whenever groups clique-up, they get the benefit of like-mindedness and the detriment of lack of diversity. which points to the benefit of rhizome community ties. you can have your queer tribe and still interact with straight tribes or mixed tribes and get the benefit of comfort and the benefit of diversity.
I fully beleive you can be both queer and heterosexual. In fact, I fully beleive I AM both queer and heterosexual.
when it comes to how i present myself sexually, i behave how i feel and leave the categorizing to others because i really donāt see any importance in it. i donāt describe myself as anything because that would confine me to that description. i just act upon my feelings and leave it at that. itās not that iām undecided about my sexual orientation, i just donāt care because i believe that my sexual orientation is specific to the individual that i am.
I also donāt describe myself as anything in terms of gender. I realize that what youāre talking about is sexual orientation wich is way different, but some of the things you said can be translated into a discussion of gender. I use genderless pronouns for myself, I donāt feel confined by them. The problem I have with leaving the catorgorization of myself to others is a problem I think alot of people would have. Say everybody you encounter is always somehow bring up how gay you are, and you donāt identify as strictly gay. Donāt you think it would eventually wear you down just absorbing that day after day without ever trying to explain that you donāt identify as a total homo?
[quote=āTrollSplinter, post:24, topic:389ā][quote author=thunder thighs link=topic=417.msg5310#msg5310 date=1192903840]
when it comes to how i present myself sexually, i behave how i feel and leave the categorizing to others because i really donāt see any importance in it. i donāt describe myself as anything because that would confine me to that description. i just act upon my feelings and leave it at that. itās not that iām undecided about my sexual orientation, i just donāt care because i believe that my sexual orientation is specific to the individual that i am.[/quote]
I also donāt describe myself as anything in terms of gender. I realize that what youāre talking about is sexual orientation wich is way different, but some of the things you said can be translated into a discussion of gender. I use genderless pronouns for myself, I donāt feel confined by them. The problem I have with leaving the catorgorization of myself to others is a problem I think alot of people would have. Say everybody you encounter is always somehow bring up how gay you are, and you donāt identify as strictly gay. Donāt you think it would eventually wear you down just absorbing that day after day without ever trying to explain that you donāt identify as a total homo?[/quote]
my bad. maybe i should have explained a little more or maybe iām getting something wrong.
when people ask me what gender i identify as i tell them i identify as male, but even that kind of bothers me because most people have a pretty stereotypical view of what makes a male and then often attach sexual orientation to gender. what i mean is that most people donāt make much of a distinction between gender and sexuality. if i were to say i identify as male, itās usually assumed that iām straight, unless i go into more detail. if i were to explain that i also identify as queer the āqueerā is tagged onto the āmaleā so that i become a āqueer maleā. so now iām described as a queer male even though i donāt think those descriptions do me justice as an identification because i view them as different terms that i would use to describe two different things and therefore donāt belong together as a boiled down description of who i am. yes, i am technically a male, and yes, my sexual orientation is best described as queer but i donāt prefer to be identified as a queer mail because my sexual orientation has little to do with my gender.
say someone asks me for a description of my gender and i were to describe my gender as an it, the average person would probably respond with a confused inquiry as to what my sexuality is as if it were related to my gender. i would tell them that they had asked for a gender description, not a sexual description and that i can give them both but that i donāt think the two are related enough to constitute a description. the problem is that society doesnāt draw the line between the two and that most people donāt understand where they become different things. thatās why i try to disregard the labels people come up with to describe these to things because they are often misunderstood as descriptions for each other.
so i guess i shouldnāt have described specific gender or sexuality terms as confining. what i mean is that the confusion between what both of those things are is often confining because of the way people mix them into a kind of single description. so what i do is try to avoid being categorized, not necessarily leave the categorizing to others as i had said. my response wasnāt very well thought out and maybe iām the one thatās confused. i dunno.
my bad.
*male, not mail.
Oh I got ya now. That all makes perfectly good sense to me, infact, with a wee bit of tweaking, I could have writen close to the same thing about myself. Sorry I miss understood you, I know how frustrating that can be.