What it means when someone is biologically male and socially gender-fluid.
…and no, gender-fluid is not a new concept, and gender-fluid people are not born in the wrong body.
Or banished from parenthood and sworn to eternal singlehood.
Granted, cis-gendered or gender-conforming individuals may find gender-fluid people a little confusing. But, that doesn’t mean that a gender-fluid person is confused or going through some phase in their life.
Many gender-conforming individuals often raise arguments such as society’s absolute need to distinguish between who is male and female and how it is chaotic to threaten that order.
Sometimes, children are dragged into the mix, and it is always the case that the children will be confused by all this.
But, the real question is: What do people understand as gender-fluid?
Gender Identity & Gender Fluidity
At birth, each of us is assigned a gender identity according to our physiology and anatomy, and by that, I mean reproductive organs. People have always been divided into genders, male and female.
What seemed to be a very organized way of assigning identities was only very limiting because, regardless of their anatomy, many people feel different ways on the inside. For many people, identifying with one gender identity (male or female) is just too limiting because deep inside them, they sometimes show up as a different gender or none of the genders at all.
When a person’s gender identity is about expression, not anatomy, it becomes gender fluidity. So, how a person represents or expresses themselves can fluctuate between feminine and masculine characteristics. This fluctuation can occur as often as every day or a couple of times in a month or a year.
Remember this about gender-fluid people;
They choose their identity based on the way they feel on the inside. The way they feel on the inside could change frequently, and their gender identity is valid.
Can I be gay and gender-fluid?
This one’s tricky!
So, the classic definition of gay means identifying with one gender and being attracted to members of that same gender. If you’re fluid, you identify with a little bit of both.
While you can be whatever you want, the tricky part is that being gay means one thing, and in some ways, identifying as gender-fluid can be different from being gay.
Genderfluid Myth
One of the comments on my TikTok video read,
So you think one day you can be a man and the other day you can be a woman.
I’ve decided that this is one of the classic myths. Seriously, it is one for the books.
The assumption in that comment is that you and I can either be a man or woman. That’s pretty much what our society has been divided into, and so when I talk about being gender-fluid, it’s easy to think in that same pattern.
Except, understanding gender-fluid people demands that you step outside those patterns and just look at people as they are.
No one wakes up a man or a woman as they please, although I think it’d be a pretty great superpower. Even members of the transgender community have to undergo surgery to reach the physiological state that they identify with.
However, feminine, masculine, or agender expressions are entirely possible no matter the biological parts you’re born with. This understanding is what society has snuffed out of most people and something everyone needs to unlearn.
Let’s Wrap This Up…
There are tricky parts and myths about being gender-fluid out there. That does not mean that gender-fluid people aren’t simple enough to understand.
It’s always about expression, not biology. Remember that and…
I hope this helps!