Why are some people so hung up on Lifestyle labels?
I mean does it mean that much if you are gay, bisexual, straight, transgender or what not?
I mean I am really guilty of this. I mean did I really need to announce to the world that I am transgender and does it really change anything for me on here other than just being upfront and honest about who I really am? I mean will people look at me differently than they did when I was just that gay guy that came here once in a blue moon?
I mean I have been here for a long time and only have like 200 some posts.
Do you feel that you need to label someone to be able to get along with them?
I just sometimes feel like labels can get us into trouble.
What are people's opinions about labels?
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Labels are mostly indeed trouble. Some people will claim you have changed while in reality you've just made peace with who you are. I advise you not to give a damn care about labels. You only can get along with someone who understands you, accepts who you are, and values your friendship/relationship, regardless of which group you belong to. More, let these know how much you've struggled to discover your identity.
However remember that not everybody will truly look at you the same way they used to. Just know who are your friends and choose wisely who to trust... well you know the story.
I, personally, would have looked at you the same way. As for now I'm happy for you.
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Labels are very handy gadgets. However, they're deceptive. The catch-all phrase is: "The map is not the territory." IOW, the experiential reality is always different from our description of it. I can say, "The apple was sweet, tart and crispy," but reading or hearing those words isn't the same experience as biting into the apple. Even whatever you imagine those words mean isn't the same as the experience.
This is true for everything we take for granted in life. I'm a man. My name is Mike. I live in California. California is a State of the United States. The United States is on planet Earth… etc. The *reality* is that these designators have associative meanings within the mind and are useful as such, but we perpetually mistake them for that which they represent. We become identified with our labels. I habitually think I am "Mike" (and all the rest of it). But take the words away and what's left? I'm sure you know exactly what I'm talking about, Jason. It is that moment when you're out in the wilderness and you realize that that experience of being there is more real than anything we might think or say about it, and considerably more real than "social reality".
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Labels are shortcuts. It is always important to remember that giving a label to anyone puts them in a larger context which is always more vague than calling them by name which is specific to them. Jason, the important thing to me is that you are you--the wonderful phenomenon that I enjoy more and more as I get to know more of you. As a society we often make the mistake of thinking that conformity to a mold is desirable when the opposite is really the desirable state. Interesting people are simply not easily pigeonholed.
One lovely example of this should get Virge excited. The fundamentalists are completely bewildered when trying to deal with people who will not mold their thinking to narrow standards. by requiring adherence to a standard defined by a label--some perverted meaning of "Christian" in this case. They lose sight of the person involved and substitute the labelled identity for the individual. If you look at biblical examples it is easy to see that Jesus teachings run completely opposite to the fundies' ideas. Thus we get to know, instead of tax collector and whore, the real and vibrant Zacchaeus and Mary Magdelene.
I bid NO Trump!
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One major misconception with labels is from the point of perspective. One thing you have to realize is, whatever labels you give yourself OFTEN times aren't the same ones someone else would give you.
Looking from the inside out, and from the outside in are totally different sides of the fish bowl. How you view yourself and how others view you are very seldom close to equal. As an example, I've known some complete assholes who thought they were nice guys. I've also thought the world of people whom didn't give themselves enough credit on how great they were.
I don't think it's necessarily earth shattering for either of us that we didn't agree on which label was accurate, unless you're one of those people whom completely evaluate their own self worth by outsider's opinions. I agree with MikeW in that they're a good starting point for generalizations, but not the complete picture in minute detail.
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You may hates labels but just realize that you're using them yourself to define yourself. Without the label how do you know you're actually a transgender? How will you call it? Label are used by everyone and as much as you don't like it, you're using it yourself on a daily basis. One may claim to be gay, bisexual, straight or transgender. Why do you feel the need to label yourself as such? Because you have been accustomed to categorize things and even you will be categorizing yourself. There is bad labelling, but there's label that you're using and that everyone here are using because we are human and we need the labels to set ourselves apart from other social groups whether you like it or not.
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The previous four posts covered my points, better than I would have done. To summarize, labels are a useful and powerful tool, both for social and personal purposes, but like other powerful tools, they can be dangerous if not used properly. It's a natural human social/cognitive phenomenon that is not inherently bad.
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That makes alot of sense Jake and thanks for that.
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In the seminars I facilitate we talk about attraction (I try to sometimes use "attraction" and "affection" in stead of "sexual" because you can be attracted to people and not have it lead to sex... and it also helps disarm the notion - perpetrated by the right - that queer folks are all sex-obsessed deviants who are incapable of actual love) and gender as points on two intersecting scales... most people are not exclusively one thing or another, and many people do not identify the same way their whole lives, or even all of the time.
You would be amazed how many people it never occurs to that folks who ID as transgender also run the gamut in terms of to whom they are attracted. I know at least one couple who stayed married after one partner underwent gender transition... this by default means that the attractional orientation "label" for the other partner has changed, even though they're with the same person. That wakes a lot of people up to how arbitrary these words are.
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