Most people will not notice that Facebook this week added a custom option to the usual male/female gender box. Many wont care and many others will say what the heck or why bother. Others will have outrage over correctness gone too far. As for me I am happy that Facebook has finally recognized that we don’t live in a binary world of just a male/female check this box world. Instead we live in a world with a rich tapestry of genders. The addition of a custom gender option is recognition by Facebook of the rich tapestry of our gender identities. Google Plus has had an “other” box for gender since they started. This post is my reflection on why the fall of the either male or female gender box is so important, a beginning of a pull up a chair moment, a hope for some empathy , a wish to improve understanding of a complex subject.

We live In a world that wants to label us and put us in nice neat boxes. The problem is our world wants to limit the boxes, people find their box and say get in , far to many only see their box or believe their box is the only proper box. It wasn’t so long ago that the white race box was a box of prominence even considered the better box, then there was the time that the male box carried additional privileges check male you could vote check female nope not you, this happened because the majority carried a bigger stick. One of the more disturbing societal trends is the tendency for people to think you have to be like them, think like them and live like them or you are not worthy of gracing this planet. Wars have been fought and people have been killed all because of differing beliefs and different boxes. All one needs to do is read the history books to see how society resisted changing our boxes, slowly we have eliminated racial discrimination, religious discrimination, and discrimination against those with variations in sexual orientation. I am pleased to see discrimination in gender variations to also slowly disappear. If you happily live in one of the boxes it is hard to understand what the fuss is about by those who are excluded or worse persecuted. . For those that are not included though this is a big deal.

Many of my friends fit in a nice neat male female box but some do not, until recently they were left to feel like outsiders with no place for them. It wasn’t always that way. The Native Americans who were here way before us have two spirited members who are revered in their communities. They have both male and female spirits in them. The Mexican Zapote have centuries of acceptance and respect for Muxe their men who take on feminine roles. Tomboys have been accepted for decades although many just assume they will outgrow it and become proper ladies, fact is there are plenty of lifellong tomboys. Finally even the bible is full of examples gender variations for example eunuchs that are not warriors but are gentle caregivers of the queens of the land. It is modern society that created the binary either or box, which is fine for most but patently unfair to the others who don’t fit in the box.

Gender theory could fill a few hundred books but perhaps I could share some basics on why eliminating the binary male female gender box is so important. Most people assume that our sex that is the physical x/y chromosome and sex organs define our gender that is our sense of being male/female boy/girl man/woman. Once our gender is established there is then the gender role we are expected to play. So born with male sex organs , then the expectation is a male boy/man gender identity with the further expectation they will behave in the male role model, no dress for him. For many the defining sex characteristic makes this identity true. Some are born intersex and even the sex characteristics are not a clear indication of gender, that is they may have an extra x chromosome, ambiguous sex organs, or one of several other causes of being intersex. In the past there was a rush to stuff people born intersex into a male or female box and history is full of examples of getting it wrong, we have learned far better to wait and let the individual determine their own gender, its their body after all. Others are born with clearly defined sex organs but are transgender with their gender identity , that is their sense of being male or female is different from their physical sex characteristics . Many are aware of the difficulty transgender individual have finding their proper sense of self and we now understand that for some transitioning to have their physical sex match their gender has huge benefits to their wellbeing. Many don’t understand this, all I will say is I have yet to meet a transgender person where I didn’t have an eureka moment and say of course they are, I see a happiness that we are all entitled to. If you don’t understand the nature of being transgender you absolutely need to find a transgender person and talk with them, if you talk with them long enough you will come to understand the importance to them of aligning their gender with their sex.

Perhaps the least understood aspect of gender is those who don’t fall in the binary either male or female. There are some who are androgynous, these are the people whose gender is perhaps blended or blurred, if you have ever wondered if someone you met is male of female you have experienced androgyny. For some gender is fluid and varies over time, sometimes within a day other times over the course of a lifetime. There is also a bigender gender identity, people who are bigender have a wide variety of ways their gender presents itself . They may be physically male and yet feel like a female inside. Bigender individuals often have no desire to transition to the other gender because then they would miss the gender they had left behind . Bigender or gender fluid people are perfectly happy being in this other, not male not female but a delightful combination of the best of all worlds. Bigender can also simply mean a variation in gender identity, the sense of being both male and female or neither male or female or some sort of blend. In this case the bi prefix does not me either/ or it means other.

One of the most important aspects of gender is that it is a sense of self, by its very definition sense of self is who we feel we are. No one but ourselves can define that and no one but ourselves should define that. This is why the movement towards allowing us to define our own gender identity is so important and why allowing us to define our own pronouns while foreign to most is an overdue societal trend toward acceptance and a kinder gentler world. No one should feel like they don’t belong to society. Telling people that how they must feel, how they must fit in a box is just plain wrong and history is full of similar mistakes. Sadly we still have countries that believe people who are different need to be purged or cleansed from the earth. If we don’t stand of for the right to live as the person we are then whos to say that someone else decides you don’t fit in the box and that you are the one that has no right to exist, acceptance of our differences whether our own personal beliefs accept them or not benefits everyone. Human beings are part of a rich tapestry and I welcome the inclusion of everyone into this fabulous and complex world.

I don’t expect most people to understand why the fall of the binary gender box is so important to some of us. I would like to invite any of my friends and family to pull up a chair and chat with me about ticky tacky boxes anytime you would like.

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Note this is a complicated subject and in some cases my chosen words may not reflect what I am trying to say so expect to see me edit and refine this note as my understanding improves.