Self Defined
Jan. 23rd, 2023 02:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ahunter3Folks seem to think I need their acceptance, that I need them to think of me a certain way in order for my identity to be valid.
That's not really true.
Let me clear some things up for you.
I don't need you to think of me as one of the girls. I'm alerting you to the fact that I've spent a lifetime thinking of myself as one of the girls. Knowing that should make it easier for you to anticipate or understand my behaviors, which is something people have often complained about, that I'm weird and incomprehensible. If this FYI about myself makes it easier to understand me, good.
I don't need you to accept me as queer, as a genuine member of the LGBTQIA+ rainbow. The term "genderqueer" lets me explain my situation using a word you may have encountered before. So I use that terminology. If that makes it easier for you to understand me, good.
I don't wish to pass. The annoying default way of reacting to people like me is to assume we want to be viewed and accepted as ordinary boyish boys, or manly men, but we aren't pulling it off successfully and hence must be feeling like a failure at it. I'm not, and I never was. I don't need or want your acceptance of me as boy or man. But I also don't need you to embrace the notion that I'm different from them, that I'm actually more like the girls and women.
I don't seek to pass as a boy or man. I don't need to pass as a woman or girl. I don't need to pass as cisgender or genderqueer or transgender, as hetero or gay or lesbian or anything else you ever heard of.
I started speaking up because other people kept making an issue of it. Bringing it to my attention. Some being nasty and hostile about me not being right for a guy, and others being embarrassed on my behalf and trying to be supportive about me being ok and trying to reassure me that I was valid as a guy anyway. It got on my nerves and I felt like it was time I said out loud that I like how I am and I'm not trying to hide or slip under the social radar.
So now occasionally I get people telling me "just accept yourself". Or tsking about my need to get everybody's buy-in on my special snowflake identity.
But I wasn't putting it up for a vote.
—————
My first book, GenderQueer: A Story From a Different Closet, is published by Sunstone Press. It is available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble in paperback, hardback, and ebook, and as ebook only from Apple, Kobo, and directly from Sunstone Press themselves.
My second book, That Guy in Our Women's Studies Class, has also now been published by Sunstone Press. It's a sequel to GenderQueer. It is available on Amazon and on Barnes & Noble in paperback and ebook, and as ebook only from Apple, Kobo, and directly from Sunstone Press themselves. Hardback versions to follow, stay tuned for details.
My third book is about go to into second draft, and I'm seeking more beta readers for feedback. It is provisionally titled Within the Box and is set in a psychiatric/rehab facility and is focused on self-determination and identity. Contact me if you're interested.
Links to published reviews and comments are listed on my Home Page, for both published books.
———————
This DreamWidth blog is echoed on LiveJournal and WordPress. Please friend/link me from any of those environments on which you have an account.
————————
Index of all Blog Posts
That's not really true.
Let me clear some things up for you.
I don't need you to think of me as one of the girls. I'm alerting you to the fact that I've spent a lifetime thinking of myself as one of the girls. Knowing that should make it easier for you to anticipate or understand my behaviors, which is something people have often complained about, that I'm weird and incomprehensible. If this FYI about myself makes it easier to understand me, good.
I don't need you to accept me as queer, as a genuine member of the LGBTQIA+ rainbow. The term "genderqueer" lets me explain my situation using a word you may have encountered before. So I use that terminology. If that makes it easier for you to understand me, good.
I don't wish to pass. The annoying default way of reacting to people like me is to assume we want to be viewed and accepted as ordinary boyish boys, or manly men, but we aren't pulling it off successfully and hence must be feeling like a failure at it. I'm not, and I never was. I don't need or want your acceptance of me as boy or man. But I also don't need you to embrace the notion that I'm different from them, that I'm actually more like the girls and women.
I don't seek to pass as a boy or man. I don't need to pass as a woman or girl. I don't need to pass as cisgender or genderqueer or transgender, as hetero or gay or lesbian or anything else you ever heard of.
I started speaking up because other people kept making an issue of it. Bringing it to my attention. Some being nasty and hostile about me not being right for a guy, and others being embarrassed on my behalf and trying to be supportive about me being ok and trying to reassure me that I was valid as a guy anyway. It got on my nerves and I felt like it was time I said out loud that I like how I am and I'm not trying to hide or slip under the social radar.
So now occasionally I get people telling me "just accept yourself". Or tsking about my need to get everybody's buy-in on my special snowflake identity.
But I wasn't putting it up for a vote.
—————
My first book, GenderQueer: A Story From a Different Closet, is published by Sunstone Press. It is available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble in paperback, hardback, and ebook, and as ebook only from Apple, Kobo, and directly from Sunstone Press themselves.
My second book, That Guy in Our Women's Studies Class, has also now been published by Sunstone Press. It's a sequel to GenderQueer. It is available on Amazon and on Barnes & Noble in paperback and ebook, and as ebook only from Apple, Kobo, and directly from Sunstone Press themselves. Hardback versions to follow, stay tuned for details.
My third book is about go to into second draft, and I'm seeking more beta readers for feedback. It is provisionally titled Within the Box and is set in a psychiatric/rehab facility and is focused on self-determination and identity. Contact me if you're interested.
Links to published reviews and comments are listed on my Home Page, for both published books.
———————
This DreamWidth blog is echoed on LiveJournal and WordPress. Please friend/link me from any of those environments on which you have an account.
————————
Index of all Blog Posts
