ramblings: on "sex", on "Same Gender Loving"

ramblings and thoughts for the day...

typical forms/surveys

Name:
Age:
Sex: yes please!

This interesting little answer to the question of "sex" on surveys actually can serve to be, at the very least, subversive of the gender binarisms in which heteronormative societies participate. Simply put, "yes please!" can be a colorful way to disregard the ascribing of the type of sex you have on your gender. The two answers allowable (generally) are male or female. And based on this answer re: sex, it connotes the type (i.e., heterosexual) of sex you have and with whom (the "opposite" gender). "Yes please!" is a wonderful quip to authority, though I don't think many people put it down on surveys and such. I mean, even on my xanga, blogger, myspace, facebook, friendster (damn...i have a lot of useless internet stuffs) accounts, i put "male" as the answer. And because of such, people assume that 1) I have a penis which 2) means I will enjoy "sex" with a body that has a vagina. What is most intriguing is how the word sex is slippery. It slips between this biologic construction to this sociologic construction: the "sex" of the body (with or without a penis; with or without a vagina) connotes the "sex" to be expected with that body. In this way, biologic constructions of "sex" are mere social constructions as well because they slip so easily into the realm of sociologic constructions.

Just what do we do with the gray areas? For those bodies that have both a penis and vagina, how do we biologically understand them? They're called "intersex" because of the mixture of the "two" sexes but this has it's problems. Because even the biologic construction of sex is founded upon a sociological construction, the term "intersex" finds it's locus in confusion of the between.

this leads me to a critique of SGL

SGL is a term meaning Same Gender Loving. I want to move backwards and first talk about the latter, loving, and then about the former, same gender. What I find most interesting in discourse regarding SGL people (I'll use the terminology) is that "love" must be attached to them in order for our claims to be substantiated. In seminary, I see it all of the time. "As long as two people are in a loving and monogamous relationship, God honors them." I'm not taking anything away from love (at all) because I think it's great when you have it. But, well, what if two people just want to fuck? What if you enjoy copulation with folks who have similar bodies (trying real hard to not say same gender haha) but don't want love to be attached? I understand the connotation of loving but I'm wondering if using the word forces SGL folks to pass some litmus test that straight folks don't have to pass. There are no Opposite Gender Loving people...

This necessarily leads me to a critique of the former same gender idea. I am relying on the above discussion of "sex" as both biologic and social construction here. How is same gender, exactly, defined? If gender is performative and citational (Judith Butler), how exactly are we interpreting same gender? Generally, when this term is invoked, it isn't with regard to gender as a socially constructed reality ascribed on bodies but rather is speaking of the body itself in it's biologically constructed reality. This is the same slipperiness (is that a word? haha) that we encounter with "sex" from bio to socio but in the opposite direction. "Gender," here, goes from a socially constructed idea to a biologically defined concrete. If you are a man, and thus a body with a penis (socio >> bio), then if you are same gender loving, you enjoy and engage in activities with similar bodies (socio >> bio). Yet, this whole system is built upon a heteronormative understanding of gender AND sex...that there are opposites and that they should attract. Male/Female; Man/Woman; Straight/Gay...these all function under the premise that there are two (and only two) ways in which to be intelligble in a variety of systems. So what of the F2M trans that dates a "woman"? Or of the M2F that dates a "woman"? Or a W2M that dates a "man"? Of a W2M that dates a M2W? Or a...

Well...you get the point.