Other

I just had to fill in a sort of demographics-type questionnaire (ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, etc) and then reflect on how I felt doing it as preparation for the next class in my counselling course, topic: ‘working with difference’. I would like to share my reflections:

I’m thinking about all the demographics/equal opportunity questionnaires I’ve had to fill in, and how many times I’ve ticked ‘other’ because there is almost never a box for any of my identities. It’s funny in a way that increasingly now there is a box a can tick that better describes my gender identity (non-binary), but still usually none that helpfully describes my mixed race heritage (I usually tick ‘mixed other’). I think it used to be more important to me once that I could be both accurate in these things AND be able to tick something other than ‘other’. I want to be knowable. To have a box for me. I think now it bothers me less — I find it liberating to tick just ‘other’, much less looking through loads of options when I know mine probably won’t be there. It does still frustrate me though.

It’s liberating also because I’m realising just how much ‘other’ encompasses, and frustrating because I know that by ticking ‘other’, my own specific identity and the experiences associated may not be meaningfully counted.

‘Other’ is always last, but encompasses SO MUCH more than all of the other categories. It’s presented like the odds and ends box for human identities; the drawer where you store the things that don’t quite fit anywhere else, but really, it represents and contains the length and breadth of human diversity. Of course, it also obscures it.

People sometimes complain about ‘all these people labelling themselves in their profiles’. Yes, I have my pronouns in my profile, and the fact I’m autistic. I might put in my other identities too if I had space, and I can understand why others might also do it: when you have had to select ‘other’ all your life, when there is no category for you, it can be really important to be able to finally claim and announce those more accurate descriptors for yourself, and also make you part of a community.

There’s something really comforting about being average and fitting in boxes, as I found since realising that I seem to be a fairly ‘average’ autistic (I talk about that a lot more here). It’s like I get to feel my edges more, and define myself without so much work… But actually, it’s only in having to put in that work and actively look for my edges that I have been able to be more honest and authentic as myself, and in many ways I feel lucky for being so un-definable in it forcing me to always be exploring and wondering.

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