By Rusty Rust
We as a society hate to not know things. We walk around and collect information to use as a basis for making assumptions about people and the environment around us. The problem with this form of knowledge building is that societies are built to privilege the existence of certain identities to the exclusion of many others, which are then marginalized.
In the United States, we have organized society around the idea that there are only two genders and that everyone is sexual. We think that we know these things to be true because there is very little representation to tell us otherwise. When, in fact, many societies have existed for ages that recognize a multitude of genders and a spectrum of sexuality.
People outside of these preconceived ideas of gender and sexuality have only recently being recognized.
Transgender people are being more widely represented but only within the framework of being men or women, reinforcing the binary structure of gender.
One notable example of this is the character on “Orange is the New Black,” Sophia Burset, played by Laverne Cox. This was one of the first major trans characters on a show in the U.S. Non-binary people are often misrepresented as androgynous or being without gender, if they are represented at all.
“Billions” is an HBO show whose character Taylor Mason, played by Asia Kate Dillon, is both masculine and androgynous presenting. This show is one of the first to feature a non-binary character but does so by reinforcing stereotypes that make non-binary femmes invisible.
Similarly, sexuality is being represented across the heterosexual and homosexual spectrum but if someone is asexual, they are represented as someone who does not have sex at all. When in reality, both of these identities are way more complex than anyone cares to investigate.
We would rather look at someone and think that we “know” their gender rather than ask what pronouns they use. It is just as easy to assume that everyone around us engages in sex with their intimate partners.
“Game of Thrones,” “Bojack Horseman” and “Spongebob Squarepants” are our most notable examples of asexuality on television. However, all three of them do not engage in sex or experience sexual attraction.
Like non-binary people, those who are demi-sexual (only experiencing sexual attraction after an emotional connection is established) or otherwise experience limited sexual, are lumped in with and reduced to characters that experience no sexual attraction.
Those who experience no romantic attraction or limited romantic attraction (aromantic, biromantic, etc.) are erased completely. These things happen because diverse representations are non-existent or are very limited.
So, what are we to do in this kind of climate as people who live these identities? Often, we are made be representations for or educate those around us. This is tiring.
Some days I feel like I have an infinite amount of energy for helping people understand my identity as a transmasculine, non-binary, demisexual, queer person. Other times, I say “Google it.”
If you are one of those people seeking education, do the research for yourself and if at some point, you have a say in the kind of representations that exist in popular media, work to make them more diverse and not caricatures.
Educate people around you and if someone tries to extract energy from someone with one of these identities, stand-in and do the labor or help your friend establish or reinforce their own boundaries that protect their emotional and mental health. Society is lagging; do your best to help it catch up.
