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View submission: Do non-binary identities reenforce gender stereotypes?
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.
There's nothing here!