Taking Back Tomboy
Where did all the tomboys go?
Remember seeing tomboys? Girls that played in the mud, played sports with the boys teams, and would rather wear cleats than be caught in heels?
I remember. I was one.
My mom and dad tell a very colorful story of me throwing a dress on the floor after my grandmother practically forced it on me.
I was 4. I had no idea what a gender was. Or sex. Or a sexual orientation.
I just know I didn't like dresses. I liked football. And playing in the mud. And working on cars with my dad. (I use the term "working" loosely)
Now? I'd be labeled a boy trapped in a girl body. I'd be recommended puberty blockers, hormones (DRUGS call them what they are), and maybe even Gender Reassignment Surgery.
That's horrifying to think of as an adult.
What makes no sense to me on top of it, is the same crowd that would tell me to do all that, would also preach that gender is a social construct.
But it made me wonder, what would my life look like had I been "transed"
(transed - verb - assuming someone who is attracted to the same sex, or has interests of the opposite gender, that they are trapped in the wrong body.
Ex- "Haley got transed into being a dude cause she likes football and vagina.")
Well, I know I wouldn't be as healthy as I am now. I wouldn't be as grounded, stable, secure. I wouldn't accept myself for who I am. I'd have LOADS of identity issues, and my dating pool would be cut to 0.
But, I grew up in a different time. (That sounds weird to say, I'm only 29.)
I want to say, if you're a woman or a girl reading this and you like sports, and playing football, and shooting guns, and anything else considered "masculine" or "manly"...
You might be a lesbian.
But you're definitely a tomboy.
And tomboys are fucking rad.
Own it. Embrace it. BE PROUD OF IT.
To answer the question in the beginning of this post; "Where did all the tomboys go?"
To gender identity clinics cause someone told them they were probably a man. And they sadly, believed it.
#takebacktomboy
(Coffee for today is BRCC Iced Vanilla Espresso. Let me know what you're drinking.)
I hated wearing dresses, hated playing with dolls, and was never interested in babies like the other girls. I remember sitting in Spanish class when the teacher had her baby, all the other girls were up with her looking at it. All the boys were sitting in their desks talking about sports or whatever else they're into. I was all by myself interested in none of that. I was into legos too. But none of that made me a boy trapped in a girl's body.
What people call gender is simply personality and stereotypes. I never knew we had so many believers in those stereotypes in my life. It's shocking that people are doing this to children.
We should be teaching people to love who they are, and not teaching them to hate their own bodies. It's insane. If the medical community wasn't captured it would be called insanity.
I was a total tomboy: I always liked playing with boys better than girls, I rode bikes, climbed trees, played “smear the queer” (before it was bad), and hated wearing dresses. I cut the hair off my dolls, played “Kimba” and “Speed Racer”, loved reading “The Three Investigators”, and at 8, I wanted nothing more than to be (a) 12 and (b) a boy.
I turned out to be a straight woman. By 16, I could rock a miniskirt and 5” heels like few could. After 30+ years of marriage, bearing and rearing a child, enduring menopause, and embracing traditional gender roles, I’m still not sure what “being a woman” is supposed to feel like...and I’m 100% okay with that.