More on where do I fit in? Labels, why do we need them?

[aishah]

my sexual orientation is queer (technically speaking i am pansexual but i prefer the term queer). my gender identity is femme (and i was assigned female at birth so i am cisgendered). i'm disabled and mixed (native/white).

these are not labels to me...they are all integral parts of who i am as a human being. they define me, sometimes in ways that are supportive and other times in ways that are difficult to deal with. sometimes they are useful for communicating my particular understanding of the world to other people. claiming who i am has been a powerful process, for me, of creating a space of authenticity in a world where bodies like mine are not valued and where people would not only rather erase my differences, but in some cases wish to literally eradicate people like me from existence. knowing who i am gives me strength.

there are labels that i have that might communicate parts of how i see the world or struggles/joys that i face, for example i am muslim. but these things are not quite as deeply tied into how i define and understand myself. the label of muslim isn't always useful for communicating what i believe (in terms of religion). sometimes it is. so some parts of who i am are not so deeply static or ingrained. 'polyamorous' is a label that describes how my relationships are structured and how i approach relationships - i go back and forth on whether i see it as an integral part of my identity.

Queer is probably among the most stable of my identities simply because the very implication of queer is completely open and not attached to sex/gender or who you fuck, but has more to do with dynamics and existing outside a sexually normative framework. I actually see queer identity, for myself, as important especially when in Canada there's still a lot of G/L folks and straight-identified folks who think rights struggles are over since marriage equality happened (without challenging the oppressive origins and implications of the marriage institution) and basically are still on a crusade to prove that "we're just like everyone else." Basically the party Pride culture, white gay male "professionals" and the white picket fence. Whereas being politically queer, to me, means making the challenge to normativity (sexual, ability, racial, gender, sexed etc.), and not just to the "heterosexual" world. Queer is important to me because it's an identity that really acknowledges its function as an identity within a social/political context.

i love your whole post, ender, but particularly this part. i relate so much to this.