Can someone explain?

Hi. Thanks for your post and adding that intro paragraph for context.

I agree that society is often obsessed with labels and that gender stereotypes are sometimes ridiculous, but I’d also say that a lot of people, especially those in the LGBTQ+ community, find labels comforting.

And gender is complicated and nuanced and hard to understand sometimes, and that’s okay. I also identify as cisgender and while I’m a part of the LGBTQ+ community, it took me a long time to grasp the concept of gender and sometimes I still don’t fully understand it. And that’s also okay, as long as I respect and validate those who identify as anything other than cisgender.

So, to try and explain gender is rather difficult, especially speaking as a cisgender woman, but I’ll try.

Gender is not the same as your biological sex (which is also more than the male/female binary--but that’s a different topic). Biological sex is assigned based on, yes, your genitals and then gender is usually assumed based on that. But gender can differ from the sex you were assigned at birth, and is more than just expressing yourself as masculine or feminine. It’s possible to have a feeling or sensation of gender like your genderfluid friend is describing.

You may have experienced those feelings of gender without knowing it because you’ve always identified with the gender (male) that you were assigned at birth. For transgender and nonbinary people, their feeling of gender is often at odds with the gender they were assigned at birth. This opposition can cause significant discomfort and distress. Given this, gender is often felt more strongly by folks who identify as trans and/or nonbinary.

But back to the point. Gender is a spectrum, and there are many gender identities (like genderfluid) that exist outside of the traditional male-female gender binary. Nonbinary is often used as an umbrella term to describe these identities, but it can also be used as a standalone identifier.

And anyone, of any gender, may express themselves in a variety of ways that may be coded ot stereotypically seen as ‘masculine,’ ‘feminine,’ ‘androgynous,’ or anything else. This expression could take the form of clothes, the way they hold themselves, makeup, anything. And all of that expression is valid!

It’s fine to not believe in gender stereotypes and I agree, anyone of any gender can do whatever they want. But I don’t think that in order to have gender identity you need to accept gender stereotypes. Some people, cis or not, may want to use or fit into gender stereotypes because it makes them feel good or happy or like they belong. Your genderfluid friend may want to use the femininity that’s ascribed to dresses and the masculinity that’s ascribed to having a flat chest (binder) and wear docs because it makes them happy and aligns with whatever gender identity they’re feeling that day.

And some people may just naturally fall into gender stereotypes without realizing it, and that’s also totally fine.

And again, you can choose to reject labels and not ‘buy into it,’ but for some people that’s what brings them comfort, and no one can change that. All we can do is accept people as they are, as whatever they identify as.

I hope this was helpful. There’s so much more to gender than I wrote here, but I tried to keep it relatively concise.

However, if you’d like to do some further reading on gender, here are some resources:

LGBT HERO has some gender identity resources here: www.lgbthero.org.uk/Pages/Category/gender-identity that also may aid you in understanding gender.

Gender Spectrum has a great page on understanding gender: genderspectrum.org/articles/understanding-gender

Gendered Intelligence also has info: genderedintelligence.co.uk/

Hopefully these are helpful as well.

Elle