I don't want to fit into a box

[bahbahrararara]

I’ve been thinking, I was a Tom boy who wouldn’t wear dresses. No interest in boys - my DM assumed I was lesbian. More interested in tanks than barbies. I threw dolls out of the window as parachute practise. I’ve been told on More than one occasion that I think and talk, walk like a man....I’ve worked in very male industries. I don’t fit into a box, I have my hair done by a barber, but I will wear a dress on occasion. I’m married to a man with three children. What on Earth would have mermaids done to me... we don’t all fit into stereotypes.

The current debates make me feel like people like me are to be eradicated , because I don’t fit a gender stereotype. Why can’t we be just whoever we are, if you’d asked me at 9 did I want to be a boy - my answer would have been yes, at 13 the same... at 24 very different.

I’m me, I don’t fit into a neat box, and I’m happy with that. I’m not happy with now being told I have to conform & be a “cis” woman, and if I complain I’m a “terf”. When did it all become so hateful, masochistic and patriarchal.

I’ve spent 40 years fighting sexism and socialital norms to be at a comfortable space. It now feels as if all that fighting is being taken away, I am now being told I have to conform to be a woman. I can’t be formidable, I’m to be a little “cis” woman. HELL NO.

I feel like I am being silenced. How do we fight back? I’m a fighter, I won’t be put in a stereo type box.

Snap.
I buy men's clothes. My jacket is brilliant 6 pockets !
As a teen if I'd been told. I could dodge puberty, and not have breasts I'd have opted for that.
If I could have avoided being harrassed since I was 12 that would have been great.
Thank goodness I'm not a teenager now.

Quite. There are so many different ways of being female, literally the only thing all women have in common is female biology. Taking that away too makes nonsense of the category itself.

''When did it all become so hateful, masochistic and patriarchal''
Excellent question.
I think things are worse for teenage girls and young women than they were for my generation, and that's despite decades of campaigning. I used to believe we were making some progress, and I used to feel hopeful that I would see real change in my lifetime.

We have to be the role models we would have wanted when we were younger, no compromise.

@UpstartCrow like it, yes we have to be role models. I'm a bit different, and I accept that, society had accepted that. I'll keep being me even when "society" says that it's not ok.

It was ok to not conform to stereotypes, it no longer is. I can't comprehend why the left is so ok with this. I'm struggling with my politics at the moment. As they are telling me I'm not ok. It's not acceptable to be anything than barbie.

I worry that those growing up now, will be told that being different means being neutered & physically changed.

It's a form a social cleansing in my opinion. Conversion therapy in the extremist sense.