#agender experiences

from the MOGAI ABCs prompt list:

Day 7: Gender - what’s your experience with gender? how do you understand it?

That is not an easy question to answer with our level of alexithymia and identity variation due to plurality. We're going to answer as a collective first, and then as individuals (those of us in front, anyways)

As a collective

We have very little instinctual collective identity? By which I mean, our collective identity is more chosen than, say, had? We think of it like the back up textures videogames use when the specific object's texture is missing, if that makes sense.

Because of this, I guess the gender label that best applies to us as a collective would be agender? With a masculine presentation as default, since we are out as a trans man to most people we know irl.

As an individual - Talon

The most important label I use for my gender is trans man. My masculinity/being a man is inherently trans, the two cannot be separated. This is important enough that the rest of my gender labels are almost entirely accessorial to my transmasculinity, or stem from it.

The only other gender label I find relevant to bring up is the fact that I'm also archtransalfosic. I find a lot of comfort in seeing queer people of the past as my ancestors, maybe not by blood but definitely in spirit and by culture. I find a lot of comfort in using older/historical queeer labels, like being a butch man, because of this. Queer history and culture is my history and culture, and it means a lot to me.

As an individual - Rumi

When I first formed, I was identifying as an agender woman. I now feel that I do have a gender, though I don't really know how to put it into words yet. I think, if/when I find a label that fits, I'll recognize it, but that has yet to happen unfortunately.

Nonbinary experiences are muted in general, but often do get described-- in contrast to the binary. Even 'gender-neutral' is usually conceptualized as androgynous, could-be-male-or-female. 'Neither gender' is usually thought of like, 'a secret third thing' rather than 'nothing.'

I grew up disliking barbies because they were a toy my parents didn't prefer. My parents are older, so they saw a lot of cultural shifts: the '60s as kids, the '70s as young adults, the '80s happened as they began to gain stability and had me in the '90s. So the journey from 'baby dolls' to 'fashion dolls' really didn't hit any feminist women-can-be-adults statement to either of them. They were fully awake for Reaganism and how it turbo-boosted femininity as a consumer product. I know that's the opposite of the typical 'my boomer parents' narrative but it's the truth.

So I didn't play with dolls, dress-up or otherwise, much as a child. I found other outlets for that type of play that satisfied me. I played a lot of pretend, I dressed up in my own costumes, I designed characters, I wrote and drew them, and I 'dressed up' avatars in video games. I really didn't feel like I missed anything.

I began questioning my gender more when I had to present more feminine for things like job interviews and for work. I realized that I was playing a role that was not 'me', but dressing up like a doll. You know, not just 'costume time' but 'costume time, with accessories that come in the box.'

It disturbed me for a little while, but eventually I found the idea freeing. For the first time, I was not just 'bad at doing 'girl' but 'someone who can assume the form of a girl' even if the way I acted and felt was just 'me.' It occurred to me that ordinary girls probably didn't feel like they were collecting 'garb' like for a SCA event or a ren faire to go into the city every day. I am going to the party in disguise, I am a shapeshifter, I can Assume The Form You're Comfortable With, impostor syndrome who?

For a lot of people, this would be 'being in the closet.' Or it would be 'girlmoding' or 'boymoding' or whatever. And others might be like, 'it's not trans representation to present as the gender you're assigned at birth!' But it's actually impossible to 'present as' the null. We don't look at the people around us and think 'are they all in costume, pretending? What if they're nothing?'

In fact, conservative power despises this idea and projects it on the most vulnerable people in the queer community. If somebody passes an anti-cross-dressing law, they think they are safe from doubt. But if they went to a wedding and everyone in their gowns and suits told them, we're not men or women, it's dress-up, it would be a nightmare for them.

[Follow up to this ask]