#so i hope its ok to put this under mogai coining

[mogaicoiner]

turtlegender:

a gender related to turtles for @radioheadrei

[image id: a long rectangular flag with five horizontal stripes. the colors from top to bottom are: myrtle, green leaf, apple, golden sand, and sweet corn]

[fuckmogai]

hi! i was just reading your posts about pansexuality and i'd like some clarification if that's ok - do you think it's always bad for a cis person to be pan? doesn't it just mean they have the capability to be attracted to nb people as well as men and women? also if bi means two or more then is there a need for the label ply anymore? i'm genuinely a bit confused but i enjoy your blog

Let me start off by saying I appreciate your politeness! It’s perfectly ok to ask me questions and for clarification on my opinions and posts. I welcome respectful debate!

I typed this out, deleted it, and retyped it. It’s really easy to say when something bothers me; it’s not so easy to explain exactly why it makes me so uneasy.

So the first aspect of your question- do I think it’s always bad for a cis person to id as pan? I’m giving a reluctant, slightly uncertain yes. While the intention may genuinely be to be more inclusive, or they’re drawn to the idea that their love isn’t defined by parts (a really bad mindset that i’ll explain momentarily), it within itself is a messy way to id. Imagine a bisexual woman calling herself femme or butch. The intent may not be bad, but it would definitely rub lesbians the wrong way.

Secondly- what about cis people who are attracted to boys, girls, and nb ppl? Non-binary is a broad umbrella to encompass people who don’t fall under the binary. It is literally impossible to tell who is non-binary and who isn’t. Personally speaking; I am not androgynous. At all. I haven’t medically transitioned, or made an effort to alter my physical appearance to look… other. I look cis, and many people automatically assume I id as my assigned gender. It sucks, but it doesn’t make me any less non-binary.

Saying that you are attracted to nb people, when you can’t tell who is nb and who isn’t, implies two things: one, you’re assuming you can tell who ids as what based on appearance, which is not a good mindset to have. It’s messy. And two, if someone were to explain that they are nb to you, and you’re only attracted to them after gaining that knowledge, it’s fetishization.

I will speak from personal experience- my cis friend ids as pan, and she’s told me that one of her biggest sexual fantasies is to have sex with a trans woman who has only had top surgery (meaning she has breasts and a penis). She seemed to think that her fetishization of trans/nb people was progressive and acceptable. It made me beyond uncomfortable for multiple reasons, that being that she has a fetish for people who blur the traditional lines of gender. Like me. My personal struggle with dysphoria and desperate search for a label, to find others like me, felt trivial, reduced to a circus act, entertainment for cis people. I confessed to her once that I have periods where I long for different genitals; since then, she’s made jokes about my dysphoria. My suffering was funny to her.

Gender is a complicated thing for trans/nb people, and having our struggles with our bodies, our minds, our whole beings put into a line on a cis person’s List Of Things I Find Attractive is more than just insulting- it’s transphobic, and pansexuality gives cis people an outlet to be open about their transphobia under the liberal guise of being inclusive and progressive.

I will say that I do not care if trans/nb people id as pan. Again, our relationship with gender is complicated and pansexuality allows us to separate attraction to other people from our own gender. Gay, lesbian, and even bisexuality to a degree implies alignment to either a binary or a specific gender that we may not always id as, or a gender at all. Some nb people are agender, and sometimes they don’t feel comfortable calling themselves gay (implying alignment to masculinity) or lesbian (implying alignment to feminity). But sometimes they do! Which is fine. Again, gender and sexuality are complicated for nb/trans people.

People also seem to be under the impression that bisexuality is transphobic, not inclusive of nb/trans people, because of the prefix bi. Bisexuality was coined before people openly explored gender; words change and adapt over time, as do their meanings. Bisexuality doesn’t mean conforming to a binary anymore; it didn’t so much back then.

Pansexuality was coined as a “hearts, not parts” thing, implying that bisexual people fetishize the people they’re attracted to, or fixate on the genitals of the people they’re attracted to. Biphobic. I don’t want to say that the nature of pansexuality is biphobic, but its coining and adoption has firm roots in biphobia. And what about trans people? Women with penises and men with vaginas exist, and implying that lgb people would only be attracted to them if they were cis or had “the right parts” (a gay man should not date a trans woman because she has a penis. She is a woman) is really really gross. A straight woman who dates a trans man is still straight. She’s not pansexual or bisexual because he was assigned female at birth.

Bisexual means two or more genders; there is no need for plysexual as a label at all. It’s MOGAI and completely unnecessary. It’s also unnecessary for cis people to id as pansexual, simply because their grasp on gender is so juvenile, and they can’t seem to try to understand it without being transphobic and offensive in the hopes of being inclusive and progressive.

tl;dr cis people use pansexuality to distance themselves from transphobia and give themselves an outlet for their fetishization of trans/nb people