver and think that everything wrong in their old life was Chicago’s fault. Some transsexuals seem to me to be forced in their happiness with their outcome… Not all, not most, just some.
Do you know what I mean? Maybe I’m just projecting my genderqueerness on them. We all think our brand is the best choice. In my heart there’s no better gender to be.
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Sam replied:
December 28th, 2010 at 7:42 pm
I think a lot of times people just need to push away their birth gender so that they can become comfortable enough to accept some of the traits they still retain from that gender. I know it took coming to terms with the fact that I feel most comfortable as a girl to accept that I am incredibly butch. Did that make any sense?
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December 13th, 2010 at 10:58 pm |
I wonder if, had I been born and raised as a boy, I would fight my gender just as fiercely. I’m glad I am who I am.
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December 14th, 2010 at 6:27 pm |
Smile.
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December 28th, 2010 at 10:13 pm |
if I were born a boy, I’d still think I looked good in eyeliner
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Jessica replied:
December 29th, 2010 at 12:41 am
Eyeliner, done properly is an improvement for most people. Trouble is, so few people do it properly.
As my mother used to say: makeup is a suggestion, not a statement, a hint, not an answer. It should never be used despite one’s features but to enhance what one already has.
A terrifically passe viewpoint, I know… but then I learned makeup in the “natural look” late 1960’s.
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Elle replied:
December 29th, 2010 at 1:16 am
Jessica, you rule!
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tigr replied:
December 29th, 2010 at 1:42 am
So how do you do eyeliner properly?:)
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Jessica replied:
December 29th, 2010 at 8:29 am
So as to not look like a silent film star.
Elle replied:
December 29th, 2010 at 10:27 am
Or a raccoon.
December 29th, 2010 at 1:26 pm |
yes yes less is more, yes yes, you’re not painting a house, yes yes, ladies pinch who’ores use rouge, yes yes too much concealer you look like wednesday addams, yes yes too much lipstick you’ll look like the joker, yes yes…you can’t make beautiful what isn’t there yes yes… These helpful tips from older women are what made me so glad I had no interest to begin with, I felt like ralphie being told you’ll shoot your eye out kid.
I just think had I been a cisboy, things would’ve been fine because I wouldn’tve wasted time trying to keep up appearances and force myself to try to like boys, as a cisboy I’d probably have an odd fascination with the angular beauty of johnny depp and just assume I’m jealous of him being a pirate, and probably have tried eyeliner long before that franchise of movies came out. I would think I was femme in the way bowie is femme, it would be a punk thing more than a gender thing. Punk cabaret is freedom. I would hope that I would still go into petstores and make squeaking sounds and say to whoever I’m with “y’know, one day I’m going to own a -species/breed- just like that one and name it -literary reference or type of candy-” and that I would like foreplay. That had been one of my greatest fears and concerns of my exgf and I, that had I been a proper boy [a cis or transguy instead of just stone butch] would I care about anothers needs and pleasures nearly as much if I cared about my own instead, if I acknowledged my need to be touched, would I want to touch someone else, and decided that is what seperated me from some men. If I had a dick I’d be arrested in 5 minutes, I’d go pee on things, or try to have sex with things, or decide I didn’t like pants. Its why I am a gate keeper and not a key holder. Responsibility of the gods. Like giving fire to Prometheus, sometimes it’s just easier to be powerless.
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Jessica replied:
December 29th, 2010 at 2:54 pm
Peeing on things is over-rated. It’s always what we haven’t got that we yearn for without having. One needn’t be Prometheus to be damned. Eyeliner I can live with, it’s mascara that I can’t stand. Nasty gooey stuff – still better than false eyelashes – they’re downright scary things: like being attacked by spiders. I could never get the hand of those weird pliers you put them on with. But then I’ve got two thumbs and always have had. And you have never lived until you had stockings with a seam going up the back you had to keep straight. Special ladies’ torture department, third floor. Mind you way then.
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December 29th, 2010 at 2:49 pm |
http://theinspirationroom.com/daily/commercials/2007/5/ellen-degeneres-raccoon.jpg ha.
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December 29th, 2010 at 9:25 pm |
I think I would because I could, the novelty would eventually wear off, but I love camping, but hate having to slow down production while hiking to find a nice clearing, or roadtrips with my dad and saying, can’t go behind the car find me a restaurant or a gas station, always made me feel like not one of the boys. Waiting outside in Toronto for a concert once, these girls from New York got drunk on Canadian beer and peed in a snowbank while we were standing having our I.D. checked and what not. Girls can do it too it’s just maybe more obvious.
I don’t think I’ve ever wore mascara, I kinda flipped my lashes up by hand before probably unsafe but just kinda tilting them with my the flat side of my finger, I would kamikaze my tights I wouldn’t care about the blood and gravel, if I could throw myself into the driveway before we got to the car, I could go bare legged. I would usually get pulled back inside and be told, we were supposed to be there but you need a bandaid and there’s no time to stop on an easter sunday looking for a pair of little girl tights for you to rip them in the car on purpose or throw yourself into the mud, one day, one day is all I ask… [she doesn’t ask anymore] Never would’ve kept the seam straight, could hardly keep a run out of them if I wore them on purpose. I’ve wore a skirt to be extra genderqueer, with a pair of chucks, and tattoos, but it was as a bit of a favour for a transboy, I was trying to make him at 5’4 look incredibly more masculine than my 5’11..6’2 in docs
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January 15th, 2011 at 11:54 am |
When I was a kid, I hated the color pink because I associated it with femininity. If I had been born a boy, I’m certain I would have hated blue just as much.
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Jessica replied:
January 15th, 2011 at 1:35 pm
From QI: Traditionally, in Europe until around 1920, pink was a color that was associated with boys, especially baby boys, while pale blue (which is a color associated strongly with the Virgin Mary) was the color for girls, especially girl babies. Pink was thought a strong color, very akin to red and so more masculine, while blue was more becoming to the face and more flattering to the feminine. Nobody knows why all of a sudden in the early 20th century these colors switched their gender allegiance.
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James replied:
January 15th, 2011 at 8:06 pm
I think it something to do with that princess who decorated her baby’s room pink than had a girl.
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