Mr. Kate and Maggie, Conversation Part 4
April 22nd, 2008 maggieIn this edition: The love child of James Dean and Bettie Page, describing and defining (or not). Â
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3
I loved your comment, “femininity feels at some deep subconscious level dangerous, weak, and wrong.” And I think that is why I cannot escape an identity that somehow involves femme-ness. There is something about presenting in a femme way, which I call “girl drag” in my every day life, sometimes I also use the drag terms “en femme” and “en drab” to describe my presentation. I’m not sure that I want to say that that “wrong” is exciting, but I like that strange feeling, which I can only liken to walking down a dark alley. For me femme is never “safe” it involves skin and secrets and forethought and it is often about things that other people don’t see, like under garments or beauty rituals. Masculinity for me is more about the outside, I think because I feel more that I have to prove my masculinity than my femme-ness, because femme-ness on me would make sense to the world at large, far more sense than some cobbled together transmasculine identity. Read the rest of this entry »
