Posted on 10/10/2005 4:07:58 PM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
(Gender bending, expressing non-traditional gender identities, isn't new, but it's increasing.)
Like many female UW- Madison students, Dite Bray and her friends walk past the fraternity houses on Langdon Street wondering if the men inside will notice them.
Unlike most of the other students, it's not because they're looking for dates.
"I've walked around town in drag before," Bray said. "I'm frightened, because I'm walking down Langdon Street and we have fake facial hair stuck to our faces. I wouldn't do that by myself, but in a group it's OK."
Bray, 24, is one of the growing number of young people who express non-traditional gender identities, exploring and challenging the social categories of male and female, manifesting aspects of both without transitioning from one gender to the other.
"For me it's more about not feeling 100 percent comfortable identifying as a woman, because I don't feel like I fit into any of the stereotypes," said Bray, who volunteers at OutReach, a lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender resource center in Madison. "But I don't identify as a man, either, in any way. I'm in that sort of fluid zone where who I am is not really represented by society."
George Sand's cigars
The concept of gender- bending is, of course, not a new phenomenon. Nineteenth century author George Sand was famous for her cigar-smoking and pants-wearing, while "female impersonators" worked their way from underground clubs to prominent billing on the Las Vegas strip.
More recently, against a backdrop of increasing equality in the workplace, youth and pop icons have been pushing the limits on gender roles - from the long-haired rock bands of the '60s to David Bowie's androgynous look and Madonna's celebration of drag in the 1980s and '90s.
Now, macho men get makeovers on mainstream TV and one of the most popular TV talk show hosts is a lesbian comic who feels comfortable in slacks and sneakers. And academics who specialize in gender and pop culture say today's youth are continuing to test the boundaries of gender - challenging societal standards in the process.
Chris Daniels, 19, a UW student who wears makeup, rainbow-striped bracelets, and a thumb ring, is part of the trend.
"Even though I see myself as a male, often I'm talking to other people, especially within the LGBT community, and I refer to myself with feminine pronouns and nouns and think nothing of it," said Daniels, self-proclaimed "webmistress" for the LGBT campus center. "(It's) kind of a dichotomous relationship between my anatomy and my mannerisms and behavior."
Eric Trekell, the director of the campus center, referred to this kind of expression as "gender fluidity." He believes that the way society reacts to people who don't conform to gender expectations will be the next public debate after gay marriage.
"What we're seeing more and more are students coming out of high schools who are rejecting the common notions of gender," Trekell said. "They say, 'I express myself how I want, whenever I want.'"
While researchers have yet to quantify the trend, Caitlin Ryan, a clinical social worker at San Francisco State University who's conducting a long-term sexual orientation and gender survey of youth and their families, says in the last five years, she's seen more young people coming out as transsexual - those who believe they are one gender trapped inside the body of the other.
She and others in her field also are seeing a noticeable number of young people who are, like Daniels, taking it further by purposely evading gender definition, expressing androgyny with wardrobe, hairstyle or makeup - sometimes going as far as calling themselves a "boi" or a "grrl."
'So unfathomable'
The issue of the biology of gender was a subject at the annual International Behavioral Development Symposium in Minot, N.D.
"It's so complex, so unfathomable in some respects, that it is no wonder our politicians find comfort in defining a world that is populated by only 'men' and 'women,'" said Kinsley, a neuroscientist at the University of Richmond in Virginia. "But trying to define males and females as just males and females really misses the point."
He said there is "clear and incontrovertible" evidence that biology - genes, hormones, and the brain - is a major factor in creating a wide range of gender identities and sexual orientations.
Andy Marra, the 20-year-old head of the board of directors for the National Center for Transgender Equality, agrees.
"People assume that gender is cut and dried - and it's not," says Marra, who describes her "gender identity" as female and "biological gender" as male. "But what about a gay male who's effeminate - or for that matter, a straight male who's effeminate or straight woman who's butch?"
Bray, who used to shave her head but now has longer hair, said when people assume that she identifies as a woman, she often doesn't bother to correct them. And since her appearance fits gender expectations, others don't realize the problems their presumption can cause.
"I used to live in an all- women's dormitory, and I felt really uncomfortable there," she said. Many of her transgender friends received unwelcoming looks from dorm occupants, and she had to use women's restrooms.
Since strangers are forced to interact closely in public bathrooms, restrooms can be awkward places for the transgender and gender-fluid population.
"If it was raining outside and I was wearing makeup and needed a touchup, I would never go into a men's restroom," Daniels said. High school locker rooms present the same problem: Daniels described changing after gym class as "uncomfortable and nerve-racking," both for himself and for his peers, who knew he was gay.
A few Madison buildings, such as Monona Terrace, have unisex bathrooms, but most post Men and Women signs on all facilities, even single-toilet rooms. Many restroom signs depict gender differences visually.
'Rigidly enforced'
In the past 50 years, though, gender roles have become more flexible than the strong- men-in-pants and curvy- women-in-dresses stereotypes.
"When I grew up, gender roles were very rigidly enforced," said Laura Gutknecht, a transgendered Madisonian who was born male but identifies and dresses as a female. "I think that things are changing. The young among us feel more gender fluidity, feel like they are allowed more leeway in that respect."
Gutknecht said when she started high school in Brown Deer in the late '60s, male students would have been harassed or even assaulted for wearing an earring.
Today, jewelry and hair- styling products have entered the wardrobe of the average male, and nail polish and makeup use is becoming more common, with rock musicians and goth-attired teens leading the trend.
However, people who stretch gender stereotypes do not always feel safe doing so publicly. Trekell, of OutReach, said many of the gender-fluid students he meets conform to their biological gender at school, work, or any place they perceive as hostile toward gender variance.
Gender-fluid and transgender individuals are often assaulted or even killed because of their appearance, Gutknecht said, by people who don't accept their lifestyle.
"They will selectively pick where to express their fluidity, maybe at a party at one of the co-ops, which would be considered safe spaces, or at (the South Side gay and lesbian bar) Club 5," Trekell said. "They probably are very sensitive, even though they feel they should be able to express themselves however they want."
"No one wants to get beat up," he said.
Bray said she hasn't been harassed about being "gender- queer," probably because her gender-bending is not as obvious as, say, that of a man who wears skirts.
But as young people continue to challenge gender distinctions, the answer to the question "boy or girl?" will become more complicated. Trekell said it may be more difficult for the straight public to accept gender fluidity than gay or transgender culture.
"Gender identity is still such a pervasive part of our society that students that are really fluid in that are still seen, I think in some ways, more as 'freaks' than trans(gender) people," Trekell said. "It's like, 'Choose. What are you?'
"We still have that dipolar concept of what you should be."
- The Associated Press contributed to this story.
Back in my day, we just called people like you "freaks of nature." *Rolleyes*
"It's Pat!"
"Like many female UW- Madison students, Dite Bray and her friends walk past the fraternity houses on Langdon Street wondering if the men inside will notice them."
The first sentence nails the entire issue.
It's all about getting attention for being 'different'.
Poor screwballs.
WTF? It must be some feat to fluidly shape shift.
In my world....I still do! ;)
For Gawd sakes, she's 24 years old , and she's still in college? (I'm assuming undergrad. Heaven help us if she's doing for a PhD!) Hope she graduates and figures out her "sexual identity" before she reaches menopause...
"If you want to see just how biased this article is, substitute 'loves to have sex with elephants' with 'transgender' throughout the article."
That is an excellent rule of thumb to use. :)
"People assume that gender is cut and dried - and it's not," says Marra"
Possibly the greatest inadvertent quote of the 20th century.
Let's see...by the time I was 24 years old, I'd already been in the Army 7 years, married and divorced my High School Sweetheart, finished most of my college degree, owned a home and rental properties and had been to Europe, Mexico and Hawaii.
Bet you a doughnut she still lives in her liberal Madison parents' basement, LOL!
This is too freaky
Well...everyone needs to be some place and these freaks are in the correct place.
I think she had a bad start, and got worse as time went on. In another couple of years she will be a certifable linitic...whereas now she is just a lunitic in training.
It sounds like these "girls" have spent a little too much time watching the behavior of dairy cows.
Sheesh, these stupid kids in flyover land, they're always just so behind the times.
If your gender is cut and dried you must be a mutilated male who dried his real appendage and keeps it on the bureau at home. LMAO @ cut and dried.
I have to get up every morning and shave thios mess off my face and this nut is gluing hair on. I got news for you honey --it isnt facial hair that makes the man, its the plumbing. Or do you march by wearing a strap-on too.
Poor kids these days are met in school by liberals who have them so screwed up they dont know what they are.
LOL! (Seriously, I hope these gals don't mount the one in heat!!)
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