Comments on: Saint Joan http://www.lesbiandad.net/2006/06/18/joan-of-arc-by-dante-gabriel-rosetti/ notes from the crossroads of mother and father Wed, 07 Jan 2009 03:59:55 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 By: LesbianDad http://www.lesbiandad.net/2006/06/18/joan-of-arc-by-dante-gabriel-rosetti/#comment-14 LesbianDad Mon, 19 Jun 2006 18:07:19 +0000 http://lesbiandad.net/?p=27#comment-14 Thanks for reading and chatting, Mermaidgrrrl! I used to read <i>Dykes To Watch Out For</i> religiously when I lived in a town whose queer press ran it in syndication; haven't seen it for a while. But that would be right up that fabulous Ms. Bechdel's alley, a storyline about a genderqueer kid. I just looked at one of her most recent episodes,<a href="http://static.flickr.com/47/148336882_4cea73bcc0_b.jpg" rel="nofollow">episode 488, "Your Children Are Not Your Children"</a> (offa your link), and low & behold. Thank you. You know, Allison Bechdel wrote an essay that ran in St. Paul's <i>ArtPaper</i> way back in the early 1990s, about how coming out enabled her to make peace with her femaleness, and therefore become capable of finally drawing women, because she could finally really see them. That's a way boiled-down synopsis, but the thing I most brought from the essay, which really spoke to my own gendered evolution. Thanks for reading and chatting, Mermaidgrrrl!

I used to read Dykes To Watch Out For religiously when I lived in a town whose queer press ran it in syndication; haven’t seen it for a while. But that would be right up that fabulous Ms. Bechdel’s alley, a storyline about a genderqueer kid. I just looked at one of her most recent episodes,episode 488, “Your Children Are Not Your Children” (offa your link), and low & behold. Thank you.

You know, Allison Bechdel wrote an essay that ran in St. Paul’s ArtPaper way back in the early 1990s, about how coming out enabled her to make peace with her femaleness, and therefore become capable of finally drawing women, because she could finally really see them. That’s a way boiled-down synopsis, but the thing I most brought from the essay, which really spoke to my own gendered evolution.

]]> By: Mermaidgrrrl http://www.lesbiandad.net/2006/06/18/joan-of-arc-by-dante-gabriel-rosetti/#comment-13 Mermaidgrrrl Sun, 18 Jun 2006 08:11:33 +0000 http://lesbiandad.net/?p=27#comment-13 I once went to a presentation by <a href="http://www.egomego.com/judith/home.htm" rel="nofollow">Judith/Jack Halberstam</a> where s/he showed segments of "Boys Don't Cry" and talked about genderqueer issues. At once stage s/he asked a question - why is it more likely to catch mainstream sympathy if someone is to be found to be F to M, rather than the very unpopular topic of M to F? I remember expressing a point of view extremely similar to your own - that for society in general there is a perception that to aspire to be a man it is perceived to be raising ones status. For a man to become a woman well - how could they think about becoming "less than"? Whilst Judith/Jack didn't share my opinion, I was approached after the lecture by an M to F woman who said that for the first time she had heard someone express what she faced every day, that people couldn't understand how she could give up her almighty penis and become "only a woman". Do you read the comic strip <a href="http://www.dykestowatchoutfor.com/index.php" rel="nofollow">Dykes To Watch Out For"</a>? In that strip there is a woman with a genderqueer child and the dilemmas she faces with raising a child with this issue. I once went to a presentation by Judith/Jack Halberstam where s/he showed segments of “Boys Don’t Cry” and talked about genderqueer issues. At once stage s/he asked a question - why is it more likely to catch mainstream sympathy if someone is to be found to be F to M, rather than the very unpopular topic of M to F? I remember expressing a point of view extremely similar to your own - that for society in general there is a perception that to aspire to be a man it is perceived to be raising ones status. For a man to become a woman well - how could they think about becoming “less than”? Whilst Judith/Jack didn’t share my opinion, I was approached after the lecture by an M to F woman who said that for the first time she had heard someone express what she faced every day, that people couldn’t understand how she could give up her almighty penis and become “only a woman”.

Do you read the comic strip Dykes To Watch Out For”? In that strip there is a woman with a genderqueer child and the dilemmas she faces with raising a child with this issue.

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