#about femme through the eyes of masculinity STOP IVE BEEN FEELING THAT WAY (dont stop ofc)

[variousqueerthings]

I’m reading Persistance: All Ways Butch And Femme and lemme tell you it’s doing wonders for everything -- feelings about gender, politics, language, relationships 

every time I think I’ve come at some unknowable concept about myself that nobody could possibly understand and I’m totally alone (or at the very least I’m something new and fragile), reading about other queers makes me understand that actually it’s existed possibly forever and I can calm tf down and stop being so angsty, it’s not fragile at all, it’s years of others living these things into reality!

anyway, us lonelies under 30 (and over 30 too quite probably) who think we’ve reinvented the wheel and nobody could possibly get it, we need to read this sort of stuff to get out of our own heads and to respect where we came from and maybe all the fucking discourse can chill out and we won’t be so afraid of changes and concepts that already exist and have done for a lot of years!

#persistance: all ways butch and femme #queer stuff #queer theory #queer lit #lesbian lit #me like: im overcomplicating it ive gone too far im a fraud #a dyke who came of-age in the 60s: anyway these fag genderqueers i met in the 90s love em couldnt do without em great stuff #also rae spoon i owe you everything #and this discussion i just read in it i need to get their names #about femme through the eyes of masculinity STOP IVE BEEN FEELING THAT WAY (dont stop ofc) #and the new spectrum bit???? wtfwtfwtf i feel like im being inundated with The Lore and im some starry eyed apprentice #whenever i forget i can be like -- is my icon a claude cahun homage for NOTHING?! #it's about context building! it's about history! it's about thinking those threads were spindly but they're strong as anchors or smthin #fuckit im just amazed i cannot properly articulate how amazed i am #ALSO look im not a lesbian/i never came to transness through lesbianism like a lot of my peers (only briefly and it amounted to one bar) #my point being that if you think you can't relate to that title because you think you didn't get to experience that lens #1. read the lesbians generally because they're good for you #2. trust me this book opens some fucking doors (doors I'd been worried were me going too far/werent allowed) #recommend this to all the queers and non-queers alike boys and girls and people who think they're unfathomable #you will be uh... fathomed... as it were #(or not but it's still vital)

[cardigans-and-bowties]

While I’m making long, rambling personal posts, why not talk gender

I remember thinking that I wish I was more open on tumblr or a journal or anything about my sexuality. I think the same thing about gender... but Im still afraid to put it down somewhere to an extent. 

It’s so hard to parse through everything when youve been told for so long that you have to be a certain way. I wouldn’t say I was particularly girly growing up, save for Disney movies and loving animals - neither of which make sense to gender. I wasnt really into make-up. I was “allowed” to wear it in 6th or 7th grade but (despite being given it at holidays by certain family members) did not care for it. I wore pretty much whatever but my stepmom cared a ton about clothes and my cousin would pick on me about clothes. 

This insecurity regarding clothes and make-up has fucked a lot. There was a lot of thinking that I was ugly and bad at make-up when I did wear it. When I started wearing it regularly in high school, I’d only wear certain kinds of make-up because I thought I was just bad at doing it any other way. I was equally bad at doing it other ways - I was just used to my face looking that way. The times after high school that I’ve done make-up consistently, as much as I wanted it to be “for me”, a lot of it was feeling like people would think I was ugly or tired or like a 12 year old without it. 

Sometimes I really am feeling it. But more times, I feel like a clown. Sometimes it is nice, but a lot of the time I just end up feeling weird and ignoring it. 

A lot of the time, especially when I was younger, I really don’t know why I picked certain clothes. But I know that how I specifically looked in them was not something I had a full picture of. 

Honestly saying most of this makes me feel so fucking weird. I dissociate a lot. I was depersonalized a lot. I don’t remember a lot of what I thought about myself because I didn’t think anything about myself. Am I making shit up at that point? I am not about to go into a spiral like that. 

There was a period Sophomore/Junior year of college where I wore dresses and make-up a lot. I thought that I didn’t like wearing certain things because I thought I was fat or ugly - which maybe wasn’t entirely untrue - but I told myself that negative thoughts about my body was bad. And truth be told, at that point I looked super cute in those clothes. If I didnt think about the fact that it was me in those clothes, nothing would be wrong with it. I was thinner than I’d been (and have been since then). I didnt have a bad face - but I still felt bad. I just thought I was fucked up and Bad™ and didn’t have words for it so I chalked  it up to me thinking I was fat and ugly. So I wore those so I could condition myself to feel less bad about it. Eventually I was sure enough that I could wear more clothes that I liked without worrying about other people and as I’ve gone more that direction, I’ve gone more androgynous with hints of femininity. 

I’ve been trying to wear just what makes me happy (which is fucking hard - this post doesnt even really touch that mess). And I definitely gravitate towards more neutral things. I do wear feminine things sometimes - sometimes it’s fun but it’s more like dress-up.. It’s not me, it’s just a fun thing to do occasionally. When I do wear make-up (like cat-eyes and eyeshadow), it’s in that dress-up context or when I’m dressed more neutral/masculine and feel like the femininity gives it a good contrast. Or when I feel like looking like a 2000s emo kid (eyeliner all around).. mostly that tbh. I still feel the need to wear it in some contexts. For instance, I found this awesome outfit for a wedding I went to. A simple patterned button up and guys pants - so I thought id wear make-up for that contrast (but mostly bc I was seeing people at the event). At first I felt good about it, but more in the dress-up kind of way - it was just fun. But before we even got to the event, I really hated it. It was a mask to make the people around me feel comfortable. And I took some really cute pictures that day! I just wish I’d worn less or no make-up. 

I don’t even know how to approach body stuff. CLOTHES were hard to figure out because I have felt so separate from my body - Imagine trying to figure out my body. The only times I’ve liked how my boobs look has been in a performative context. My boobs had to look like x y z because theyre boobs and theyve got to be presentable (??? yeah I know it makes no sense - a lot of engrained shit doesnt make sense). When I bind, I feel comfortable with how I look with myself. But I get scared to go out because I don’t want people to notice BECAUSE it’s different. They will notice it’s different and say something about it. And its not like “oh no - theyll think I dont have boobs” - its about them noticing something is different and asking me why Im doing it. Or I even get scared of positive attention. I don’t want people to notice if I start binding or dressing differently. I REALLY wish I could just do and try different things with that and just have no one say anything about it. Like compliments are fine but noting that its different or asking questions is just incredibly uncomfortable. 

Words are a bit easier to talk about. Ive ignored discomfort, just like Ive ignored a lot of discomfort. I know that feminine language sounds weird and fake. But Masculine language is largely just as weird. I’m not a “girl”, I’m not pretty,  I’m sure as fuck not a “woman”, but I’m not a “boy” and definitely not a “man”... but sometimes I can get behind “boi” (why is that more neutral in my head? I dont know) and “handsome” and I’m mostly always down with “cute”. I don’t even really like feminine pronouns. They feel fake - it’s just convenient and asserting neutral pronouns just sounds like way more explaining that I want to have to do. 

My name is harder to talk about though. “Rebekah” makes me feel like I’m supposed to be Amish or have braided pigtails or something. “Bekah” is okay - but mostly because my friends use it and it’s a lot nicer than “Rebekah”. “Bek” has specific connotations to specific people and I don’t think I could use that as my primary name. So Mostly I feel kinda weird about the name situation. But I sure as fuck wouldn’t tell my family if I wanted to change it. I’m not even out as not-straight to most of them. I don’t even want to think about that. Honestly I can’t imagine trying to implement that kind of change. I don’t like the idea of people potentially asking questions about why Im binding - this is a whole nother level. 

Sometimes I think maybe I should just shove everything down. Just dress really femme - hell, buy a wig - and just make myself be super feminine... maybe Ill just stop thinking about it then. But I know thats not how life works. Repressing has always just brought more shit to deal with. 

#personal #gender #its 5am and i have Fellings