Preparing for the Shitstorm
But I have a completely legitimate journal to write with lots of questions.
You guys all know what Otaku's/Otherkin are, right?
People who believe that they're REALLY just an animal or a video game/movie/book/anime character on the inside.
That they're in the wrong body.
Oftentimes they're given slack for thinking that they're a wolf/Mario/Naruto reincarnated, because, what the hell... You're human!
But how is this really any different than Transgender/Genderqueers?
I'd like to reiterate that I support and accept both of you guys, but I'm just going to write to ask opinions. I mean not to offend anyone here.
A lot of argument to these people is that there's no possible way they could be reincarnated wolves/characters, since they first had to be exposed to them to know what they were like, and to attatch to it.
I ask you: Is this related to gender identitiy?
Had we, as humans, grown up not even knowing the difference between bodies (Pretend we all look asexual and the genitals are hidden from view always), would we all be straight still? Bisexual? If we can't see the sex of anyone, would Transgenders still feel wrong about their body? Would Genderqueers want to be "seperate" genders?
If you're not exposed to anything different, would you be technically forced to accept your body? Or would you still feel odd?
And why is it okay to bash on Otaku's/Otherkin for feeling like they aren't the same inside, when it's OH SO WRONG to not understand or believe that TG and GQ don't have legitimate problems?
In the end of the day, what causes that dysphoria? Is it really something you're born with, or is it exposure? I'm sure for Otherkin/Otaku's, you'd say "Well you think you're a VULCAN inside!? Of course that's exposure!", but how is that really any different?
I had good news but I'm too lazy and tired. Still bleeding. Took a five hour nap today and I'm still dog tired. My back hurts like hell. My muscles need massaging.
Accidentally bra-flashed my orchestra teacher yesterday. I'm like 80% sure he's gay, and I feel terrible.
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Comments
I am a Vulcan. Lol - - - - -
I am a Vulcan. Lol
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I don't need company in the company of you. I don't need love, your love will do. And I've got you and you've got me and this is all you need. I don't need air, I don't need to breathe. I don't need rest, I don't have time to sleep.
Lol and I am a pokemon
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That's redick!
CAN I BE RAICHU
CAN I?
Yes
If I can be Manaphy. ^_^
Technically she asked me :P
And yes, Super Duck, you can be :P
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That's redick!
It's not like trans people
It's not like trans people ask to be a gender, so other people shouldn't ask to be a pokemon.
^Win.
Uhh...
Okay?
I didn't think it was a competition.
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That's redick!
Well...
It seems only related to transgender issues in the sense that it hijacks their language to propel what is essentially nonsense but giving it the false notion of authority. Sorry, but if your actual life sucks, you don't get to be Tyler Durden or a donkey.
All of the rest I don't follow, but not interested in false premise arguments typically, heh. If there was only one flavor of ice cream, would you long for something different? Bleh. This is more a sci-fi premise than anything.
And I'm adding Otaku and Otherkin to the list of words I won't use, so cisgendered finally has some company.
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"Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." - Kurt Cobain
Well I don't normally use those words either,
But I saw a bunch of arguments about this going on, and how we need to RESPECT THE OTHERKINSSSSSS and I was like, what.
I dunno maybe it doesn't make sense, but I had to puke something out so you guys didn't think I was dead :P
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That's redick!
Urban Dictionary seems to nail it...
Otaku is extremely negative in meaning as it is used to refer to someone who stays at home all the time and doesn't have a life (no social life, no love life, etc)
Usually an otaku person has nothing better to do with their life so they pass the time by watching anime, playing videogames, surfing the internet (otaku is also used to refer to a nerd/hacker/programmer).
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"Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." - Kurt Cobain
That's the traditional Japanese meaning of it :P
but "otherkin" adopt it as a... *gag* loving term for them. Ehuhuhughh.
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That's redick!
So much has passed me by :(
I wish I knew how to speak this language! :(
Oh, well...
heh...
You're not missing anything. ;-)
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"Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." - Kurt Cobain
It shouldn't surprise you when I say...
They're completely different.
For starters, a lot of sex and gender related stuff can be attributed to things like hormonal exposure in the womb. We can't say for sure that, that's what it is, but there is evidence to say that there is some sort of biological difference between trans and cis people. Including things like phantom penises and differences in brain shape pre-hormonal therapy (apparently, trans women's brains look much more like those of cis women than those of cis men). Which makes me think that being trans is an invisible form of being intersex, but the experience is completely different because of the way trans and intersex people are treated. (When I talk about trans people I'm including all forms of gender variance as well.)
There isn't an equivalent for Otaku or Otherkin or whatever.
Anyway, if someone wants to identify as an anime character or a wolf of even a dragon, that's not my business and they can do what they want. It's a form of disassociation. Like, my dad identifies as a "ball of intellectual energy" because he has a fair amount of internalized race issues. I don't really care until he tries to relate to me that way. Being trans is completely different from that. :I
I'm gonna pretend to be a psychologist now, and guess that when people identify strongly with some kind of fictional being or animal, it's because they're trying to escape a problem, probably one that they feel they can't solve.
But being trans isn't like that. People don't ID as trans to get away from something (or at least, not usually, and the people who do tend to realize that they're not trans later on.) and often people will go through denial and do things to get away from realizing that they're trans...
When people ID as otaku or otherkin, they make the choice to somewhere along the line. Chances are they came across it and it "felt right", but it wouldn't have if they didn't want it. If you're trans, it doesn't matter if you want it or not. People ID as trans because something within them is telling them that whatever gender they've been assigned is wrong.
Um... a few things to clarify
Firstly, it's wrong to characterise otakus as people who believe they are fictional characters. They are people who obsess over anime, manga and videogames, and occasionally they dress up as those characters. You will see them at anime/gaming festivals and often they change their costumes from year to year. They certainly don't legitimately think they are naruto one year and suddenly goku in another. They also don't actually think they can cast spells and their existence is to defeat villains.
The difference between 'otaku' and transgender, then, is that otaku indicates an interest, and not actually a form of self-identification. Unless of course you consider liking something as a form of identity - but then anything can be an identity - from eating ice cream to pedophillia, and such a low threshold alone can hardly be grounds for making rights-claims. Unless of course you are saying we just need to 'tolerate' them, then your point is null because we already do. Compare: when I meet a gay person for the first time I don't think 'I must therefore like or dislike them', it depends on the person. Similarly, if I meet an otaku then it will depend on the person. Except, of course being an otaku says more about the person than being transgender. Being transgender is limited to a mismatch between body and gender (and the person could be anything) so we prevent its arbitrary discrimation, while being otaku already indicates certain preferences, associations and behaviour.
word. i was gonna say that.
word. i was gonna say that.
It's pretty safe...
... that I'll never see anyone at an anime or gaming festival ;-)
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"Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." - Kurt Cobain
Here's what I think, and
Here's what I think, and this is actually going to counter Riku's point pretty seriously. Even if gender ID and the trans* identity is hard-wired into us, I think if gender roles weren't associated with your parts/chromosomes/facial hair/etc on such a basic level as they are in our society, the trans* experience would BE EXTREMELY DIFFERENT. I'm not saying it wouldn't exist. I'm saying that the body dysphoria for SOME would probably be eliminated (an example, I, as a transmasculine genderqueer person, don't have dysphoria about my body. I have dysphoria about THE WAY MY BODY LOOKS IN CLOTHES because of the way that body makes people PERCIEVE me), or at least be GREATLY REDUCED. If a "man" and a "woman" were defined by non-physical, but rather emotional, decisions, yes. The trans* experience as we know it would be so altered as to not VISIBLY exist.
~"And why is it okay to bash on Otaku's/Otherkin for feeling like they aren't the same inside?" IT ISN'T OKAY TO BASH ON ANYBODY. people who bash on people, whether they are trans* folk , furries, or anime nerds, are being rude. Now, asking legitamate and interesting questions to see where they're coming from (like draco does all the time on this site)? totally awesome.
~Long story slong, though, I think that dysphoria and the trans experience as we know IS CAUSED BY CONSTANT EXPOSURE TO FIXED GENDER ROLES. remove that from the picture, remove the exposure, as you propose, and yes. Life would be a helluva lot easier and WAY less expensive for the vast majority of transfolk. (see how i said vast majority? I don't speak for everyone, I speak hypothetically.)
<33 great question, draco. ^.^ I think about this all the time.
This reminds me...
Of something Gore Vidal once said, which is that before there was a gay identity, you could have sex with a lot more guys. But once a line was drawn it became, "Hey, I'm not gay..."
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"Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." - Kurt Cobain
right. the idea that one's
right. the idea that one's sexuality is totally set in stone, and that banging a guy means you MUST ONLY BANG ONLY GUYS EVER, probably makes a whole lot of people's sex lives a whole lot less interesting/fulfilling.
same goes for gender.
i've always thought i was a
i've always thought i was a mermaid or a cat born in the wrong body
What makes me feel werid
What makes me feel werid after reading all this is... that I am one of these furries that you guys are talking about... I am a bird furry and believe I was a gryphon... :P
Me likes to dress as a bird, but me never has any conventions to go to... or friends who likes to do the same thing... *sighs* :P
I don't think...
... this journal was anti-furry, etc., just that it isn't the same impulse as transgender.
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"Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." - Kurt Cobain
Well,
here's what I've gathered. The people who are transgendered have a gender identity conflict (if I'm using that correctly). And the people who are anime people or whatever just have an indentity conflict.
They're similar but not the same. Gender identity and self identity are not the same.
But what IS the difference?
How is gender seperate from self? Is gender not a self-identity factor?
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That's redick!
well
i calim no expertise in this area, but they what i think is that gender is a part of yourself, that your born with. now the sex of your body might not macth the gender that you were born as. so what we have hear is your mind, which is who you are is a certain gender, while your body is a differnt gender. but since the body is just a tool of the mind, the sex of the body has no affect on the real gender of the person, since thats all in your mind, which is the part that matters.
"A loving man and woman in a committed relationship can marry. Dogs, no matter what their relationship, are not allowed to marry. How should society treat gays and lesbians in committed relationships? As dogs or as humans?"
To address the above
To address the above conversation about Pokemon: I get to be Ninetails! :D
And as for your question, it's really not as complicated as you think. Here's the difference: gender is a real thing. Anime characters are not real. They are created by people.
Any questions?
"gender is a real thing" I'd
"gender is a real thing"
I'd like to counter that- gender identity and roles are something that our society has created. the idea of what being woman or man means is not universal, nor is it static. Now, physical SEXES exist- people are physically male or female or any or the various brands of intersexed. However, what those sexes mean, how they relate to our identity, lifestyle, and chosen gender... those are things decided by the world around us, not inherently real identities. I would, in fact, argue that gender exists about as much as an anime character does. It is a creation of our imagination that some choose to identify with, read about, study, and/or emulate, and others choose to ignore.
What you just said.
I like it.
I disagree. I think gender
I disagree.
I think gender is biological to some degree, but not in any significant or tangible way, except for that it may effect how people identify themselves or feel about their bodies.
Like, statistically, most people who ID as male have a Y chromosome. But there are plenty of people who don't have a Y that still ID as male, and there are plenty of people with a Y that don't. There's a trend of male identifying people with a Y, but, contrary to popular belief, you can't look at a person's chromosomes and decide how they identify, making the trend meaningless on an individual basis.
And gender is like that. It's a big mix of weird chemical and social and biological hodge-podge that has some trends in some direction or other, but can't say anything about an individual. It's fluid and messy and inconsistent enough that maybe there isn't even a point to acknowledging that there are trends, or possible biological causes. Everyone is different, and reacts to things differently, this is true socially and biologically. Humans are complex machines and any tiny difference in the mechanics could amplify into any number of things.
Gender is something inherent in most people and buried deep enough that whenever people try to understand why they feel it, they're at a loss. You ask an otaku why they like anime, they'll have a response for you. It might be something silly but it's surfacey enough that they can come up with a reason. Trans people get asked why they ID as whatever gender they do all of the time, but I've never seen anyone give a solid answer to that question. Usually responses beat around the bush and end up along the lines of "because that's how I feel" or "because that's who I am".
Whatever gender is, it's pretty hard-wired into most people (I think fluidity is something that can be wired in too, because it's still a form of identification, even if that identification is something that changes over time), and you can't change it by bringing a person up a different way. That says to me that there's something biological going on at some level. Without all of the social constructs, a lot of stuff that society has built up around gender wouldn't matter, and most of what people think of gender is just things we've built up around it based on trends. But gender wouldn't cease to exist.
Buuuut, none of this matters because whether someone was "born that way" or if they chose their identity, it doesn't effect the validity of their identity and it doesn't effect how much respect they deserve.
ahh, and here we have a
ahh, and here we have a basic disagreement on what the definition of "real" is. Because when I say that gender isn't real, I mean gender as our society defines it- mam/woman binary roles that fit along male/female binary sexual characteristics.
I'm not saying that there isn't some kind of basic feeling of gender within our species. But there's no way to PROVE that that feeling is basic/universal/definable.
what I believe is that gender wouldn't exist in a vacuum- that if you removed all the societal roles and knowledge of the sexyparts of others, as Draco proposed in the original question, gender AS WE KNOW IT would cease to exist. And because I'm an idealistic nihilist type, I connect that inability to exist in a vacuum as a lack on true reality.
HOWEVER. I cannot prove any of what I just said. It's just my personal view of gender that makes me feel better about my life. And honestly, everything you said makes perfect sense to me, too.
The question becomes... what would gender have to BE in order for it to be REAL?
For a nonsense thread...
This certainly got a lot of play.
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"Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." - Kurt Cobain