LGBTQA and Ally Safe Space

[Madam_Patella]

You don't need to say sorry, you made a good point.

[ColoQ]

Cool, but it'd be cooler if they said just "tank" and "t shirt" instead of "women's tank" and "men's t shirt". Clothing has no gender. [emoji12]

Hmm. Interesting statement. Care to explain that further?

 

My current understanding is that clothing does have a role in gender. My ex (a genderfluid girl who dressed as a drag king when feeling masculine enough) told me that a clothing is a main element of presentation: that being seen as the gender you identify is closely tied to societies' understanding of what is masculine and what is feminine.  She would not, by way of example, wear a dress or a skirt; or short shorts; or a "women's cut" tank (as they accentuated her boobs).

 

And that logic follows somewhat: I am not going to wear a skirt tomorrow as that is a traditionally feminine attire.

[Twilight]

I don't have the spoons at the moment, but I'll try and come back to it if I can.

[Latsu Swagneel]

I don't have the spoons at the moment, but I'll try and come back to it if I can.

Spoons?

Sent front phone. Any mistakes are its fault.

[Jett]

I think maybe the issue is describing it as a women's tank and men's t-shirt, which suggests that a man shouldn't wear the tank top, or a women shouldn't wear the shirt. The clothing may be cut to accentuate people who have a certain build, as typically seen on males and females, respectively, but it could be seen as part of the casual dismissal of people whose gender doesn't totally fit their body. Not that Nerd Fitness is intentionally doing that, but it's society at large that continually reinforces the idea that a man must be masculine and have a certain body type, and a woman must be feminine and have a certain other body type. Thus, men's t-shirt; women's tank.

 

That being said, the tank definitely won't fit the typical masculine build as well as it'll fit a feminine build, so I agree with Patella that you have to make some mention of how it's cut. I don't personally have a problem with describing them with a gender that will most frequently be able to wear them to best fit. I just see "men's t-shirt" as shorthand for "t-shirt intended to fit someone with the traditionally masculine build, ie, large shoulders and a narrow waist."

[Teirin]

Spoons?

Sent front phone. Any mistakes are its fault.

 

Spoon Theory

 

Please let me know if I'm misinterpreting.

[Twilight]

I think maybe the issue is describing it as a women's tank and men's t-shirt, which suggests that a man shouldn't wear the tank top, or a women shouldn't wear the shirt. The clothing may be cut to accentuate people who have a certain build, as typically seen on males and females, respectively, but it could be seen as part of the casual dismissal of people whose gender doesn't totally fit their body. Not that Nerd Fitness is intentionally doing that, but it's society at large that continually reinforces the idea that a man must be masculine and have a certain body type, and a woman must be feminine and have a certain other body type. Thus, men's t-shirt; women's tank.

That being said, the tank definitely won't fit the typical masculine build as well as it'll fit a feminine build, so I agree with Patella that you have to make some mention of how it's cut. I don't personally have a problem with describing them with a gender that will most frequently be able to wear them to best fit. I just see "men's t-shirt" as shorthand for "t-shirt intended to fit someone with the traditionally masculine build, ie, large shoulders and a narrow waist."

Partially this, yes. The should and should not.

There are some guys I'd really like to see in a tight, revealing tank, but they're given "permission" to wear the more modestly cut shirt. Women are expected to be sexy and available at all times, so are given the skimpier shirt.

Bodies with breasts are diverse, just as bodies without breasts are diverse. The shirts can be worn by anyone and will fit most people. They aren't going to spontaneously combust or be completely impossible to actually put on if worn by the "wrong" body. Saying it fits better relies on us having a universal definition of what "better" is.

[Artinum]

I think that in this case it's not so much attaching a gender to them as describing how they fit (Traditional view of men's meaning a rectangular torso with more room in the shoulders and women's having more room in the hips). I'm not saying that it's right to attach specific physical characteristics to a gender. I am saying that for practical reasons you couldn't do away entirely with using words to describe the distinction between styles of clothing. It would be clearer to actually say 'fits tighter/looser in ___ area' though.

 

TL;DR I agree with you. I'm just feeling pedantic right now.   or just sleepy, they tend to coincide. 

 

The most binary distinction for men/women is physical. Emotional/mental distinctions are much fuzzier, but generally you get one set of bits or the other to start with - and a lot of other physical traits come with them. It's not that simple, of course - I've seen plenty of big built women and slender, effeminate men, and there's a small but significant number of people who straddle both or neither gender type - but the majority fall into one set of body shapes or the other, and relatively few fall into the "wrong" set.

 

Clothing companies don't tend to cater for the middle ground so much out of sheer economy. It's nothing personal - it's business, and it isn't just the genderfluid that fall into the gaps. Any of us with unusual shapes have to do what we can - my mother has such little feet, for example, that she buys children's shoes. Very few shoe manufacturers bother with adult shoes in her size because the margins are so small. Meanwhile, I'm lucky my feet stopped growing when they did, or I'd have to get my shoes specially made. I've met people who do.

 

If you feel you're being told you "shouldn't" wear a particular top, is it really the clothing company saying this? I'm sure they'll be happy to sell you anything you want to buy regardless of your gender.

[Latsu Swagneel]

See, this is why I've had to explain to people the difference between sex and gender.

To me, sex is your chromosomal arrangement. XX gives a female type body with all of its hormonal and physical aspects, while XY gives a male type. Gender, on the other hand, is how a person identifies. After all, there are 3 main sexes (male, female, and intersex). Gender, however, is a fluid spectrum, with some people falling on one end, others on the other end, a portion falling somewhere along the spectrum, and another portion not falling anywhere at all.

I think clothing companies are not referring to gender when they say male or female clothing, rather, they are specifically referring to the general archetypes of the sex they are designing the clothing for.

My take is, wear whatever the f*** you want, regardless of what the clothing company or store marketed it as. If it makes you feel good about yourself, then ignore the people who make disparaging remarks.

As always, I'm speaking from my perspective, so, please comment. Don't take my words for disregarding anybody's opinion or experiences.

Sent front phone. Any mistakes are its fault.

[SolitaryOrchid]

It might be there as a size marker. I know in most places a typical woman's clothing small is a lot smaller than a typical man's clothing small. Kind of like the difference between men's and women's socks or shoes. If not though it does seem strange to me that they would label it like that.

I'm in the country so guys wear tanks here all the time. As far as cut goes I could see a baby tee being denoted as a woman's cut but both a tank and a tshirt are so gender neutral that I don't see much purpose in labeling them men's or women's unless there is some distinct difference like size or something.

[Jett]

I think Orchid's right about t-shirt sizes - that a "men's small" is bigger than a "women's small". Other than that, of course, t-shirts are pretty gender-neutral. As far as I know, the "women's tanks" are lower-cut at the neckline than tanks for men, and flare out slightly at the hips for a "fitted" look.

 

As an attempt to clarify my earlier comments, I use 'man' and 'woman' as separate terms from 'male' and 'female'. As Latsu pointed out, gender and biological sex aren't always the same. A woman could be biologically male, but her gender identity is as a woman. In that case, a "women's tank" may not fit her that well, which is a subtle sort of way of suggesting that she isn't really a woman. The same sort of problem exists for cis-women who just happen to have big shoulders and narrower waists. Offering women-specific clothes that don't fit actual women very well can be kind of painful for those women who have an less-than-typical shape. (I imagine this happens somewhat for men, too, but men's clothing seems to usually be looser, which can help hide a variety of different frames.)

 

But, that said, a large proportion of the world does fit, more or less, into the shapes generally thought of as "man" or "woman". It's easy to see why clothing companies would use that as their descriptors, without thinking about why that could be a problem. The number of customers that it's a problem for is pretty small, which means the likelihood that it'll change any time soon is very low. It is a symptom of the cultural confusion between gender and sex, and the idea that there are only 2 genders.

 

I see why it's a little problematic, but at the same time, I don't take it personally. There are bigger battles to fight than how we label our clothes. I know what it means when a shirt is labeled a "women's tank", and I know it will be well-fitted to the body I happen to have, even though I don't really identify as a woman. If I don't feel like showing off my curves today, I'll wear a "men's t-shirt" even though I also don't identify as a man. And, knowing I don't fit into most people's understanding of the world, I'll be gracious about whatever pronouns they decide to use for me on any given day. For me, it doesn't really matter. I know it means a lot more to other people, so maybe some day we can get clothing companies to rename their sizing charts.

 

(Actually, I'd just love to see a goddamn standardized sizing chart for American sizes. How the hell am I an XL in some brands and a small in others? That just makes no sense...)

[Artinum]

(Actually, I'd just love to see a goddamn standardized sizing chart for American sizes. How the hell am I an XL in some brands and a small in others? That just makes no sense...)

 

This is not unique to America. I don't know why it happens, but my best guess - psychology. Some people love hearing they're a "small" rather than a "medium" (for instance), so they'll buy clothes that claim to be "small" because they've been... flattered? I dunno.

 

I'm the worst person to ask about buying clothes as I avoid it wherever possible. I hate shopping generally and for clothes in particular. Shoe shops are worse, except for running shoes. :-)

[insanity]

This is not unique to America. I don't know why it happens, but my best guess - psychology. Some people love hearing they're a "small" rather than a "medium" (for instance), so they'll buy clothes that claim to be "small" because they've been... flattered? I dunno.

 

I'm the worst person to ask about buying clothes as I avoid it wherever possible. I hate shopping generally and for clothes in particular. Shoe shops are worse, except for running shoes. :-)

This... it's a self-esteem boost for people to fit into a 6 when they were just barely fitting into an 8 a year ago, despite weighing the same. That's the one thing I like about mens clothes, it's hard to change a size, that's based on inches. Our shirts still have that issue though.

 

I feel the same on clothes shopping, but I love psychology.

[ColoQ]

This... it's a self-esteem boost for people to fit into a 6 when they were just barely fitting into an 8 a year ago, despite weighing the same.

...  Now with more data

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/esquire-your-pants-are-lying-to-you/

[insanity]

...  Now with more data

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/esquire-your-pants-are-lying-to-you/

Well damn... I retract my previous statement about waist sizes based on inches, let's just completely mislabel them... that's the first I've seen of that, though it doesn't surprise me.

[SolitaryOrchid]

I've definitely run into trouble with buying 38 "inch" pants without trying them on because an inch is an inch, right? Only to find out later that the 38 on the tag is definitely not 38 inches. I imagine this problem will only get worse as the waistlines continue to grow. I have found that thrift stores tend to be a bit more true to the inch than department stores. I guess because most of their products for sale are typically older.

[Jett]

Yeah... I'd love it if sizes were just the inches of various key areas of the garment. Like for shirts, it should be shoulder width, chest circumference, waist circumference. Pants should be waist circumference and thich circumerference plus length...

 

As it stands now, I have to try on anything and everything before buying, or at the very least, I don't buy online unless there's a very comprehensive sizing chart with the measurements I mentioned above. It's annoying.

[Teirin]

Gender transition services must be covered in health care plans for Federal employees provided by their pool of providers.  Hope this is as good as it sounds and helps some people!

[Hit]

Gender/sex definitions are sketchy, and using terms like "biological sex" (especially saying sex is defined by chromosomes) is very murky water. At the end of the day, nobody asks you about your karyotype so it's hardly relevant to a discussion on clothing. The issue is actually far more commonplace. See this from ColoQ 

 

 

 

clothing is a main element of presentation: that being seen as the gender you identify is closely tied to societies' understanding of what is masculine and what is feminine

 

is spot on! essentially, we as a society go male = man = masculine and female = woman = feminine. with the shirts what you really have are masculine and feminine styles, so we call them mens and womens respectively. The issue is that the first assumption (sex = gender = presentation) doesn't hold true for everyone, and hence the following labels become uncomfortable and ill-fitting - clothes metaphors yo. 

 

While this is a useful shorthand for many people, it's also an example of cis-binary privilege, and a reason why so many non-binary and trans individuals get annoyed or dysphoric while trying to find clothes.  

[Vella]

This... it's a self-esteem boost for people to fit into a 6 when they were just barely fitting into an 8 a year ago, despite weighing the same. That's the one thing I like about mens clothes, it's hard to change a size, that's based on inches. Our shirts still have that issue though.

 

I feel the same on clothes shopping, but I love psychology.

 

And then there was the day when I bought two pair of size 34 men's jeans and one pair size 32, and I fit perfectly into the 32, while one 34 was on the borderline of small and the other 34 had to be belted so they didn't expose my buttcrack.

I suppose clothing companies are always going to be the same about this stuff - if there's money in it for them, they will.

 

The main reason I dislike "men's clothes" and "women's clothes" is because (despite the fact that I technically have a bit of privilege in this area; I live in a place where it's less frowned upon for AFAB people to wear "men's clothes", particularly clothes designed to fit AMAB bodies but in garments which are available in both sections of the mall (jeans, baggy tee shirts, hoodies, work button-up shirts) than for AMAB folks to wear "women's clothes"), it still took me years to be comfortable shopping in the section of the store marked "Men's". I've been made to feel like utter crap when I've been shopping for shirts in a menswear store, asked for pricing help, and the store clerk looked me up and down, raised an eyebrow and asked "How big is your boyfriend? Or is this a gift for your father?" (Please note: the only thing I really, truly regret about this situation is not giving her a deadpan stare, gesturing to myself and saying 'Exactly this size. To the millimetre. The shirt is for me).

It's true that most places will just sell you the damn pants (I've also had experiences where the store clerk, a lovely middle-aged guy, suggested specific styles that would suit my body better and make me look more masc than the Generic O'Straightleg cargo pants I was looking at), and online stores? Super simple. It's the expectations that the gendering clothing creates for the people who are shopping there that makes a lot of people uncomfortable, I think, rather than the simple fact that the clothes are "for" men or "for" women. The subtle hint that because of cut and style and the bodies that generally shop there, certain bodies are unwelcome.

TL;DR - It's not the clothes label, it's how people think about the clothes label.

[Vella]

Aaargh, sorry for the double post, needed to vent. Spoiler tags for people who wanted to continue the other conversations without my interrupting. Note: Is about people who have transphobic views, of the irritating and wrong rather than violent variety.

 

I have a friend who is a demigirl. She is currently at university, but lives at home. Her parents are quite transphobic, and when the subject of trans people and especially nonbinary people was delicately broached, they have expressed the firm and unwavering view that trans and nonbinary people are "just confused" and such things. My friend has, understandably, chosen not to disclose her identity to her parents for this reason.
Now, I'm out to all my friends and I've been a walking teachable moment for the kids at the childcare where I work, and I'm about to be out in a reception workplace. I won't usually just correct people on the street who happen to use the wrong pronouns, but I will pull up friends who slip up and all that, and I will (usually quite willingly) deal with kids' questions and explain how gender and sex can mismatch and all the basic concepts and stuff.
However, my friend has been asking persistently that I come over and have dinner at her place, and be "insistently enby" at her parents to try and see if they can change their minds if presented with a reasonable, responsible adult with a very certain gender identity that is not cisgender, and a good grasp of how to express the concepts involved.

 

I would really like to help this friend out, and I feel like I'm doing her a disservice by not trying to help her, but at the same time, I'm really not sure I want to walk into a conversation with two people whom I know are going to be hostile to the topic (though not me; despite my friend mentioning my identity, they were very polite and we had some good conversations), and spend several hours that I know will be intensely awkward and for which I'll have to have my points down pat and my Receptionist Face on. I have very little emotional energy to spare at the moment, because of financial and anxiety issues, and I know it's going to trigger a bit of dysphoria (which I don't get really badly, but still sucks). Part of me really does want to help, and is telling me it's a small, temporary sacrifice for a friend who has to live in this unsupportive situation for the foreseeable future, but another part of me just wants to tell this friend it's not my responsibility and she has to stop bugging me about it.

It probably doesn't help that this friend is a lot "closer" than I like to be to friends; because I'm helping with a mutual friend trying to move out of a less-than-pleasant home life, she sort of assumed I was OK to provide the loungeroom space of my one-bedroom, combined kitchen and loungeroom apartment as sleeping space if that friend couldn't find a house right away, which I am, because I would prefer to do that than throw this friend out on the streets, but after that, the assumptions just kept coming in and in and in, like of course I'm OK to have a weekly dinner night for the three of us, and of course I'm OK to come and educate her parents, and of course I'm OK to use as a contact resource for all her other enby friends who need binder advice and of course I'd like to discuss private matters of my personal intimate partner preferences (she is fine with that level of openness. I've all but outright lied to her, implying I'm asexual or grey-ace to stop her inquiring into my own affairs and stop her trying to set me up with her friend and suggesting ways for me to get either an SO or just get laid, she's not really fussy as to which.


Uuuuurgh. I feel a bit awful for trying to get out of helping a friend, but at the same time, this just seems really like it's not something she should be relying on me for? I dunno. Maybe when I'm in a better financial position, I'll be able to go and help out, because I'll be less stressed generally. Thanks for letting me vent, folks.

[SolitaryOrchid]

Vella, first and foremost you are responsible to yourself. If doing something runs the risk of putting undue stress on you then by no means should you feel obligated to do it. Especially since in this situation there's no guarantee that you meeting with her parents will even help one bit (honestly I seriously doubt it would do anything to change their minds at all.) That's not being selfish, it's taking care of yourself. Besides, it does sound a lot like she has been using you as a crutch lately without your permission. That's never a fun place to be. It's important to set boundaries.

[Jett]

Orchid's advice is totally solid. It's not your responsibility to open up her parents' eyes, and although you want to help, you need to make sure you're taking care of yourself first. It sounds like this friend has been walking all over you - with the best of intentions, sure, but not with very much tact or sensitivity to your needs. I understand that it can be hard to say 'no', especially when the person asking really does need some help. But it would probably help your stress levels and your relationship with this friend if you could explain to her what your needs and boundaries are, and insist that she respect those. No more discussions about sex. If you don't want to be the advice-giver for her friends anymore, tell her to stop giving out your contact info. If you need some time home alone, tell her to take the mutual friend out for dinner instead of eating in. Etc etc... This is your home and your life, and you have the right to do what you want with them.

[WingedBeastie]

Scout here.  Bisexual (as in attracted to same and other genders)  Polyamorus Non-binary (henceforth referred to as 'nb' on the Aromantic spectrum. I prefer she/they and almost never interact with LGBTQA spaces because I find them wicked frustrating. There are a lot of assumptions about people who are any one for these groups of people, so having them together is kind of a cocktail for stupidity.

[Hit]

 

 

There are a lot of assumptions about people who are any one for these groups of people, so having them together is kind of a cocktail for stupidity.

 

While true in almost every space, that's a really strange way to introduce yourself to a group. But sure ok, hi and welcome and stuff.

 

 

 

Uuuuurgh. I feel a bit awful for trying to get out of helping a friend, but at the same time, this just seems really like it's not something she should be relying on me for?

 

Honestly doesn't sound like this person is being much of a friend, and while they clearly are in need of some help they are acting in a very inappropriate manner. I feel like you should redefine your boundaries here, and make it clear what you are comfortable doing and what you are not. 

 

Being, as you put it, a "walking teachable moment" gets old very quick, but people will continue to assume you are okay with doing that as long as you let it happen. If you want it to change, you need to put your foot down.