WEEK 2 THREAD IS UP!!

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Let me know if I missed anyone there.

Reading this part left me a bit conflicted. While Les demonstrates really well why solidarity is so important, especially within the LBGT community and the feminist movement, and how nonsensical cisnormativity is, I think there’s too much emphasis on people’s AGAB.

Both sie and Linda correctly state that one’s body doesn’t dictate your gender (“True gender lies not in the appearance of the body but the workings of the mind.” is an amazing statement from someone who was born in the 30s), but their choice of words gave me the impression that they at least somewhat viewed their AGAB to be an essential, unchangeable part of them.

I wonder if Linda would’ve been happier if she could’ve said that she’s just as much of a “real” woman as her wife, instead of constantly having to come up with terms and phrases to talk around that fact. I mean “two things I loved to do growing up, working on cars and dressing as a girl. Go figure.” and “I wanted to not only love them and be with them, I wanted to be them.” are peak transbian shit. She was really ahead of the meme game here.

And also:

The “nature versus nurture” debate has meaning for each of us here because we are constantly being asked in life: Why are you the way you are? When did you first know you were different? Do you think that while you were in the womb your tiny fist inadvertently clenched an essential gene too hard? Or was your mother domineering?

And my answer is: Who cares! As long as my right to explore the full measure of my own potential is being trampled by discriminatory laws, as long as I am being socially and economically marginalized, as long as I am being scapegoated for the crimes committed by this economic system, my right to exist needs no explanation or justification of any kind.

And that is because cross-dressing has always been socially synonymous with gayness. I think this misconception is based on the fact that uni-gender lesbian and gay cross-dressers were socially visible and organized at a time when most bi-gender, heterosexual cross-dressers were isolated or members of “underground” organizations.

I don’t know if I agree with this, I think it’s more a result of the cishet (comphet?) worldview’s inability to understand that sexuality and gender are separate things, and to instead to view gender in an essentialist way w.r.t sexual activity (you want to be a woman, so that must mean you have an urge to be the woman or “receiver” in sexual relations). You even see it later in Linda’s story, where a doctor assumed she was gay for crossdressing, well before the gay rights movement in the 60s.

I liked reading the stories of Linda and Cynthia. There were parts I identified with but others I don’t, namely the part about being able to easily socialize with girls lol; I think it’s because I’m one of the ones that Linda described as carrying a constant sense of guilt, which influenced the way I interacted with other girls. I was always more interested in what my girl cousins were doing than the boy cousins, but I felt like I would be unwelcome or intruding among the girls, so instead I would hang out with the boys. Which is unfortunate, because I feel like they could have given me some great tips about dressing goth/alt in a feminine way, but instead I learned a bunch of shit about Bush era pro wrestling, a subject I don’t give a shit about at all . I guess I’d at least say playing basketball with them was pretty fun even though I suck, and to this day I prefer FPS games to Harvest Moon and such.

Feinberg earlier made a point that it shouldn’t matter whether a trans person was made that way as a result of nature or nurture, but I think there’s something to be said about whether the sense of guilt some of us internalize comes from nature or nurture. In my case I truly don’t know, I’ve had it for as long as I can remember, and am barely starting to unlearn it.

Great chapter! Les has such an amazing literary style that sears the heart with revolutionary fervor and solidarity. What I found especially important and profound is hir insistance on different marginalized groups fighting for each other’s rights, strengthening them all.

A bit personally, introspection on gender over time has had me reconcile that I see myself as a “less masculine male.” That doesn’t mean I see myself as “more feminine,” but as someone cis, I still feel trapped by the rigid contours of pink and blue. I’m happy with who I am, I would not be myself if I pushed myself to be more masculine, breaking down the barriers of pink and blue allows me to be, well, me.

Linda and Cynthia were great examples of why reading other perspectives is so wonderful. I agree with others who have pointed out the essentialist nature of how gender is viewed by them, which is an unfortunate and sad product of their time, but I find it wonderful to see how they both managed to carve out their own happiness and organize safe spaces for others. I find it especially encouraging to see gender further explored and understood as time goes on.

Great chapter!

I read up to here last week, I’ve read this section before so it didn’t make as much of an impact on me, but one thing I remember is where Les talks about how genderqueer people expand the amount of people you can be. Like it’s so obvious to say “there are gender norms that you can live outside of, you can be who you want”.

I don’t know if I have a point, I’m very tired just after work rn so maybe I’ll have something more indepth to say in the morning.

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