After I received an email from another list member, it occurred to that it
had been a while since my introduction (Jan, 2000) and some people might not
remember who I am or might even be newer to this list than I am... so I
decided to post my reply to the list as well:
----- Original Message -----
> It appears as if Loree Thomas <loreetg@yahoo.com> wrote:
> |
> |Amara... As both a father AND a woman... I give you MY permission to
> |celebrate in any fashion you want.
>
> Elaborate.
Ok... A little bit of Feminist Theory first.
Biological sex and gender are considered to be two seperate things.
Biological sex is determined (for the most part) by your chomosones...
specifically the xx or xy. We use the words "male" and "female" as sex
designators. We won't go into the possible variations and anomalies, but
for all intents and purposes there are two sexes, male and female, with a
few individuals that are neither one or the other but some combination. The
mixed sex individuals are usually (but not always) sterile.
Gender, OTOH, is considered to be a social construct... a series of roles,
expectations actions and attitudes that vary from culture to culture and
within a culture through time. We use the words "man" and "woman" as gender
designators.
Ok... seems those crazy feminists got somethings right after all.
Gender is a fuzzy concept, with no clearly defined borders... which is why
we can talk about one person being more or less of a man (or woman) than
another.
> I have had the impression that a ``father'' implied a male while a
``woman''
> implied a female, and that a human cannot be both a male and female at the
> same time.
So you see, your confusion is a result of a mispercieved identity between a
sex (female) and a gender (woman).
Just to further confuse things... there are different types of gender.
Internal gender (which appears to be set in the womb and unchangable)
expressed gender (what you choose to show the outside world) and percieved
gender (what the world sees when it looks at you). Except for internal
gender, these attributes can change over time or even vary depending on the
culture of the person doing the observing.
I am one of those rare (about 0.01% of the population) and strange people
who was born with an internal gender that didn't match my sex. For years, I
was forced (first by my parents and then by social pressure) into expressing
a gender consistent with my birth sex... but I was never really good at it.
So I became a somewhat efeminate male. Being as I am also bi-sexual, and a
certain type of woman (sane) finds efeminate males attractive, I had no
problem finding a spouse (I've had 3) or having kids (3 also). I expressed
my real gender mostly in the privacy of our bedroom... or the occasional
night out at a queer disco in drag.
My oldest is now 16, my youngest 10. About 4 years ago, my ex decided she
needed a "real man" and moved in with my best friend. This led to a
divorce... and since my ex also decided she now really wanted to be a
mother (she hadn't been up to that point... I had done all the normal fem
stuff around the house since our marriage) she fought for (and won) custody
of our kids.
Social restrictions on alternative gender expressions have relaxed quite a
bit recently. I started outwardly expressing, with both clothes and
mannerisms, my real gender. After a year of living as a woman 24 hrs a day
7 days a week I decided to alter my body using current medical technology
(transhumanism at work!) to make it align more closely with my actual
gender.
I've now been on hormone replacement therapy for 2.5 years... and there
isn't much of my body that still looks male.
So yes. I AM both a woman and a father.
Hugs,
Loree
Recent picks at:
http://www.geocities.com/westhollywood/4958/99.html
For the rest of the story, just drop the 99.html off of the url
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Jul 27 2000 - 14:12:31 MDT