Week Starters
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by Corey Gray I am a person. I am not your fetish. I am a femme nonbinary AMAB (assigned male at birth) person. I am not your fetish. Over the past year I’ve realized when it comes to romance, I’m not a very lucky duck. I trucked off to school in Boston after growing up in rural Maine and was aching to be in a place with a larger queer community. While I did find that, I for some reason could still only get the occasional Tinder match, and could even more rarely get a date with anyone. I’m not here to toot my own horn, but I consider myself to be attractive and interesting, and have been validated on both claims by many people, so I was stumped as to why I was struggling to find anyone willing to connect with me. It clicked near the middle of the school year when I realized that most of the people who did show interest in me thought I was a cross dresser and would ask me to be their little girl or to dress up in lingerie (that they offered to buy me). When people pass me on the street I can sometimes
see in their eyes the confusion as to what I am. In this world of labels and stereotyping, people don’t really know what to make of me. A lot of people really just aren’t familiar with any gender non-conforming identities. I’ve been asked more times than I can count if I’m transgender, but never if I’m agender or genderqueer. The world is still grappling to understand, so where does that leave me? That leaves me here to educate and fight for recognition so that future little nonbinary babies won’t have to. Over the past year at school, a school with many gay men, two straight men targeted me. They both were in relationships with women when they first started pursuing me, and they both just really wanted to know what it’s like to have sex with someone who is AMAB. They chose me because of how femme I am and one of them even said he wanted me to be his princess. They both made it clear, though, that I could never under any circumstance talk to them in public. Of course, I didn’t do anything with these obnoxious boys because, shocker, they treated me as just a pretty thing with a penis whom they could never be seen with in public lest their bros think their gay. Currently, I would say the most recognition we get is as a fetish. Or as an affront to masculinity. Both are applicable, honestly. I’ve gotten reactions ranging from, and I quote, “Over the top. You have a penis, you’re a MAN not a princess”, “You are terrifying”, to sexual ones that I really shouldn’t repeat here. The gay community is already anti- femme in the first place, but then add in some hyper-femme presenting AMABs into the mix and you’ve got some real dissonance. Luckily every other nonbinary person I’ve met has been incredibly positive, healing, and inspiring. I’m not exaggerating to say that they have all proven themselves to be the strongest people I know, especially my POC nonbinary friends. We really have picked ourselves over romance. It took me a while to realize that I had done so, but when I did, everything became clear. It’s all about priorities. I would rather be alone in the romantic sense and try and add my voice to the nonbinary cause and hopefully the ingrained societal beauty ideals will become more forgiving in the future so that being nonbinary won’t make you just a fetish. No part of me is willing to concede any of my self-expression or identity to better fit into this society. Nobody should have to feel like they have to tone down themselves to make themselves more palatable for a first date. Society likes to spread this gospel of being yourself unapologetically and staying true to yourself, but then goes on to tell us that we have to still fit within this one societally acceptable box. It’s not fair and it’s my nonbinary siblings and I are bullied, raped, and murdered just for expressing ourselves. We do want love, but we know that there are more important things than that, like not getting murdered and fighting for our recognition and acceptance. We are people. We are strong and proud people. We will not be recognized only when your marriage is failing and your wife is at work. We will not be treated like nothing more than a sexual conquest. We are not your fetish. We are beautiful and interesting gender non-conforming people who deserve so much more than we get.
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