Beyond the Binary-Chapters(1-4)

                                 

     Generally speaking, psychologists and almost any person on the street will tell you that 

visuals and looks are the first aspect that we notice about anyone when meeting them for the first 

time, or even passing by them in a public location. People take notice of what you are wearing, 

what color is your hair, what color is your skin, what do your features look like and what kind of 

emotions does one feel when they look at you, how do you smell like, how tall are you, how slim 

or heavy are you, and so on. Looks and visuals make up the majority of one's impression of 

someone, and that person’s words only change or supplement the first impression, if the 

visualizer is willing to engage in further conversation. When we are always physically analyzing 

and processing what kind of potential a person could have in our lives or interactions; whether 

they could be our friend, lover, spouse, etc, then the same would go for trying to attribute a 

gender to someone when you first see them. Is it on purpose? No. It is simply human nature and 

perhaps one of the first active instincts that become activated when you see someone. It is innate 

and automatic. 

We physically analyze others for various reasons apart from them possibly being our new 

friend, lover, or spouse. It could happen because we are assessing whether we feel safe around 

this person, do they make us feel fearful, uncomfortable, relatable, and if we feel any kind of 

connection at all. It can be considered that assessing someone physically can always be a way to 

be alert, for example, if you see someone with a gun and ski mask and perhaps an empty bag, 

you will probably pick up on the fact this could be a lethal bank robber. So, you stay away from 

and act accordingly. If you see someone who looks healthy, has attractive features, smells 

relatively nice or like nothing at all (as long as they don’t smell bad), then your impression will 

be to want to approach them further and try to forge some sort of relationship (not necessarily 

romantic), just a human-to-human relationship. We physically attribute characteristics to people 

when we see them, also based on our personal and past biases. 

To ask this question of whether or not we could communicate with someone who is 

transgender or gender queer without attributing gender on them, is as if to say that people who 

are only interested in the opposite sex, do this to transgender and gender queer on purpose and 

out of some type of dislike or hate. This habit of forming first impressions and attributing things 

on people for the first time is simply a form of human curiosity taking place. I have met many 

transgender people, mostly males changing to females, and although this did not effect how I 

spoke or felt about them--in the beginning there was certainly curiosity on my end as to what to 

address them as, and how to speak them appropriately. Because you can’t talk to a male, who 

thinks in a masculine way, about feminine topics. However, if it’s a male who identifies as a 

female and although they look like a male, they think like a female, then you know that you can 

talk to them about certain topics. 

So when we are trying to assess whether a transgender person is a male or a female, it is 

out of curiousity and out of politeness for that person and ourselves. For example, it would not 

be appropriate to talk to a female (a man who sexually identifies as a woman) about working out 

at the gym to gain six-packs. It also wouldn’t be appropriate to talk to a man (a woman who 

sexually identifies as a man) about shopping, respectively. Plus, I feel as though this is where it 

would seem ignorant and insensitive to ignore what a person truly wants to be recognized and 

simply placing your own attributes and beliefs onto them. To wonder in curiosity about someone 

based on their looks is something everyone does, but what they do further from here is where the 

divide in thinking and manners comes in. Some will be rude and voice their hurtful opinions 

saying, “you look like a man so I’m going to treat you like one”, and others will be more careful 

and patient and either wait for the person to drop obvious hints or even share openly what gender 

they are, or politely ask them out of respect. 

It is not necessarily the gender attributing thought process that is bad, but rather how the 

person decides to act and talk after they’ve made attributions and assumptions about a 

genderqueer or transgender person. As (Dembroff, 2007) puts it “By overlooking those who 

identify outside of the binary—we are left without tools for understanding these new and quickly 

growing gender identifications.” In other words relating back to the prompt question, it is again 

not the nature of wanting to attribute characteristics onto someone that is unhealthy, but rather 

the ignorance that people breed in not wanting to expand on what they already know about 

different types of sexuality. It is ignorance that holds people back from progressing in this aspect 

of society. To be educated on any topic for that matter, is what allows people to at least agree to 

disagree and refrain from violent conflict. Dembroff does however, mention that “Despite this 

ever growing public awareness, nonbinary gender identities have been an afterthought within 

philosophy of gender, and especially metaphysical discussions of gender”, this is to say that 

gender queer and transgender are ignored and overlooked and paid no heed to in any sense, 

including cinema, literature, and all other aspects of social life. However, my belief is that, even 

if one is transgender or genderqueer, still, in a sense you are binary if you think about it. A 

transgender man prefers women, a transgender woman prefers men. Although their mental 

secuality is different from their body, they are still loving someone of the opposite sex, 

technically. The takeaway from all this is that, although gender attributing (meaning assessing 

someone physically in order to form first impressions) happens innately and automatically, it is 

not the culprit of how people behave towards gender queer or transgender. What is the actual 

culprit is the ignorance and past biases that people struggle to destroy and reform in order to be 

more accepting or at least, respectful not to make rude gestures.