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For all of us in the LGBT communities, our experiences and expressions of gender shape who we are and influence how others respond to us. Gender has been used as a weapon, a protest, a marker of difference, and a means of conforming. Gender influences attraction. Perhaps more so than our sex (the physical makeup of one’s sex organs), our gender is one of if not the first thing others notice about us. Its importance in our everyday interactions cannot be underestimated.

We are a society that likes binaries. Thanks to bisexual and transgender people who are attending events and programs at the Pride Center, I have a new appreciation for what troubling binary definitions of things can do to people. It makes us uneasy. It disrupts our handy labeling system. Are you or aren’t you? Yes or no? Man or woman? Gay or straight? We are challenged by the people in our midst who will not or cannot give us an answer that fits into one or the other category. Those who move and live in between our comfortable dichotomies break “the rules” of binaries. Yet, when we think about it, haven’t we all, at least privately, found ways to transverse the boundaries between male and female, masculine and feminine, and live, if only for a moment, in the places in between?

Gender overlaps in deep and significant ways with many if not all aspects of identity and personality. It also shapes our sexualities. If we are forceful, dominating, and aggressive, we are viewed as being masculine in our approach to sex. Submissive, receptive, and gentle expressions of sexuality are viewed as feminine. These characterizations may seem simplistic, stereotypical, and I’m sure there are numerous examples and personal experiences that shatter these classifications. Yet many of us have heard, experienced, rebelled against, and subscribed to these prescriptions and constructions of genderedness at one time or another. Sometimes it’s fun, sexy, adventurous.

For people who feel forced into a gendered role or existence that does match their true sense of self, the stereotypes and social prescriptions of gender can be painful. These binaries push and constrict them, trapping them in places where they feel they don’t belong. Sometimes people who don’t fit into society’s binary prescriptions feel very alone, wounded, and confused. This is why the Pride Center, with the assistance and guidance of Spectrum Transgender Group, is beginning a Gender Identity Support and Talk group. The acronym of the name spells gist – which means getting at the essence or substance of something. There are multiple expressions, words, meanings, and definitions relating to gender – far more than merely two. In GIST, participants will be able to explore these meanings for themselves, with others who understand and are willing to struggle with that understanding, in a safe, confidential environment.