difficulties with identities

Today I saw a friend whom I haven’t seen in about two years. This is one of the friends who happen to be queer, an aspect of my friends that I didn’t really seem to care back then. (But perhaps I also did; why else are most of my friends queer?)

While walking, it was suddenly mentioned that my friend now identifies as genderfluid. It came out very matter-of-fact, casual, and easy. It sounded as easy as waking up and deciding to go to the mall, or perhaps to Paris. To decide to buy a TV, or perhaps a guitar.

This stirred a reaction in me. I was shocked. I felt an impulse to question, which was difficult to hold it back. I wanted to frown, I wanted to ask questions I know I wouldn’t want to be asked myself, I wanted to walk away. Fortunately, it was temporary. Sometime later, it made sense to me, knowing the kind of person my friend is, and knowing the kind of person I am.

What kind? I don’t know how to put it yet, and perhaps it makes no sense.

===

I wonder if pride and comfort come more easily to some than others, and I think they definitely do. I don’t think I have the exact language to talk about it yet, but this is something that I’ve wanted to talk about for a while now.

===

Me.

It took me a long time to be able to say the word “transgender.” It was always shortened to, “you know, da trans,” “I mean, hashtag, trans”, or “this gender thing.” Casual and subtle. Still, sometimes just thinking about the word makes me a little uncomfortable.

I don’t think I have ever said the whole sentence “I am transgender;” the closest I have gotten to was when I brought my depressed ass to seek help at the LGBTQ+ center. Choking on my own tears, I managed to shake out the following words: “I… think I’m transgender, and I don’t know what to do.”

Back at the time, I slid down the slippery slope of depression because I couldn’t think of a future where I could be who I want to be but still myself. I wanted success, I wanted to impress, I wanted to be one of the professionals in some industry, I wanted to change the world, I wanted to make people’s lives better. But I didn’t want to be a woman, and I actively wanted not to be a woman, in all of this.

And all my experience told me there is no way that would work. Being transgender meant being different without a clear cause, and will inevitably be viewed as defiant. Defying womanhood. Defying nature. Defying morals. Defying traditions. Defying God. Defying your family’s honor. Being defiant has consequences; in a conformist society, which is most modern societies, it means losing trust, respect, and dignity. It means becoming an easy target, a fair game — now those who take you down are no longer doing to satisfy their selfish vices, they are taking one for the team, they are doing everyone else a favor.

In some places, one may die of this. In my case, I didn’t worry as much about being murdered. I worried about losing everything I knew I could have had if this weren’t part of the equation. I worried about being treated like a problem, a monster, a disease, a tragedy, or at most, an “inspiration”, or someone who requires protected. I worried about not being treated like a talent, a role model, a protector, someone worthy of respect. I worried that people would never see through my appearance, that I would always be rejected because I would never be able to make sense of myself to them.

When I was a child, for years, I was treated like a monster. It took me years of work to get out of that status. I knew how it feels, and I would rather die than go back. When it felt like there was nothing I could do to prevent this from happening, it was only natural to think about dying.

I was terrified, and sometimes I still am.

Now that I look back, it has become easier to see that a lot of my fear were unnecessary. But it has not become harder to see that they were reasonable.

===

It’s hard to see others do so easily something you have to struggle so much to do.

I guess that’s my sentiment.

===

When I was in Shenzhen and working as a volunteer for PFLAG China, we held a weekly group for a handful of volunteers. The format of the group was inspired by the “Encounter Group” proposed by Carl Rogers, a pioneer in humanistic psychology. Put less fancily, it was a space where anyone could say anything.

The youngest member of the group was only 19 and a college sophomore. His personality was cutesy, upbeat, mildly flamboyant, and dramatically emotional. He had never been bullied. His boyfriend, who was a bit older, loved him to death and spoilt him like a child. Shortly after we started having meetings, he came out to his parents at a school play related to sex ed including homosexuality. Although his dad allegedly took some time, both of his parents were acceptive of him.

Everyone else in the group, including me, felt incredibly jealous of him, and it was something we talked about sometimes. Most of us had incredibly traumatic experiences, usually with our family, regarding or regardless of our queer identities. some of the member coming close to being carted off to the corrective therapy. Some of us were bullied or made fun of. Some never talked about it with anyone. He was young, and he got to grow up in a more accepting time and environment.

But we also felt glad. We were happy for him, and we wished everyone could have what he had and more.

This was inspiring to me, for some reason.

===

I don’t want to use the word “privilege” in framing what is happening here. It’s a word that people throw around a lot, and I don’t think it’s healthy. I can’t say that I agree with the practice of asking people to “check their privilege” unless it’s done explicitly as a way to provoke aggressively. It’s a violent act. I know I have a lot of my own privileges to check as well, and I do check them, but checking them does not solve my own problems which are often caused by my lack of privileges in other areas. So I’d like to check them at my own time when I get around to it. And I’d not feel comfortable to not allow others to have the same kind of peace of mind.

Maybe this is not the wokest thing I’ve said, but I guess this is where I am. I can be lame, but I’m not going to try to out-woke myself.

What’s more important to recognize is that it’s natural to feel jealous and unfair when we see others have something we wish we had. Then, maybe it’s good to think in the direction of, good for them, and what makes it easy for them and less easy for us? How can I get there? Is it something that could be changed? Because, especially in a society where essentialist thinking is prevalent, we often underestimate how many things we have control over. Oftentimes we simply lose sight of it when we are obsessed with fear and our perceived limits of ourselves.

But that’s not us. Someone who’s drenched in fear, someone with well-defined limits; that’s not what we are like. Everyone is a dynamic blob of chemicals without an absolutely definite boundary that is constantly changing and interacting with the outside environment, and therefore possesses unlimited potential by nature of the theoretically unlimited amount combinations space and time in the universe.

What I mean is simply that the bounds of our potential is scientifically and philosophically unlimited and defy definition.

===

When seeing someone do so easily something you have to struggle so much to do, sometimes, brings an epiphany that perhaps, even if it’s still hard, it’s not impossible for you to do it easily.

Maybe it’s idealistic, but this is what I’m trying to hold on to now.

I still want all the things I wanted. Now I’m a little better at imagining how to get there. Imagination is important, the most important of all.