Gender and Sexuality!

Hiya folks! I come to you today with a really great list of posts from tumblr about tone policing and "hate breeds more hate" and the like. http://unicornwithaflamethrower.tumblr.com/post/83424645464/kinglers-a-really-great-powerpoint-that-shuts?utm_campaign=SharedPost&utm_medium=Email&utm_source=TumblriOS

We have been learning about how men and women (there are more than 2 genders) are socialized to think and act according to their gender.

Women are socialized by the media, family, and friends that they must look, behave, and think a certain way. They are told they MUST have long, straight hair, be a size 0, be dangerously skinny, have large breasts, wear makeup, and dress to please men. If they're a WOC, they're told that only white women are beautiful so they must deal with hair relaxers and skin lighteners. This is a dangerous set of qualities that only a small fraction of women actually meet. As a result, there's an eating disorder epidemic, and women and young girls learn at an early age to hate their bodies and starve themselves. My 10 year old cousin already hates the way she looks. She's already gone through a diet where she lost a dangerous 30 pounds too quickly. I'm extremely concerned about her. Last year, my younger sister spent a semester abroad in Israel. She did her Junior research paper on Israeli vs. American media guidelines and found that in Israel and much of Europe, models below a certain weight and/or size are not allowed to model, so as not to give girls an unrealistic idea of beauty. The US has no such guidelines. The media is even allowed to photoshop pictures without telling us. It's horrifying and extremely disheartening to watch my sister and little cousins suffer. Even looking at those Dove "Love Your Body" commercials is disheartening. Dove isn't doing it because they truly care about the fragile and often attacked self-esteem of women and girls, they do it to make money, which makes me feel sick. It's disgusting to profit off low self-esteem.

Boys are also socialized. They're told by media, family, and friends that an ideal man is a violent man who takes what he wants, gets what he wants, and feels entitled to a woman's body without her consent. Being gay is shamed and often leads to being beat up and mocked heartlessly. Yet boys aren't observed with the same amount of societal scrutiny that women are. Even looking at instruments it's clear what's aimed at women and what's aimed at men. Men are encouraged to play a loud instrument like the trumpet or trombone. Women are encouraged to play a quiet and meek instrument like the flute. Which is why if you look at bands, you see a disproportionate amount of men on trumpet and a disproportionate amount of women on flute. When we watched the video about Disney and masculinity, it reinforced the idea that men must be burly, strong, and vocal. We also watched a video called "Tough Guise 2" about the male socialization process to be more violent. The rate of violence in young men is becoming disturbingly more and more common, as school shootings multiply is the face of a lack of gun control, while nearly every shooter has been a white man.

Society behaves in a very transphobic and homophobic way when encouraging and enforcing gender roles, trying to push the clock back to the 1950's.

Unfortunately I was unable to be on this year's LGBT+ panel, so the class didn't get a trans person's point of view, but if people have (respectful) questions, I would love to answer them.

My abridged story is that I always knew what I was, even when I was little and didn't have a word for it. But the hell really began when I hit puberty and my body was transformed against my will into a body that I never belonged in. All that pain and misery could've been avoided if I had been taught about LGBT+ issues at a young age. The boiling point was sophomore year during health, when they divided up the class by gender and sent the boys into another room to talk in a very transphobic way about genitals in disturbing detail. I couldn't take it and had to sit in the hall, which I was mocked for, thanks to someone who is supposed to be my best friend saying loudly enough for all the girls and boys to hear, "Hey <birth name>, why're you going to sit in the hallway?" I cried myself to sleep that night. My parents always said they'd love me no matter what, but then why didn't they teach me it was okay to be different? I was picked on in school for years, bullied to the point where I attempted suicide. And yet people still don't seem to realize that their ignorance hurts and kills people like me on a regular basis. The murder rate for trans people is 1 in 12. But for trans women it becomes 1 in 8. I've experienced more bigotry and hatred because of my hideous crime of daring to exist in my 18 years of life than most people ever will. I've lost friends over it. One of my friends is a freshman who's parents won't let him hang out with me only because I'm trans.

I know I can come across as cold or vicious, but that's not my intent. My inability to properly control my facial emotions and tone of voice comes from my autism, a whole different experience to be discussed at a different time. I hate yelling at people and being angry. It makes me sad and drains my energy, but sometimes it truly is the only way to make people see the light. If people won't listen when I kindly and politely educate them, maybe they'll listen to my anger and frustration. And if they don't, then they'll never listen. As Aang from Avatar: the Last Airbender said, "Words won't solve problems, action will."

I sure have a lot on my plate. I have mental and developmental disorders, I'm transgender, and gay. Oh boy it just keeps piling up. But I've got the mental strength to keep fighting, and will never surrender, if only to spite the people who want me dead. I don't care if you love me or hate me. I'm not here to make friends. I'm hear to make a difference in the world.

Toodles!