Youâve just finished lifting weights. Youâve been at it for a really long time. You remember when you first started training, how weak you felt and how vulnerable you felt. Now, after 3 months of going at it, youâve started to feel and see the difference those hours have made. Head for the showers, walk out of the gym, and start walking home feeling exhilarated after a great workout. You walk towards a group of men, and even though youâre staring straight ahead, you feel their eyes bore into you. You close in on yourself, and cross your arms over your chest but itâs too late. Once you walk past them, you can hear their unusually loud whispers, as if they meant for you to hear them saying; âWas that a man or a woman?â and âDid it have tits?â or âThat was unnaturalâ. We all know that guy who sways his hips a little more than usual, who has a smooth soft voice and cares for his appearance. We call him fag, label him gay even if he has a girlfriend, run him to the ground because he doesnât fit as a typical man nor is he a biological woman because we, as Western civilization, criticize and ostracize anyone who doesnât fit into the concrete gender binaries we have today. Gender isnât black and white but either, a rainbow. In the words of Lacey Roop, poet, gender is a universe and we are but mere stars apart from that great galaxy. Before the 1950âs, blue was considered as a feminine colour while pink was considered to be masculine. Today in our society, it is reversed. Gender conformities are fluid, they change with the passage of time. Women didn't wear pants until the late 19th century, and it was fashionable for men to wear high heels between the 16th and 18th century. We are forced into girl or boy the day we are born. This judgement follows us throughout our lives. Youâre supposed to be delicate, sympathetic. You canât sit with your legs wide open, thatâs what men do. Youâve got to wear that skirt, you must, you shouldnât, doâs and do notâs. And boys, youâre supposed to be strong emotionally and physically. Youâre not supposed to be sensitive and youâre the one who takes charge of the family and keeps everyone on track. Youâre supposed to love sports. These are the qualifications that weâve made. Skirts are only for women. Construction is a manâs job. And to deviate from these norms makes you less of a person? Iâm not sorry to sat that these presumptions are completely absurd and irrelevant. You donât have wear high heels to be feminine, nor do you need to be muscular to be a man. Gender diversity shows us that we do not need to conform by our western standards. We are taught at a young age that pink is for girls, blue is for boys. But is this all really necessary? No, it isnât. We are not categorized, and moulded into the shape of your âaverageâ boy or girl. You donât need to be a boy to like wrestling, just like you donât have to be a girl to enjoy baking. As people, we need to surpass gender conformity and accept that we are all different. We donât all have to fit into one mould. We can be as many as we want, fit into both, or neither. Some girls lift weights and donât wear lipstick while others do, and that is perfectly ok. Some guys prefer to write poetry over watching the super bowl, and there is nothing wrong with that. We judge and condemn those who deviate from our gender norms. Those who take a step back, and decided not to jump into the melting pot assigned to you by whatâs between their legs, and for what purpose in mind? Who are we to judge someone one what makes them feel good about themselves and happy? I donât tell you what your favourite colour is, or your sexual orientation. So why should we decided the fate of those who are not comfortable with whatâs between their legs, or those who donât correspond to our gender norms? If something you love to do was considered a gender non-conformity, would you stop doing it? Would you follow social norms, follow the crowd, like sheep? Would you jump off that bridge if everyone else was? Deviating from the gender binaries wonât make you less of a man or a woman. Just like a girl having short hair doesnât mean she's into chicks, and being a boy who enjoys dancing doesnât make him gay. Gender doesnât stop at male and female. Unlike your sex, gender is fluid. There are countless of possibilities, as there are stars in space. Someone once said, they didnât understand women who wear menâs clothes. They said that it was weird and unnecessary. The way someone expresses themselves has nothing to do with you. No one told you to tattoo yourself, or to pierce your ears. You dress and present yourself in the way you feel the most comfortable in. Westerners need to realize that gender truly is a universe, and what we call normal isnât the only star in this great gender galaxy. Many cultures around the world have accepted that we are not only men and women. The Native American's two-spirited, Indiaâs hijras and as well as the Bugis people of Indonesia have 5 different genders, cisgendered (your gender assigned by your sex) male and female, bissu, calabai, and calalai. These people have acknowledged this universe and have accepted that there arenât only two stars. Even if I might not feel like a woman, or if George wants to play with Barbie dolls or if Mary wants to be a firefighter when she grows up, we as people have the right to be who we want to be and not what everyone tells us to be. Transgender, transvestite, transsexual, agender, genderqueer, two-spirited, genderless, bigender, gender normative, man or woman we are all people, so why do we waste time criticizing those who donât correspond to gender norms? Gender isnât black and white, itâs many colours, shades and personalities. Gender is a universe, and we have yet to discover the millions of stars out there.
