On my last post, I mentioned that our government is making all Kenyans who own a SIM card to have it registered. They need identification documents to have this done. I am perturbed. Why? Because my current identification documents do not resemble me one bit. Fine, you may say “it sure looks like your brother” but that's as near as you may go. It has my former (male) name, it has an “M” for sex etc etc. So how am I to register? They need a copy of your ID card to register you. That means I can't even go to a friend who does the registration and ask him/her to just register me without the need to produce an ID. It is times like these that I feel like saying “FML!!”.
Still on the same, Kenya is in a voting mood. We are voting either for or against the constitution. Oh, wait, THEY are voting. Oh no, not me. The government doesn't know I exist! Okay, I can do something about it and I am doing it, but if youve been following this, you know that I started it like three months ago! So that means, I cant vote YES. I am rooting for the constitution. It has good things for us. But I cant vote. I have an ID that doesn't look like me! Huh!
Finally, I read something on transgender identities in Kenya. The author kept saying how people need to stop “pigeon-holing” transgender individuals in identities that don't belong to them. I completely agree. And it is indeed true that trans persons keep being pigeon-holed into the binary system of “male” or “female” and where one is found to have the genitalia of either or, then they use that to define you. Who gave them the right? Huh? Who made them judge? Fine, we can agree that “oh no we have never heard of transgender before” fine. But if I tell you I am a transgender then don't start asking me what I have between my legs. Does it matter? Did I say I wanna have sex with you or something? Because basically that's the only reason you'd have to ask me such a question. What am I saying? Basically, it is plain wrong to identify someone by what they have “down there”. I personally am a woman. A female. A girl. I choose that because it feels right. Wait, I am not saying am not transgender, am saying that transgender is not my identity. There is a difference. There is my status and the identity I choose. So if someone wants to be called, not a woman but, a transsexual woman, then so be it. If a transsexual woman wants to simply be called a woman, then so be it. This manenos of putting people in boxes should cease and desist.
Period.
*XOXO*
7 comments:
Why don't you show a picture of yourself???
What I really find a little bit disturbing is the angryness felt "between the lines" with yourself and life as a whole. Have you think about this?
Hehe... You are putting yourself in the "Woman box". Why are you afraid to have a Transgender Identity? Have you found it threatening? Why you need to sort out of it? Is that really right activism?
You say: "I don't exist". Isn't this drama?
What do not exists are your female ID's or Do you exist only through ID's?
What makes a woman a woman Lindsay? Breasts? A Vagina? A femenine Voice... What about a woman that has lost her genitalia and her breasts? Does she stop to be a woman? What of a woman that has a tough face? Clothes? What of a woman that dresses in an andogyn fashion? Genes? If that, then, you are not a woman. And what of women that have the XY cromosomes. Or men with XX cromosomes. Do you know that happens? Why are you aginst the bigendered social construction when you are giving us a dramatic rant so to be put into one of the cages of this same Bigenderism?
Think about this: There is nothing concrete that makes a man a man and a woman a woman. It is a better activism to live with what you have done to yourself pacefully, openly, and stop ranting about identites that do not sustain by themselves. First of all you are a person that has gone through this, consciously, so to be in pace with yourself, and I do not see such a pacefull self reading your blog.
Hi Anonymous,
Well I hear you and I completely agree that there is absolutely nothing that makes one 'man man' or 'woman woman'. But I chose what fits best. I chose what feels right to me. This is what feels right.
All those things you cited about different 'types' of women or men are exactly what I'm for. They exist and they need to be recognized and respected. I am against bigenderism, and my being on one extreme end of this doesn't stop me from being against it. Why? Because I am okay with it. Its the ones not okay with it that need this pep talk.
Lastly, thanks for commenting and putting the word out.
Your wellcome Lindsay and sorry if I were rude with my comments... Everyday I learn something from the different one. We can not all think the same and that is really great!
Also I think that being different is important but it should never bring us into setting hierarchies because of them. And why not, maybe, at the end we can see that we are not so different at all.
Anonymous,
Its okay. And you're right. We all think differently but some things remain the same. Our humanity.
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