Facebook is the wrong format
But this is a jumble of thoughts I've had in the course of arguing with someone in a comment thread.
1) I'm tempted to post to FB that I like making music with men. It should be obvious, of course, since I keep showing up to lots of events where men are the primary song-leaders, singing my heart out, and going home smiling. I don't know whether I have any non-women friends who are seriously worried that I'm judging them. I suspect I do, and I suspect that only the bravest will ask me about it. My enjoyment of woman-dominated music spaces in no way diminishes my enjoyment of man-dominated music spaces or my respect for the men I'm friends with. Speaking of which, my Sunday night gaming group is one of the things that's kept me sane through this round of depression, and that's a man-dominated space. What makes the difference is that in all these spaces there is room made for women, even when the women are awkward and/or annoying. They are inclusive spaces. They don't give me the heebie-jeebies the way GenCon did that one time, and Magic tournaments frequently did. So yeah, I'm down with the existence of men. But I won't post this directly on facebook because it'll sound like protesting too much.
2) I've discovered a tendency in myself to essentialize gender along space-taking lines. Although I would never be so rude as to intentionally outwardly disregard someone's stated gender identity, I think I internally tend to judge trans women as "passing" when they take up woman-sized bubbles and trans men as "passing" when they exude that entitlement to a man-sized bubble. This is transphobic because it applies a different standard to trans than cis gender identities and I should cut it out, or start noticing cis people's bubble sizes. But I also think that bubble size is a major component of gender enactment. Part of what I value about my own womanhood is the perspective you get from looking out of a small bubble. I get frustrated with with my little bubble, too, pretty often, and that manifests outwardly more often than it maybe should. But I affirm my identity as a woman and I think I would be even more uncomfortable with a man-sized bubble, as nice as some of the perks are. It would feel inauthentic. One of the really cool things about deliberately queer people and spaces is the negotiation of bubble size and shape, so as to give people enough space without impinging. It's more work in some ways than enacting a binary gender, but it certainly has its payoffs. Conversation on this topic and on useful mental frameworks for gender perception is welcome. I am willing to adjust how I see these social realities.
3) My mother has been in the struggle against the patriarchy for about twice as long as I've been alive. She's had some victories, but I think mostly she's had losses. She's a canny old fighter who knows how to pick her battles, survive, and keep going, but it's been hard for her, too. My mom is a badass. I've never felt like a Furiosa, but my mom is totally one. Or, from another series, a General Pyotr, adapting to win in a new landscape again and again. Unlike Pyotr, she hasn't hit the change she couldn't take (yet). She is tired but not beaten. I have the energy and optimism of youth to look at what's going on in our state right now. She doesn't. She has the memory of scores of major defeats and thousands upon thousands of minor ones. She says, "The lesson of WWII isn't the death camps. It's that the Nazis took power. For a while, the Nazis WON." Unlike the myths we build about what America did in that war, about how moral courage is the only necessity to stand up to fascism--unlike the story the Sing Along tells--my mother knows that you need power and strategy to build the world you want. She is a religious person but she has no faith in the moral arc of the universe. She knows that MLK was fallible because she's studied his story. She knows about Chicago. But my mother is a pessimist, not a defeatist or a nihilist. She'll fight anyway. Like I said, she's a badass. I want to be happier than her when I grow up, but I wouldn't mind being as strong, or having my kids feel the way I feel, knowing she's in my corner. Some people go shopping with their mothers. Mine helps me fight kyriarchy on facebook. (And actually sometimes we go shopping together and it's fun.)
4) Being a good person is really hard, you guys.
1) I'm tempted to post to FB that I like making music with men. It should be obvious, of course, since I keep showing up to lots of events where men are the primary song-leaders, singing my heart out, and going home smiling. I don't know whether I have any non-women friends who are seriously worried that I'm judging them. I suspect I do, and I suspect that only the bravest will ask me about it. My enjoyment of woman-dominated music spaces in no way diminishes my enjoyment of man-dominated music spaces or my respect for the men I'm friends with. Speaking of which, my Sunday night gaming group is one of the things that's kept me sane through this round of depression, and that's a man-dominated space. What makes the difference is that in all these spaces there is room made for women, even when the women are awkward and/or annoying. They are inclusive spaces. They don't give me the heebie-jeebies the way GenCon did that one time, and Magic tournaments frequently did. So yeah, I'm down with the existence of men. But I won't post this directly on facebook because it'll sound like protesting too much.
2) I've discovered a tendency in myself to essentialize gender along space-taking lines. Although I would never be so rude as to intentionally outwardly disregard someone's stated gender identity, I think I internally tend to judge trans women as "passing" when they take up woman-sized bubbles and trans men as "passing" when they exude that entitlement to a man-sized bubble. This is transphobic because it applies a different standard to trans than cis gender identities and I should cut it out, or start noticing cis people's bubble sizes. But I also think that bubble size is a major component of gender enactment. Part of what I value about my own womanhood is the perspective you get from looking out of a small bubble. I get frustrated with with my little bubble, too, pretty often, and that manifests outwardly more often than it maybe should. But I affirm my identity as a woman and I think I would be even more uncomfortable with a man-sized bubble, as nice as some of the perks are. It would feel inauthentic. One of the really cool things about deliberately queer people and spaces is the negotiation of bubble size and shape, so as to give people enough space without impinging. It's more work in some ways than enacting a binary gender, but it certainly has its payoffs. Conversation on this topic and on useful mental frameworks for gender perception is welcome. I am willing to adjust how I see these social realities.
3) My mother has been in the struggle against the patriarchy for about twice as long as I've been alive. She's had some victories, but I think mostly she's had losses. She's a canny old fighter who knows how to pick her battles, survive, and keep going, but it's been hard for her, too. My mom is a badass. I've never felt like a Furiosa, but my mom is totally one. Or, from another series, a General Pyotr, adapting to win in a new landscape again and again. Unlike Pyotr, she hasn't hit the change she couldn't take (yet). She is tired but not beaten. I have the energy and optimism of youth to look at what's going on in our state right now. She doesn't. She has the memory of scores of major defeats and thousands upon thousands of minor ones. She says, "The lesson of WWII isn't the death camps. It's that the Nazis took power. For a while, the Nazis WON." Unlike the myths we build about what America did in that war, about how moral courage is the only necessity to stand up to fascism--unlike the story the Sing Along tells--my mother knows that you need power and strategy to build the world you want. She is a religious person but she has no faith in the moral arc of the universe. She knows that MLK was fallible because she's studied his story. She knows about Chicago. But my mother is a pessimist, not a defeatist or a nihilist. She'll fight anyway. Like I said, she's a badass. I want to be happier than her when I grow up, but I wouldn't mind being as strong, or having my kids feel the way I feel, knowing she's in my corner. Some people go shopping with their mothers. Mine helps me fight kyriarchy on facebook. (And actually sometimes we go shopping together and it's fun.)
4) Being a good person is really hard, you guys.