"What gender is that cat?"
// pt: what gender is that cat? //
a personal zine about gender, nonhumanity and a little bit of liomoqai (it's all linked, anyway)
Finally getting comfortable with my identity as a genderless yet also xenogender nonhuman; my gender and nonhumanity are inextricably linked.
Tagging @radiomogai because I think it also archives experience posts, and @alterhuman-art as I'd like this to be reblogged there.
Thank you so much @soporine for making a term I identify with so deeply.
[Transcript/ID:
A zine with 9 pages, all off-white with black text, typically in a monospace font with a white background, but sometimes in quotations, larger with a serif font and also with a white background
i've spent a lot of time trying to figure out my gender.
(in doodled thought bubbles) am i a boy? am i a girl?
(next to doodled symbols) nonbinary, genderfluid, transmasc, demigirl
all words i've used to describe myself at some point in my life.
i got myself in a rut about it
introspecting, introspecting, introspecting.
i started looking into the core of it
(circled) "But what is gender, anyway?"
i didn't know the answer.
(next to handwritten and crossed out she/her, he/him, they/them) "Gender is the pronouns you use"
but gender doesn't equal pronouns. but pronoun non-conforming people exist.
"Gender is the way you present yourself to others"
but gender non-conforming people exist. but closeted trans people are still trans.
"Gender is what you want your body to look like"
but what about trans people that don't medically transition?
but what about nonbinary and genderqueer identities that don't have a base for the gendered body?
(cut off) but what about-
so gender doesn't mean anything?
"Guess you'll have to define gender for yourself the way it is for you"
(handwritten and crossed out who am i, anyway? drawing of anthro cat facing away)
(cut off) "Let's start with some questions, then-
"What pronouns do you want to use?"
(next to handwritten and crossed out there are more pronouns than just he, she and they?) i don't really know, nothing feels quite right.
"How do you want to present, to be percieved by others?"
i don't really care, people percieve me as whatever they want regardless of what i think, anyway
i don't put effort into presenting myself in any particular way.
"What would you want your ideal body to look like?"
i mean, i guess, i guess
does it have to be (underlined) human?
i think i'd want to be a cat.
does that count? does that count as 'gender'?
i've been identifying with 'xenogenders' as metaphors, ideas
just describing feelings i'm not sure are gendered feelings at all
does this count? this feels more certain than a metaphor
i mean if we're talking about animals,
they don't have gender, this human (repeated, underlined) social construct
(next to drawing of cat facing away, tail overlapping text) they're just flesh and blood and instincts and biology
can i be that too? nonhuman? all the way down to gender?
(handwritten and crossed out 'it/its is dehumanising!' isn't that the point?)
i got deeper into the liomoqai community, the alterhuman community, too
i found terms, genderNH, kingender, acreaturic
(acreaturic is circled, the arrow leads to the text) "a label for when you are just a creature/being, perhaps with no concept of gender, and simply pretending to be a certain gender for fun."
that makes sense. gender is so meaningless to me.
i don't think cats are a fan of gender, really
i think i'm using gender to describe other things in my identity!
i can do that!
i can do that :)
(drawing of cat, finally facing forwards, eyes closed in a pleased manner)
End transcript/ID.]
