He/They

In the last year or two, I have taken to identifying my pronouns as He/They.

I can't actually remember the first time I did it and I haven't until now talked much about its meaning or my reasoning. But tonight I want to chronicle my personal experience with gender and try to understand how I got to where I am (and in the process maybe help someone else understand the world of gender just a little bit better).

As I kid I don't think I demonstrated some of the stereotypical flags of someone who identified beyond their assigned at birth gender. I dressed in traditionally "male" ways and was always comfortable doing so. I participated in classically "male" activities, like blacktop soccer rivalries and pop-warner football, and felt I belonged without much question.

Though my life wasn't restricted to those "male" activities, I was fairly into art and music and enjoyed cartoons like Powerpuff Girls. I think, that was more a result of a healthy upbringing that didn't force me into predetermined gendered boxes, it really had little or nothing to do with what would become my gender identity.

I mention this because it highlights how different my gender journey has been to that of my sexual orientation. I didn't come out as bisexual until high school.

And even though my sexual orientation is probably better understood now as pansexual (an attraction to a person regardless of gender); the nostalgia of labeling my first sexual revelation, the effort it would take to re-come-out as a new label with near to the exact same meaning as the first, and the fact I prefer the bi-flag colors have all kept me clinging to that identity since high school without much change.

Even before I formally came-out as bisexual I, internally, was able to look back on my childhood and know it is who I always was, even if I didn't know it yet. I can think back to childhood "best-friends" who were boys that I absolutely had a crush on. I can remember wanting to hold their hands and getting jealous when they hung out with other friends. I remember in middle school not being anywhere near as grossed out as some of my peers were when we learned about male reproductive organs during sex ed. And I remember catching myself appreciating the attractive male artists of screen and sound just as much as I did the females...

In fact as I think about it the reality dance TV show "So You Think You Can Dance" actually played an embarrassingly large role in helping me figure that out. While other members of my family would remark that their eyes would fixate on one dancer or another... mine were constantly bouncing back and forth between the opposite-sex duos.

I have a fraction of as many gender-related memories. As a teenager I dressed like a basic white guy; jeans or shorts and hoodie.

As I came out as bi and generally just grew up a later in high school and with that my style evolved. But not in gender-bending ways. It just became jeans, a t-shirt or occasional collared shirt, a tweed blazer (you don't need to shame me, I assure you I am embarrassed enough), and a LOUD flat cap covered in pins and buttons. Still dumb white-boy attire, just with some "oooh look I am political" edge.

That said there are occasional moments here and there where I started to play with how I displayed my gender, I can remember the time I wore a friend's skirt at a party because I was getting to overheated in jeans and ended up feeling very at home. I loved the few times I got try drag with friends already in the community as young adult. I would go shopping with girl friends and realizing their clothes were much cuter than the men's section. But none of these memories were rooted in dysphoria; extreme discomfort, anxiety, and/or shame in/with one's own body. They did not reveal a deeply suppressed identity beyond the binary I was raised in.

And it wasn't like I didn't have opportunities to discover this about myself or learn about the community. I was luckier than most, I was connected with friends and partners fairly early in my life that identified as genderfluid, transgender, and nonbinary. And that entire time I was seen as a man and felt like one too.

This feeling continued throughout the start of college. I was an ally, I respected pronouns, I fought to make sure Trans Lives Matter and are protected, but I remained sure I was cis-gender myself. Until I met a brave young person.

Out of respect to them, I won't include any identifying information, but I got to become a friend to this remarkable young person. I got to stand by them with ever-growing respect and love as they journeyed through their sexual orientation and gender identity, having to deconstruct a lifetime of coercive and reductive socialization. I watched them hide their identity from people who were supposed to love them.

I watched someone risk their livelihood because they knew who they are. They knew that the loved ones lost and risks risked could not hurt them as much as lying to themselves about their identity. It makes me emotional now just thinking about it again.

Seeing them and so many other friends and folks like them having to overcome the tragedy of a doctor making an honest mistake at their birth and misgendering them from the get-go leaves me awestruck. I cannot imagine the strength it takes to look at a world that refuses to see you in any way other than the one it assumes and say, "no I am who I am and you don't get to have an opinion about it."

I have friends who walk outside every day and are forced to say exactly that just by the way they dress, talk, and introduce themselves. And every day they have to stay strong while the world abuses and weathers their identity with nonstop "ma'ams", "misters", and "bros". What we are taught as respectful etiquette has evolved to assuming things about people we cannot even being to understand without them explicitly telling us.

They know who they are, and they fight every day to live in a world that will one day respect them as who they are. And while every day I plan to get up and fall in line alongside them in solidarity with that fight, it still doesn't feel a fight that belongs to me personally.

So I come back to my pronouns, after having comfortably listed them as He/They now for about two years. I can't remember when exactly I added the "They" or why exactly I did it, but they've recently been a subject of conversation with friends, teachers, and family. In these conversations, I have been able to speak endlessly on the experiences of others and the communities properly-pronouning can protect, but when I am asked point-blank about my own, I fumble.

In this post about my personal journey through gender, I have dedicated a not-insignificant amount of time to my sexual orientation and the gender journeys of others. This is because I am not sure I have ever actually fully sat down and tried to answer this question, the "They" really just kinda felt right.

When I am asked by family or friends, my answer is usually something like "while I identity as a man, I don't feel fully committed to the idea of masculinity, I embrace masculinity, femininity, and androgyny to different degrees at different fluctuating times."

And while that statement is not exactly untrue, it is more an academic answer than a personal one. And just because someone identifies as a man doesn't mean they owe the world masculinity, gender-expectations are archaic and people should be given the space to embrace their true selves without feeling pressured into a label or box.

Now it feels like I am somehow simultaneously suggesting I don't need to identify with the "They" pronoun to be my genuine self, that everyone should identify with non-gendered pronouns, and that the idea of gender, gender roles, and pronouns are incompatible with the human experience.

So yeah maybe pronouns are a little old-fashioned or constrictive, since I don't anticipate abolishing them any time soon...

...so I am forced to return to the question; why do I use He/They pronouns?

At first, I thought this post would be exploring my personal motivations and feelings justifying my use of the singular "They" pronoun (not that anyone ever owes you a justification for their pronouns, I am choosing to provide a justification on my own accord, please don't be a rude colander and go around asking people to justify their pronouns to you). But upon deeper thinking, I think I have to back up both.

The "He" feels simple, I have always been identified by the outside world as a "He" and I can honestly say that has made me uncomfortable... or at least I cannot honestly say it never has.

I am a man who loves how makeup looks on men, and yet outside painting my nails; am I going about my day with a killer contour and smoky eye? Definitely not.

I like how certain dresses and skirts feel and look on me, but outside drag shows, some very queer-friendly parties, or maybe the occasional political statement do I ever rock them out and about? Again, definitely not.

Do I sometimes feel weird in a men's restroom and hate using urinals? Yeah, but I still definitely use them and would feel a million times more uncomfortable in a women's restroom.

So let's examine the "He". Is the inclusion of the "He" the ingenuine part of my identity? Is it a result of some internalized transphobia? Or perhaps out of fear? I have seen the struggle that has followed friends across the spectrum when they came out, the confusion, the constant misgendering, the apathy or vitriol they face... and the reality that it makes applying for jobs harder, buying a beer uncomfortable, and meeting new people terrifying. So maybe having the "He" default is a crutch, if I never admit to myself that I am not a man then I never have to reconcile my identity with a world that won't accept me as anything else.

While I have at different times felt all those feelings to different degrees, I still feel fairly secure in my male identity. I got lucky, I was assigned male at birth and remain to this day someone who is comfortable living in that space. But I definitely am also somebody who is not as comfortable living with that identity as another cis-man might be. All my abovementioned anxieties and feelings are still real, even if they aren't public (well I mean now they are on the internet but like four people read this blog so not sUpEr PuBiLiC).

This is where the "They" enter the picture. Is the "They" a tool for encompassing all those intricacies of my identity? How I try to address my gender-related anxieties? A way to tell the world I am comfortable being identified as a man but I refuse to feel and live the way you think a man should? Is it a reflection of who I truly am, a man who at times in his life has felt his gender become much more fluid and transcend the "He" pronoun?

Or is it something less esoteric? The thought has certainly crossed my mind. As a bisexual person, you often will hear "you're just bi for the attention" or "you're just bi to be trendy and different". And while that's bullshit, I assure you my bisexuality has played little role in me being an outspoken person that takes up too much space. I am a white political science student who has read too much Marxist theory, it was a foregone conclusion I would be loud and take up too much space regardless of my sexual and gender identities.

Still, the ideas fester. Am I identifying as "They" because being cis-gender is too "basic" or "normal"? While the idea is scary, it also almost certainly not the case. The "They" goes generally unnoticed because I don't ever actually have to come out as someone beyond the binary because to a very real degree my identity still subscribes to binary.

I think there is a question that carries more weight though; do I identify with the "They" because I am trying to communicate to historically marginalized communities that I am not like "those" white cis-gender men? By nature of how I present to the world, I represent the very thing I oppose, a system of patriarchal, forced-binary, white supremacy. I organize against the system, but I still benefit from it. My academia is rooted in studying alternatives to the system, to critiquing the system, but still I benefit from the system. And I still I mess up, I take advantage of my privileges in ways that hurt others and then say or do things which minimize their experiences.

So is the "They" pronoun an attempt to cling to something that will separate myself from the system. These thoughts are not new to me, they often arise when I question my sexuality. My longest, most public relationships have been straight passing, so am I really bisexual? Or do I just long for a way to be disconnected from this system of exploitation, marginalization, and oppression? Essentially, am I trying to fabricate oppression as a means to reduce my white and male guilt?

I wish I could follow this up with a triumphant and well reinforced "NO!" but instead all I can offer is a noticeably hesitant and anxious "no". I have had real emotional and sexual connections with men and nonbinary folk, I have genuinely questioned the "He" in my identity, and I feel self-aware enough that I would stop myself from engaging in an internal race to the bottom. But, the imposter syndrome cannot be rationalized away and I can't say that right now that I totally want it to.

I, like everyone, should feel totally comfortable identifying as their genuine selves. That means people should absolutely feel comfortable and safe acknowledging genders outside the binary and sexuality outside heterosexuality, but also means there should be comfort and pride in being an ally. I am still wrestling with which one I feel more comfortable identifying as inside, and I think there is value if being public about that too. You can't come out of the closet without fumbling around in the dark looking for the doorknob first. I might have stepped out but I am still learning to walk, still questioning my identity, and still unsure of who I am.

I think that's why I identify as "He/They" because if I don't know who exactly I am yet, then you sure as hell don't get to either.

So, for now, I am Peter Gaughan, son of Cathy and Pete, brother of Sally Ann, way too proud of my Irish-American heritage, at my most joyful when listening to live music or on a mountain, constantly trying to fight systems of exploitation and oppression, and I use He/They pronouns.

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Tonight's selection pairs best with a full-bodied, persistent Cabernet Sauvignon (which also happens to be my personal favorite)

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Photo: https://blog.asana.com/2018/05/new-profile-setting-pronouns-asana/

Sources: my own clusterfuck of a mind and heart