On identifying identities

[Butterfly]

On identifying identities
Feministe
09 February, 2010


http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2010/02/09/on-identifying-identities/


It takes some kind of extraordinary arrogance to declare an identity for someone else. This is an attitude that says, 'My perceptions are more important than your lived experience.' 'My comfort in my ability to correctly assess people overrides the truth.' It is extraordinary what lengths humans will go to in order to make the world in line with their screwy ideas about the people in it. As for 'the truth,' that's the thing. The truth is that someone's identity is whatever they hold it to be. Asserting your idea of what a person is over theirs says that it's okay for everyone to weigh in on and locate and decide it as an objective truth.