femininity

To my friends, you are the most important and special thing I have in this life.

I resisted obsession of boy bands and MagCon boys, avoided indulging in makeup until I was in high school, and certainly didn’t claim pink as my favorite color. But why? Why was it necessary for me to avoid these things?

I struggled to surrender myself to my femininity; without realizing it, I was bringing the defensiveness I met the outside world with into our studio.

While perhaps not homophobes, straight men feel an inclination to portray queer men in a sexual or feminine context as a joke in order to distance themselves from queerness.

Ole ole, ole ole, softball players do not always swing the other way. Like all stereotypes, the lesbian label deeply affects all softball players.

Before I even entered middle school, I recognized that I was seen as undesirable. Even though my Asian family members were quick to reassure me of my attractiveness, they would also call the majority of Asian men ugly.

We have been taught to think, from a very young age, that an intelligent person, a scientist, looks a certain way, which often isn’t very feminine.

I don’t want to carry on the tradition of the gender binary. I want to analyze it, question it and reject it altogether, all the while encouraging others to do the same.

“Cool Girl” is no longer a defining compliment in my eyes. I’ve instead accepted it as a product of the male gaze.

Maybe if I stopped all attempts at femininity, my appearance would no longer be in focus. I could blend in the background, a vague outline of a person.