#queer stuffs

[auroraboringaliceinwonderland]

It’s funny watching shows as an aroace person because sometimes that makes me the only person in the room who doesn’t ship the couple that you’re supposed to ship in a show.

[extensionallydefined]

Aight so this is very random but I need to talk about a pet peeve of mine.

Every time that I see the idea of not having a gender/sexuality label brought up, it's as an "in-between" state. As in, when not having a label appears in a conversation, it's always "it's okay to not have a label if you don't know what you are yet!".

And this is not incorrect. It is absolutely valid to not give yourself a label if you're not sure what label will fit you. But get this, revolutionary thought: sometimes no label fits you. And sometimes instead of making your own label to fit you, you just *don't want one*.

People have a hard time understanding this sometimes. No, I'm not a man or a woman. No, I'm not nonbinary. No, I don't even identify as agender. Sure, I share a decent amount of experiences and thoughts about myself with nonbinary, agender and even other kinds of trans people. That doesn't necessarily mean I am one of them myself. Sure, sometimes nonbinary and trans work as umbrella terms under which I can be included sometimes to explain my experience/discrimination, like, for example, when exorsexism is brought up. But this doesn't mean that I "am" anything.

I don't identify as anything. If the usual narrative is "people with no labels don't know what they are yet", my question, is, am I really supposed to "be" something? What if I'm nothing? What if I've decided I'm not anything? What if I don't want to be labelled? What is this thing I'm supposed to "know" that I haven't reached yet? Because what I know is that I don't want a label.

And this has its own unique challenges. It's hard to form a community around the idea of "you can't describe me/I don't want to describe myself". There's no word to rally under, no specific flag to call your own - and while these are certainly struggles in some sense, they're derived from features, not bugs. It doesn't make me worse, it makes me have a different experience.

So basically I'm just asking the queer community to recognize us. Some of us don't want labels. In my specific case, I just don't have a gender identity, I don't have a positive experience of gender (in the sense that I can only say "what I'm not"). I'm just me. I don't even want to label myself as agender. And I want that to be recognized as a form of being queer: a lack of "identity" surrounding gender and/or sexuality. Who knows, maybe I'm the only person in the world with this experience. I know some people who relate but still use labels such as non-binary. Even if people like me, who don't use any labels, are very few, I feel like that doesn't make us any less valid, or any less queer/genderqueer, in the broad sense of the terms.

So yeah. Just putting it out there. It's a thing. And sometimes if you feel like no label fits you, maybe the problem is the idea of labelling yourself altogether. It's not just existing outside the binary, it's existing outside gender, at least as far as self-identity is concerned. I'm probably just screaming at the void here but you know, I had to put it out there and tumblr feels like a good place.

[telesilla]

I’m not feeling articulate enough to add on to this one post about corporations and Pride, but here’s the thing about being a 57 year old queer American (living in NoCal but not the Bay in the 80s). I remember when corporations started pandering to us and even at the time i had mixed feelings. Ya know why? First off, you have to understand that the queer community in the 80s had alcohol issues—so much of our culture was centered on bars and, like marginalized folks sometimes do, we had a lot of people turn to drugs and alcohol just to get by in a world that hated us and didn’t care if we died. Not to mention that the US was drinking more in general at the time, so yeah booze was already everywhere at Pride.

And into this toxic mess came....out lord and savior Absolut Vodka. And Budweiser. Was it a big deal that major corporations were suddenly acknowledging us as an unique advertising demographic? Yes. But idk...do y’all remember that whole Mad Men thing about advertising to Black folks? Like, is it progress when all the white, cishet owned companies don’t give a shit about your struggle but are happy to take your dollars? Was it progress when they looked at a community with a drinking problem and thought, “holy shit we can sell them SO MUCH BOOZE AT PRIDE Y’ALL!”

You know what meant the most to me? The truly small, local businesses that weren’t run by queers who started to put out rainbow flags during Pride. Absolut Vodka couldn’t lose any amount that mattered advertising to us, but the family owned dry cleaners up the street or the indie yarn shop downtown? Those people could have, and probably did, lose customers when they put those flags up. The fabric store in the suburbs we always went to was a national chain and while they never advertised specifically to queers, the managers at our local store always rearranged the store for Pride they way they did for Halloween. I’m sure some of their customers were upset, but the queers felt seen.

So yeah, corporate advertising at Pride and to the community in general felt significant, but not necessarily in the best way.

[auroraboringaliceinwonderland]

I bring the ‘tism into aromantism, trust

[auroraboringaliceinwonderland]

Everytime I see someone wearing a black ring I get really excited because “oh my gosh are you ace too have I found one of my people do you feel the pressure from society about getting a partner and shite where did you get your ace ring you are so cool—” but then I realize it’s on the wrong finger.

And hand.

[auroraboringaliceinwonderland]

I know people are allowed their own headcanons and all that jazz, but I feel like it says a lot when people look at the gender nonconforming characters - the guys who are more feminine and the girls who are more masculine - and headcanon them as trans.

“Gender nonconforming guy? Nah nah she’s a girl!!”

“Gender nonconforming girl? Well when is he going on T??”

It feels like the easy way out; you look at the feminine traits of the guy, can’t get his pronouns right or internalize that a guy can too have those traits, and say he’s a girl instead; you look at the masculine traits of the girl, and instead of realizing that girls can look like a guy, you decide to go with “he’s actually a boy” because that’s easier than internalizing that people are people and will look like people, whether or not that’s feminine or masculine or androgynous.

Guys can be feminine; girls can be masculine; and there doesn’t have to be a reason other than that’s just what makes them feel good.

[auroraboringaliceinwonderland]

Gosh I love talking to other people who are dysphoric. If I tell them I’m too dysphoric to change my sheets they just get it. Yeah, dysphoria and changing sheets aren’t related in the slightest, but those who know… know. If I told this to someone who wasn’t dysphoric they’d be like ‘wtf??’ And unless they want a long ass rant - or unless I actually have the energy for one - then they’re just gonna hafta take my word for it.