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   lirazel (lirazel@federatedfandom.net)'s status on Wednesday, 22-Nov-2023 03:09:36 JST lirazel

   I feel like I'm constantly being reminded that there is this important thing called "gender" in the world that I don't understand. I legitimately do not know what it is or what its point is. No definition or explanation I've ever been provided with makes sense to me.

   It's different than being ace. I don't feel sexual attraction, but I at least understand what it is and what purpose it serves in human existence. Gender seems as arbitrary (and, honestly, as destructive) to me as race does.

   At least this makes me very trans-friendly. I fully support any gender anyone tells me that they are because it all seems made up to me! But I know it matters to you so I will treat yours with the utmost respect! And I will 10000% defend your rights!

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     Chicken :cqlgusu: (lookitmychicken@blorbo.social)'s status on Wednesday, 22-Nov-2023 03:09:32 JST Chicken :cqlgusu:

     in reply to

     • Julia
     • Soph (they/them)

     @lirazel
     @soph_sol @thalassa
     Gender as "something imposed on me" -- that's such a great turn of phrase!

     I never really feel like gender is imposed on me. I'm aware of societal expectations and traditional gender roles, and I mostly just ignore them and do what I want.

     I lean into a femme aesthetic because I like to look pretty and cute. But it's a choice, and it doesn't feel imposed.

     Maybe I'm lying to myself, but it doesn't feel that way. 🤷

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     lirazel (lirazel@federatedfandom.net)'s status on Wednesday, 22-Nov-2023 03:09:33 JST lirazel

     in reply to

     • Julia
     • Soph (they/them)

     @soph_sol @thalassa I definitely think that I'm inherently agender! But the experience of being treated as a girl/woman has so shaped me that I have *become* a woman. So that's how I understand gender--on good days as a series of experiences that have shaped me, on bad days as something imposed on me. Sometimes I hate and resent it, sometimes I am fine with it.

     But yes, it is similar to the difference between romantic attraction and deep friendship! I have not experienced it, so I don't understand the difference really! My understanding has always been deep friendship + sexual attraction, because that's what makes sense to me. But like you say, people say there's something else going on there! Perhaps I will experience it one day, perhaps I won't!

     But yeah, secretly inherent gender instead of gender as experience...sounds super fake to me!

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     lirazel (lirazel@federatedfandom.net)'s status on Wednesday, 22-Nov-2023 03:09:34 JST lirazel

     in reply to

     • Julia

     @thalassa Yes, I am comfortable with the idea of gender as a set of role expectations. That is a definition that makes sense to me and resonates with me.

     But both trans and cis friends tell me that there is something that they feel is inherent. And that's what I don't understand at all. What is that thing? If you disconnected it from cultural expectations, what would it look like? How do people know what their gender is aside from being told by their culture?

     Because trans friends are very clear that it isn't just that they connect to the set of expectations of a certain gender. They say that if there were no gendered expectations in their culture, they would still be [whatever gender they are]. And that's what I don't get at all.

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     Soph (they/them) (soph_sol@federatedfandom.net)'s status on Wednesday, 22-Nov-2023 03:09:34 JST Soph (they/them)

     in reply to

     • Julia

     @lirazel @thalassa this sounds pretty agender of you, I've got to say! :P

     your thoughts here remind me a lot of the efforts I used to go through to try to understand romantic attraction/interest, as an aromantic person. everything alloromantic people ever said to me about trying to explain what distinguishes romantic feelings and relationships from other forms of love felt to me like just social constructions of what is or isn't considered the "right" way to show affection within a certain framework of relationship. but I'm told that there is something inherently different about the feeling! I eventually came to a place of just being like, "you do you and I don't have to understand it, I'm glad you're having fun with your thing." but I will admit that it secretly still seems super fake, lol.

     (for whatever reason, despite being agender, having an inherent gender identity does make more sense to me. idek!)

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     Julia (thalassa@fandom.ink)'s status on Wednesday, 22-Nov-2023 03:09:36 JST Julia

     in reply to

     @lirazel I mean, there are multiple competing definitions of gender out there... You're probably talking about gender identity? I also can't relate to it, to me it's similar to people talking about their religion. Gender as a set of role expectations that is arbitrary and culturally defined, and used to oppress women especially, makes much more sense to me as a concept.

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     Chicken :cqlgusu: (lookitmychicken@blorbo.social)'s status on Wednesday, 22-Nov-2023 03:11:54 JST Chicken :cqlgusu:

     in reply to

     • Julia
     • Soph (they/them)

     @soph_sol
     @thalassa @lirazel
     Oh wow I LOVE this Trenchcoat Model as a way of thinking about gender. 😍

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     Soph (they/them) (soph_sol@federatedfandom.net)'s status on Wednesday, 22-Nov-2023 03:11:55 JST Soph (they/them)

     in reply to

     • Julia

     @thalassa @lirazel yeah I think gender is like...a whole bunch of things shoved together into a trenchcoat, and some people only have a fiew of those pieces, some have a different collection of those pieces, and some have all of them and some have none, and so sometimes people talk past each other a bit when trying to explain or describe what it is to be a gender. For some people their gender is what they were raised and socialized as, for some people it's what they feel they are inherently, for some it's the social role they find most appealing for themself, for some it's probably other things too! or any combination of the above. and then there's also that different people have different amounts to which their gender is important to them, which compounds the effect of the differences in what the gender is/comes from.

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     Julia (thalassa@fandom.ink)'s status on Wednesday, 22-Nov-2023 03:11:56 JST Julia

     in reply to

     @lirazel I don't know what proportion of people feel an inherent sense of gender that's independent of their body, that would be an interesting topic for a survey. I can only say it isn't universal, as you and I clearly don't have it :)

     As for the connection to gender role expectations, Idk, from my impression those two categories aren't clearly separate, for example when people question their gender bc they don't conform with cultural norms.