Identity & Intersectionality

Experience without theory is blind, but theory without experience is mere intellectual play. ~ Immanuel Kant Disclaimer: this is not a scientific or technical piece. There aren’t any broadly applicable conclusions. It’s an anecdote and reflection on personal experiences. A close friend once relayed her experiences around emotion. In the before times, emotions felt like maybe 3 buttons to push. There wasn’t much room for nuance, but they kind of got the job done. Now there seems to be limitless layers, cross-sections, and permutations of emotion. ...

Pain by iProzac. Creative Commons License This tragedy isn’t played out on stage or on screen. It’s about a human who finds themself relying on substances to exist in the world. That doesn’t sound healthy. Yet they’re scared that if they don’t numb themselves sufficiently, they won’t be able to sustain existence. They constantly reflect on the balance of self compassion and allowing their mind to breathe while not repressing emotions entirely. They can’t go back to that level of depersonalization. Their physical world continues to shrink. Wondering—dreading—what happens next. Wondering what kind of hellish life is this to live. Wondering when the suffering will come to some terminal state. ...

Portion of the exhibit “Crossing Boundaries: Portraits of a Transgender West” I recently experienced an exhibit highlighting the history of transgender people on the West Coast from 1860-1940 at the Oregon Historical Society. It captured details of people moving out West to be themselves, the instability they experienced wondering when they would be discovered, the beauty of a gender affirming surgery happening in 1918, and the persistent cycles of trans erasure and sensationalization. ...

Painting by Steve Johnson: Creative Commons License Soft Content Warning: This post touches on topics around physical safety, specifically for women and femme presenting individuals, including highly inappropriate interactions the author experienced. None of the interactions discussed amount to assault, but are somewhat tangential. There is this odd sense around safety experiencing society perceiving me both as a man and a woman. When I was perceived as a man, I rarely considered my safety. I was generally aware of my surroundings and wasn’t carefree, but most of the time I generally felt safe. Put another way, safety was considered the norm barring a significant reason to consider otherwise. ...

Identity is primarily described as an internal sense of being. My internal existence is held tightly—it was a challenging, emotional, and difficult thing to admit, explore, and ultimately claim as my own. However, identity doesn’t exist in a vacuum. We are surrounded by individuals, communities, and systems which create their own taxonomies of classification. How do I acclimate to taxonomies which don’t align with my nuanced reality? In order to proceed with this exercise I must recognize my own lenses through which I observe the world. I am a trans feminine person who finally started working through my gender feelings in early 2022. I have chosen to pursue several options of medical transition, but I also rarely use the term woman to describe myself. I fully endorse that trans women are women and trans men are men—it isn’t comprehensive for my experience. I am also a late diagnosed Autist and person with ADHD. I’m polyamorous and explicitly reject concepts of the relationship escalator. I recognize that this particular identity intersectionality may be considered societally atypical, but I embrace and am proud of who I am. ...