145 upvotes, 37 direct replies (showing 25)
View submission: Do non-binary identities reenforce gender stereotypes?
I think it's important to distinguish between gender expression and an internal sense of gender identity.
Tomboys, femboys, femme girls, manly men etc are all valid types of gender expression. A feminine girl or a tomboy, or a butch woman, etc all have an internal sense of gender that says "woman." This must be separated from how each type of woman expresses their gender. Tomboys and butch ladies are still very much women, so long as they have that internal sense of gender that says "woman."
Likewise with men. Femboys are a valid expression just as a macho guy is a valid expression of the male gender.
For a nonbinary individual, the internal sense of gender feels different. It may not be there very strongly, or maybe at all. For some, it may fluctuate between genders. But I cannot stress enough that it is the *internal sense of what your gender is*, which must be distinguished from how a person chooses to look on any given day, the social roles they play, or how their body looks, or what hormones it may have. The internal sense may feel like...nothing. In terms of gender *expression*, some nb people are very femme, some are very masc, some are in between. It just depends on the person.
Nonbinary people struggle with binary people trying to define the nb gender in reference to binary genders. But nonbinary gender is neither, and exists on its own, often as an absense of gender, not in reference to female and male.
I feel that for cis binary gendered people this concept can be difficult, because their internal sense of gender matches their body and gender expression, and so they don't distinguish between them. Perhaps it's more difficult to distinguish between the two *because* there isn't any mismatch. That's why they can reduce gender identity to body parts - because they've never thought what makes them a woman/man. They just know their body parts are right, there's never been any sense of conflict, so they just think it's the bits that do the deciding for everyone.
If you couldn't use the reasoning of body parts, hormones, social roles, etc -- how would you know what gender you are? What do you feel like? What is your internal sense of who you are?
Comment by kitawarrior at 12/01/2025 at 09:28 UTC
58 upvotes, 7 direct replies
Thank you for your perspective. That last question you posed is especially intriguing and something I don’t think I’ve ever considered. Outside of body parts, social roles, and hormones, when I think of myself, I just think of my personality and thoughts. Nothing about that feels male OR female. I’m curious, and maybe it’s just different for everyone, but how would you define gender outside of those factors? If I were to say I feel female, with no consideration for body parts or social norms, what does that even mean? I would think that gender is not even a part of our soul/internal identity.
Comment by Trashtag420 at 12/01/2025 at 18:34 UTC
30 upvotes, 5 direct replies
internal sense of gender identity
What ever happened to "gender is a social construct"? I can't help but feel like this "internal sense of gender identity" is simply "personality" being misunderstood and mislabeled.
Masculinity and femininity are not internal emotions we evolved to feel, they are cultural concepts we have been immersed in and taught all our lives. Your conception of "man" or "woman" is, in fact, *not yours;* it was taught to you and hammered home through habits that you had to partake in lest you be ostracized.
This "internal sense of gender" is about as natural as the internal sense of shame religious people get when straying from their lifelong habits, no matter how oppressive partaking in those habits was. Which is to say, while it is very real to the person experiencing it, it is not a *good* thing you *should* experience, and even though it may not be fair, you have to do work on yourself to grow past it.
Comment by -endjamin- at 12/01/2025 at 15:36 UTC
17 upvotes, 4 direct replies
Without a body, there is no gender. What is it that makes you feel like the gender you identify as? I certainly don't "feel like a man". I just am one. I often feel like I am not like other men because I don't like the same things or do some of the same behaviors. But I still am one. Not because of something I feel. It's just the way my body is. I'm just a conscious awareness that exists in a body, and that body has the male configuration.
Comment by btafd1 at 12/01/2025 at 15:43 UTC
18 upvotes, 4 direct replies
What the fuck is “internal sense of gender”? It sounds like a made up expression where we submit to full subjectivity and completely abandon any shred of logical reasoning.
The fact is that genders are a social construct, and the argument that your “internal sense of gender” doesn’t align with one or another social norm is worthless. Cool, it doesn’t. It’s fake anyway. It’s a social construct.
I’m a man. I don’t need to express “masculinity”, even though I do stereotypically “masculine” things like competing in combat sports and lifting weights. That has nothing to do with me being a man. I am a HUMAN. Everything associated with gender is extrinsic. I have absolutely zero tie to my “gender” when it comes to my identity. I am who I am regardless and my gender doesn’t dictate who I am. It only plays a role in the reality I live in society… except, again, that’s extrinsic. No “internal sense” bullshit.
Comment by One-Load-6085 at 12/01/2025 at 16:56 UTC
10 upvotes, 1 direct replies
I have never had a sense of being a woman. I am naturally dominant and also I love feminine things... light and dark,black and pink etc. So I have no idea. It is an interesting question one I have pondered before. I wonder why you presume that binary people do have some sense of gender identity. No one I have ever talked to about it IRL does.
Comment by shivux at 12/01/2025 at 22:10 UTC
5 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I’m a “cis binary gendered” person (as far as I know) and have absolutely no idea what anyone means when they talk about an “internal sense of gender identity”. I’m a man but I don’t think I’ve ever once “felt like a man”, and I’m not sure I even understand what that *would* feel like. My body parts don’t feel right **or** wrong, just there. People have tried to explain the feeling to me by talking about how being misgendered feels wrong and gross. I used to have fairly long hair so it’s happened to me before, but it never felt bad, just kind of funny and awkward. I like having a beard and I hate wearing makeup, but those are only “manly” traits because society says so. If I had to somehow determine my gender without any kind of external cues… I don’t think I could.
Comment by pen_and_inkling at 12/01/2025 at 12:42 UTC*
9 upvotes, 0 direct replies
If you couldn't use the reasoning of body parts, hormones, social roles, etc -- how would you know what gender you are?
In other words, our ability to identify gender ultimately depends on our understanding of either biological sex (primary and secondary sex characteristics, hormones) or sex-based stereotypes (gendered social roles).
Comment by UnderCover292 at 12/01/2025 at 15:14 UTC
8 upvotes, 2 direct replies
Isn’t gender expression a reinforcement of gender roles/stereotypes?
Comment by poli_trial at 12/01/2025 at 10:51 UTC
20 upvotes, 2 direct replies
Tomboys, femboys, femme girls, manly men
Do these labels really help? Someone will always be between one category and another. Why can't your sex and how you express yourself not be forced into a category at all?
If the goal is to move away from essentializing sex/gender, why would categorizing someone a femgirl (feminine woman) or femboy (feminized man) do anything other than reinforce the idea that there an essential characteristic one is moving towards in their expression of it?
What is your internal sense of who you are?
For the vast majority of people, sex is a biological reality that they operate from, while at the same time, not something they want to spend time actively considering/weighing. The freest form of oneself is generally to operate non-ideologically and just be.
When it's clear others will now judge you for the choice, suddenly what you are can now create pressure around that choice whereas most people want to express themselves without having to justify what they are or explain what category they fall within. Thus, being non-binary in theory helps with expansiveness and self-expression, but in practice now you have to stand outside of social norms and deal with what an expression such as this means. The people who will choose this path are likely those that have rather strong feelings about gender ideology. Those that don't are left with the choice of not doing so, almost implying acceptance of "traditional" roles that now they have to actively step outside of as opposed to being allowed to freely move around within.
Comment by AriasK at 13/01/2025 at 01:27 UTC
4 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Thank you for that explanation. Something I've never understood is how someone does or doesn't feel like a particular gender. I'm a woman and I identify as a woman. But I've never FELT like I identify as a woman. As in, it's not an emotion or feeling. I have a woman's body, I like feminine things, I have no desire to be a boy, but there's no internal feeling about gender. I struggle to understand how, unless you explicitly feel like you want to be a particular gender, how someone does or doesn't feel like they are a gender. It's like, I have two arms. They just exist. I don't "feel" like I have two arms, I objectively do. It's the same with my gender.
Comment by scared_kid_thb at 13/01/2025 at 02:18 UTC
4 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I have a very hard time seeing what identifying as a man means if it doesn't mean having a preference for a particular kind of expression, to be treated in a particular way, to have others expect certain behaviours from you, to have a certain kind of body, or anything like that. Like, it's not *just* about the label "man" or "woman", right? So what's the thing the label is actually referencing? When you identify as a man, what are you identifying as?
Comment by kwantsu-dudes at 13/01/2025 at 00:01 UTC
7 upvotes, 2 direct replies
This doesn't explain WHAT an "internal sense of gender" consists of, why anyone would adopt one or reject one.
The way you explain "nonbinary", makes me believe most everyone is "nonbinary", by not having some inherent sense of "identity" to a term with no social definition.
What you think of as cisgender people finding this concept difficult, is actually just a bunch of agender people who have no idea how this "gender" concept can even exist and reject it, more often having a social identity to sex, rather than some personal identity to a completely individual manifested concept of gender, to which then some people illogically want to be leveraged as a collective label.
It's not about one's body parts being "right", or their expression being "right". Most people just believe if they are male, they are a man. Even if they'd desire to be female, they'd BE a male, and are thus a man. Because that's all it conveys. That it a humanized term for the sexes. Not a label for one's "gender identity" or any aspect of WHO someone IS. Most people don't have a "gender identity" that "matches" their "assigned gender at birth". They simply have never registered or completely reject the logic of a "gender" being an aspect of identity.
If you couldn't use the reasoning of body parts, hormones, social roles, etc -- how would you know what gender you are? What do you feel like? What is your internal sense of who you are?
Why would your "feelings" be linked to gender categories? Why does my internal sense of who I am have to be categorized into the label of "gender"? None of this makes any sense.
That's the very issue. If gender has no societal classification and is just a individually created concept, it means nothing and conveys nothing amongst society and is useless as a categorical label.
Under gender identity, the labels of man, woman, trans, cis, non-binary mean NOTHING. You know nothing about a person by these labels as they are completely personally assigned and can mean what ever that person wants it to mean. Thus it's useless as a categorical term.
Comment by Agreeable_Tennis_482 at 13/01/2025 at 11:15 UTC*
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I'm a man biologically but I wouldn't say I have an internal sense of gender. Why do you assume that must be the case? I personally have various interests and a personality that I am confident I could keep the same regardless of what my body looked like. I don't bother molding myself to gender norms anyways I mostly do what interests me. So are you really certain there must be an internal sense of gender?
I don't think anything makes me a man internally. I am ME, but being a man is not essential to what makes me ME inside my head, if that makes sense.
And isn't this also a cultural and socialization thing? Maybe you were taught that gender is something innate but a lot of cultures consider the soul to be genderless, or have concepts such as reincarnation. I am from such a culture so maybe that's why I differ in how I view myself. I really can't agree that I've ever thought my "spirit" or internal self is gendered. And from my perspective, I do agree with OP that nonbinary concept reinforces gender norms.
I think the west commonly has this issue. You all try to scientifically label everything, even things that aren't based on science, but just creating a concept of an internal sense of gender doesn't make it become something real. Especially when such concepts are limited to a western perspective. From my perspective it is all sociological. Just like race has no basis in biology, I would argue gender is the same. We as humans love to create labels and give meaning to things that aren't necessarily "natural" phenomenons.
But then, OP poses a valid question. If this is all sociological constructs, then doesn't the way we choose to label them determine the outcomes? All we can say scientifically is that humans are a sexually dimorphic species with broadly speaking 2 sexes determined by chromosomes and physiology. But all the narratives and ideas we have created about the minds that inhabit these dimorphic bodies are just constructs imo. If we had lived in a society with different labels and gender conceptions, we would also think and behave according to those constructs. Going back to the race example, you can see firsthand how racial categories differ wildly from culture to culture, and especially in places that have had a lot of "racial mixing" like Latin america.
So anyways I do think nonbinary reinforces gender as being something essential when I think the reality is it's a social construct and we should move towards discussing that side of things more.
Comment by flimflam_machine at 14/01/2025 at 13:54 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Unfortunately none of this explains what you mean when you say "gender". You talk about "male gender" but with no explanation of what that means or how it differs from "female gender".
If membership of any particular gender isn't defined by biology and it isn't defined by behaviour (since, as you demonstrate, any form of expression can be a valid expression of any gender), then what's left? What is it that people are referencing when they say that their "internal sense of gender" is best described with a certain label. All possible external points of reference i.e. "genders" as categories, are incoherent because they can contain people of either sex performing any type of gender expression.
Comment by hereforthesportsball at 13/01/2025 at 12:27 UTC
2 upvotes, 0 direct replies
All that internal stuff is strongly influenced by the society we are in, hard or maybe even impossible for someone to distinguish the source of those feelings when there’s no way to control for it
Comment by mcove97 at 13/01/2025 at 16:04 UTC
2 upvotes, 0 direct replies
A feminine girl or a tomboy, or a butch woman, etc all have an internal sense of gender that says "woman." This must be separated from how each type of woman expresses their gender. Tomboys and butch ladies are still very much women, so long as they have that internal sense of gender that says "woman."
What if they don't though? I don't have that internal sense of gender that says woman, and I still consider myself and view myself as and identify myself as a woman simply because I'm biologically female.
Comment by YourDadCallsMeKatja at 13/01/2025 at 16:15 UTC
2 upvotes, 1 direct replies
The definition of non-binary cannot be created by imposing a made-up definition on others who do not identify as NB.
Men and women are not defined by some deep inner sense of identity. Some may be, but that's not a criteria. For example, lots of women don't feel like women, but want to be in solidarity with common struggles women share under patriarchy. You don't get to define them out of existence.
Non-binary identities, like all gender identities are a cultural phenomenon specific to the time, place and history of any given person and community. They aren't any more defined by people's inner feelings as they are by their social context, availability as viable identity to take on and motivations of the person odentifying as such. No one gets to demand a specific set of inner feelings to recognize the validity of someone's NB identity.
Not caring about one's feelings in relation to one's body does not denote harmony between the two. It just indicates a lack of interest in the subject, an unwillingness to create hardships for oneself or a cultural/ideological perspective that doesn't make NB identities interesting or relevant.
I would add that trying to box trans women and men into some weird and deeply personal invasion of privacy by defining them based on intimate feelings instead of recognizing them as valid humans who don't owe anyone an explanation is transphobic AF. No one needs to even think about other people's inner feelings.
The only definition needed is an acknowledgment of people's existence and a commitment to upholding human rights. Trans folks are people who face discrimination because their bodies at birth do not match their gender. Non-binary folks are people who face discrimination because society is founded on a system that only recognizes 2 genders.
As for OP's initial question: it's not anyone's job to reinforce or not reinforce gender through merely existing as themselves. It's everyone's job to be in solidarity and fight gender-based oppression. Your freedom is never gained by diminishing someone else's.
Comment by theniwokesoftly at 13/01/2025 at 20:28 UTC
2 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I personally dress fairly feminine but am demigirl at best. There’s an inherent sense of “woman” that I just don’t have, and I have straight up dysphoria with my reproductive organs. Took me a long time to identify what it was because it doesn’t make me go “ew I wish I had testicles”, but there’s a disconnect where I go “no, those ovaries must belong to someone else” when I see them on an ultrasound, for example.
Comment by getrekered at 12/01/2025 at 20:55 UTC
5 upvotes, 1 direct replies
You perfectly described why people think being transgender and non-binary is a matter of delusion: because “gender identity” is based on literally nothing but self-perception. Mark, a biological male who is 6’8”, 300-lbs of muscle, with a viking beard, deep voice, dick down to his knees, dresses like a lumberjack and works in oil fields—and who has no intention of going on cross-sex hormones, getting surgery or changing his “gender expression”—is actually a woman because he unilaterally declared it so.
Which would be fine if sane people wouldn’t be compelled to participate in his delusion, change society to affirm it, and propagate such insanity to impressionable children.
Comment by SamsonOccom at 12/01/2025 at 14:56 UTC*
2 upvotes, 1 direct replies
But many of those categories are transitioning now. Butch girls and castrato gay guys are being told that those characteristics makes them not the sex they were born as
Comment by Famous-Ad-9467 at 13/01/2025 at 13:24 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
What does the internal sense of gender have to do with the outward representation? That's the question.
Why would someone say, I never liked dolls or cooking, I always knew I was different, that's how I knew I was non binary or trans?.
Comment by OneAwakening at 13/01/2025 at 18:28 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
If you couldn't use the reasoning of body parts, hormones, social roles, etc -- how would you know what gender you are? What do you feel like? What is your internal sense of who you are?
I'm just awareness. The concept of gender or male or female or anything else doesn't come up at that level of analysis.
Comment by FryCakes at 13/01/2025 at 23:21 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Just like you said, you don’t really feel your gender unless there’s some sort of mismatch. The mismatch is often actually painful, which is what most people don’t get. And then people say that gender is a social construct, and I get that they say that to be affirming, but in reality it’s gender roles and expression that is a social construct. I guarantee a social construct wouldn’t cause as much pain as dysphoria lol
Comment by No_Business_271 at 14/01/2025 at 03:36 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I know a male. Hes shortish lets say. He shops for clothes in the womans section. The sizes fit better. Hes dapper as hell. Most gents dont know how he finds such classy suits. I think most "men" would scoff at this. So with all that in mind...it all boils down personal comfort zones and a possoble willingness to lean one way. But maybe we should progress forward with nuance of dissestablished gender norms and approach it with nuetral light as you suggested. But how do we achieve this when biological factors dictate our ability to adjust to our enviromental settings, and societal expectations require a submission to "norms". I feel society needs proper guage on what defines normal. Not as a or b. But functionality and purpouse. Gender shouldnt matter. What should matter is our ability to elevate our communities and ourselves. Gender just seems to complicate the reality that a man can child rear and a woman can pump iron. But thats irelevant, when the true fact is that people are people and we can do anything. Regardless of our perceived limitations based on external observations. Personally I wish we could all just wear robes and masks. Let whats inside come outside.
Comment by ncave88 at 14/01/2025 at 05:07 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I would add that you can have a profound sense of internal complexity with your gender and see yourself as being connected with the opposite sex and still be cisgender. However there would still be belief involved, so that supports your point.