Other in Talk Radio

I am probably a woman, whatever that means. But lately I have been being an other gender. If I can specify, I usually type unicorn, which is supposed to be one of those tongue-in-cheek but also rings of truth. There is maybe a perhaps a component of wishing I were something else that is imaginary, something nonhuman, majestic and untamed but gentle and appearing only to the pure of heart. It’s an experiment, for the features of the dating site, for the community, and even my identity.

I’m out with coworkers and my asymmetrical haircut is a mild androgynous cut on the short side, a longer but shorter than my face length femme bob at an angle on the other side. Losing weight, this time around, an unexpected benefit to my gender ambiguity that I’m now going for. My butt and boobs aren’t quite as ginormous.

But please let me express some skepticism in the concept of transgender and have it be as least attacking as possible. I get the the questions are scary, existential even. I realize I don’t have to advocate any disrespect for trans people for those existential questions get to a place where they can be used to threaten someone’s way of life. Insert “my best friend is a minority” sounding argument here, I have known and loved and, I feel, the trans community has generally been comfortable around me. I mention this not so I don’t have to check my privileges or anything, but because they have counted me among them before I even thought to–with suggestions such as bigender, androgynous, and agender. I really wouldn’t have considered these things given my skepticism had it not been suggested to me first.

Let’s just say I’m curious about this, it’s an ongoing experiment, and I feel a little guilty for not always taking it seriously. Maybe I’m working with some internalized queerphobia, but I do have a strong feeling I can’t be anything I want because I assert it to be so. I don’t think there really should be gender roles, so mostly given that there are some strong and unreasonable ones, I think transgender makes sense. But I don’t like the concept of “gender identity”, I don’t want gender to be my identity.

I’ve been on OKcupid for ten years and there have been times where every time I logged on I had hundreds of messages. Unless I’m single, I rarely meet people, I just like talking to them. I usually have this stated clearly on my profile, but it is in my experience that there has been nothing I can say to make guys stop wanting to be persistent in their persuit of sex. Tell them I want to chat to with randoms and don’t really want to meet soon, and they’ll wonder why they aren’t good enough to date and why I’m such a shut in. Tell them I’m a lesbian or an asexual or in a monogamous marriage with a man (while I was still married, was agreed to not be mono, although never practiced it, but I used it to turn guys down) and they think they have the magic dick that will change anything. Hell, plan to meet them but cancel due to illness and still get a pity party. In any case, nothing I can say to make them stop, to make them not feel so cruelly led on.

Anyway, lately I have not been getting so many matches and activity on dating sites. I kind of thought it was my terrible attitude– giving them shade when they tell me I’m pretty, telling them I hate art when they tell me I’m creative, that I’m dumber than I seem when they think I’m intelligent, etc. But I went over my profile with Eric and I think found out the reason. He told me he’d swipe left on an other gender, even one apparently female. He gave two distinct reasons, one is that he doesn’t even want to accept the possibility of a date possibly having a penis. Now, I’m only mildly androgynous looking, you couldn’t really be confused as to what parts are down there, but not using the GIRL label is just too much possibility of there being a penis down there. I am actually shocked that dudes who have been so persistent wouldn’t see someone plausibly female and hit on it until they see a boner. The other issue aside from homophobia is being part of the whole genderqueer subculture, which isn’t being taken seriously.

But I am liking not getting a barrage of messages. Maybe people willing to date genderqueer is a good filter for my messages and it’s actually making me feel like maybe I don’t want to be a woman after all.

Last updated July 02, 2019