but in reality, the spectrum of gender identities is

Aparna Narrain on the other hues of the LGBTQI rainbow

"I don't believe in being labelled as man, woman, heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, lesbian. I am ina space where I feel like a man sometimes, I feel like a woman, I feel like a

Perfect Quality Louis Vuitton Replica hijrasometimes. That's exactly whoI am. There are no boxes for my gender expression and there are no boxes for my sexual expression," says Sumathi, a musician and activist who identifies as gender queer(someone who doesn't identify as male or female or is gender less)."

The gender binary male and female stereotypes is ingrained early in life. But in reality, the spectrum of gender identities is vast ranging from gender queer, gender non conforming, and gender fluid to bi gender. The language of self assertion is key, feels Navadeep, research fellow at Anveshi Research aaa replica designer handbags Centre for Women's Studies in Hyderabad, who identifies as transgender queer.

"One way of expressing gender is with your lifestyle and the way you live. But it is also about asserting yourself through language. When you don't have the vocabulary, you cannot assert your identity and not just with others, but with yourself too," says Navadeep.

And the moment you don't conform to the replica designer handbags system that is prescribed, making you "fluid," you're destroying the structures of being male and being female, says fake designer bags Sumathi. are now giving students the choice of using pronouns other than "he" and "she") and celebrities are talking about being gender fluid including actor Ruby Rose of Orange Is The New Black,while actor Jaden Smith shot for anad campaign for Louis Vuitton's womenswear.

But Alok Vaid Menon, an artist based in New York City, who identifies as gender non conforming, says "Ifind this to be pretty ironicbecause prior to colonisation, places like India actually had many, many genders that were replica louis vuitton socially and culturally recognised. The gender binary was imposed through colonialism. That's because LGBTQI movements themselves are so fixated on the idea of categories and identities. There's no longer a space to bethat is more complicated (or even 'I don't know!'). There's a pressure to come out and now the identities are already fixed for you."

But the mainstream media coverage of the issuehas changed, says Sumathi. "It has understood these issues but then again they only look at either gay men 1:1 replica handbags or male to female transpeople. Other people who exist in the spectrum are not at all visible in the media. It's actually not about being visible or not visible, it's about being acknowledged. Recently, after the February 2 judgement, we went to Town Hall (in Bengaluru), there were either gay boys speaking or male to female transpeople speaking. Not one gender queer, lesbian or a female born person spoke. There should be some amount of balance, so the media should also think in terms of representation."

There is still a very long way to go indeed, says Navadeep. "I will not nullify the judgements and say they mean nothing. At one level they do mean a lot to the community, but to what community of LGBT is the point. These judgements matter to the educated, elite, upper middle class, English speaking LGBT community because they know the existence of law, they inhabit urban spaces where law operates in certain ways if not completely. We don't live in a country that is nearly or completely run on constitutional legality. We live in a country and society that is run by religious morality, family all which propagate traditional values of gender and sex. So a mere change in the judgement or announcement of a judgement will do nothing Designer Louis Vuitton Replica Handbags on the ground."

There is much more understanding about sex and sexuality than there was before, says Nivedita Menon, professor replica louis vuitton bags from china and feminist scholar. "Society has Designer Louis Vuitton Replica Handbags changed a lot already because the queer movement has been around for 10 to 15 years. So it's Fake Louis Vuitton Replica Bags not like you have to start from scratch. But certainly the media has a greater responsibility and has to be more alert and resist slotting the whole world into male and female and treating everything else as an aberration. Of course, this also has to happen in classrooms, in conversations, at parties and on social media.

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