Transgender and Crossdressing

Disclaimer: I'm not a crossdresser, crossdreamer, nor a drag ace†. Clue by four.

"I would never want to be a woman. That would spoil all the fun of dressing like one." - Carly*

I don't know if anyone noticed, but I put up the definitions of the words I use (and feel free to mention if I need to add any more or you have problems with the ones I put up). I wanted to elaborate a bit more on why I define transgender as I do. Which is:

An adjective describing a person whose gender (part or all of it) does not match the sex they were assigned at birth. Transgender makes no assumptions about the person’s genitalia, sex, gender role, presentation in daily life, or anything else- only the disconnect between what the doctors assumed the person would be and what the person actually is.

Now, I know that's not how everyone uses it- particularly as an umbrella term. One thing that there tends to be some disagreement on is whether or not people who don't uphold gender norms (crossdressers, drag royalty†, etc) are included in this. And here's my take on it.

Sexuality, Sexism and Why I Care

As I'm extremely loud about- I am asexual. I don't experience sexual attraction and, beyond that- I don't want sex, I don't have sex, I don't particularly want to hear if anyone else has sex but I accept that they do. So it might be a bit strange that I support the pro-sex movement, seeing as, by all rights, you'd think I'd be happy if everyone were ashamed of their sexuality and never talked about it, right? Wrong.

Write-ins included "Ze/zem/zeir/zemself" and the nebulous "Baked goods pronouns!"

It is hot. Really, really hot. And I've been doing more exercise than I have in years. It's not hard to believe that I've been sweating a lot (and drinking a ton of fluids). I've also been hanging out in my room shirtless. I even went to the bathroom (co-ed) shirtless, but no one really saw that so whatever. I want to go outside like this as well, but the scars make me self-conscious. The nipples probably look a bit weird, but from afar I doubt that's as big a deal as the giant red slashes across my chest. But it's really nice to do this anyways.

I still have to moisturize the scars. A lot. Like, 3/4 times a day. I don't know if the heat is exacerbating it or what, but I do. So, yeah, top surgery tip: stock up on moisturizer.

I also got weighed for the first time since surgery. 122 lbs. Prior to surgery my weight has been consistently between 126-132 lbs for about 5 years. So there you have it, a good 4-10 lbs. [insert pun about "weight off your chest"]

Gender and the Binary

During the talk I had with Milla the other day, I started thinking about what gender would be like without the binary. And before I go on- let me make something clear. When I say "without the binary" I do NOT mean "without wermen and women", I mean "without the idea that everyone must be either a werman or a woman. Not both, not neither. One. Or. The. Other." (as well as the cissexist binary which says "and what you are is based on your genitalia" and "breaking gender roles makes it okay to mistreat you").

AVEN

AVEN, the Asexuality Visibility and Education Network, is a good resource. The wiki is wonderful and everything else is a pretty cool 101 resource. But the forum? Not so great. It made me uncomfortable for awhile, but I could never quite put my finger on what. Thankfully, Kaz did it for me. (emphasis added)

Because most minority groups, they have their spaces where everyone is going to be on their best behaviour and try to do educating of the clueless and then they have their spaces that are minority-and-clued-up-ally-only where people can let off steam and clueless privileged people who wander in can expect to get blasted. AVEN is trying to be *both* the great centre for education and visibility (in the name!) and the centre of the asexual community, and when you think about what that means it’s clear it can so very easily lead to shutting down of opinions that aren’t nice clean friendly we-all-love-sexuals-really and forcing all asexuals to be nice and polite.

AVEN is a Public Relations site designed to educate and spread visibility of asexuals to sexuals. It is not a support forum designed to create a safe space for asexuals to talk about their problems and experiences without fear of being silenced. Unfortunately, to the detriment of the entire community, it tries to be.

Then Why Does Misgendering Matter?

Also known as: "It must be so nice to be comfortable in either social role (even though you say you aren't)" and "I don't care about non-binaries enough to find out what things are like for you, so I'm going to make snippy digs about how I have it worse and therefore don't have to care about non-binaries".

This conversation happened on facebook in a conversation about passing: Person1: "I don't really identify as female. I identify with both sexes. It's kinda hard to explain." Person2: "okay, then why would passing as male as opposed to female be an issue?"