Dress you up
"Fellow trans women and transfeminine people told me to “tone it down,” and not “draw so much attention to myself” with my style. The idea here was that being trans meant I was already made into a spectacle and I shouldn’t give people more of a reason to gawk at me. Cisgender women told me that if I “wanted to be read as a woman” I should probably start dressing like one; several went so far as to offer me links to more “appropriate” clothing — by which they meant clothes that would conceal my broad shoulders, cover my hairy chest, emphasize my curves."ALOK
For the binary-comforming cisgenender gay man there's no struggle. A 'normal' gay will just throw on some GAP shirt and some Levi's and go his merry way. Not a care in his mind. Some even take pride in their no-high-maintenance routine. But for gender non-conforming or non-binary guys every day is a struggle. It kinds of reminds me of the stories LGBTQ people from the fifties tell: you needed to have ONE piece of clothing conforming with your birth gender or they'd take you in the paddy wagon to spend the night in a cell.
That is, not mentioning the pressures gender non-conforming people receive from LGBTQ people AND straight cisgender people all the time. It's an avalanche of disapproval that would flatten even the most confident person. When people who supposedly belong to your tribe still tells you that you're 'too much' of anything, the pressure can become crushing. And when the patriarchal ideal of which traits of masculinity or femininity one should be spousing is the rule, there's little it won't criticize. The patriarchy is alive and kicking.
Fifty years after Stonewall, people like Alok or Jamee could still get beaten up or spat on (like it happened to Jamee) just because of their gender expression. People are very afraid of the feminine that's not feminine enough and mock and despise what they don't deem masculine enough (and therefore feminine):
userisnolongervisible:"I don’t think it’s straight men who gravitate towards him but rather closeted men who still think they’re supposed to be attracted to femininity. maybe openly gay men don’t because, well, they know that they like men."
Jamee
Just being themselves will get them in trouble. They're either 'too much' of something or 'too little' of something else. Other people's idea of the binary does not let them live or be themselves. Notice that Jamee thought at one point that they could even need feminization surgery to make them appear more appealing to OTHERS. Alok is constantly chided because they don't appear more masculine (or feminine) and they need to erase themselves in order to make others more comfortable. Can you imagine that? That you cannot be YOU just to please and appease everybody around you?
So next time we think we need to 'look better' or that our pants don't fit right, we better think that some people could be beaten up just because they decided to wear print pants or a skirt and some glitter. Fitting Privilege. Passing Privilege, some of us do have it.
XOXO
Wow that video is telling. “I won’t dim my light.” A small but powerful phrase. It’s a horrible world when people fear being who they are. Society always fear those who are different or don’t fit into their ideas of ”normal.”
ReplyDeleteSo let your light shine. If you can be safe, be your genuine self. And sometimes that may mean a hidden piece of clothing that makes you feel like the special person you are.
XOXO 👨❤️💋👨
As a society, we need to let people just be. This fall I wore a pair of plaid pants in neutral tones, and was told they looked gay. Granted I wear my pants fitted, but when was plaid gay?
ReplyDeleteI don't understand why we grow up with messages like "Be yourself," or "To thine own self be true," when as adults we are forced to conform, not rock the boat, or fit in. Look it at all the profiles on Scrinder, and the boys of summer. They all look the same! Clones! S'been this way for aeons, I know. But then I see folk like Alok and I think, that's fabulous! Billy Porter = Fab! It's our transgender and non-binary folk that will save us in the end. They're the ones with the guts to say, This is me! And had I a bit of guts, I'd put on the garb that's buried deep in my closet and go hang out with them.
ReplyDeleteI have always loved and admired people who step outside the norms in the way they present themselves. It takes a brave soul to walk that other line, and, seriously, who does it hurt?
ReplyDeleteIt only hurts those who are questioning their own image.
"Normal"??? lololol. Never have I been referred to that. I've been called "Gifted", but never normal.lololol
ReplyDeleteThis person to me is not unusual. But I live in a 'straight tolerant' city.
Ffs, live and let live (that does not include drfump).
@bae: people fear what other people may do to them if they’re who they are. That’s crazy!
ReplyDelete@maddie: the gaystapo is always ready to tell us that something is ‘too gay’. Always.
@Walter: precisely! The whole ‘be all that you can be’ like in the army is bullshit. People want people to conform, to not stand out, to mix and mingle. And you are right, I’d hang with them, too, if they’d have me. The conversation should be fascinating.
@bob: yes! Because those people have the most interesting lives and points of view! It’s all about projecting, for the haters.
@jimmy: of course you’re gifted! And I’d like to live in a straight tolerant city. It sounds like heaven.
XoXo