Am I non binary?

uhmmmmmm

Ok, give me your best description: what is the non-binary thing?

also, if you are non binary, you're not removing yourself from 'the fight'

Oh true, you’re putting every other woman into The Woman gender box, just like the patriarchy does. Totally revolutionary amirite?

m.youtube.com/watch?v=0PPV83fgJx0

The implication she is making is that woman who do not declare they are NB or Genderqueer (and tolerate the use of female pronouns) are gender conformists.

I saw a video a few days ago about what it means to be non binary.One person in the video said that they don't fit into the "restrictive boxes of man or woman."
I find it interesting , actully horrifying, that some people who are non binary are having masectomies but other non binary people wear lipstick and skirts to show their non binary identity.

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every time a non conforming woman declares themselves non binary they reinforce the extremes of gender expectation and narrow the definition of woman

This is completely right, and you too OP have explained it very articulately too. And you are right that this NB is the culmination of an individualistic society. Don't like sex stereotypes? Don't try to fight to end these stereotypes for everyone - just say you have opted out for yourself, give yourself a special name for this, and sit back and wait for your woke pat on the back. Job done (except it isn't - all you have done is reinforce these stereotypes for everyone else).

@ItsLateHumpty ah, oops. my statement still stands though.

also, if you are non binary, you're not removing yourself from 'the fight', men, women, trans men, trans women and non binary people alike help with the 'fight'. we're all in it together (excluding the middle aged misogynistic men, who are irrelevant anyway).

Mostly everyone is "non binary". I can't think of many people I know who are hyper masculine or feminine. Such standards are broadly socially constructed anyway.

Most of the women I know have an interest in at least one sport, spend most of their time in trainers and are partial to a beer. Most of the men I know enjoy a glass of prosecco, shed a tear at a sad film and enjoy spending time with their children.

The gender stuff is extremely regressive. People are just people. Female people and male people have different bodies. That's pretty much it.

i would ignore the posters claiming non binary isn't a thing. they are the same ones who will get their knickers in a twist over someone writing 'gender' instead of 'sex'.

They swear blind that there are tonnes of people who wake very morning feeling their gender is right and proper...

I am a pretty gender non-conforming woman, and I have never, ever contemplated my gender. Not even as a young tomboy with short hair and a collection of Transformers toys.

I said that I felt taking on a non binary identity just removes me from the fight - just makes the issue about me and not society.

With you there, sister. The new gender ideology is a convenient way not to have to organise politically or become an activist - people think they can 'identify out' of oppression, because - it's all discourse, innit?

Tell them you are gender non-conforming.

Which is much more radical & revolutionary.

Ah. Supplementary question:

Are your parents fine with your sister being a lesbian?

OP sorry if it's already been asked but may I ask:

Does your sister fancy men or women?

And has becoming "non binary" improved (or impacted in any way) her dating possibilities?

She knows people in the street will judge her female. She compared it to her friend's ASD diagnosis in enabling her stronger sense of self.

I just don’t get it. Wouldn’t staying true to yourself (Woman who wears / does as she likes) and saying “fuck the system that makes me feel wrong” be more productive?

The implication she is making is that woman who do not declare they are NB or Genderqueer (and tolerate the use of female pronouns) are gender conformists.

So she's using non-binary markers to indicate "I am not of the class Woman."

Which, if you consider exactly what goes into the ever-evolving culturally-specific Platonic ideal of Woman - the pink and sparkles, the domestic drudgery, the pornified hypersexual availability, all of it - is perfectly true.

But what she's doing in order to deal with this is to effectively declare herself 'not like the other girls females'. Which rather suggests she on some level believes that the other girls are that horrible set of stereotypes. I'm not surprised you're upset.

It strikes me there's something of the madonna/whore dichotomy about this too. I need to think about that some more though.

And your sister needs to realise we don't get to identify out of this shit, because we never identified into it in the first place.

We're all "non-binary" because the binary is an artificial socially-created division.

It's the cis/trans binary they're identifying as not part of - very obvious when you put their prefix system in. OP's sister is neither a "ciswoman" nor a "transman".

I agree with pp that it's the new word for 'gender non conforming". It just sounds a bit batshit to the rest of us because we're using the labels man&woman to refer to humans of a particular sex rather than humans of a particular essence (masculine or feminine).

It's cowardly though. It accepts the 'truth' of gendered essences being a defining feature of the person; it accepts the imposition of gender as bad without any analysis of what function that imposition serves; it's an individualistic response to a societal problem. And it does nothing to tackle, or even acknowledge, the root of the current assault on sex-based rights - the ejecting of 'inadequate' males from the Man Club.

I would advise smiling, nodding, and mentally readjusting your assessment of her critical faculties, OP, but if it were me I'd be getting drunk and having a flaming row. It wouldn't be pretty!

the whole 'non binary' thing actually serves, in my opinion, to reinforce gender stereotypes rather than break them down.

This. This. This.

Yeah my children also escaped this madness but it's the grandchildren I concerned about now.

Thingybob

You know what, I actually more happy all my kids are now safely in their mid 20's to 30's and though Uni. (Where non of them seem to come across the gender debate)

They are all just as non conforming as their parents and not ready to have kids just yet.

What a state of play.

Hi Dryadia, well done for being brave enough to do a first post. I think many of us have arrived here in the same way that you did with the scary realisation that we would have been transed had we grown up today.

THANK GOD I grew up in the 70s 60s and 80s 70s

We're almost all non binary, especially women.

The distinction is surely between those who think it makes them different /special and those that don't.

That said, I forgive younger people who identify as non binary. They've been given a choice akin to "Christian /Muslim /Jewish /Buddhist /Infidel". If I didn't realise there was another way, I'd probably choose "Buddhist" too and get really upset with those who assumed I was "Christian" just because of how I looked.