To be fed up with people misgendering DP (not trans)

[SarahAndQuack]

My partner is female, as am I, and we have a daughter who recently started school. DP has always had the odd person be confused about her gender, but when we got together there was a big surge in people assuming she was a man, and when DD was born, even more so. DD is nearly five now, and I still find people glance at DP and assume she's a man. I'm posting because one of the school mums - and DD goes to a tiny rural school so there are only a handful of us - has still not clocked that DP is a woman. I was at the school gate chatting and she asked about my husband, so I replied my partner's a woman, and she clearly didn't know what to say.

I find it frustrating because, if you actually bother to look at DP, you can see she's a woman. She always wears jeans or trousers (but women's jeans or trousers), and usually a shirt or a hoodie. Sometimes the shirts are from the menswear section, but the hoodies are generally Seasalt women's. Her hair is short, but so is mine, and no one ever mistakes me for a man. She wears unisex doc martens, but so do lots of women. She's all of 5'8 so not exactly a towering masculine height.

I am aware people misgender her mostly out of kneejerk, unconscious bias: they see one woman (me) and another person, and they automatically decide the other person must be a man. Or they see me and DD and decide the other person must be the dad.

But it's really starting to bother me, because DD is getting old enough to start wondering about what people say, and she is trying to understand what makes someone a man or a woman. She is getting a clear message that her mum is doing womanhood 'wrong', and that people don't think she is a woman, and she's started asking us why. I don't know what to say - and I don't know how to respond to people misgendering DP in a way that is still friendly, but does get across that it's not ok?

@verymiddleaged

It is a shame you aren't closer to Scotland, Episcopalian women can marry each other. My dm got married to her wife at church.

That's so lovely!

@verymiddleaged

It is a shame you aren't closer to Scotland, Episcopalian women can marry each other. My dm got married to her wife at church.

Yes, could you get married in Scotland, Anglican churches there can marry same sex partners.

I hope the C of E manage to enter the 21st century soon. Best of luck to your family.

I also find people are so insanely self-absorbed here in general that it's unsurprising you get asked about your "husband,"-- they won't have clocked you as a lesbian couple because they are ultimately only interested in themselves and their families (speaking with a broad brush here and of course there are exceptions).

People know very little about me because I volunteer very little, though I chat a lot to people- but they only ever chat about themselves!

There's also the fact people don't really listen.
I dress Ds in pink, yellow and turquoise a fair bit. We tend to correct the first time but generally people just carry on with she's anyway.
I like to think it won't hurt him being spoken to a bit gently and treated as less boisterous won't hurt him.

@hotmeatymilk

Also, what if it’s something your DP can’t do anything about or doesn’t want to do anything about? Like you ask three people who all say Something unchangeably physical like “it’s her jawline” or “it was the shoulders”, or something mannerism like “the walk” or “a (wo)manspreading aspect when she sits”. How will that information help other than give OP some unwanted knowledge she can pass on, or not, for her DP to then have to shrug off, or be self conscious about, but can’t change. I can’t think of many people who could deal with the burden of such feedback, and it puts the onus on DP to deal with it, when really the issue here is: how to talk to DD and manage her feelings around something that keeps happening.

Well, quite.

I think, really, the absolute primary reason is quite simply that they see me, they see DD, and any warm body in the vicinity is presumed to be 'dad'.

If they were looking at secondary characteristics, it probably is how she moves and stands and gestures.

A few people on this thread have said they're confused how DP and I get read, because they're not read like that when they're out with female friends. And I was thinking about this this morning when we were out with the lesbian mums group. One of the other mums is quite butch, and at one point her partner sat down and she came to stand beside her with a hand on her shoulder, and she asked something totally mundane about whether they should get food for the kids. Absolutely basic as a conversation, but I have never seen two female friends stand like that. It's not that there's anything overtly sexual about the posture, or anything like that, but it just isn't 'friendly,' it's 'relationshippy'. And I suspect that sort of subliminal visual imagery also reinforces the idea that we're in a couple, so if they know I'm female, they assume DP is male.

I am slightly guessing, but I think something that bemuses, and maybe hurts DP is the way people assuming she's male are kind of implicitly denying the feminine aspects of her? Obviously this isn't a school gate kind of issue, you wouldn't expect people to form a very deep impression there. But, women will chat to me and say things like 'ooh, that's a hand-knitted cardie, do you knit then'?' and they want to start a conversation about a (stereotypically feminine) hobby. OTOH, they won't say that to DP; if there's a conversation about knitting going on she might jump in to say 'oh, I knit too' but no one will approach her on the assumption she might do these stereotypically feminine things. I don't know if that makes sense?

If you ever want to get married in a Scottish Anglican Church the Episcopal cathedral in Glasgow is particularly gay friendly.
I hope the English church catches up soon for you.

@PlanktonsComputerWife

I hope the C of E manage to enter the 21st century soon. Best of luck to your family.

I also find people are so insanely self-absorbed here in general that it's unsurprising you get asked about your "husband,"-- they won't have clocked you as a lesbian couple because they are ultimately only interested in themselves and their families (speaking with a broad brush here and of course there are exceptions).

People know very little about me because I volunteer very little, though I chat a lot to people- but they only ever chat about themselves!

Thank you!

I don't think the issue is DP not chatting about herself though - I know some people are very private and I think that's absolutely fair. But she does and will volunteer information if she can.

@verymiddleaged

If you ever want to get married in a Scottish Anglican Church the Episcopal cathedral in Glasgow is particularly gay friendly. I hope the English church catches up soon for you.

I hope so too! And thank you. Good to know!

Does she have the butch look? It's hard to think that people would mistake the average woman for a man.

Not doubting it happens. Just wondering how.

@WhiteVanWoman91

Does she have the butch look? It's hard to think that people would mistake the average woman for a man.

What's the butch look?

@WhiteVanWoman91

Not doubting it happens. Just wondering how.

My hunch, TBH, is that it actually happens a lot more often than people think - because thinking about it, all the posters who're sure they never mistake anyone's gender, probably just never know when they did, right?

It sounds from this thread (and from other conversations I've had with lesbians in couples/families), that it's really quite common for this to happen, but it's only the lesbians who notice, not the straight people.

So, probably, it does happen, but people who can't tell butch lesbians from men mostly don't realise they can't tell?

@SarahAndQuack Totally makes sense. I suppose in a small place those conversations will come once people get past their misperceptions, but frustrating to have to have it as a hurdle to overcome in the first place.

Off-topic: forum chat is a minefield for tone and people willingly misreading even when things do make sense, but this has been such an enlightening and calm thread (…at times), somehow covering trans issues, the church, style, presumptions of heteronormativity, etc, that’s been a pleasure to participate in. And all credit to you for moderating a personal conversation like this! In AIBU of all places… Don’t think there’s been a deleted post in the whole thread, you should get a prize.

What's the butch look?

This.

I have a wee bit of a crush on boo…not gonna lie

So, probably, it does happen, but people who can't tell butch lesbians from men mostly don't realise they can't tell?

I reckon that there are people who can tell the difference everytime, people who cannot tell the difference at all and loads of people in the middle

My dad watched an episode of ru pauls drag race (my son and his partner love it as does my daughter)

It had to be explained to him a number of times that none of them were women…not one

@RufustheBadgeringReindeer

I have a wee bit of a crush on boo…not gonna lie

So, probably, it does happen, but people who can't tell butch lesbians from men mostly don't realise they can't tell?

I reckon that there are people who can tell the difference everytime, people who cannot tell the difference at all and loads of people in the middle

My thoughts were most could tell but might be unsure if a butch person would actually want to be addressed as a woman.

@hotmeatymilk, that's so kind of you! I don't think it's really to do with me but I agree, it's really nice this has been so calm.

@WhiteVanWoman91 - ah, ok. Lea DeLaria does nothing for me, and I'm partly reading in from her character in OITNB, but I'm not keen. So if it's that version of butch you mean, no, DP isn't butch - and she would hate the idea of being that kind of butch.

@RufustheBadgeringReindeer - YY, DD is the same. She doesn't understand RuPaul isn't a woman.

Haven’t you heard of New Romantics ???

She clearly looks like a man enough that numerous people are making the same mistake.

@RufustheBadgeringReindeer absolutely that there are people who it just does not occur to, and those it always occurs to (who check twice) and the majority in the middle who I reckon SarahandQuack and DP are mostly encountering.

I remember being in the ladies loo a decade ago at the theatre in the interval of Hairspray. Michael Ball was Edna Turnblad. Even if you hadn’t read the programme, or knew the cast, or the musical, it was obvious. Blindingly, to me. It’s a part written for a man playing a woman. And if you’re at all familiar with British panto it’s referenced throughout. But the conversations in line were hilarious- fully 50% I reckon did not understand that was a bloke playing a version of a woman. Loads were US tourists so I think the British theatre panto trope played in …but it’s set in America, it’s a US show basically. They should have seen it, it’s not subtle!

If you don’t expect to see it perhaps you really just are oblivious until someone/something pulls you up. Rural village communities are definitely more at risk here than urban environments. No shade - I love both and have lived in both and each have different things as positives/negatives.

How your DP would like to handle this is very much up to her, but I wanted to say some things about how children respond to confusions and stereotyping about sex.

I think quite small children do pick up very stereotypical ideas about "what a man looks like" and "what a woman looks like" from about the time they start nursery. My DS once came back from primary school and announced "girls have long hair and wear skirts" and I just gently asked him about whether he's ever seen me wear a skirt (no), whether his friend James' dad ever wears skirts (yes, he got married in a kilt and the wedding pics are all over their living room), whether any member of the family wears anything that looks like a dress (yes, great grand-dad, who wore a long white kurta), and so on. Same with hairstyles, and all the women I know with short-back-and-sides. (I did not tell him then that his godfather was a retired drag queen, and used to have quite a lot of skirts, but saved that for when he was quite a lot older...)

At the same time DS was often taken for a girl, because he had longish hair (and didn't want it cut), and because I dressed him in bright colours (easier to keep track of when running around in the park), but he never got upset - he barely noticed After a time I stopped correcting people when I saw how little he cared, because I didn't want to make it a "thing", or make it seem like he was being insulted in some way. People stopped calling him "miss" when he got to six foot and grew a moustache, but with long hair he still very, very occasionally gets called "miss" when people can't see his face. He - a straight man - still couldn't care less.

All of which is to say - if you want your DD to grow up into the kind of person who won't casually assume a woman is a man because they are wearing jeans, have short hair, and are partnered with another woman, then just carry on as you are, and when DD asks questions, answer them honestly - eg if she days "why did Tom's dad call Mum a man?" then you can just say because he was being a little bit silly and didn't look properly, and so on.

(As an aside, it's amazing what strong signals hair sends to some people. I now have long hair, and am currently thinking about cutting it short because to a lot of men - the same sort who think my son is a "miss", just because of his hair, - also think long hair = younger. Even though my long hair is streaked with grey, an unwelcome side effect of wearing a mask is that when I take it off, revealing my wrinkles and jowls, the shock and horror on some strangers' faces, quickly covered up in polite confusion, is getting a bit much. I'd really rather signal from the start that I am older!)

I wonder if it’s a question of contrast, if you are a very ‘feminine’ woman.

DH and his family are all tall, but DH is exceptionally so at 6ft 8. People who first knew him and his brother as a pair often comment that they ‘hadn’t realised you were tall!’ to BIL on first meeting him alone.

BIL is 6ft 4. He’s not exactly a midget. But people are dim.

Actually thats a good point guppy

A friend and i were arguing over sam and dean from Supernatural

She was saying she didnt like short men (i seem to) which is why she preferred sam but actually dean is 6 foot tall…he just looks short compared to 6 foot 4 sam

@Penistoe

She clearly looks like a man enough that numerous people are making the same mistake.

It’s not that simple though, is it?

One-on-one with her DC, she never has an issue.

With her more feminine-presenting DP, and her DC, sometimes there’s an issue.

Same clothes, hairstyle, presentation. Same kid!

It’s the feminine partner that’s signalling ‘family group, find man’ in people’s primitive brains.

It doesn’t matter except that a) it’s annoying and b) parents worry their child will start to question their place in societal norms or gender norms or … stuff.

No one is doing anything wrong. No one needs to change on a personal level - certainly not OP or her DP. The annoying stuff will continue to be annoying because society is inherently heteronormative- not necessarily through malice or prejudice in the case of school parents. But OP and her DP don’t need to worry their DC will grow up worried by this - it’s all OK. Everyone will adjust. Most people actively want to be kind and accepting. Sometimes they fuck up and feel terrible and make it worse by not knowing how to fix it. Sometimes they’re homophobic arseholes, of course. Expect OP knows the difference!

So far I’ve found that regardless of whether they’re 5 or 15, or any age in between, there’s no downside to honestly discussing anything at all. Choose your language, sure, but if you are a good listener then you’ll judge the level your child needs to discuss tricky shit. Our own discomfort at discussing tricky shit should be secondary to attempting an honest exploration of what they’re curious about.