Roll with it this time...

[etana.livejournal.com]

Okay so here's my problem (behind an lj-cut for sensitivity to my personal life)



So I'm a queer-identified woman. But others inside aren't. And some are riling up to date a guy. Not a particular guy, they just want to stop having this body identify as lesbian and stop being lesbianic.

This poses a problem because I like Iding as such, and since the body and we collectively have been single for about 5 months, what's the worry? But they are in an uproar.

I'm a queer activist and well-known in this area. I'm also blind.

So put it all together and you have a big mess.

What do you do?

Comments

[littlebus.livejournal.com]

Claim bisexuality - it's kinda a lie and yet kinda the truth. Sometime you (*you*) want to date girls and sometimes you (*the others*) want to date boys.

Or the very lame route of "Oh! He's a boy! I didn't realize" when someone calls you on it.

Yeah.. they're both not very good answers, but it's a tricky question.

[westly.livejournal.com]

I'm with Littlebus here.

I'm a gay Trans Guy (meaning I like men, am a man, but am physically female) with a straight guy "other"

I've got my husband (Who is gay) and he has his girlfriend (who is straight)

Everyone knows about eachother, everyone is very cool with eachother. (Works well, seeing as I have a very loving heart and physical relationship with my husband, and Roanoke has a very loving cyber relationship with his girlfriend...)

My advice? If you can, be very open about everything. Honesty is the best polocy in my opinion.

[pengke.livejournal.com]

If the other people are unlikely to ever date, you could try privately identifying the group as bisexual. Outside people would assume that your statements about being a lesbian covered everyone but all of the people in your system would know that they weren't required to uphold that lesbian image. It would give them the freedom of identity that they want. The problem with this is that the bisexuality will become public once they start to date males unless you want to actively hide your sexuality.

Politically, you'd be better off in you eased into identifying bodily/as a group as bisexual. This would prevent people from claiming that you're betraying the cause should someone else suddenly begin a relationship with a male. Individually, you would still be a lesbian. If you're open about your multiplicity, you could explain the reasoning behind the decision to them. You could also be more open about your multiplicity; identifying yourself as a lesbian while explaining that others in your body aren't. You would be leaving yourself vulnerable to people who might think you are using/making-up the other people to allow you the freedom to play both sides of the fence, though.

[nematoddity.livejournal.com]

A friend of ours--who's not multi, but hey--identifies herself as "lesbian-identified". In other words, her heart-relationships are with women, nearly completely; but what the body does, well, she's made love with women, men, groups...whatever. Don't know if that would work for you, but it seems to work for her.

[szczur-system.livejournal.com]

Was actually just having a discussion over this today, and our discussion-partner wasn't entirely good at understanding. :P

[nematoddity.livejournal.com]

I hear. If it's not DID throwing sand in the works, it's poly; if it's not DID or poly, it's sexual orientation. It's always something, it seems.

[szczur-system.livejournal.com]

The general populus needs to get over themselves. :P

[nematoddity.livejournal.com]

So damn true. It's a nice dream, though. :)

[luwana.livejournal.com]

Selene's like that. Technically bi or pan sexual, but identifies as lesbian.

[nematoddity.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I think I just confuse people when I say 'bi dyke'. I've started temporizing and saying 'dyke' or 'lesbian' these days...it's stupid, I should be able to just say who I am, but...people get so caught up in exact labels. Nrrrgh.

[nansvision.livejournal.com]

I have had similar worries, being straight, and having lesbians who share my body.
None of us are dating right now, so it isn't the problem it would seem to be.
We make sure we communicate with and listen to each other.
Interestingly, though the body is without sight, some of us identify as sighted,
rather than being blind. Though, outwardly this doesn't change things.

[luwana.livejournal.com]

I say, identify the body as bi. Both myself and selene are prone to identifying as gay to different extents, but with the engagement that'd be, odd. So openly, we tend to say bi. We add that we're pretty much gay if the situation is appropriate.

[sharpsight.livejournal.com]

(Ah... a question: if you are blind, how do you identify what is being said in response online?)

[etana.livejournal.com]

excuse me? is this sarcasm or are you really that clueless?

[etana.livejournal.com]

It always reads as a rude response to me- similar to the "if you're so blind, why you walkin around then?" question.

as if only sighted people can use the internet.

"seeing impaired" isn't exactly a proper term for someone with low-vision or who is blind.

But kudos to you for making an accessible web page! Those are rare!

[gia1977.livejournal.com]

I can identify here with my deafness. Everyone assumes that just because I'm deaf that I can hear extremely high sounds or they get stupid when I use a phone - talking only to those I have spoken to face to face for many years and learned their voices to "hear" generally okay (sometimes words get messed up, but it makes for great comedy) but I limit phone calls to "have to do" so - it's just so depressing how people are not thinking right.

[sharpsight.livejournal.com]

Thank you. *was unaware that such software existed*

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

Reader software for the blind has been around since the early days of personal computers. One of our close friends in the late 1980s was a blind college girl with a talking computer. Others we knew of had printers that printed Braille. Nowadays, there are Braille display readers that move pins up and down to form characters.

One of the major reasons we are so militant about keeping our pages text-based is that we're acutely aware of what happens when Twitter or Willowpond or any of the other talkers or screen readers out there comes across a graphic image with nothing to indicate what it is. Particularly when that image is the vital link to the rest of the site; we used a text-only computer for years, and I shall never forget Iris' frustration with the one and only multiplicity website on the entire Internet at that time, which put everything behind a huge ISMAP -- a graphic map that one "just clicked" various sections of to enter different areas of the website. Very clever for rich people who could afford a computer that could run Windows, but completely useless to the (at that time) majority, let alone blind users, who would detect only the word [ISMAP] on the screen -- nothing else.

To people designing web pages, we always remind them that the ALT tag is their friend, and recommend that they read Could Helen Keller Read Your Page (http://www.pantos.org/atw/35412.html).

[etana.livejournal.com]

you. are. my. hero. I switch between jaws and zoomtext 1 depending on my mood (haha).....and I jaws tends to hate most websites.

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

*bows* We are honoured to be of help.

[luwana.livejournal.com]

Are you really this rude?

I hadn't put the two together, but until, luterally, this wednesday, I had *no* idea there was software that could read websites out loud.

the question was just curiousity. Keep your hair on.

[etana.livejournal.com]

no, I'm this defensive - because I'm tired of people thinking that it's okay to ask a blind person how they live and do things they are obviously doing without first asking if it's okay to both tokenize and de-humanize them.

Your response obviously re-instates this point, thta as a disabled person I should welcome your question and serve you, and since I didn't, you are offended and feel you have the right to tell me to "keep my hair on."

There's nothing wrong with wanting to learn about differences, but instead of randomly tokenizing one who is doing for themself - ask first, eh? Even my closest friends first say "Can I ask you a really ignorant question about your vision" before they do so. It's not fair to disabled or otherwise Othered people to simply get bombarded with ignorant questions and be expected to turn on "teacher-mode" if they are in a space that is not already designed for that. Since this isn't a disabilities community, I shouldn't have to be in teacher-mode, regardless as to whether or not that's the reality of how full-abled or sighted people treat me.

Seriously. Just ask first, otherwise you are offending. And I'm sure that wasn't your intention.

[luwana.livejournal.com]

... Their questions was hardly ignorant. Outside of the blind, and perhaps the web design communities, very few will know about that kind of software.

I am not offended in the slightest. I am *shocked*, that somebody asked an honest question and you, to my eyes, overreacted so badly. Somebody not knowing about some fancy little known software you use does not make them automatically sarcastic or clueless. Me sticking up for their right to just ask an honest question does not make me or anyone else expecting you to 'serve'.

Nobdy tokenised or dehumanised you. It was a question. People should not have to be afraid of asking questions just because *you* have a raw nerve.

[etana.livejournal.com]

are you blind? because if you aren't, I'm not sure you can completely understand what I'm saying. And if you aren't blind, then chastising me shows not only do you not understand what I said, but you are furthering the insult by tryiing to "discipline" me into agreement.

No, i'ts not my job to educate just because I exist. I am more than happy to if folks ask me first. This post had nothing to do with blindness and there's no need for it to turn into that. I have been tokened as a blind person and I don't appreciate it.

If you aren't blind, no, you wouldn't get it - and I don't expect you to.

But I do not appreciate the continnual lack of understanding.

[luwana.livejournal.com]

If you mention you are blind, some people might get curious and ask. If you don't want people to talk about it, don't mention it. Humans are curious creatures.

You. Are. Blind. Yes, people are going to see you as a blind person. I get tokened as a teenage white girl on medication because she's 'crazy'. Shit happens. Whatever you say, people are going to be curious about. Someone got curious. That doesn't mean they're stopping treating you as a person, it just means they want to know how something works. It's not an insult to you,f or crying out loud. Just the same as it's not an insult to me if somebody asks how my multiplicity works.

[etana.livejournal.com]

and by saying things like some fancy little known software you use turns whatever I am or do into something childish or petty. And for you to say "overreact so badly" - right, because you have the right to say that to me? Because you have an inkling of what it's like to live as a blind person and have people constantly use me as some educational tool when I'm just trying to live my life?

this isn't cool, it's not okay, and it's not appreciated. if people want ot learn about the blind they can google it, hell I do!

but go ahead, stick up for yourself and other fully-abled people.

But don't expect me to help. It's not my job. and it's not any of my other's jobs either. We do not exist to placate your curiousity or to assuage your able-bodied privilege/guilt.

[luwana.livejournal.com]

Christ, got a complex much? I'm sorry you're blind. But hey, I was born sighted, I've never had an accident that took away my sight, that's not my fault. So looky looky, you're dehumanising me, as a sighted person. *it works both ways*

I'm treating you like I would treat *anybody*. Sighted or blind, abled bodied or not, black or white or pink or orange.

If you don't want people to ask questions about your blindness, do not mention it. It is that simple. you cannot condemn people for not knowing how you function. you also cannot blame them for wanting to understand.

If you don't want to answer, then don't. Either don't comment, or say that you'd rather not answer, or rather they googled it. there is NO excuse for throwing a childish hissy fit and being down right rude to someone like that, when all they did was ask a question.


fancy little known software implies childish or petty? wtf? It implies *unusual and little known*. You use software that the vast majority of the population does not know about. Expecting people to know about it is just silly.


I repeat, if you don't want people to ask about it, don't mention it. If you don't want to answer, then don't.

There is no need to treat people like dirt.

[enigma-system.livejournal.com]

Labels are the antichrist. Call yourself a straight bi lesbian male chick and be done with it.

[etana.livejournal.com]

hahahahahhaha sweet