Who Are You?

I was shocked recently to read that Australia had instituted a third "gender" on their passports: Indeterminate. For those sexually ambiguous folk, mid-transgender, or what have you. Meaning, I guess, that what lies underneath doesn't match what's seen on the surface.

It makes me think of a child who regularly visits my library. Or, more accurately, the adult who brings him. This person is quite apparently his parent, as the facial resemblance is unmistakable. But is that person his mother or father? The parent in question sports a short, spiky hairdo and wears baggy, unisex-style clothing which masks any telling body shape. The voice is most assuredly feminine, yet one day I noticed a five-o'clock-shadow. The name--Shawn--really doesn't nail it one way or another. I am itching to know: Male going female? Female going male? And why is it so important for me to know if this is the little guy's mother or father? Why is gender identity so inherent in our society?

I was raised on a farm, where chores needed to be done no matter who did them. I heaved hay bales, drove tractor, and helped castrate bulls and boars alongside my brothers. Okay, so the boys got to run the heavy machinery, while my sister and I cleaned the house and cooked--it was the 60's, after all. And maybe that had less to do with that being "women's work" and more that my sister and I were diminutive in stature (hard to believe if you could see us now) and physically unable to meet the demands of field work, and Mom worked full time and the house had to get cleaned. During the summers we all made our own lunches, and my brothers could whip up a mean fried hamburger or scrambled eggs all by themselves. (I don't, however, recall them ever having picked up a dust rag.)

So I grew up not so bound by perceived gender limitations as some of my contemporaries had. I never thought there was anything I couldn't do simply because I was a girl. I barreled through life expecting to do whatever I wanted to, no matter what society thought was proper. I was raised to be my own person, and bristled whenever anyone suggested I couldn't do something, working to prove that I could. I was glad that I knew how to run a household, but fully expected my partner in life (and yes, I did play with dolls and expect to be a mommy someday) to share the task.

I managed to marry a man who, while growing up in a more "traditional" household, had a father who regularly cooked dinner and washed the dishes. (He also had a very domineering mother and was used to being told what to do by a woman.) While we fell into the customary patterns of the wife doing the domestic thing and the husband doing the outdoor tasks, my Big Kahuna is not averse to periodically throwing in a load of laundry or regularly scrubbing the pots and pans, and I do the lion's share of the yard work (although he has dibs on the ginormous riding mower, even though at age 12 I was driving a beast three times that size). But never once did he chastise me for installing a new bathroom sink faucet or assembling our daughter's bicycle one Christmas or erecting the backyard swing set. I grunt just as loudly with a power tool in my hand as Tim Allen does. And he has spent dozens of hours waiting outside women's dressing rooms while our daughter has selected school clothes, because he knows shopping is just not my thing.

Yet, despite the fact that I will choose denim and flannel over satin and lace every time, that I'm much more graceful in work boots than in pumps, I am most decidedly, and proudly, a woman. I would be insulted if anyone suggested otherwise.

But what, really, does that mean? Am I proud of having breasts? Of the ability to bear children? Because, technically, I am capable of doing most anything a man does--aside from any physical limitations.

Which brings us to the physical differences between men and women. And is that the sole reason why we need gender identities? I would sure want to know if I were attracted to an "indeterminate" someone. Why? Because I personally desire natural purity. I'm a farm girl. I can't help thinking that a girl physically desiring to be a boy or a boy physically desiring to be a girl goes against nature. On the most basic level, that arrangement can't naturally reproduce. (And, as a bona fide red-blooded female, it gives me the willies.)

As a Christian, I believe that this isn't what God had in mind for us. You may say that God created a person "that way". The jury's still out on nature vs. nurture. All I know is that in all my years living on a farm, I have never observed a gay animal. I think our minds have a lot to do with our physical desires. God allows us free will, but I don't think He is happy with a lot of our human decisions. I can't know the struggles of someone who feels her soul was placed in the wrong type of body. But I do know what it's like to fight against what God has intended for me. It's so much easier to follow our human desires, but deep down each of us knows what is truly right, and I wonder if the "indeterminates" regularly squelch an innate sense of wrongdoing, or if they truly feel at peace with their decision. I'm a big believer in that gnawing internal uneasiness as a moral warning.

For medical reasons, it's important to know true gender. I will never get prostate cancer. My husband will never experience the joys of menopause. If the "indeterminate" Australian person's plane goes down, how can we identify the body? Are we looking for a man or a woman? Bottom line, I think you should go by the equipment you own, no matter how much it pains you.

I'm trying to imagine a future world where gender doesn't matter. Will it ever happen? I think there are too many sirens who enjoy displaying their womanly figures and too many men posturing to win their attention. Too many men in positions of power and too many women content with it that way. On a sexual level, I think we will always want to know. The "indeterminates" will eventually be socially tolerated, because the people who don't accept them will be labeled as rigid, homophobic racists or something and be shamed into silence. But will they be pigeonholed into their own "gender" or mixed in with whichever gender they prefer to identify themselves as, leaving the poor heterosexual purists to discover the truth in an embarrassing and possibly painful way?

As for my little library friend, growing up in a sexually ambiguous household? (And yes, I've seen the other parent, who is undeniably female.) Are the kids really all right?