Traditionally, I think gender was just a biological classification, very similar to the definition of biological sex. Plenty of words have more than one meaning though, and in modern times, gender has come to mean so much more than the taxonomic classification. Personally, I compare gender to the word ‘human’. Just as being human is both a biological reality, as well as a social and personal one, I think gender can be, too. The word ‘human’ has both concrete meanings, as well as abstract and personal ones. Being human is defined by specific physical traits, but the ways one can be human on a personal and social level, are infinite. To be human, is to be in a taxonomic group, under a border categorization of ‘animal’. To be human is also to be imperfect, or kind, or empathetic, or unique, and sometimes, a human can, in a metaphoric sense, be inhuman.

I see gender in much the same way. To be man or woman, is a more specific categorization under the broader categorizations of male and female. Male and female can apply to most animals and many plants, then in turn, each individual species has its more specific categorization: mare and stallion, hen and rooster, man and woman. But then, much like being human, gender means so much more on a societal and personal level. Biological gender is specific and concrete, while gender identity, gender expression and gender norms, are personal, social and infinite.

I don’t think we can completely abandon the physical definition of gender, because just as being human starts with the physical reality of it, I think gender also starts with a similar physical reality. Biological gender informs our social and personal experiences of gender, whether that is conforming to, or going against the norm, and people should feel free to go with or against the common narrative of gender as they see fit.

Just as the physical reality of being human doesn’t have to limit the way we express ourselves, the biological reality of being man or woman doesn’t have to limit the way we express our gender, and that includes being trans, non-binary, or any other gender identity.

This is just my view, and how I make sense of all the controversy. I feel like it’s a bit of an unusual view that many people will not agree with, but it is only how I make sense of it in my own mind. I respect all gender identities and gender expressions, and I also respect all viewpoints on the matter as long as there is no intention to cause harm. I don’t think there is ill intention by most people on either side of the debate. I find the discussions and debates around gender to be very interesting, but I wish we could discuss it more openly without so many hard feelings and accusations.

Every day that passes

Seems more pointless than the last

Ears and eyes shut, but mouths wide open

The noise!

that comes from these monkeys

You wouldn’t believe it

They don’t even know they’re in a cage

At a zoo, mere spectacles

Shouting to the delight of onlookers

Whose pockets are lined, and fists are clenched

I must admit…

This zoo has always made me feel

Terribly Sad

In the gray of winter

It is easy to wish for sleep

A rest so long that when you wake

You are tickled

By green blades between your toes

And the sunlight rouses you

Bright and warm against heavy eyelids

But there is something to be said

For the silence that embraces us

After a fresh snow when the sound

- Try as it might -

Seems to vanish with little more

Than a whisper on the wind

In the quiet I am reminded of the end

The world is not an hourglass

That you can simply turn over and start again

Without the noise I am able to focus

On every grain of sand I have left

Any Prosers who know a bit about me will be unsurprised that I've been driven back to Prose after a short hiatus to debate social issues. I believe there's value in creating awareness around topics that folks might otherwise ignore out of complacency or selfishness. It's also a worthwhile pursuit to question and critique EVERYTHING - especially today, when so many people's perspectives are based on misinformation and biases (unconscious or not). Plus, I'm a Gemini, and I've never met an argument I didn't like. :)

**Before we begin, a disclaimer - I'm happy to provide any and all links to the research I reference throughout this piece. As far as I'm aware, the current Prose UI doesn't support hyperlinking, and I simply don't want to clunk up my writing with lengthy URLs. Feel free to reach out in the comments or via direct message for more information.**

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When I came across this thoughtful writing challenge on gender, I was excited to read about folks' experiences. As Baldwin says, "'You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read." I find that even when I read about someone with a vastly different human experience than mine, I'm able to find connection in the emotion - and it helps me better understand certain people and communities with whom I might never have the opportunity to interact with otherwise.

But as I read one particular post by @EstherFlowers1, I must admit I'm having trouble empathizing with her perspective, mostly because I think it serves to invalidate the experiences of trans, non-binary and gender fluid folks, which is not only demoralizing, but dangerous. Also, there's a fair amount expressed in her piece that simply isn't based on an accurate understanding of gender and sex, which are two distinct concepts. While I can agree to disagree with all sorts of folks, it becomes an issue when their opinions are rooted in or contribute to the oppression, marginalization or brutalization of others. That said, I doubt there is a purposeful attempt to do harm here, but outcomes matter regardless of intention. Hopefully, this can be a good learning experience for anyone who engages with both of our pieces.

To start, I want to note that I have a Master's degree in Communication, with a research focus on gender and politics, and I've taught a host of undergraduate courses on gender representation and the intersection of gender and labor, among other things. I tell you all this not to toot my own horn (although, I worked hard and published some great work, so why not?), but because of this: Since the Trump presidency, there has been a troubling trend of anti-intellectualism where folks think all opinions are created equal. The reality is, however, if someone is an expert in their field, their educated opinion should and does hold more weight than a random person you pluck off the street who doesn't have the same working knowledge. That's why we go to doctors when we're sick and not our neighbor who is an accountant. In terms of this discussion, I have no insight into Esther's background, so I am not asserting that she doesn't have any authority or experience with which to speak on the matter. I only state this to let folks know what academic and professional experience I am pulling from when I lay out my thoughts in this piece.

To start, Esther makes the point that gender, though a generalization, is not a completely useless way to categorize people, because it helps us identify who to have sex and reproduce with. There are a couple of issues here. The first is that it is sex, not gender, that has served as the basis for humans to determine who to mate with for reproductive purposes. The term is "sexual dimorphism" not "gender dimorphism," and for good reason. Early neanderthals, for example, were often nude - they could see the biological differences in others - breasts and vaginas versus penises - and that is how they determined who to reproduce with. And you better believe that everyone was hairy as fuck - so it's not like they were confused by a woman with a mustache because there's something innately unfeminine about body hair. Furthermore, having sex to reproduce is different from having sex for pleasure, and, as a result, we've see homosexual and bisexual activity across different species and periods throughout time.

Additionally, it's worth noting that there is a growing pool of research about "postgenderism"that examines the potential for advanced assistive reproductive options to render all humans capable of both carrying a pregnancy to term and impregnating someone, which would eliminate the need for gender identification in society to its benefit - individuals would no longer be constrained or oppressed by gender role expectations. So, to say that this or other interrogations of gender as a social construct is making a "mockery of sex and gender and reproduction" that will contribute to natural selection weeding out such folks is not only false, but also seems to suggest that those who do not ascribe to a binary interpretation of gender don't have legitimate reasons for doing so. If we're mocking anything, it should be a binary understanding of gender that doesn't adequately represent the breadth of human experience and largely only serves to pigeonhole people. But much more effective than mocking is dismantling and reimagining.

In early civilizations, expectations as to behaviors for women and men varied from community to community based on the environment and population size, not because they recognized some innate characteristics of women to be more gentle and men to be more assertive, for example. The research continues to show that there is no sex-based evidence for behavioral traits. Rather, modern day women and men in the U.S. have been socialized to believe in and ascribe to traditional gender roles because they are rewarded with social capital. In fact, we've seen societies - both throughout history and in contemporary contexts - that have completely different conceptions of gender than we do in the U.S. or other industrialized Western nations. Certain Native American tribes, Indigenous Australian populations, South Asian and Samoan communities (just to name a few) have recognized gender fluid or non-binary folks, others have five or six gender categories, and some have none at all. Similarly, they have different expectations of those gender roles, or are largely egalitarian - because, put simply, gender is what a society makes it.

A great example of an egalitarian-minded society exists in Sweden. In certain schools in modern-day Stockholm, teachers try not to use terms like “boys” or “girls” or gender-specific pronouns. In an effort to reach a greater level of gender equality, they push for gender neutrality. Pronouns like “he and she” are replaced with “hen,” and children’s books have protagonists who are not clearly male or female. This effort helps teachers interrogate and counteract impulses to behave in certain ways with students of certain genders that disadvantage them - Like telling little boys to suck it up when they get hurt versus taking time to console and communicate with them like they do with little girls. The model has been so successful that they've continued to expand it to new schools every year.

The bottom line is that the gender binary assigns different roles, status, expectations and power to humans with male and female genitals, without any biological need to do so - it's a way to exercise cultural control that puts a population of humans who have all sorts of preferences and traits into a binary prison that not only forces them to deny their authentic selves to the detriment of their mental health, but also renders them vulnerable to discrimination and violence based on a conception of how folks "should be" that ignores the reality of how they actually are. In this case, a world with no gender or a broader understanding of it, at least, would mean that your biological sex would have no social meaning, just as being right-or left-handed has no inherent meaning. (Although people actually used to think left-handed folks were less capable, so parents forced their kids to use their right hands. See how sociocultural attitudes can shift over time when we encounter new evidence?) To me, genderlessness doesn't sound too bad at all.

With that, there are a few tangential points left that I would be remiss if I didn't also address. In her piece, Esther goes on to assert that "children need fathers and they need mothers," hence why maintaining a gender binary is important - but there's no factual basis for this claim. In fact, the research suggests the opposite. In these contemporary studies, we see that children in same-sex-parented families outperform children in different-sex-parented families on multiple indicators of academic performance, including standardized tests scores, high school graduation rates and college enrollment. Adolescents of same-sex parents also experience fewer social problems than a nationally representative age-matched sample of American youths. Even after controlling for a range of socioeconomic factors, this positive association does not disappear. What this research may suggest is that same-sex couples who are more open-minded and understanding of varying representations of sexuality and gender, based on their own experience, are more likely to produce thriving offspring than heterosexual couples who may be constrained by traditional gender role stereotyping.

This segues into her discussion of "anti-breeding" sentiments, which she dismisses as a selfish trend. The observable reality, however, is that there are a myriad of substantive, material obstacles to childrearing in 21st century Western capitalist societies like we have in the U.S. Without living wages, affordable healthcare or childcare, less and less folks have the practical ability to raise children, even if they want to. And from an environmental perspective, we also must consider that the planet is overpopulated, climate change is an existential threat to humanity, and people do not want to raise children in a world where there is so much uncertainty about food and other resources, natural disasters and what have you. All this is not to say that as our understanding of gender roles evolves, that personal choice is not also a factor here - women no longer feel the same level of societal pressure to marry or reproduce - and why shouldn't both women and men feel empowered to make the best decisions for themselves? It seems that this should be the most fundamental of human rights, especially given that we are not facing an extinction crisis from lack of childrearing (although from all the other stuff, sure - we're on our way out.)

I'll conclude by saying this - someone expressing their gender identity outside of the binary conceptualization we've been taught does not hurt individuals, nor collective society. The only folks being hurt are the ones that are being denied the right to do so - whether it's through legislation that bans gender affirming care, restricts access to public restrooms, allows businesses to refuse service etc. or through hostile communities that ridicule and endanger them both physically and mentally. Even for cisgender folks, traditional gender roles are often the cause of great strife, whether it's through the restriction of bodily autonomy, a lack of career opportunities, discrimination in the workplace, abuse at the hands of others who deem themselves more powerful on the basis of gender alone, or simply mental anguish over not "fitting the mold." As long as they're not hurting anyone, how hard is it to just let people live their lives how they wish?

No one dreams of becoming a heroin addict when they are a child. I certainly didn’t. I wanted to be a Ghostbuster or Indiana Jones. I didn’t grow up in a home that would likely produce a heroin addict. My parents have been married for 40 years, I wasn’t abused, I always had a roof over my head, and I was and still am loved by my family. Certainly, we weren’t a perfect family. Like most, upon reflection and close examination, this fact is abundantly clear.

Was I genetically predisposed? Was I to pay a price for the sins of my father? Was it fate, karma, or something else? I thought about these questions for many years. Now, 39 days from 8 years of sobriety I rarely do, and this is one of the many impacts addiction had on my life.

I’m lucky to be alive. When you do heroin for long enough, the fear of death becomes a dull noise in the background of chaos. Now, from the outside looking in, I see how truly nefarious addiction is. Slowly or rapidly, the monkey on your back whispers in your ear as you march yourself to execution. What other affliction does this? It is from this perspective I can now see how precious life is.

What level of pain causes someone to become their own gleeful executioner? Be the trauma real or imagined, the results of escape via substance abuse are absolutely real. Further, the self-inflicted harm, like interest, compounds over time. “Jail, institutions, and death.” I know the pain that causes this. I’ve seen the rain bounce off the same square of concrete I was sleeping on. I’ve watched my family despair over their son’s whereabouts, well-being, and sanity. They watched me slowly attempt killing myself before their very eyes. To this day, eight years later, I still feel the pain of regret from my behavior. The pain is no longer crippling self-loathing. No, today it is a gentle angst that humbles me and reminds me of what exactly I have been saved from.

Perspective is a powerful tool. Like all tools, it can be used for good, or it can be used for abominable evil. The second greatest gift my addiction gave me is perspective. When you’ve been trapped in the darkest dungeons of evil, hopelessness, and despair, your perspective changes. Especially, when your situation is your own fault. This makes being a victim the parallel addiction. An excuse. If nothing is your fault, your genetics are bad, and the world is against you, you will never have to change. It is here where bitterness infects the blood and sickens its host. It corrupts, rots, and steals life. Over time perspective is warped so badly that the world is no longer recognizable, and neither are you.

When this perspective is flipped. Lives are changed and they are saved. This is where redemption is found. This is where we find forgiveness, love, kindness, and humility. It is from a renewed perspective that we can discover the antidote to victimhood, bitterness, and suffering. The antidote is gratitude.

When I first went to treatment for the last time, I often wondered where I would marshal the resources to change. How could I possibly be healed? After all, I truly believed I was born this way and had resigned to my imminent destiny.

This is where addiction truly touched my life in a way I still can’t really describe. This is the reason I found God. I really wanted nothing to do with God. Afterall, my superior intellect and spry mastery of the world had gotten my jailed, homeless, and addicted to heroin. There’s a nice quote, I don’t know who said it: “From the human heart hope springs eternal,” that’s the gist anyway. It’s a lovely sentiment, but it’s false. My human heart utterly lacked the resources, will, motivation, and perspective for hope. It was only when I surrendered my life to God that hope emerged and resides with me fully to this day. It is from this transcendent resource that a miracle happened in my life.

I have been sober nearly eight years and I give all credit and glory to God. That statement alone is the greatest gift I have ever been given. It is from the well of the eternal Himself that hope sprung and it is from that very well I drink from daily.

A stone pillar protected by nothing,

Buffeted by the weather,

Grows sharp, and pointed.

And this is okay.

And over time, the weather will wear down that point,

And the stone will grow smooth again.

This is okay, too.

That is what the weather does.

This is what stone does.

I ask for tea

at the cafe

because I want to read

the leaves

Carl Jung said

you find what

you suppress

somewhere

out in

the world

I see my reflection

inside a porcelain cup

my fate boiled straight up

treacherous

and hot

there is nothing more

there is nothing less

is what you see

what you want

wrist grabbing

appetite loss

bed ridden.

isolation

avoidance

bingeing.

waves.

fuck, i want to smoke.

big enough to hold the leash now,

she asks, “is that one apartments?” so

I explain counting mailboxes,

and that one’s a single family – you always

like their Halloween candy - but count this

one, four boxes affixed to the green

Victorian, two Direct TV dishes;

they built big back then, and

many in town were broken up

“like our neighbors” she says, “but not ours,”

and I say yes, like our neighbors,

like Miss Jeanne who gardens and

lets you pick peppers, or

Mrs. Johnson walking Bernie the

Dachshund, or Tom who repaired that

old red truck and moved when

his brother’s health failed;

I do not bring up the apartments across

the street where flashing red and blue

came for the stabbing and dealing last summer,

but she’s focused on our dog now anyway

because we’ve come to the porch where

that old woman smokes and keeps a sleeping

bag for her son, and she always steps down

to rub our beagle’s belly and floppy ears