Yesterday I was watching a TikTok when I heard something a bit odd that touched on something I’ve been struggling with. In the video, Sunn m’Cheaux refers to language such as “people” as being non-binary; the standard term is “gender neutral”, but that touched on a puzzle my brain’s been working on for a while.
When I first started being public about my Autism, I insisted I was neurodiverse, not neurodivergent. I didn’t like the “divergent” part, and “diverse” seemed much better. However, I was told that “diverse” is inaccurate because a single person can’t be “diverse”. I’ve since come to accept “neurodivergent” as a label, because my brain does indeed work differently, at a basic level, than the majority of human brains.
That’s tangential but important to where this road is going.
I’ve been struggling with labels lately. “Transgender” has certain implications. So do “gender nonconforming”, “nonbinary”, “genderqueer”, and “genderfluid”. They all seem so reductive, restrictive, and laden down.
To me. I want to make that clear: I’m talking about me. I’m talking about language as it refers to me. And I won’t go into my problems with each word here, because that’s not the point of this.
Logically, semantically, I realize all of those words apply to me. And I understand that the purpose of naming things is so that effective communication can happen. But this is all you really need to know about me:
- Don’t use masculine language to refer to me, especially masculine pronouns as well as “sir” or “mister”.
End of list.
How I see myself isn’t really anyone else’s business. I have no desire to use women’s-only bathrooms, and I don’t play sports. I can cosplay manhood when the context requires. So unless you’re going to flirt with me, you have no need to delve deeper into the subject of my perception of my gender than that.
I remember exactly two times where I felt like I’d truly been accepted as “one of the women”, if only for a brief time in a specific context. I like being treated like “one of the women”, but I realize that’s too much of a challenge for a lot of women. So I don’t push it unless I think it’s truly welcome.
(This is where the trans community darts in and tells me that I shouldn’t put myself second like that, and this is where I tell the trans community that I’m my own person and can make my own decisions, thanks.)
Back to the first two paragraphs. What’s my problem with “nonbinary” (again, for myself)?
Just as “neurodiverse” requires a variety of options, “nonbinary” requires a binary to stand against. Using “nonbinary” in place of “gender neutral” seems, at least superficially, somewhat accurate. Language terms are binary or nonbinary. People are people.
I recently suggested that, instead of “nonbinary”, we could call ourselves “quantum”, and honestly, that feels like a better description of how I see my own gender than any of the other terms. (And, because this is the Internet Age and few clever-but-obvious terms can sit around untouched, “quantum gender” already exists as an organization name for folks beyond the binary. But that’s neither here nor there.)
(The linguist in me is compelled to point out that “quantum” originally meant something different than what it’s coming to mean in the field of quantum computers. Language changes, and besides, I’m not really serious about calling my gender quantum, at least not at this point. It’s a rhetorical tool for explaining a concept that I’m having trouble explaining otherwise.)
Am I transgender? Semantically, sure. And I will remain steadfast in my fight for transgender rights.
Am I nonbinary? Semantically, sure. It’s an ugly flag, though.
Genderqueer, gender nonconforming, genderfluid? Okay, whatever, I suppose. Genderwibblywobblytimeywimey, but okay. Even accepting agender (which doesn’t feel right anyway) feels like too much of a commitment.
I just want to be me.
Ultimately, the representation closest to my own gender is Janet’s, from The Good Place: They’re not a girl, I’m not a boy. Beyond that, I don’t know. I struggle with gender neutral pronouns; I struggle with feminine pronouns. I struggle with wearing feminine clothing, and with wearing masculine clothing. It gets fraught and complicated very quickly, but this one constant remains:
- Don’t use masculine language to refer to me, especially masculine pronouns as well as “sir” or “mister”.
End of list.
