Hi, only wanted to ask about xenogenders: why do exclusionists think they aren't valid? Just curious
Thanks for this blog btw, one of my favs now :)
First off, let's talk about their history. They were coined by a cis, neurotypical woman who posed as a trans woman online. She basically insinuates that neurodivergent people can't understand what gender is. Which, yikes. Throughout the entire history of them, it's been said that it's "for neurodivergent people who have a hard time understanding social constructs like gender" (which I'll address later in this post), or "for neurodivergent people who have a hard time understanding their feelings, so they describe the way their gender feels like light and fluffy like a cloud, or angry and soft like an angry cat.". The problem with this, it infantiles neurodivergent people.
Which is fine when it's coming from someone who actually is speaking for themself. Neurodivergent people who experience something that does cause them to not be able to do something are allowed to convey that they can't do those things, and they are not infantilising anyone, and they are not putting neurodivergent people down. Having a disability is having a disability, it isn't good or bad, and it's wrong to act like someone with a disability can do anything. It's wrong to place expectations on disabled people they can't live up to, and when a disabled person can't do something, don't act like they're making a biased judgement about disabled people because they aren't. I can't just stop ticking, and my tics extend to affect more of my life than just my tics. My ADHD "infantiles" me in some ways, and there is nothing wrong with that, and don't expect me to be able to exist in the same way as a neurotypical person.
HOWEVER, the majority of people who label themselves with xenogenders are neurotypical or self diagnosed. They do not have the ability to speak on neurodivergence correctly. They just don't. They don't have the tools. They don't have the experiences. They don't have the time in therapy. They don't have the education. They are using neurodivergents as a scapegoat and in the process insisting that there is something so fundamental that we simply cannot understand. They are speaking for us, and have created false information about a group they can't speak for.
Gender isn't a social construct. At least not in any way that is compatible with the concept of xenogenders.
• Gender in the terms of *gender studies* which was formed in the soft science of *sociology*, describes the expectations, performances, and roles associated with being a male, and a female. In this theory, a social man is someone who is masculine and a social woman is someone who is feminine. In this theory, these are learned behaviors enforced by society. Men are masculine, they're strong. They hunt, they have no feelings other than anger. Women are caring and nice and they cross their legs when they sit. Obviously this is not applicable to individuals. Because obviously most people don't fit into these definitions. This concept of social gender is useless for labeling an individual as a man or a woman. It's bunk. It's accurate for how society treats people though. Xenogenders do not have any socially ascribed behaviors, expectations, or roles. Therefore under the tucute definition of gender "gender is a social construct", aka gender theory, xenogenders are not genders. Some people could argue that "well my learned behaviors are light and fluffy like a cloud", that still doesn't mean that society perceives you as cloud-like or that your learned behaviors are similar to that of a cloud. It also doesn't have anything to do with the sexes, and therefore isn't compatible with this theory.
• Gender in terms of what we identify with is a different thing entirely, and is a neurological and psychological map of your sex characteristics. Someone who individually is a man identifies with a body that is entirely categorizable within male range, and someone that is a woman is someone with an identified body that is entirely categorizable within female range. Someone who is nonbinary, (nullsex or on the duosex spectrum), is someone who's identified body doesn't fit within those ranges. Gender is different from the "gender" represented in gender theory. This is because a man can look, act, sound, think, and express in the ways typically associated with women and still be a man. Even if he's trans. The social ascriptions to gender are meaningless, and gender itself is not. Xenogenders do not reflect any gender identity. They are not correspondent to an individuals understanding of their own body, and not equatable to transness or nonbinarism. They're a self-chosen label that bares no meaning. They represent nothing real.
Ultimately if someone wants to call themselves catgender, ok i guess I can't stop them and I'm not going to be a dick about it but I'm also not going to sit around and pretend like it holds any water or means anything.
