sqbr: pretty purple pi (femininity)
Sean ([personal profile] sqbr) wrote2016-06-04 11:55 am
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Good resources for Non Binary...ness

So I spent the last however many years building up resources and social environments etc so I no longer felt so confused and alone about being a biromantic grey asexual woman. And now feel like I have to start all over again with being genderfluid :( I'm at the point where I don't so much have questions as like....a blank of ignorance I need to sketch out before I even know what the questions are.

I've looked about for spaces by and for non binary people and have found a few but am not sure where to start. And a lot of it seems focussed more on persuading cis people that non binary genders exist, should have legal recognition etc, all important work but not very helpful for my purposes.

I'm increasingly annoyed with the spaces I'm already in for how completely they erase non binary genders. So much feminist discussion which assumes anyone who isn't a woman is a man and vice versa :/ And it makes me feel both alienated and afraid that if I say something I'll be seen as (and maybe even be) not-a-woman-splaining or a special snowflake etc.

The places that remember non binary people exist tend to assume we divide neatly into "effectively men" and "effectively women". And while I do, overall, identify much more strongly with women than men, a huge part of my gender identity is not feeling stuck in any gender box. And regardless I'd rather find spaces that remember the existence of all non binary people, not just the ones whose gender people find it easiest to gloss over. It reminds me a of those conversations which assume all women divide into straight cis women and "queer women" where a "queer woman" is, if not strictly speaking a lesbian, then certainly only really interested in dating women, and definitely not a straight or aromantic asexual trans woman.

I've also found a few places which acknowledge the full spectrum of non binary genders but are only interested in catering to the more strictly feminine (or in rarer cases, masculine) ones. This is less annoying representation wise, but still not much good for me personally.

So does anyone have any recs? Books, websites, blogs, anything. Formal or informal, even fiction if it's got something useful to say (though not just "any good book with some mention of non binary genders"). They don't have to be entirely focussed on non binary people as long as they are genuinely inclusive. I guess what I'd like, to the extent it exists, is an equivalent to the breadth of feminist spaces, but either focussed on or equally inclusive of non binary people.

What I have so far:
Notes from a Wiscon panel on The Pitfalls of Haphazard Gender Inclusion with links to panelists' blogs
Notes from a "Beyond the Binary" panel which includes a bunch of links and the blog it's on.
A post with questions about how non binary and trans people fit into feminism and the "lifeoutsidethebinary" blog it's on.
Chaos Life is a comic created by an agender person which I generally like.

These are definitely something to start with (my browser is a wall of tabs right now :)), but recs would still be super useful.

(Also I need to make a new gender icon this one doesn't quite feel right any more!)
aris_tgd: "Pew pew! Lasers! Pew pew pew!" (Lyttle Lytton Lasers)

[personal profile] aris_tgd 2016-06-04 08:55 am (UTC)(link)
Someone just started a nonbinary resources help thread on the Friends of Captain Awkward forum, if you're registered over there, let me see if I can dig up some links and stuff.

Gender Paint Chart on Assume Benevolence
[livejournal.com profile] rosefox blogs about gender occasionally (and more on CA and the CA forums) (and being in a poly household)
Melanie Gillman is a non-binary comic artist who has a new comic out called Non-Binary but I cannot find ANY information about it ARGH

Wait! FOUND IT. ""Nonbinary" is a new minicomic by Melanie Gillman (creator of As the Crow Flies.) It contains 16 pages of full-color, autobio comics about their process of coming out and living life as a person of nonbinary gender. Topics covered include: pronoun changes, dysphoria, dealing with reactions from friends/family/employers/etc., misconceptions about nonbinary people, and more." Here is her gumroad store.

That's all I have on hand, but good luck with the gender things!
yalovetz: A black and white scan of an illustration of an old Jewish man from Kurdistan looking a bit grizzled (Default)

[personal profile] yalovetz 2016-06-04 09:06 am (UTC)(link)
There's a fairly sizable community of non binary vloggers on YouTube. You can find them easily by doing a search on terms like 'non binary' and 'genderfluid'. I'm happy to link current vloggers I've come across recently, though there are also some legacy channels that are no longer active that might be of interest, but you can probably find voices that are relevant to you just by surfing around a bit.
Edited 2016-06-04 09:07 (UTC)