But by mentioning it in that context – i.e., the context of someone that 17-year old trans boy – your comment could reasonably have been read (as I did) as suggesting that greater acceptance of gender fluidity might make such a transition less necessary, rather than as suggesting that it might make his life easier after transition. You seem to have meant the latter, but I don’t think it was entirely clear.
It seems to me that by using all caps, etc., you’re demonstrating some sensitivity yourself!
Musicprnt, I’d amend your comment only to say that it’s really only within the last 10 years or so that you’ve seen noticeable numbers of trans kids (adolescent or pre-adolescent) living as such with the support of their parents and the medical community. There have been trans teenagers transitioning for decades (at least as far back as the 1960s) on their own, without parental support, living on the streets (many because they were kicked out by their parents), buying black market hormones, etc. Sylvia Rivera, for example, was on the street by the time she was 10.
I confess, and I’m sure I’ll get flamed, that aesthetically, being “gender fluid” seems the least attractive of both worlds - you’re neither a good looking man nor a good looking woman. It’s just kind of butch and ugly IMO. But, having said that, it’s no concern or business of mine how other people wish to present themselves aesthetically, and they certainly needn’t worry about pleasing me. Their lives, their business. But I do confess to not fully understanding why one wouldn’t want to be more attractive about it, in either direction.
Although we spent a lot of this thread fussing around social expectations of “attractive,” it is, well, fluid. My D’s friend loves her punky haircut that makes her look like a cross between a marine recruit and a rocker boy. Is it her best look? Nope. But it’s her look. Really, really nice gal, btw. (Ironic reminder of the Nike shorts thread, eh?)
I see some of this like asking a gay person why they want people to know they’re gay, why they can’t just love whom they love and that’s that? There’s a point at which we have to accept their self-knowledge and their decisions and just appreciate the good.
Pizzagirl – that’s a fairly idiosyncratic view; from the earliest days of the 20th Century there’s been a strong current of androgyny in feminine standards of beauty, and many, many highly stylized masculine-looking women have been considered great beauties. I know some extremely attractive “butch” women. I don’t think most people these days would equate androgyny with “ugly.”
@donnal:
You of course are correct, as you note I was talking in the context of kids getting formal treatment and transitioning with their families support. It isn’t that there weren’t young trans people, it was that back then they had two choices, they could either try and hump it out as their assigned birth gender and have their family, or run away to be themselves, and generally not to an easy life, to say the least. I would love to tell some of those who argue about young kids transitioning, say they shouldn’t be allowed to, the stories of those who ran away from home (or sadly, were kicked out by their own family) to find themselves, the kind of lives they lived to try and be themselves and hopefully it would tell them just how much this can affect young people,how strong the feelings are.
I find that an unlikely concern. The vast majority of “cis folks” are probably pretty comfortable with–and definitely accustomed to–“traditional” defined sex/gender/sexuality. Including, judging by my acquaintance, most of the gay and lesbian population. After all, things are pretty much set up for the benefit of cis people and those with clearly defined gender/sexuality.
Insofar as people ask trans individuals why they couldn’t just be happy as a genderfluid person, sure, I can see how that would rankle. But I don’t think that anyone who devoted more than ten seconds to thinking about what a person undertakes in transitioning would realize that one must be REALLY serious about it to do so, and have a really strong need that would not be satisfied in any other way.
Speaking personally, I don’t advocate it in order to make myself more comfortable as a “cis” woman. (I really don’t like that terminology, I admit. I resent having a label I don’t need applied by external forces.) I am perfectly comfortable with trans persons.
I’ll plead guilty to being unclear. But I definitely meant the latter. I–obviously mistakenly–thought that at this point I had made my POV clear. A lesson in ego. B-)
I’ll also plead guilty to being sensitive to being thought a bigot and/or a person who cannot deal with the great variety of humanity. (Sure, like almost everyone else, I’ve had a learning curve. But in my case it started at about the age of 12–I read a lot B-) --and my basic nature is to be accepting of and interested in people.
I have to disagree with you, @Pizzagirl, on aesthetics of androgyny. Consider David Bowie. :x :x Consider Grace Jones.
I find it interesting that Ruby Rose is considered an androgynous actress in some quarters. To me, she seems very, very female. Sure, she has tats and short hair, but really?
I guess to me David Bowie still presents as male and Grace Jones as female. (BTW, I saw the David Bowie exhibit last year at the Museum of Contemporary Art here in Chicago - was great!!) I was thinking about a different kind of look. I found some pinterest representations of what I’m thinking, but I can’t figure out a way to link it without linking to my personal account. But it is highly idiosyncratic – and no one need really concern themselves with my personal aesthetic preference, know what I mean? It’s a free country, dress and present how you like. I don’t need to “get it.”
Not to make cis women and men comfortable with themselves, not those who are already satisfied with their own “traditional” expressions, for heaven’s sake. Rather that some cis folks might be advocating gender fluidity because they are uncomfortable with the person who wants and needs to change gender. I know my comment is loaded. But a lot of this thread is about recognizing and respecting that another may truly feel, in short, mis-assigned. Do we really want to say (eg, to a woman,) just dress like a man, tell people you are a man, do man things, it’ll be fine? Fine for whom?
As for Grace Jones, she was always striking and an artiste.
@Consolation, I understand your thoughts on the matter and I agree with you.
Upon some definition hunting, I learned my idea of gender fluidity is not what the term “gender fluidity” means. While gender fluidity is “a wider, more flexible range of gender expression, with interests and behaviors that may even change form day to day”, I view gender fluidity as the idea that gender identity, expressions, and behaviors vary individual to individual. A woman may identify as so while liking men and posses/express more masculine behaviors while a transgendered woman may like women and posses/express more feminine traits. That’s gender fluidity to me - it’s more of a spectrum across a group of people rather than focusing on one individual’s variances day to day. Although, I will add that transgendered people don’t really seem to “fit” on the spectrum or at least the suggestion of a man born in a female body simply behaving like a woman, but to explain any further gets pretty rough in wording and does not translate well over message board. I’ve tried typing it out several times now! At the end of the day, identify, express, and have however you feel is fit – that’s the key in my idea of gender fluidity.
Perhaps the previous posts were in reference to the definition and not what I thought. Perhaps, I’m just off believing sometime else that’s different from others, but that’s what I believe. Posters are free to believe what they want from it.
Re: Androgyny
There’s something about an androgynous man – log hair, strong eyebrows, feminine features. Beautiful. Count me as one who believe androgynous people definitely do not have to worst of both worlds! My standards of beauty are dynamic and I’m able to see the aesthetic appeal in things while I may not do them myself.
Sigh. I don’t really mean the kinds of examples you all are tossing out. I mean the lumberjack butch kind of look which I find neither attractive male nor attractive female. But whatever. It’s of no importance to anyone else what I personally find attractive. Seriously.
Besides, we have kind of swerved out of gender and into sexuality. What gender a person feels like and identifies with on the inside is independent of how they express that externally and their sexuality / sexual orientation.
But I definitely meant the latter. I–obviously mistakenly–thought that at this point I had made my POV clear. A lesson in ego. B-)
