Can someone explain the terms genderfluid, genderqueer, and homoflexible to me? They sound very similar when I tried to look them up, so I was hoping I could get someone to explain it to me in their own words I'm just curious :icon_bigg
Genderqueer means non-conforming to standard notions of a gender binary, i.e. everyone is categorizable as "man, therefore masculine" or "woman, therefore feminine". Gender fluid means you don't always express your gender in the same way. Someone who's gender fluid would fall into the more catch-all category of gender queer (since the binary norms of our culture tend to make us believe that gender is innate, biological, and fixed, and not socially constructed and malleable), but not all genderqueer individuals are gender fluid (for example, if their expression is non-binary but basically consistent over time). Homoflexible, on the other hand, has to do with sexuality. Like, 90-something % gay, but open-minded.
Thanks! That was definitely really helpful! I do have one question though...wouldn't genderqueer just be another way of saying transgendered then? They both pretty much have the same definition...I know everyone has their own perceptions and social constructions of different terms, and I totally get that, but they both sound the same to me :/ I'm just trying to understand...
A transgendered person identifies as the opposite sex to which they were born biologically; so an mtf (male to female) trans person was born with a male body but is mentally female, and an ftm (female to male) trans person was born with a female body but is mentally male. Being genderqueer is not the same as the person does not identify completely as either gender. I am genderqueer but not trans because I've never thought of myself as particularly female or male. You can think of gender identity and orientation like a spectrum if that makes it any easier; with some people on one end or the other, some right in the middle and others somewhere in between those points.
