Susan's Place Transgender Resources

We seem (desperately?) proud of our fondness to play as a group. Wondering whether you think that being an androgyne comes from this playful blurring and changing of boundaries, or whether the sense of play comes from being androgyne...or whether you think the two are not linked or that even the two don't exist.

So a chicky and the egg situation

As playfulness is associated with children, I'd suggest that androgynes are or seem more playful than others based on that. So much of growing up is focused on becoming a man or a woman. And as sometimes happens with transsexuals, there is no clear way to go at a certain age for androgynes. There's no template for an androgyne to grow into. As a result, perhaps androgynes retain their child like traits more than others. So, maybe playfulness or the appearance of it comes from androgynity.

<professor hat, engage!>

Androgyne's a pretty big area, without a lot of rules to box it in. Seeing as how an androgyne basically makes up their own rules to live by (because everybody needs some direction, even if that direction is 'dash around randomly'), being one seems to require a certain amount of whimsicality in order to stay together. Highly ordered people would not take the inherent lack of order well.

That having been said, I can imagine the playfulness might lead to experimenting with the boundaries (kind of like kids do). So... basically, I don't know. One of each?

Lousy professor hat, never can finish its hypotheses... I'm going to get a refund on this thing.
Also, while I was writing, my post's been posted by someone else. Ah well... ^_^

I don't see myself as childlike whatsoever, despite being playful. I may not be growing into a male or female role, but that doesn't mean I am not mature, intelligent, and full of adult experiences and understanding.

That being said, I do think that androgynes have a more upbeat attitude in general, which can definitely be playful. It's really just a...I don't know, an "I'll never be normal anyway, so I can't take myself too seriously" attitude.

Oh yeah. I definitely don't see myself as abnormal or less than someone who is binary. I guess I just mean, that because I am different from what most people can understand there is just no point in bothering to try to impress anyone.

When I was i my teens, I tried very hard to present myself as a heterosexual, cisgender and totally binary girl. And because I pulled it off, I felt this need to continue being so serious because I received rewards for it. I felt I had too much to lose because I had invested so much in this image.

This happened even as FTM...the more manly and binary I behaved, the quicker I got access to testosterone, the quicker that people in my support system came around to see me as someone worthy of transition. I had invested so much in having others dictate my 'worthiness' to access these things that I was afraid to let go and just be happy as a transitioning androgyne.

So for me, it's just really liberating to think that actually, others don't decide how worthy I am of anything. It's a new thing in my case. There's always going to be people who will judge me for things, whether it's my sexual preference (female-bodied person liking women), my transitioning body, or my refusal to categorize myself in the binary. People always generalize and find reasons to hate and judge. So I may as well just let myself be who I am in all parts of my life! And not care. And be playful, allow myself to express things others might repress for the sake of their social conventions.

i'm not a playful person. usually i'm far too serious about things, so i feel lucky that i came by this forum before i got totally serious about being a man. realizing there's no need to choose one or the other was very liberating, but i'm still not more playful than any of my binary friends. most of them totally outdo me in that area

I can't speak for anyone else but I'm playful  and I'm an Androgyne.  I'm also Mature and I was forced to grow up quickly because of my medical crap.  I've always had a playful side and I've always been differently gendered I can't say I'm one because of the other but they do seem interwoven at times

I said I don't know because really, we live in a world with no wall or definitions. No two the same. Try it on and see how it fits. The I don't know option just feels right ... to ME but I don't think I'm all that playful. My sense of humour is medium at best.

Perhaps we just have nothing better to do  :D

It's the only thing worth doing, as it's the only real way to deeply learn.

I actually am even less playful since going andro. Most people are not attracted to genderless people it seems and thats why i dress this way.

Quote from: Forum Admin on June 30, 2011, 06:54:56 PM
As playfulness is associated with children, I'd suggest that androgynes are or seem more playful than others based on that. So much of growing up is focused on becoming a man or a woman. And as sometimes happens with transsexuals, there is no clear way to go at a certain age for androgynes. There's no template for an androgyne to grow into. As a result, perhaps androgynes retain their child like traits more than others. So, maybe playfulness or the appearance of it comes from androgynity.

^^^ Like ^^^

I don't think you have to be an androgyne to be playful but I think it helps to be playful if you're an androgyne.

Quote from: Luna! on June 30, 2011, 07:00:21 PM
Seeing as how an androgyne basically makes up their own rules to live by ...  being one seems to require a certain amount of whimsicality in order to stay together. Highly ordered people would not take the inherent lack of order well.

Nice hat! 

Finally explains why I can't ever seem to clean my room. 

Seriously, tho, I don't know that being an androgyne necessarily means one is more playful.  I do think that truly accepting the fact that there are no gender rules that apply forces one to chose how they want to proceed with their lives.  Rather than chose to worry or obsess over how to fit in, I chose the path of not taking my perceived gender role too seriously.  In fact, I embraced the playful rebel within and opted to have fun with the rules.  I mean, what good are rules if you can't bend and twist them to suit you?

Quote from: Caseyy on June 30, 2011, 10:53:22 PM
It's really just a...I don't know, an "I'll never be normal anyway, so I can't take myself too seriously" attitude.

Who would ever want to be normal?  Seems like too much work constantly evaluating everything you said, thought or did to make sure it was OK with everyone else.  Go ahead...misbehave a little...you might like it

Quote from: explorer on July 01, 2011, 04:08:56 AM
i'm not a playful person. usually i'm far too serious about things, so i feel lucky that i came by this forum before i got totally serious about being a man. realizing there's no need to choose one or the other was very liberating

Yes, dear friends, another lost soul has found their way to the light.  Let us rejoice in their timely rescue and their choice to lay down those burdens "down by the riverside".  Can I get a Hallelujah?  Can I get an Amen?  Can I get a hand getting out of this corner I painted myself in?


I tend to agree with the others who say that the two may not be related, but being playful certainly helps one deal with the ambiguities of being an androgyne.

......Laurry

Quote from: M2MtF2FtM on July 03, 2011, 09:10:49 AM
I actually am even less playful since going andro. Most people are not attracted to genderless people it seems and thats why i dress this way.

You dress 'boy' ?  Thats what you're avatar looks like but I'm not sure if thats what you mean. I agree with you that not everyone is into the andro look when picking friends or SO.

I was playful before I was an androgyne.
Since I spent most of my teen years in a closed room with a computer and lots of books, I never really developed any socialization, so I don't even know what other people are like.

I know I like to experiment and try and play, and I often break things just to put them back together in a better way (this is really fun to do with porcelain, btw)

And regarding AGity... I dunno. I feel that that's completely irrelevant.

Yesterday there was a "gay parade" kind of event, with a bunch of gays mounted in a party car dancing with stereotypical gay music. I felt really sad about the whole thing.
I don't even want to be thought as one of them. I don't want to be thought of as a woman, or as a man, or as a "steretypical gay".
So yea.

The point is that the androgyny for me, is more about running away than playing around. Or something.

Hmm,  I was expecting there to be thought a much stronger link to the two, but that could be because of the central notion that playfulness has in my system of values - I feel the majority of things I have ever been proud of or really, really enjoyed were as a result of playing around.

Quote from: Pica Pica on June 30, 2011, 06:00:32 PMWondering whether you think that being an androgyne comes from this playful blurring and changing of boundaries, or whether the sense of play comes from being androgyne...or whether you think the two are not linked or that even the two don't exist.

Yes.  ;D

I'm a very playful, youthful type of person. I'm also androgynous to some extent. I'm friends with a lot of very silly, playful people. Yet I'm the only androgynous person I know, as near as I can tell. I don't see a link, but that doesn't mean it's not possible.  :-\

wow, I'm useful today...

yes, you're useful, julian. i know lots of playful people myself. most of them are men, for some reason, one's even a homophobe. wonder where all the playful women and androgyne who should've been in my (real, not online) life are...

interesting to see someone thinks we don't really exist, btw

Quote from: explorer on July 09, 2011, 04:08:26 PM
yes, you're useful, julian.

haha, thanks. rereading my post, all I really said was 'eh, maybe, maybe not.'  :P

Quote from: Flotsam on July 11, 2011, 01:52:06 PM
They don't think unicorns exist either. Which is why we all hang out in the unicorn forest.

wondering if someone would call my bluff on that.

Honestly, a big study in psychiatry is that with the appearance of the face and body, societies around the world judge haggard, masculine looks as "that person should not be playful, that freaks me out", all the way to how societies around the world view Androgynous all the way to Female images as "okay, that person looks soft, cuddly, or playful, that personality seems natural for them, I'm not freaked out."

With time, this can catch up to a naturally playful, cute acting person if the person develops very masculine, aged, manly features that don't suit the personality; it may not directly cause distress at first to the person, but eventual outside forces can. Trust me, both studies and personal experiences proves that almost every single person out there will be freaked out and even will make fun of a masculine man who acts cute, playful, "queer", or whatnot, when they wouldn't do that to a person who's appearance already "matches" with the playful personality.

This may and will cause an extroverted, playful, expressive person to become extremely introverted, shy, depressive, ect ect. There's rarely any escaping it, and it's a very extreme problem in the world of people who feel that they look different than what their personality is. It's why that, while a playful personality can truly be innate, that it is almost always diminshed as a person grows more haggard or aged looking. It's why many people are forced to "grow up", and the concept of "having to grow up just because I look grown up" is a horrid concept that I fight against a lot.

I just cringe when I see just how discriminatory society is against haggard looking men in terms of playfulness. It happens to me and it happens to other people. Yet it doesn't happen in the men who just seem to somehow not look old or haggard. It's like two different worlds!

being playful is what stops you looking haggard. If it doesn't, you're not doing it right 8).

Quote from: Padma on July 12, 2011, 05:36:49 AM
being playful is what stops you looking haggard. If it doesn't, you're not doing it right 8).

a playful spark in someone's eyes usually shine so brightly you don't see their otherwise haggard looks. even the old men around here are playful, and the kids love to hear them tell stories about the mischief they did in their own youth. if those same old men weren't playful, the kids would hate them

I know an extraordinary haggard man who is also one of the most playful I know - and it looks perfect.

I play, therefore I am.

Well I think it's because the "inner child" isn't silenced anymore.

As when we grow up, we are forced to act like an adult. So we just learn to silence our inner child and learn to do things the way it's appropriate to our age.

As when we grow up, we are forced to act like an adult

Not all of us, it's easy to grow up without really growing up.

It could be that we become playful to deal with all the crap around us too.  :)

Quote from: Flotsam on July 13, 2011, 11:38:40 PM
There is crap all around us??  Nobody tells me anything...

You never been in a sewer?

Mother never taught me to sew, So I have to go to these sewer shops where they sew lots of things.

This thread is sew going off on a tangent. 


See what I did there?  :icon_eyebrow:

*giggles* I just have to say that you people are fantastic XD  I'm all on pins and needles waiting for the next pun... oh wait, there it was, lol.

Back on topic, though, I'd say that you really shouldn't generalize and say that all androgynes are playful.  Looking at you guys and at myself, though, there does seem to be a sort of link.  I've always been in touch with my inner child, it's way more fun that way!  I've also noticed that I've become sillier and more playful since I started to think of myself as androgyne (or perhaps that's just the sleep loss from staying up late reading info on this every night, and the resulting tons of caffeine the next day XD).

I picked "I don't know."

I know an asexual genderqueer biogirl who, on the surface, seems stony-faced and angry and refuses to ever have a good time.  But she's a musician, posts a lot of goofy things, likes a particular silly animal, and I have seen her grinning.

And of course there are plenty of binary people who, aside from going "11010110" all the time, are playful.

I do think maybe there's something in the mindset though... a realization that absurdity is everywhere, especially in society and its rules.  The world is a terribly silly and improbable place, and the human condition is ridiculous.  (Fnord.)

There might also be an association with chilhood, in that ] young children are often blind to gender roles/stereotypes and ] chldren don't have highly developed physical sex attributes and are sort of androgynous naturally.

This could all be bogus of couse, especially that last part.  But count me as useless anecdotal evidence toward a link between nonbinary and playful.  I don't think one causes the other, but they go together like peanut butter and chocolate.

I wonder about the connection between wordplayfulness and androgynes?  Y'all are really good at it. :)

the connection between wordplayfulness and androgynes

Education

Ah, makes sense :).

Quote from: Jen on August 10, 2011, 11:49:11 PM
I wonder about the connection between wordplayfulness and androgynes?  Y'all are really good at it. :)

Imagination

Quote from: Jen on August 10, 2011, 11:49:11 PM
I wonder about the connection between wordplayfulness and androgynes?  Y'all are really good at it. :)

Most of us haven't even made it out of the Peter Pan Level.

That's the best level anyway, no reason to leave it.

Peter Pan was one selfish prick though.

Quote from: Pica Pica on August 12, 2011, 02:10:46 AM
Peter Pan was one selfish prick though.

Whats got yours in a bunch Tink?

Funny you say that, I have three pairs of tinkerbell knickers on the line and tinkerbell pyjama trousers on my legs - I went through a tink phase.
I liked the description of her being 'two small to have any more that one emotion at a time'.


But I once played Tootles in Peter Pan, and the fact is that it is a dark story about an eternally selfish little boy who gets his own way all the time.

I have a friend who'd totally wear the Tinkerbell stuff, to match the decal on his Macbook.  And another friend who threatens to put me in Hello Kitty pants.  I may have to get some myself preemptively.

I have daisy decals on my macbook.

I know someone who likes little Mermaid ....ALOT
i think she's waaaaay cuter then little Mermaid but...you know ..to each his own LOL

Beauty and the Beast was one of my ones - I wanted to be Belle...mainly because of this

Beauty And The Beast - The Library Scene (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FShFSqulwL8#)


I also wanted to be the Genie in Aladdin.

Belle is sweet. I bet that library held a few 1st editions

Wouldn't it have been a tragedy if it was all just Reader's Digest condensed books?

I have daisy decals on my macbook.

I think of that as more of a mod/hippie 'flower-power' Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In kind of deal myself.  Like wow, and far out and totally 60s.

I like daisies, something about their simplicity of design and ubiquitous nature - something more charming then their more glamorous cousins.

Quote from: Pica Pica on August 12, 2011, 03:50:27 PM
Wouldn't it have been a tragedy if it was all just Reader's Digest condensed books?

hahaha thats funny !

Know what I like?  I like that you can use the word 'ubiquitous' in sentence so casually.  Given the plethora of words you could have chosen, you picked "ubiquitous."   There should be a prize for that.

Dunno how it can be surprising to use the most apt word - but then I did see the little plethora snuck in there.

Your use of "apt" was also very apt

I wanna be where the people are.  I wanna see- wanna see them dancing

Oh my goodness, yes, I have always been envious of that gigantic library in Beauty and the Beast.  The walls covered in books a few stories high... or hundreds of stories high depending on how you look at it ;3

My favorite was always Cinderella, though, and... I'm not sure why, really, lol. 

But I did always want to be Peter Pan.  Something is really fun about never growing up and getting to fly around.  Funny thing is, though, I don't think I've ever actually watched the movie.  I've just watched Hook a million times.  Robin Williams was absolutely perfect for a grown up Peter, so boyish and silly.

Quote from: sunny-side on August 13, 2011, 01:22:46 PM
Oh my goodness, yes, I have always been envious of that gigantic library in Beauty and the Beast.  The walls covered in books a few stories high... or hundreds of stories high depending on how you look at it ;3

My favorite was always Cinderella, though, and... I'm not sure why, really, lol. 

But I did always want to be Peter Pan.  Something is really fun about never growing up and getting to fly around.  Funny thing is, though, I don't think I've ever actually watched the movie.  I've just watched Hook a million times.  Robin Williams was absolutely perfect for a grown up Peter, so boyish and silly.

And Dustin Hoffman a surprisingly good Hook - especially the suicide scene.

Quote from: Pica Pica on August 13, 2011, 01:52:05 PM

And Dustin Hoffman a surprisingly good Hook - especially the suicide scene.

Oh yes.  That movie was so well cast!  I'd still consider it among my favorites.  So cleverly written too.

Smee made me laugh so much XD

And I loved the scene where the lost boys were trying to teach Peter how to eat the pretend food and then he got into an insult war with Rufio XD "you lewd crude piece of pre-chewed food dude" lol

Quote from: Juliet on August 13, 2011, 03:19:07 AM
I wanna be where the people are.  I wanna see- wanna see them dancing

Walking around on those - what do you call 'em ? Oh - feet!

Quote from: espo on August 13, 2011, 07:07:53 PM
Walking around on those - what do you call 'em ? Oh - feet!

I actually typed that, and deleted it - I thought I'd leave it to someone else. Didn't disappoint, good.

Quote from: Pica Pica on August 13, 2011, 07:12:50 PM
I actually typed that, and deleted it - I thought I'd leave it to someone else. Didn't disappoint, good.

Thanks. You're a real nice guy.