Sunday Short - LARP: your prejudice breaks my immersion

This post is inspired by some conversations and mutual rants on my Facebook feed. Names are blanked out as this was not on a public filter. 

The subject of today's post is that of how people fight against the notion of using the correct pronouns and gendered terms for people. I have chosen to take excerpts from a thread of people who were all "on the same side" in this battle and who were collectively venting their frustration at people who look for any excuse not to use the correct pronouns for people when asked to do so.

This mutual annoyance had been triggered by a series of comments on a LARP specific facebook page in which a person had said they had some wooden pronoun badges available for people at an upcoming event. They also shared the relevant rules pages of the event that explained both acceptable in character (IC) and out of character (OC/OOC) language and the in character attitudes toward both gender and people who are trans and/or nonbinary. For the most part the responses were positive and supportive. Many people expressed excitement at how these would be personally helpful, while others expressed mild confusion to the concept along with their support and promises to do their best.
This is exactly the sort of response you would hope for.

Of course though there were those who adamantly insisted that it was all too confusing for them and others who insisted that having to use correct pronouns or seeing setting appropriate pronoun badges would "break their immersion". But more of that later.

I wanted you to see it from this angle as I think often in these situations, the minority group being targeted feels they have to go to great lengths to stay polite and reasonable and any show of anger and annoyance is seen as being unreasonable, demanding and disruptive. What's not understood is that actually these things really do upset people, that restraint is not just tedious but emotionally draining and actually, in safe spaces people have a lot to say. Not only that but that this isn't one or two individuals nor is it just those who are personally impacted there are many others who offer their support.

These excerpts are taken from a much larger discussion.
NB when it is necessary to differentiate between people posting I will refer to them by the colour used to blank out their names.

screen shot of a Facebook post. The posters name and profile picture are obscured. transcript below.

[red person] [LARP list - Empire - small rant cw. misgendering]
I am gonna start by saying I'm angry, but not necessarily at anyone in particular.
Yes, one guy said that PRONOUN BADGES BREAK HIS IMMERSION-ish. And sure he was way privileged but not malicious. Although it annoyed me because this was posted in the AMAZING [name redacted]'s post about their awesomeness to get IC pronoun badges out, supporting transfolk (including me!) And some cis-jebend comes out with this?
Nah bruv. Back of the line!
As was pointed out, there is (meant to be) no gender bias in Empire, but it's not gender blind.
Also if pronound badges break your immersion ... just ... really, it breaks your immersion?!?!
Luckily, though it's not about you or your immersion. It's about avoiding misgendering, which can be HORRID btw.
Sigh. 

Luckily ppl have been amazing in response. 

I mean this sums it up really. It's frustrated and annoyed and the poster just wants to have nice things and not be misgendered.

Yet when a person starts complaining about having to call people by the correct pronouns that's what they are doing. They are knowingly getting a part of somebody's identity wrong. People will come up with all sorts of excuses about why this should be ok , or about why they should be excused from the basic courtesy of calling people by the name and gendered terms they are comfortable with.
As we shall now see.

Screen shot of facebook comments. The first comment is by ORANGE and has two short replies from RED and PINK. There is another comment from PINK. Both comments have a number of like, love and funny reacts.

 [orange person] Know what breaks my immersion? the tractor that empties the toilets. Know what form of immersion I'm happy to deal without? Actual literal tonnes of human waste.
[red person replies] YES!
[pink person replies] Hahahaha. Giggling at my desk here.
[pink person] If a wooden badge breaks his immersion, I dread to think what potion lammies, the caterers, the use of normal money to buy things, monstering battles, referees, the toilets, the continued existence of Silverstone on the edge of hearing and time-out do. But I have a long standing solution to people with immersion problems. It involves a large paddling pool and I didn't need it last event. 

Immersion, for those not familiar with the term in this context, is the concept of being fully immersed in the make-believe world of a LARP. It is how much you feel that it is all real as it is happening and "buy-in" to the game. It's not essential and it's never going to be 100%. At the end of the day we all do know we are at a game and this isn't real life. Some degree of immersion really can make for a better game, there's little argument there. We often strive towards as compelling and "believable" setting, story and characters as we can and that's great. If you don't LARP think about sitting down to watch a film or read a book and getting totally engrossed in it so that the mundane world is temporarily shut out. It's a much different experience than when people are rustling bags of crisps, talking and walking across your view of the movie screen.
But, our orange and pink people above aptly describe, there are always going to be intrusions. In a fest LARP they can range to basic modern sanitation like emptying the portable toilets to things designed to make the games work like referees (I've included a brief glossary of terms at the bottom of this post). We just work around them, accept them and carry on with our game.
The references to Silverstone by the way is because this game happens to take place near Silverstone Race Track and though we never run on major F1 days there are often other race days on which can sound like an alarmingly large swarm of wasps.

To argue that with all that, pronoun badges and calling people the right terms is immersion breaking is a weak excuse. It's churlish and transphobic. It's finding the thought of being reminded to use the correct terms so outlandish and unreasonable as to be more disruptive than a septic tank being emptied.
Not only that it is selfish. Even if it were somehow terribly disruptive to be reminded by a small wooden badge what pronoun a person uses, it presumes that your own sense of immersion and experience of a game is more important than not misgendering somebody for an entire weekend.

OK on to the next round.

Screen shot of a Facebook comment with three replies. two names have been obscured the third is mine. Transcript below

[red person] HALP
What can I reply to comments such as "[name redacted] see this is my problem to me, people are people regardless of these endless labels, we all are just people" ??
That's GREAT that you do and fab. The label, the one you scorn that helped me find who I am "Agender" is part of my IDENTITY. Don't DISMISS MY IDENTITY JUST YOU DON'T SEE IT.
I'M A PERSON RESPECT WHO I AM.
[Robin Tynan] "though we are all just people labels are commonly used in our culture and language. Since we use them all the time for people it's a good idea to make sure we use the correct ones. Also while you may be happy to have any random word used to describe you, others prefer if the language is more precise. It's just personal preference and there's no harm in respecting that."
[green person] With an axe?
[Robin Tynan] ^ wait ignore me, do this.

What we have here being quoted by Red Person is a frustratingly common rhetoric. "We're all just people", "I don't see labels". Yet people do see labels. Most people are comfortable being called by their own name and not by somebody elses, or even by a variant of their name. I have worked with a Steve and a Stephen, they were very different people. Steve hated being called Stephen and vis versa. Equally, a lot of people get ranckled if they get a letter addressed to Miss instead of Mrs, Ms instead of Miss or Mrs instead of Ms: that's not even misgendering, they're all female but we know that in our culture each of those labels confers different meaning and so we like the correct one to be used. Most cis people don't have the discomfort of being routinely misgendered but wouldn't hesitate to correct somebody if they incorrectly used Sir or Madam - and those who got bullied when younger for being "like a boy" or "not manly enough" may particularly be sensitive to what pronouns and gendered terms get used for them.
And that's just us as individuals. Have you ever patted somebodies dog and said "How old is he?" only to be given a firm "She is eight." . So many people are very quick to make sure the "correct" labels are used for creatures (and even things, like boats and cars) who have no concept of English language let alone sex and gender.
This is a common and shared experience. Most people actually do care about and use labels far more than they realise and I can't think of anybody I have ever met who has genuinely appeared not to care. Yet when it comes to asking people to respect the pronouns of people who are trans and/or nonbinary people forget a lifetime of experience and turn into egalitarian hippies who shun labels and social constructs like gender. Its insincere, it looks insincere and it infuriating. Again it's hurtful and transphobic and unnecessarily passive aggressive. If these arguments only apply when you are in a conversation about trans and nonbianry people then you are discriminating against them and acting with prejudice.

Screen shot from facebook showing a comment and subsequent replied from the same person. The second reply itself contains a screenshot from elsewhere on facebook. Name obscured, transcript below

[purple person] YUP THAT THREAS IS 99% AWESOMENESS AND THEN THESE TWO PEOPLE.
like, I'd already ranted about [name redacted]'s first comment last night, and it's like, it's not enough she's not being coddles for not being able to use "they/them", she then has to continue plowing in with her fucking aggravating comments. like SHUT THE FUCK UPPPPPPPPPP [name redacted].
[purple person replies] Honestly, Like, this comment is the only reason I engaged with her second comment. Like, first of all, there's no "problem". Second of all "if I'm uncertain"?? THE POINT OF THIS IS TO MAKE [SURE] YOU'RE NOT UNCERTAIN. THIS THREAD [the original] IS LITERALLY TALKING ABOUT HOW TO MAKE SURE YOU'RE CERTAIN ABOUT SOMEONE'S PRONOUNS.
THIRDLY I AM DONE WITH "I'M OLD SO I'M TRANSPHOBIC/RACIST/SEXIST"
[quoted excerpt from original thread] perfect I am older than the average LARPer and therefor find adjusting my language hard and have been known to cause offence inadvertantly. In an effort to prevent this if I am uncertain I use the person's name instead of pronouns. Problem Solved.
[purple person] AND THEN THAT PITY PARTY OF A THIRD COMMENT. LIKE, WE GET IT, YOU'RE REALLY MAD YOU'VE NOT SUCCESSFULLY MADE THIS THREAD ABOUT YOU BUT STFU PLZ

As you may have noted, Purple Person has some strong feelings here. You might think some of their responses are an over reaction, but I absolutely 100% agree with them and they are far from an over reaction. (keep in mind this response was not said directly to the offending person, the wrath was reserved for elsewhere). I want to focus on the quoted excerpt here. It almost sounds very reasonable and quite nice. They are making an effort aren't they? What's wrong. 

Well read it again, and read it from the point of view of who it is aimed at.

"I am older than the average LARPer and therefor find adjusting my language hard and have been known to cause offence inadvertently." This is actually a good start. Because you see, we're all human, we all make mistakes. People who are trans sometimes make mistakes about their own names and pronouns especially if they haven't "fully" transitioned or have to use one name in one context and another elsewhere. Adjusting language takes time. 

The thing is, most of us realise that firstly, if you make a mistake, most people aren't actually offended. They aren't because, mistakes happen. A single mistake isn't a problem. But reading between the lines here we know that this isn't a one off slip of the tongue. It's multiple mistakes. It's repeated "mistakes" it's mistakes with no effort to really learn and no real concern about the impact. You think you've likely caused offence. You know your actions are less than good. 

Secondly, this sort of statement should really be followed by an apology. There is no apology, just a statement that you know you do it wrong, you know what you do may hurt people and that's it. That's pretty self centred and pretty crap.

Now on to the second part "In an effort to prevent this if I am uncertain I use the person's name instead of pronouns. Problem Solved.". Really as Purple Person pointed out, you have already been given a solution to this, an aid so you don't have to just know or try and remember: pronoun badges, the thing you are grumbling about. This has a number of issues. Pronoun badges are things which many trans and nonbinary people have decided they are comfortable to wear and understand that it makes it easier for people to use and remember their pronouns and genders. When ti comes to dealing with "isms" and discrimination against minority groups it's very important that we listen to those minority groups. They are generally best placed to know what solutions will work best for them as they are the ones with first hand experience. So here we have a number of people who belong to a minority group saying "this is a tool which will help all of us, please use this to reduce a problem we experience". To be completely ignored and then to see somebody declare their own "solution" completely ignores and disenfranchises the minority group. It serves to assert the majority as the dominant voice over the minority.

The "solution" itself is a problem. It ignores the problem and erases a core part of the issue. If the issue is having genders recognised and respected including both nonbinary and binary genders, then a solution that seeks to ignore those and just use a name means you are neither recognising nor respecting the person. It also means that you are treating trans and nonbinary people differently to cis people. Other people are afforded pronouns and appropriate gendered language in a natural use of the English language: trans and nonbinary people will be referred to differently only using their name in a manner that is awkward with common English language usage. 

As previously Purple Person also highlights the use of excuses designed to place a person's comfort above a person's right to be recognised as their own gender (which is literally covered by the Human Rights Act 1996). In this case the excuse isn't "immersion" it is age. People are well aware that people with a lifetime of using one set of language may struggle changing that language, as noted above we all make mistakes and that's ok. However there is a marked difference between those who say "ok it may take me some time to get used to it, it's unfamiliar" and "I'm old so I find it difficult so I'm going to fight it.". Furthermore we aren't actually talking about anything particularly new here. People of any age are used to using a singular they/them - it's something we have done for a long time if we weren't sure of a person's pronouns e.g. "do you know when they called?" or "I got an email from Alex, I will reply to them later.". People are also used to being polite and respectful and using the pronoun, salutation or name asked of them: to use an earlier example "It's Mrs, thank you" "oh, sorry, Mrs Reynolds". Being polite and respectful around what people are called is nothing new and has little to do with age.

Purple Person made a lot of good points and one final thing I'd like to explore from their posts that is important to us all is, as they put it, "the pity party". That's really what a lot of this comes down to and I have already talked about it briefly: the idea that it is all about them. Somebody is making a polite request and sharing some useful information that helps a group of people: people reply in a way that recentres the conversation around them and how they feel about it. Let's be clear here, the original post wasn't a debate, it wasn't even a discussion. It was for the sole purpose of providing information. That it became a point for people of the same minority group to show appreciation was a bonus. There was no need for people not of that minority group to voice their opinions. Asking respectful questions "is it ok if ..?" "where can I find out about ..?" is one thing, challenging and arguing is another. 

Not everything is about you. Or me. Or them. Or that person over there. There are some people who are in more privileged groups, that is they are not in a minority or have any protected characteristics, who are very used to things being about them. The whole reason we have minority groups is often because our culture is set up to serve one particular group of people: names white, British, straight, male, able bodied and cis-gendered. The more of those groups you fit in to the more the world is set up to benefit you. People who find themselves in several of those groups often seem to express shock and annoyance when conversation doesn't revolve around them and there is a natural tendency for them to try and shift the focus. 

This means they are taking the voice away from an already underrepresented group. That's literally discrimination.

Face book screen shot with person's name obscured in blue.

[blue person] OOC prejudice sneaking IC breaks my immersion.

I love this comment. It sums it all up very well in my opinion. Plus I like a bit of dry humour. 

You think a small pronoun badge makes the fanatsy world a little bit less real for you? Well your prejudice makes the real world a lot harder for me and many others.

It's not a competition. It's not about trumping people. It's about being a reasonable person and sometimes putting people's real world needs above petty annoyances. 

A pronoun badge shouldn't break your immersion, but if it does, suck it up.

Glossary

LARP - Live Action Roleplay

IC- In character, when a person is playing as their LARP character. Can also refer to things happening within the game world that the characters are experiencing.

O/OC - Out of Character, when you are being yourself and not your character: things experienced in the real world, not in the game.

Immersion - the sense of being part of the game world and story and experiencing things as your character

Referees - people who help to run the game usually in the function of enforcing or facilitating rules. They may be present IC or OC.

Monstering - the role of playing a non-player-character or monster instead of your own character in order to provide plot or action for others. Often means taking a turn playing "the opposing side" in a battle.

Names, identities and hats

The eagle eyed of you who have followed me for some time may have noticed that while the blog name has stayed the same, my name has changed a couple of times. I guess name changes aren’t all that unusual on the internet but I think it’s time I told you why, and why it shouldn’t be changing again for a long while, if all goes to plan.

Hi, I’m Robin, I’m non-binary and agender.

So that line sums it up pretty well and I guess I could leave it there. But if I was in to perfunctory statements I wouldn’t have this blog.

First of all what does this mean. Let’s get some things about gender straight. Gender is a social construct. It is a method of labelling ourselves and others that was created within our culture and is shaped by our cultural norms and history. That’s why in different parts of the world the exact definitions of gender and the labels available can differ to our own. What we think of as masculine and feminine isn’t fixed from culture to culture.

But that also means that genders aren’t fixed definitions and it doesn’t have to be a binary state of male or female. There are many people who do not identify with either purely male or purely female and instead feel like they are something else. This is being nonbinary – existing outside of the commonly used binary system we have in Western culture. I should emphasize here that this isn’t just “not being like other girls” or “I’m not really one of the lads!”.  While those experiences can be a part of the nonbinary and trans experience they aren’t the whole deal and can and do form a part of the identities of people who have binary gender.

Pencil sketch of me by Jennie Gyllblad 

How do you know then that you are nonbinary? 

Honestly I can’t say. How you identify is personal to you. So let me tell you how I know and the process I went through.

This is a story of two halves and like the most edgy of modern fiction I will start with the latter half. Though I had heard the term nonbinary (NB) before and knew that there were people who were neither male or female, it was only a few years ago that it was a concept I really started engaging in and thinking about. I had a couple of friends who were nonbinary or who came out as NB and I found that it was entering into my sphere of awareness online more and more. It was the first time I really started to think about it. Listening to other people’s understanding and lived experience was key as there were a number of instances you could term “light bulb moments. Tiny light bulbs maybe but still, something in my brain was clicking in to place and saying “oh, that sounds familiar. Interesting”.

Additionally this exposure to conversations on gender encouraged me to consciously think about my own gender identity and what it meant to me. This is something I would encourage people to do, even if you are comfortably binary or cisgendered (or cis, means that you identify with the gender and sex assigned at birth).  Because we can only really know our own feelings about identity it is very easy to assume that what we feel is the default and that this is what everybody means when they say “I am female” or “I am male” or even “I am trans”. It can be a good exercise in self awareness to actually examine a little more closely what you mean when you think and feel these things and to consider them in comparison to other people’s experiences.

When I examined my own identity in this way I came to realise that actually I was nonbinary and it was a term I began to use to describe myself with close friends.

Now to go back in time to the first half of this process: this process of examining my own identity lead me to consider some of the experiences I had had since I was young. I reflected that I had always bristled at being described as a girl, female, lady or woman. It had been easy to dismiss this when I was a teenager: girl was too childish whereas woman felt too mature. “Female” can be oddly condescending and lady has implications of daintiness and certain feminine behaviour I didn’t embody. But I knew that while partially true, they had always been excuses, easy vocalisations of a deeper discomfort with being labelled as those terms.

I had, like many people my age, gone through a phrase of saying “I wasn’t like other girls” and “I was more one of the boys”. Now these phrases are trickier to unpack. There are definitely influences of patriarchy and internalised misogyny – when media shows women as weak, frivolous, vapid, dumb and generally lesser it’s not surprising that many young women (or people labelled as female) choose to push against this and distance themselves from the term. That was without a doubt part of my experience, but on reflection I was able to see that there were times I said “I’m not like other girls” because I wasn’t like other girls. I was struggling to identify with “girls” as a group and often felt like an outsider. I should note here that I went to an all girl school. There was a lot of opportunity for me to feel like an outsider and gender was only a part of it. But it was a part of it.

Let’s return to sexism and misogyny for a moment. Do you know how deeply frustrating it is to be the subject of mysoginistic slurs, or grouped in to statements like “well that’s what women are like” when there is a part of you, deep down and unvocalised, that knows you aren’t a part of that group? When I say “I’m not like that” it’s not just because I am rejecting the slur, the insult and the sexism, it’s because you’ve not seen who I am. You’ve grouped me in with a group you hate and I’m not even part of it.

There had been a little voice inside me, angrily shouting for decades, “that’s not me!” but never really understanding what that meant. If asked I wouldn’t have been able to tell you why I thought that but it didn’t make it any less present.

Associated with this was how I felt disconnected with various feminist movements. From Girl Power in the 90s to contemporary feminism I had often struggled to connect with it. While I could feel with a deep passion that they were needed and important, after all I had experienced first-hand many of the issues being dealt with, when people would put out a cal to women, or ask women to band together, I once again felt that vague sense of being an outsider. It wasn’t the naive “I’m not like other girls” any more but it was a “is this for me?”. The stronger the message of women banding together the more I felt excluded even though, to the best of my knowledge at that time, I was part of the target audience. Anything related to Breast Cancer Awareness was of particular discomfort and felt like a personal affront such was their all female message so strong.

Back to the present day, or at least those days a few years ago when I was exploring gender identity and a good friend said to me “When I get called girl or woman it feels like a cat having their fur stroked the wrong way.” . That was it, the final little light bulb in my head. That was the feeling. What I found interesting is that when I thought about being called male, boy, man or lad, it felt just as alien to me. Maybe not as aggravating because it didn’t have decades of lived experience and associated sexism attached, but still distinctly wrong. I was then fairly sure I was neither male nor female.

At first I started using the term nonbinary or NB, which can be a nonspecific umbrella term and genderqueer, which was a little more specific and is generally agreed to mean a nonbinary identity that mixes different aspects of feminine and masculine without being either male or female.  Bit by bit I started talking about this to different friends and using it as my identity and it felt good. I felt calmer and more sure of who I was than I ever had. I no longer had the feeling of being slightly out of synch with what people thought of me. Over time I have come to use the term agender as well. Agender essentially means “outside of gender” or to not have a gender as understood by our cultural definitions. I am still fairly flexible on which terms I use.

So what about the name changes?
Just as I had always had this vague feeling of being slightly out of synch with how people saw me, I had always felt somewhat that my name wasn’t quite right. The name I was given at birth was Sophie. It’s a lovely name, with a rich history. It is a name to be proud of and treasure associated with wisdom and inner strength. I honestly do think it’s a beautiful name.
But it was never my name.

Picture of me from 2011(ish) with cropped blonde hair and a vintage black hat

The hat analogy 

The analogy I use I use is hats that don’t fit.

Imagine you have been given a hat as a gift. It is beautiful, majestic, and handsome. But it doesn’t fit. Whenever you wear it it’s a little uncomfortable, maybe it doesn’t balance properly, always feels like it’s about to fall off, and maybe you worry it looks faintly ridiculous on you. It doesn’t stop it being a really nice hat, and one you are thankful for being given, but that doesn’t make it fit any better.

Now for some people you might be able to alter the hat, tighten the hat band and it fits better. That would be those of you who shorten your name or go by a nickname. The Robs and Steves, Kats and Dannis. You aren’t a Robert or a Bob, you are a Rob. You aren’t a Katherine, or a Cathy, you are a Kat.

But for some of us the hat can’t be comfortably adjusted or forced to fit. It still just balances awkwardly on your head making your faintly uncomfortable. Then one day you find another hat. You try it on just to see. It’s different to your first hat, but still pretty nice. But this one fits. This one is comfortable and stays on your head. You can wear it and not worry about it falling off or hurting. That’s what it was like when I started going by a new name. I originally chose Penn. It definitely fit me better than Sophie. It was easier to wear.

The thing was, though I used that online and amongst friends for over a year it still never felt quite right. I liked it but it wasn’t completely me. I knew I wouldn’t stick with it when I decided if I wanted to formally change my name. Even though I was increasingly irritated to have to use my original name in official places, I was reluctant to change to Penn.

I went looking for a new hat and I found it. Robin is the hat that has the right look. It suits me, it fits, it’s comfortable. Somebody else can wear Sophie and it will be the right hat for them. Bot for me, Robin is the hat that fits.

Now to clear up a few points 

Am I trans? Technically yes. Trans is the abbreviation of transgender which has the accepted definition of “a person whose sense of personal identity and gender does not correspond with their birth sex.”. In our society we take the sex assigned at birth, male or female, as the assigned gender. If you identify as NB then you don’t identify as the sex assigned at birth since it’s not even an option. By that definition a person who is nonbinary is transgender or trans. A lot of nonbinary people choose not to call themselves trans as their experience is different to people who are transgender within the binary, that is to say male to female (mtf) or female to male (ftm) transgender. Because the common usage of trans generally refers to people who are mtf or ftm many NB people feel that the term doesn’t include them. Equally some people who are mtf or ftm prefer that NB people don’t use the term trans as it can confuse and complicate the issues they are dealing with.

Personally I fluctuate on whether I use it or not and it often comes down to context. In general conversation I tend not to use it because of the common usage described above. However in some conversations and spaces it is appropriate for me to use the term trans. For example in conversations that are about the experiences of people who are not cis it is appropriate to use the term trans. I also participate in a trans and nonbinary swimming club and am happy to use the term trans when there as everybody there understands the terminology as well as personal experiences.

What about tansitioning?

Understandably because the words have similarities people sometimes think trans means “transition”. What a lot of cis people mean when they say transition is medical or surgical transitioning – genital surgery, breast augmentation or reduction, and hormone therapy. While these are routes that many trans people take they aren’t universal experiences even among mtf and ftm people. It’s a very personal decision involving some pretty major medical intervention. Some people may take it up whilst others choose not to or are unable to due to other health issues. The issue is even more complicated with nonbinary people who (like binary trans people) may experience little or no body dysphoria and don’t necessarily want to change their body. Some people who are nonbinary do undergo some medical transitioning, whilst others don’t. However it is a very personal issue and one that nobody is obliged to disclose to anybody.

What about presentation, and do I still look “female”? Well that depends on what you think female looks like really. Generally I am read as female. My particular body and face shape is associated with “female” in our society. Because it is acceptable for women to wear more masculine clothes (jeans and a sweater for example) but not for men to wear women’s clothing (dresses and blouses) even if I dress in a “masculine” fashion I am often referred to as female. This is aggravating but there is little I can do about it without a concerted effort. Additionally because our culture has developed the attitude that “male is default” there is a tendency for people to conflate “androgenous” or neutral clothing with male clothing. As I said earlier, I don’t want to be male. I’m not male. I shouldn’t have to make myself look more male in order to be not read as female. It’s frustrating. Plus I like leggings and skirts. They are comfortable.

However, and I want to make this very clear: I am not presenting as female. You may read me as female, and our society may associate parts of my appearance with femininity but that is not deliberate on my part. I am presenting as me and as nonbinary.

What do I call you? Robin. Or another nickname I guess. My pronouns are they them by preference but I don’t mind she/her, especially if you are my grandfather. I am not a girl, woman, lady or female or other gendered terms (again unless you are my grandfather or we have talked about it). If for some reason you need to state my gender you can say NB, genderqueer or agender.

But what is my sex? Usually when people ask this what they really mean is "what are your genitals". Honestly that’s none of your business. You can probably work it out if you need to. But really you don’t need to.