Art Therapy №8: No Gender November

Why I started drawing nonbinary school lunch notes.

Note: This is the introduction to the November 2018 “No Gender November” portrait series on my 6yo’s lunch notes. Follow along and learn nonbinary with me!
№1: Everybody Reads >

Big Anthony, My son’s preschool teacher, told me “Batman is Trans”

For the last 15 days I’ve drawn never-made-it-as-a-comic-book-artist style portraits of queer folks to become fluent in gender fluidity and encourage my 6yo to eat his/their lunch. I have to pack all that together with turkey sandwiches because as a parent and curious being I don’t have that much free time.

To be really honest there were four main reasons behind this:

1. After #inktober2018 I ran out of daily prompts
2. To explore the relationship between representation and destigmatization
3. To attain nonbinary fluency
4. Spite

After #inktober2018 I was lost in those “what to put in Max’s lunchbox tomorrow” moments.

Hosteen Klah wasn’t put into any gendered boxes and mastered a number of the masculine and feminine Navajo arts.

It was so easy with those daily prompts. A few days earlier, though I didn’t really think much of it, I saw my friend Neva had written the words “No Gender November” on social media. I kind of passed it off in my mind with a “hmph” and stopped thinking about it. But when an eight paragraph social media essay about equal rights attracted some thorough feedback, I found my muse:

Doesn’t equal rights exist rather well in our country? The division comes from these small groups, for example GLAAD recently saying they are underrepresented on television when actually compared to their percentage in the population they are over represented… pushing an agenda. The average American is not racist, etc… most people don’t have a problem if a person is gay on a show, just don’t watch it if you don’t like it… the problem becomes when people attempt to push those agendas and politics gets involved when there is no reason to even be involved in those areas. Same thing with transgender… you have an extreme minority that want to change the entire way we communicate and use a restroom and you have the former president pushing that agenda. Why can’t we just say be nice and empathetic to these folks? It’s ridiculous.
— — Guy on the Internet

I had a lot of thoughts about this

It’s hard to describe how grateful I am to the author of this peer review. Without that I would never have actually found the words that prompted this whole thing

Not sure the numbers this representation vs. actual are or where they are coming from. But in my lifetime I have met more LGBTQ in the time that such representation has grown in popular culture, news and political discussion. To draw a conclusion from that, my observation is that the percentage of people that identify in unique ways is higher than we know because for many, being who they know they are is not accepted even to themselves. But making a connection to something bigger than themselves has given them the confidence to accept themselves openly.
— — Roboteich

Nicole served in Iraq with the US Airforce in pursuit of the ultimate masculine experience and respite from the lingering femininity she fought her whole life.

It seemed wrong to me.

In kind my muse shared numbers with me and asked for whatever empirical data I had on hand. According to him

Study shows 8.8% on TV and only 4.5% that identify.
— — Guy on the Internet

I had no data to prove my hypothesis at the time. What I can tell you is that 100% of queer folks laugh out loud when I tell them they are overrepresented. As far as collecting data, I did take AP bio 20 years ago. I’m familiar with the scientific method. So, I decided to just start collecting data for myself by getting to know some folks better and sharing the lessons I learn in a lunchbox.

I set out to learn for myself how representation affects stigma by immersing myself in nonbinary thinking.

I figured I’d learn a lot more about myself than nonbinary folk which proved true right away. I quickly realized that I only speak the High School French version of nonbinary where I’m still translating they/them him/her he/she ze/zir/hir LGBTQI in my head.

So through this process I set an additional goal of nonbinary fluency to better understand who I am. Halfway through I’ve attained like High School French 4 skills with plans to continue in college and do a study abroad thing. I’m more conversational — I’ve collected a ton of beautiful, painful and encouraging stories. Results to follow, for now at least one guy on the internet is learning a thing or two.

To watch the stories unfold follow @roboteich on instagram and I’ll get them posted in Impersonal soon.