The article also challenges the commonly presented view that androgyny is the only way to present a nonbinary gender.

nonbinary:

Excellent and highly recommended response to the flawed NY Mag Agender article from The Frisky:

It’s a common assumption that non-binary people were all assumed female at birth, i.e. born with the body parts we typically associate with girls. With the exception of Pejic, who doesn’t have a pronoun preference and has de-emphasized the importance of gender in interviews, there are few visible examples of assumed-male-at-birth non-binary people. Kopas explained how this narrow POV can harm assumed-male-at-birth people and others who fall outside the typical presentation:

It seems that we’ve started treating the most visible examples of non-binary people as if they represented the full range of ways of being. […] Who does this leave out? People of color, fat people, male-assigned people… As a male-assigned non-binary person, it’s sometimes felt like a struggle for me to have that part of my identity recognized even by other gender-variant folks. People want to place me as either as a man because of my physical features, or a woman because of how I dress or because I’m on [hormone replacement therapy]. But there’s no non-binary uniform or medical regimen — nothing says that someone can’t dress femme and still identify outside of a gender binary. So if non-binary is to mean more than a particular kind of androgynous expression, then we need to talk about the range of ways that it can look and feel.

In short? “Agender” may sound like a tidy little label — but that would be an underestimation of every agender person that you meet.

Read the full article at The Frisky

nonbinary:

The feature article in today’s New York Magazine is on agender, nonbinary and neutrois experience. The article is generally positive, presenting three different people’s experience in their own words.

Debate has ensued on Twitter about the journalist (or editor)’s choice to focus more on bodies than lives and to only feature people coercively assigned female at birth and not comment on the disparity.

Is there are barrier on CAMAB agender or nonbinary identity (or disclosure) that this article’s editorial decisions perpetuate or is it simply voyeuristic and intrusive to focus on the narrative of  transition, birth assignment, surgeries and bodies?

neutrois:

A new article about agender / neutrois people came out. I’m featured in the article as Micah. All I’ll say is, it’s tougher than I expected to put yourself out there. Thoughts?

Article extract:

“I didn’t really want nipples,” Cory said, running a hand through a mop of bleached blond hair. Born female, 23-year-old Cory uses the pronoun co—and asked that we refer to co that way, too—and got elective surgery to remove co’s breasts last year. But co is not transgender in the traditional sense, transitioning between female and male. Co wants neither gender. So co joined the ranks of the agender—or, in a more florid recent coinage, the gender neutrois.

“You read stuff on Tumblr about how us nonbinary people just want to be special snowflakes,” explained Cory, who is special but made of sturdier stuff than a snowflake. Was Cory’s desire to remove co’s secondary sexual traits a ploy for attention? A reaction to internalized sexism? The result of sexual repression? “I tackled all that stuff with my therapist. We came to the conclusion that I was not okay with this part of my body. Regardless of where that came from, it was there.” Co has neither breasts nor nipples now.

“It is so perfect,” Cory said. “For me this is what neutral looks like and feels like.”

I found Cory through the #nonbinary #agender #neutrois tags on Tumblr. The social network has become an unofficial home for the gender neutral. Though most group themselves with the transgender community, they reject the narrative of a person born into the wrong, oppositely-gendered body. All five neutrois individuals I spoke to have no need for masculinity or femininity at all.

Full article: NY Mag: Neither Man Nor Woman: Meet the Agender

nonbinary:

Signal boosting. Are you nonbinary and live in Glasgow, Scotland?

becomingkeltik:

I’m being interviewed for a study on being trans in Glasgow, the person conducting the study is looking for 2 more people, age ranges early 20s and 50+, non binary identities please! This is her explanation of the study;

“My research is looking into the lived experiences of four transsexuals in Glasgow. I recently interviewed a transwoman who had made Glasgow her new home for another piece of research and arising from this interview I wanted to explore this area more. I really want to get a sense of how transsexuals have created and continue to manage their new identity and overcome the many barriers that society places. The reason I have chosen Glasgow is that it still tends to have a tough image with strong sectarianism in football and a working man’s image of work hard play hard so it can be considered unforgiving with anything and anyone that is considered against the”norm” so to speak. Whether the people I interview are transmen or transwomen I want to explore if Glasgow and Scotland’s culture and history has helped or hindered their transition. I don’t have an end goal in mind I just believe and hope that the more information that is out there about such matters can help educate and hopefully reduce discrimination.”

If you want to get involved, you can contact Fiona at - 1103350K@student.gla.ac.uk

Please share! Thanks.

(Source: becomingkeltik)

fuckyeahftmsofcolor:

The challenge: Don’t use any gendered bathrooms or change rooms for the month of April.

What are “gendered bathrooms”? Gendered bathrooms are designated for “men” or “women” by a sign. This challenges includes ALL multi-stall and single-stall washrooms, and the bathrooms at work, schools, libraries, bars/restaurants, and everywhere, really.

There are multiple purposes for this challenge:

1) To give people who don’t find going to gendered bathrooms a difficult/unsafe experience a small idea of what it is like for trans and gender variant people to navigate this world. Hopefully, with some real life experience, you will have a broader understanding of how gendered this world really is. But,

DOING THIS DOES NOT GIVE YOU AUTHORITY TO SAY WHAT IT IS LIKE TO BE TRANS OR GENDER VARIANT.

2) To inspire people to fight for more gender neutral bathrooms.

Tips: 
- Don’t drink a lot of liquid if you are leaving the house for long periods of time
- Try to figure out where some gender neutral bathrooms are in your town/city, and plan your day around using a gender neutral bathroom.
- Remember, you can use gendered bathrooms again in May. Some people can’t. 

And, even if you really have to go to the bathroom, try to not see gendered bathrooms as a possible place to go.

If you are interested, feel free to write your experiences down and send them to gnbchallenge@gmail.com. With your permission, they will be included in a zine on the topic of gendered bathrooms.

We also recommend fighting for gender neutral bathrooms in one (or more) public space(s). Often the fight for this aspect of bathroom accessibility is only fought for by trans and gender variant people; It would be nice if other people fought for it too.

(There’s also a Facebook event:https://www.facebook.com/events/209510742488108/)

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PLEASE SIGNAL BOOST!

kyrianne adds:

It would be an interesting caveat to add if you can’t find a gender neutral bathroom, you have to use the one you normally wouldn’t use, but that could cause some actual violence (which happens to trans* people on a regular basis, obviously, but for a thing like this that’s probably not the best ever)

I guess if you want the full experience you could add that to it?

Signal boosting this request for examples of nonbinary gender outside of the transgender and genderqueer communities:

nonbinary:

As part of a nonbinary gender visibility project, I’m attempting to track down people who identify and/or express gender outside of the binary (as in something other than woman or man) despite not being involved in mainstream trans* communities.

I’m mainly active in transgender, transsexual and genderqueer communities and, as you’d expect, I know of many nonbinary people through those. These are communities that are primarily about gender transgression (of various kinds) where nonbinary experience is directly on topic.

I’m also active in various queer and (a)sexuality-based communities, most notably the asexual and bi communities and have found those to be supportive of nonbinary identity and expression, and so good places to meet others who don’t fit binary classifications. These are communities that are about sexuality that defies the hetero/homo binary and so tend to be either extremely openminded to nonbinary gender or see it as an overlapping issue. (The pansexual community would obviously fall here too).

And I feel at home and accepted as a nonbinary person at (most) literary science fiction conventions I attend (and other cons with similar feels). There (trans)gender isn’t (usually) the topic of discussion, but members of the community are generally openminded to new ideas and other ways of being, and of course there’s no shortage of science fiction that plays with gender or imagines different models of sex and gender. So this can be seen as part of a third category of community that isn’t about or related to gender transgression, but is open minded and accepting of those expressing a nonbinary gender.

Those are my experiences. What I’m now interested in doing is assembling a list of other communities where people express and find acceptance of their nonbinary genders, preferably those that are not directly related to ‘mainstream’ transgender, genderqueer and transsexual communities.

Based on my research and feedback from others, I’ve assembled the following list of communities that are (or may be) directly related to, or supportive of, nonbinary gender (which again, I’m defining as identifying or living as something other than a woman or a man):

• Intersex support groups and activist organisations
• Transvestite and crossdresser communities (those not following mainstream transgender narratives of gender identity and dysphoria)
• Butch/Femme
• Radical faeries
• The eunuch and castration communities
• Extreme body modification
• Kink and fetish communities
• Drag and cabaret performer communities
• Artist communities, particularly performance art (Burning Man?)
• Empowered multiplicity/plurality/median/mid-continuum
• Otherkin
• Female bodybuilders (perhaps? Cited as gender transgressive in Feinberg’s Trans Liberation)
• Goth and similar subcultures (Twitter suggestion)
• Certain parts of the pagan community (Twitter suggestion)

(And I should stress, I’m not saying everyone within these communities is nonbinary, any more than I’m suggesting everyone within the trans* community is, just that they may well be home to some people who see themselves as something other than women or men).

Can anyone reading point me towards nonbinary individuals from those communities, or to articles written (or documentaries filmed!) about nonbinary gender within them?

Or can anyone suggest any other communities/subcultures that haven’t been suggested yet that are home to or accepting of people who identify or live as something other than male or female?

I’ve created a page on the nonbinary.org wiki for further examples and supporting information to be recorded. Please comment here or make edits there to add your suggestions and examples:

Nonbinary gender outside of the transgender community

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* The asterisk at the end of ‘trans*’ denotes that this is the wider inclusive form of trans that includes all transgender, transsexual, nonbinary, genderqueer, gender variant and gender nonconforming people regardless of gender identity or expression.

Signal boosting:

nonbinary:

The UK trans* activist organisation Trans Media Action is running Trans Camp on January 13th at the offices of Channel 4.

Trans Camp will bring together trans* people, developers, designers and innovators to come up with ideas to improve the lives of trans* people using web technologies and the media.

In order to make sure the widest range of experiences are covered, they’re looking for one minute video responses from trans* people around the UK explaining their experiences:

Although around half of the participants will be trans there will also be people there who have never knowingly come across a trans person.

So, we want your short video responses to one or more of these questions. You can use your phone, webcam or something fancier – it doesn’t matter as long as we can hear you and see you (or whatever you choose to film while you’re speaking or subtitling.)

Your videos will be played at Channel 4 on 13th January to the participants of Trans Camp. They will also be put together on a website for people to see in the run up to the camp and afterwards. Your videos will be public so you must be sure you’re happy for them to be seen by anyone online.

Why? We want to give those who are new to trans issues an idea of the diversity within the trans community. We want to bring to life some of the questions we’re asking with real people’s voices.

QUESTIONS: Answer ONE* question per video – max 1 minute

1. CHILDHOOD: For those of you who knew, what was it like growing up as a trans child?
2. MEDIA: How does media coverage of trans people affect you?
3. COMEDY: How do comedy portrayals of trans people affect you?
4. FAMILY: How have you experienced support, or lack of, from family and friends?

*You can answer more than one question if you like, just make a separate video.

If you’re in the United Kingdom and trans* nonbinary, genderqueer or otherwise gender variant or gender nonconforming, please consider submitting a video to make sure the full diversity of trans* experiences are represented in this important project.

Full instructions on how to submit your video responses

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* The asterisk at the end of ‘trans*’ denotes that this is the wider inclusive form of trans that includes all transgender, transsexual, nonbinary, genderqueer, gender variant and gender nonconforming people regardless of gender identity or expression.

nonbinary:

New year, new web presence! Nonbinary.org now hosts a nonbinary gender community wiki with forums coming soon!

Get involved by expanding stub articles or creating wanted pages.