My housemate is throwing a party tonight. A princess party.
I don’t mind, really I don’t. It’s just… not my thing.
The other day, I ran into some of my housemate’s friends. They were (and are) over-the-top girly in some ways that I’m not used to encountering on a daily and personal basis. We talked briefly and awkwardly about the party. And then one of them said, in a really high-pitched voice, “every girl is a princess!”
On the outside, I was respectful. I smiled.
On the inside, I winced.
I felt a grinding friction, a resistance within me. It’s the same kind of resistance I felt when my mother used to dress me as a child, or when I walked by my little stepsister’s room a year ago and saw that the color pink basically threw up all over the walls, bed, and decorations.
It was then that I realized how much I was dreading the princess party. I am NOT a princess. Never have been.
And, when faced with the promising atmosphere of the princess party, I actually feel not like a girl at all. I feel like a boy, EVEN THOUGH I’M NOT.
One of the telling characteristics of my childhood is that I was an oddball, even gender-wise. I didn’t fit in anywhere. I was quiet and shy (as my mother will tell you), yet wild and fearless (as my father will tell you). I was expressive but I wasn’t talkative. I was, in some ways, both the girl my mother had always seemed to want and the boy my Dad wished I had been instead. I defied gender stereotypes simply by existing.
I would tell you I was a solitary creature, but that would be lying. I had books, toys, pets, and the occasional fellow oddball to keep me company. A pack of dogs doesn’t care about Barbie Dolls or G.I. Joes, playing house of playing fort. A pack of dogs just cares about the pack. And so I ran with packs of dogs, with Cheshire cats and Lancelot hares and Legos and talking lions.
I just didn’t understand, way back then, how my gender issues helped exacerbate my awkwardness with my peers. And yet I packed some of those feelings, feelings that are still vague and murky and childlike in nature, into a beat-up little suitcase of memories. These became part of the memories of all the feelings I neatly folded and tucked away, forgotten for today and remembered for tomorrow.
I quietly carried this suitcase through childhood, puberty, high school graduation, and beyond. Now, I can open that suitcase, explore the surviving contents and better articulate what it is. And how I am…
Part of this is because I question pretty much everything, and one of the things I most often enjoy questioning is rhetoric, cultural relativism, and social constructs. Of course, part of this is also because I am just here. Simply, I exist. Also? I don’t like being hemmed in or chained down. PERIOD.
Unfortunately (of fortunately), my gender-queer-ness has left its mark on my personal biases. As in, I tend to harbor a general dislike of hyper-mono-gendered heteronormative individuals (and a few non-heteronormative ones). This is not really a feeling of universal hatred (so please don’t take it that way), but rather a trending lack of fondness or affinity.
It’s a feeling similar in nature to the way I feel about non-geeky people, especially the ones who don’t like to read for fun: I don’t HATE them, I DO still respect them (the non-geeks and hyper-mono-gendered alike) as human beings, and I respect their choices (as long as those choices aren’t forced on others, or harmful or threatening to others who have not given consent, that is). And yet I will probably never be intimate with them, lovers with them, or even close friends. Androgynous geekery is a HUGE turn-on, while the hyper-mono-gendered or the ignorant totally turn me off.
That’s not to say that someone has to be right smack in the middle of the socially-constructed gender binary. Who’s ever right smack in the middle of ANYTHING? No, a person can still be feminine or masculine without going over-the-top or pushing it (what is gender, anyway?), becoming just an object and losing a chunk of their individuality and humanity in the process…
A girl doesn’t HAVE to be ridiculously and stereotypically petty, weak, meek, and squeaky-voiced (because all that stuff’s pretty damn annoying and makes for bad company, to be honest). She can be confident and sensitive, dynamic and compassionate, powerful and thoughtful, all at once. She doesn’t necessarily need a man (prince) or a strong butchy lesbian (king) to take care of her (a princess ZOMG), or to give up her identity and individuality to (“ZOMG I’m MRS. Steve Johnson now! EEEeee!”). She CAN take the initiative in a romance, buy roses and get down on one knee to propose to the love of her life. She can have a healthy sexual appetite, and even practice the art of self-love… frequently. She can open doors for others, and strive to protect the weak or help the less fortunate. She can be stoic and strong and be a hands-on hard worker, if she wants to. And she doesn’t have to wear heels and make-up all of the time, either, especially when wearing heels and make-up is downright impractical.
OR OR OR she can have short hair and never wear skirts and hate the color pink. And play sports and fix cars and build things. AND be horribly cuddly (with the right person, that is). AND want to be wooed and romanced (by the right person, that is)! She can even be all of this AND date men, if she wanted to (o___O). That’s perfectly acceptable, too (if that’s what she wants).
Better yet: a person could take a little bit of this from the masculine social tool box, and a little bit of that from the feminine social tool box, and create for themselves a sort of synthesized and harmonized gender identity that suits them perfectly. Unique and individual, fitting them like a glove.
Idealistically, THAT is both what I aim for (and what comes to me naturally). After all, while sex is physically inherent, gender is just a form of expression, and I really do love expressing myself, don’t you? :)
Hyper-mono-gendered individuals come across, to me, as a results of overcompensation and/or brainwashing. Again, I still respect them as human beings, but I have trouble further respecting them as my fellows, comrades, or peers.
It’s a BIAS, I know, but who ISN’T biased? I’m human, and I’m allowed these things called biases WITHIN REASON.
As to the reason behind that friction or resistance I mentioned at the very beginning of this post? Strangely, I think it does have to do with the traditional, institutionalized and socially-conditioned division of the sexes (ahem, genders), and the affects such divisional social constructs happen to have on me.
There are certain aspects of the traditional female gender that the traditional male gender will respect but not want to remotely partake in, much less be in the same room with. A girl’s night out. Hanging with the girls. Likewise, there are certain aspects of the traditional male gender the traditional female gender does not want to be a part of. Hanging with the boys and so on…
A lot of this divisional social conditioning has crumbled, yes, but bits and pieces still remain, hemming us in or locking us out. I have to admit I am subject to this conditioning, from BOTH sides. I feel at odds with BOTH genders at times; as a result, I am isolated and/or I voluntarily isolate myself, because I. JUST. DON’T. FEEL. COMFORTABLE.
One of the prevailing characteristics of my closest friends (as well as my biggest crushes and best lovers, some of which were/are also some of my closest friends) is this: they all exhibit at least a small degree of androgyny, whether they realize it or not. And it is, frankly, one of the things I respect so much about them, as well as why I feel so much more relaxed and comfortable around them. Because not only do I exist, but I also belong.
This is what it means to be androgynous, intergendered, bi-gendered, gender-fluid, third gendered, agendered, two-spirited… or, simply, just gender queer.
As for the princess party? Hmm, maybe I WILL go home and, uh, GO. I can try. I will grin and bear it. Who knows? Maybe I’ll dress up as an edgy punk rock princess, or perhaps as:
a Xena that's not Xena
Or just respectfully disincline to show up as any princess but still join the princesses (*wince*) in an air of good cheer. (And with a shit-ton of hard cider and wine.)
We’ll see. =P
Hmm: genderfork.com
