cissies: a rant

What are you?

A man?

Ah, but have you always been a man? (Actually, come to think about it, no one has always been a man because the baby-boy thing always comes first. Unless, of course, you started off as a baby girl. In this case you are a transgendered man (though I wonder if it might be more logical to describe you as a transgendered woman).*)

Phew.

Anyway, what if you aren't transgendered? What sort of a man are you then?

Well, in that case, apparently, you're a cis man. (It's all right: it sounds as if you're being called a sissie, but that's just an unfortunate coincidence.) If you've always been female then you're a cis woman.

The cis terms are presumably of some use to some people, though I think on the whole I'd rather not be called a cis woman. The thing is, I like to feel I can do a bit of carpentry or geometry from time to time without being untrue to myself...

...in short, all this stuff is terribly complicated.

Apparently on Facebook there are about fifty different genders to choose from.

I think I'm down as female; but if mildly variable is an option, then perhaps I'll change it to that.

Word To Consider Today: cis. This comes from the Latin prefix cis, meaning on this side of, which is the opposite of trans. For instance the Roman word Cisalpine, meant on this side of the Alps.

*I refuse to get het-up about the muddle of the words gender and sex: they're past worrying about.

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