Identity: Joining, or Formulating?

[ahunter3]

Here's a snippet from That Guy in Our Women's Studies Class --

Queenie’s perspective seemed to be mostly formed around belonging to an already-existing category that people knew about, while mine on the other hand was all wrapped up in theory, describing myself as belonging to a hypothetical group that I then had to describe

Comments

[kanzeon_2040]

This search for sexual/gender identity outside the pink/blue paradigm reminds me of people who are brought up within an organized faith like Catholicism, leave it, and then look for some sort of more specific spirituality among the Pagans. Not the best metaphor. But also reminds me of people who leave the Democratic/Republican paradigm and then look for some sort of more specific politics among the Socialists, Greens, or Libertarians. If you think for yourself about such things - gender, religion, politics - you're going to find that no group or label describes your own thoughts and beliefs perfectly. I recently listened to a younger person talking about leaving the Democratic Party of his parents, then finding Marxism, but then becoming post-Marxist, and trying to describe what his political ideology is now

[ahunter3]

Yes, this! If I thought enough people would get it, I'd put "If we think for ourselves, the results of our thoughts will become infinitely fractal" on a tee shirt. Of course that's a bit of a self-referential situation itself, isn't it?

We do need to reconcile our need for connection, community & solidarity with our need to transcend "us vs them".

[kanzeon_2040]

I've bought the book! Should receive it tomorrow :-)

[kanzeon_2040]

I love how honest your autobiographical voice sounds :-)

I'm loving the second book! The first one felt important and triggering and I knew it was valuable reading. This one feels like more of a romp, but still reminding me of decades past and making me think about topics that I'm still struggling with today.