15-06.22.117 in Book Two: The Fifteenth Year of the Third Millennium of the Common Era

Originally, I thought about doing this in Intellectual Controversies… but decided what I really wanted to do was go deeply personal. Deep dive some of my personal history and emotions. So.... emotional book? No, because I do want to discuss more than just the emotional aspects of this. And I damned sure want to start this by how my day was panning out. So here. But then I have to ask a further question… should I prohibit comments? I don’t know if I’ve ever done that here. I don’t know if I’ve ever considered it. Because… many reasons. (1) I am all about conversation. Let’s TALK about these things that are part of our lives. If we don’t learn to communicate, all we’ll deal with forever will be misunderstandings and conflict. (2) Notes on Prosebox are like crack to me. Not even using that cliche as a joke. I check Prosebox throughout the day to see if anyone has commented. PBers are some of my closest friends now… because all my good friends live in a different state… so THIS is my social network. So… ultimately… I won’t prohibit comments here. I just… hope that I won’t get accusatory comments and that, if there is something that offends or disturbs… we can engage in a dialogue instead of venom spewing.

My day was largely pretty mundane. I drank too much last night (poor decision on my part) and Wife woke me up around 10 am. I made her a hotdog and tinkered around on the computer trying to find ANY job posting for Iowa Attorneys. Turned on the TV and got sucked into a program that I will write about AT LENGTH (kind of the bulk of the entry). Went to work for a few hours to help with paperwork. Came home. I really should eat something today. All I’ve had in the last 18 hours is Gatorade and a hotdog. Tonight, unless she comes home “in a mood” Wife and I are going to go see Inside Out. It looks great and we’re both excited to see the film.

NOW… the program I got sucked into. Frankly, the program itself wasn’t the issue… but what happened within me, etc.

I was watching TV and SVU was doing a marathon about Trans-gendered people and the gay community… and advertising that a few of their Prime Time Original Series were going to have episodes about Trans-gendered individuals. And pretty much ladle after ladle of scooping up the Trans-gendered thing. And it started bothering me. It started making me sad and a little angry. And I couldn’t explain it. I’m not anti-trans-individuals. In a twist of fate, one of my trans friends has a birthday today. Gabe (born Gabriela) is celebrating his birthday in style today with his supportive and lovely wife. And… perhaps it is left over from my upbringing… my parents are both super religious Christians. But, while it is true that my dad has always been the “Judgmental Christian” stereotype… my mom was raised by Hippies, dude… she’s super okay with people of all different cultural, ethnic, or sexual backgrounds.

As I started watching all of the episodes, a few things kept being said (1) “I’ve known since I was a child!” Maybe this was bothering me? Because… while it isn’t unthinkable or unheard of for someone to “know since childhood”… maybe I felt by having it always said that the show was isolating and excluding people who maybe didn’t? Maybe I was upset that the culture claiming to be more tolerant to trans people were excluding a part of that population? Possible. (2) The episodes always suggested that at childhood, the play was gender-specific-different. The girls born as boys always discussed how they wanted to play Barbies and Dress Up but were forced to play with GI Joes and Trucks. The girls born as boys discussed how they would try on their mothers’ dresses and high heels and the episodes suggested that such play was proof of trans-gender. Clearly that part was bothering me. Toys and Childhood play SHOULDN’T involve sex or gender. AT ALL. EVER! Childhood playing is how kids learn to be who they are, learn to express themselves, learn how to interact with others, and learn about what interests them in the world. A kid that wears mommy’s clothes doesn’t necessarily mean that child is going to be a woman. A child that plays with Barbies doesn’t necessarily become a trans-kid.

The whole thing was becoming super upsetting. Like… distressingly so. I didn’t know why. I don’t know why. So I cam here… so I could write out all the things I’m thinking about that this whole thing started me to thinking about. Because… I can’t say exactly why I’m so sad and angry… I’m a little worried that trying to explain it will make me sound like a bigot. So… I’ll just write my thoughts… see what to make of it.

I remember when I was a kid; probably 2 or 3 years old. I would spend my afternoons at the Babysitter’s house. Her name was Mary. She watched her own kids and a whole mess of others. She had ALL sorts of toys and a ping pong table and a Nintendo and a play set and drums and blocks and even cabinet arcade games!! I always wanted to play on the play set… but every summer when it was time to do that… I would get stung by bees. Lots of them. And I would cry. Because OW OW OW OW OW OW OW. So I didn’t want to go play outside anymore. And that made me “a big baby.” But indoors had great stuff! I wanted to play video games with the other boys. But the boys didn’t want to play with the little baby… the only people that would play with me were the girls. We’d do tea parties and My Little Pony. I was always North Star or Twilight. We’d play dress up and make believe and I think that is where I first started to become interested in acting.

I remember when we moved to Des Moines when I was 4 or 5. The first people I met were girls around my age and they had an AWESOME little playhouse in their back yard!! We’d talk and have conversations and play house and have fun. Then when I started school that year, I was only able to make 1 male friend for some reason. I didn’t understand why. Still don’t. Only thing I can guess is since I hung around girls so much, the other boys didn’t want to have anything to do with me?? But I did make one friend. He and I played Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles all the time! Until one day, I came over for a scheduled play date… and he was gone. The whole family. All of them had just… disappeared suddenly. I still don’t know what happened. I always secretly assumed it was either Witness Protection or something criminal.

I tried sports. I figured… I like being active, I want friends, sports seems like a good idea. I tried every sport: basketball, baseball, volleyball, tennis, golf, gymnastics. I was always too short, too weak, too slow, too afraid of the ball, too something and would inevitably come to be the target of bullies. I can still name most of my bullies from back then. And the bullying wasn’t randomized. It was never “Nice going, no eyes” or anything like that. It was always “Christina.” I was always called “Christina” or “Chrissy” or “Christy.” For 5 years, at least half of the boys I knew would only call me by a girl name.

In Boy Scouts, it wasn’t much better. The only friend I had was a clearly homosexual young man. I say clearly not because I’m being homophobic. This kid was out and proud and very “give me attention because I’m gay.” On the swings, he’d yell loudly until someone looked at him… as soon as he got their attention, he would jump off the swing and land in the splits. If it was a boy who had just seen that, they would invariably say “Wow… doesn’t that hurt?!” To which he would always say “Nope!” and then wink at them. So… yeah. Clearly gay. And when I say friend… I don’t mean friend. I was the only one who would talk to him and, because of that, nobody else in the boy scout troop would talk to me. My mom, being the open and encouraging person she is, always tried to encourage this friendship (because “he doesn’t have anyone else”) but after two very awkward very uncomfortable sleep-overs, I told her never ever ever again.

I was involved in all sorts of music and theater growing up. I was in two dance groups every summer, show choir, honor choir, orchestra, thespians, mimes, improv troupe, broadway camp. Yeaaaaaah. I was quickly labeled as homosexual. I wasn’t. I mean… I was 13… I hadn’t even really given much consideration to serious dating yet… and already people are telling me that I am a homosexual. I didn’t think I was. I mean… girls were attractive. And pretty. I’d even had an erection by this point (because 90s girls were awesome and yes, I seriously mean Topanga Lawrence, Stephanie Tanner, Kimberly Ann Hart, Trini Kwan, Monica Geller, Kelly Kapowski, Alex Tabor, Rachel Meyers, Lindsay Warner, Alex Mack, Fran Fine, Aaliyah, and Alisa Reyes) but… I was fairly certain that I wasn’t gay.

Things got worse in High School. MUCH worse. I had female friends, not a lot of guy friends. I was involved in theater and music, not a lot of sports. The sport I was involved in was swimming. I was skinny, thoughtful, and emotionally expressive. I was NOT going to have sex in High School and I was very willing to discuss that decision with ANYONE who wanted to challenge it or me. Honestly… when I think about it, I guess I’m not surprised that my friend Jane still has old High School acquaintances ask her if I’ve come out yet. And that is serious. There are still people we knew from back then that ask her that. And of course… if everyone THINKS you’re gay… everyone is going to TREAT you like you are gay. So… I got picked on “like a gay kid” even though I wasn’t one. Which complicates matters. Because… gay kids could go to the LGBT counselors for help. I couldn’t. Because I wasn’t gay. I’m not even kidding about that. On a few occasions, I honestly pretended to be gay just to have one of them listen to me about being bullied. That’s why I didn’t go to the counselors usually. My “guidance counselor” in school was the school nurse. Straight up. I remember once after school was over and everyone had gone home except kids like me (who basically lived in the school due to after school activities)… I’m in the blue hallway walking to a rehearsal and it is just me and two female friends and I just stop and say, “Sometimes, I wish I were gay. It would make everything easier!” And that statement was not made out of ignorance or arrogance. It was genuine and it was true. AND that statement (you’ll have to remember) was made years before “Queer Eye For the Straight Guy”.

I remember… late in my High School years… crying in front of my dad. Something I hate doing to this day. Just sobbing in front of my dad telling him how hard it was and how I was genuinely worried he thought that I was gay, too.

Ultimately… the thing being that I didn’t have a place where I fit in, exactly. I was “too gay” for people to think I was straight but too attracted to girls to actually be gay. In other words, I didn’t fit the Binary Bullshit.

Then when I went to college… I had my voice rather forcefully taken away. It wasn’t literal, it wasn’t like I could no longer form words. But every. single. place where people were discussing social reform, politics, philosophy, ethics.... I was “an educated straight white male that identified as Christian” so I wasn’t allowed to have an opinion or share my opinion because it would come from a place of bigotry and arrogance. Never mind the fact that dismissing a person’s view point because you perceive them to be “the oppressor” based on appearance is itself bigotry and arrogance!

And then the world became THAT for me. Growing up, I was picked on for being small and a “baby”… then I was picked on mercilessly for being gay, even though I wasn’t. Then when I became an adult… society started “picking on” me for being a white male. Oh, I know white men have historically skewed “the game” in their favor. I get that. But… why is it okay to claim my opinions have no merit? Why is it acceptable to tell me to my face that my viewpoint isn’t valid because of my gender and skin color? Guess what… I DO know what it is like to lose a job you’re more qualified for because of gender-bias… so I do know how shitty that is and why it needs to be stopped. While working at Best Buy a Department Head position became available. I was the ONLY applicant. I had been working at that store for TWO YEARS and had a COLLEGE DEGREE. The stupid (yes, I’ll say it) bitch that denied me the job accidentally left her e-mail open… and I saw the communique to the other managers.... which said “CK is an excellent candidate for leadership; but this store has too many male department heads. I do not want to interview any men for this position and will not hire any men for this position. Please send me all female applicants who would be interested in advancement.” Yes. That really happened. Yes. I did read and memorize that. No, I was not going to sue. I needed the job. Do you know what happened? A high school drop out became the head of that department… a female. I was “graciously” given the Assistant Department Head job. Less money. Ironically, the Department Head decided to just have me do all of her work AND my work. So… yeah, I do know what Gender-Specific Bias in the work place feels like. I do have a strong opinion on it. And I do think it needs to be done away with entirely!

And I think writing all of this out may have helped me figure out the exact precise thing that bothered me so much!

Labels.
Labels and how society seems to need them.

We can’t just be people, can we? We can’t be a child that plays with dolls and GI Joes. We have to be labeled. We can’t be people. We have to exist in a Labeled and Binary society. You’re either Gay or Straight. What about asexuals? What about bisexuals? What about omnisexuals? Many of those individuals are still shit all over. In fact, the Gay community actively shits on the asexual community. Hell, we’re not that long past when homosexual men and lesbian women would treat each other as somehow each other’s enemies! We have to exist with all these bullshit binary labeling politics. Boy or Girl… never both. Cis-Gendered or Trans-Gendered… never somehow possibly between the two. We aren’t allowed to be humans with ever changing, ever growing, ever unique experiences. We have to FIT somewhere in all the horrid bullshit. If you’re straight… you don’t get to talk about Gay Rights, no matter what your own personal story is. If you’re white… you don’t get to talk about what it feels like to be a minority, even if you grew up in an all-black Detroit community. If you’re a cis-gendered male… you don’t get to talk about trans rights because you don’t have the first clue what it is like to feel different from your gender. All of this binary YES/NO, On/Off, 0,1 bullshit. THAT is what bothers me. And you know what? I’m frightened by it. Because as we pretend to be more openly accepting… all we’re doing is being more okay with specific labels. I’m honestly frightened for all the little boys and girls out there like me. The ones living now when the labeling and the confusion they may face is MORE rampant, not less. What if there is a little boy out there right now… doesn’t even know the world allows people to change their genders… and he’s having fun playing with Mommy’s make up and playing Barbie with his sister… and what if someone comes along and says, “Clearly he’s trans-gendered, you should look into hormone blockers for the future.” I get that such a fear may sound idiotic and like I’m a bigot… but I do wonder and worry and it isn’t out of hate… it is out of empathy… and it is out of a strong worry that, “There but by the grace of God go I.” Because honestly… what if someone came to my parents and said… your son plays with girls, does girly things, boys are calling him a girl’s name… he may be trans-gendered and you should look into gender reassignment?

It is true that I honestly do NOT know what it is like to be trans-gendered. Because I have never not been a boy in my mind. I have always been a boy. But I’ve always been called a girl by other people (even my wife) because of behavior. Behavior NOT biology NOR psychology. I just… I worry about people that may be in my situation. Not fitting a rigid or strict binary concept of how life says you should be. Being told that you’re THIS or THAT even when you know you’re not. I guess… I just wish we were all working towards a world where we were PEOPLE and not all the other labels. And as wonderful as it is to enter into (possibly) a new age of acceptance for Trans individuals… it just feels like another Binary Label to hang out collective hats on. You’re Cis or Trans now, take your pick. But for the people out there that aren’t just binary… we move on, ignoring them at best… or at worst, trying to force them to fit into a binary mold that isn’t right or okay or acceptable and doesn’t fit or help them or improve their lives in anyway.