Words are not always what they seem ….
Right lovelies, here goes. This may seem like the oddest title for a blog that you’ve had from me so far, it was a proper nightmare to come up with a title that worked, and this, well, this is what I came up with. So, please bear with me and ill try to explain what it’s all about. Words ……. By definition a word is a single, distinct, meaningful element of speech or writing, used with others, or alone, to for a sentence. You see, there we have it, single, distinct and meaningful. Don’t worry this is not a lesson in the English language, but more a way to explain how impacting choices of words can be, and why we all need to really think about what we say or write. I’m generally really confident in conversation and debate, both written or spoken, and feel I have a good grasp of language and how to use it to best effect. I’m not an author, I don’t write fiction, but what I do is get things out there from my individual perspective on the world. I won’t say it unique, because although there is only one of me, probably a good thing, there are many others out there like me. But although Transgender and Gender Diverse people are estimated to be make up somewhere between 1.2 and 2 percent of the population, that’s somewhere between 1/100 and 1/50 people, we are the most ‘Still in the Closet’ group of the population as well. And this is through fear, through a need to self protect, through the shame that many of us are made to feel, just because we fall outside historical binary standards that define who we all should be. So, why this, what has prompted me to write about it. Well, a couple of weeks back it registered in my head, how a particular word had started to creep into comments made on posts I had shared in social media, and what was surprising to me was that the people using this word were almost exclusively all cisgender women. Now before I get to the word and explain why it was a problem, I need to add some context to all of this. There are a really small number of places online that I share things in outside of my own personal feeds and pages, so its really easy to spot a change in the way responses are written. By that I mean that if I share something in a group, and also share on my own feed, yes, the responses are different, on my feed, it will be people I’ve allowed into my life more closely, people I share with on a personal level, in a group, generally responses will be more reserved. But, here’s the thing, every single person that comments on my personal feed gets all there is to get about language and how words can be interpreted differently. I have friends from all walks of the LGBTQ+ community as well as heterosexual cisgender men and women, and guess what, they comment and chat to me both online and face to face the same way they do to every single woman they know. PERFECT !!! However, in a few groups, which I’ve left all bar one of them, in recent months, this has increasingly not been the case, and as I said, a couple of weeks ago, this all got to me a bit. It triggered emotional feelings that impacted how I feel about me and how I perceive other people see me. At the same time, it also made me stand and question myself about who I am every time I saw my own reflection. It triggered feelings of dysphoria about my identity, It’s not the first time in my life that its happened, far from it, but it’s the first time in a long while and it really knocked me back. I know I’m digressing a little again but let me explain what this means and I’ll take this from freely available information on the UK NHS website. For me, Gender Dysphoria, which is a term that describes a sense of unease that a person may have because of a mismatch between their biological sex, and their gender identity. This unease or dissatisfaction may be so intense that it can lead to depression and anxiety and have a harmful impact on daily life. Common side effects when this is triggered include a bottoming out of self esteem, withdrawing and inducing social isolation, becoming depressed and anxious, taking unnecessary risks and self neglect. So as you can see, and I'll get to what happened really soon, the wider impacts of using certain words really can be so detrimental. Ok, let’s get to what’s happened and explain why it happened as well. I’ll start with the word or word that crept in. ‘Human’ !!! there it is, a singularly distinct word. Now, I’m not going to lie, I am a Human, I mean my species is human, I’m also a bi-pedal primate, but so are gibbons, gorillas and chimps, and that’s why no one would describe me as that. So you may wonder why being called a human caused me such an extreme problem. It wasn’t just as simple as ‘Hey human’ it was more descriptive, in being referred to as an ‘Amazing human’, a ‘Beautiful human’ and the use of various other prefixes to describe the type of human I’m seen as. Now, what makes this stand out is that almost every use of this was by a cisgender woman, and I’m reasonably confident that at no point did any of them, at any time, realise what effect this would have, but the problem was, the more the word was used, the more it was seen, and it started popping up more regularly in a few different online groups. Now, after feeling like I may have over reacted to all this, I’ve spoke to a whole load of straight cis women and asked what they would think and feel if someone told them they were a Beautiful/Kind/Amazing/Awesome/Loving Human or Human Being, and pretty much all of them said they wouldn’t have any real problem with it. But they also said it’s not something that’s been said them, or, more to the point, not something that they'd have paid notice to or remembered. They all agreed that if someone was saying those things they would be surprised to be referred to as anything other than as a woman, not a human. But, that if it did happen, they wouldn’t see it in a bad light. Here’s where this is different for me, unlike a cis woman, who’s identity has always matched with how she is defined by society and is usually 100% secure, mine isn’t, for most of my life I was told I wasn’t who I was. Society expected me to be someone else, just so I would fit in. All those mental health impacts and reactions that I listed earlier, are real, and the reason the use of the word human to describe me personally in responses on my posts is a triggering is because for my whole life I didn’t want to be referred to with male definitions and titles. The term Human encompasses men and women, and somewhere in my mind it makes me feel that maybe others see me as a man and not a woman, or less of a woman than someone else is, because after all, unlike them, I wasn’t assigned female at birth. I was assigned male, by someone who couldn’t tell you anything about who I was, other than I was a human baby with male genitals. They couldn’t possibly know that I was different, if I would be straight or gay, what I would do for a career, if I would be academically gifted, or funny or anything else. To call me a human and not a woman or use female pronouns, is to step me back from everything that to me, defines me. Its to place me somewhere back towards male, it diminishes my identity and sits me somewhere in the middle. Beyond this, there are so many words that can cause a problem, this was just one, the thing is most are offensive, and if someone is deliberately offensive to me, well, they’ve shown their card, and they’ll get whatever I decide to throw back their way. I’ve no time for offensive people, but I have all the time in the world for anyone who accepts me as me. That’s why this was so hard. To try and explain why something so utterly inoffensive to almost all other women becomes such a problem for me. This still may make no real sense to you reading this, but then maybe you love day glow green or yellow tights or leggings, and that makes no sense to me. They don’t change who you are though. So there we have it, one word, one single word, and why the use of it, in a completely non-offensive way, knocked me flat, triggered my dysphoria, and made me not only feel less than me in others eyes but also made me question myself, for almost 2 weeks now, I’ve had to reset and rebuild my own trust in who I am, to rebuild my confidence for others to see me as me, and as no less than the whole me. If this piece resonates with you and you also experience this from time to time, I am right there by your side, I know what it’s like, I know what you’re going through, it will pass and it will get better. But what you may need to do is get a message out there, talk to people, tell people. If they don’t know, how can they adjust, and if they don’t want to accept and adjust, Well guess what ?? They ain’t your kind of people. I just want to add another quick point at the end here before I finish up, and that is that social media can induce a real disconnect between the person posting, the person commenting and also, any person reading, and actually, we all have a responsibility to just be nice. I know that if I ever post a comment or make a statement, serious or laced with sarcasm or what I see as humour, I’m always prepared to be corrected, I’m always prepared to explain myself, I’m always prepared to edit a badly worded or misconstrued comment, and above all I am ALWAYS prepared to apologise to people if I get something wrong or cause upset. What I would never do, is comment in a way to put someone down or knock their confidence, if you’re going to do that, think how you’d feel if you were that person and then hit that delete button, if you can’t be nice, then don’t be horrible either and just don’t bother commenting. But most of all, remember, anything can be a trigger word for anyone, and no one else knows if they are not told or made aware, after that, well, if it happens again, you can probably be pretty sure that its deliberate. And that as they say is that …….. All that’s left is for me to say thanks so much for taking the time to read this and I would be happy to receive any comments or feedback or questions that you may have. There are lots more posts on here as well. Just check out the archives and, if you would like to follow me, that would make me very happy. Just click on the social media links below to add, follow and like my feeds and pages. Thanks again, love and hugs to all. Sophie xxxx Facebook www.facebook.com/beingsophie Twitter www.twitter.com/sophietgirl Bloglovin www.bloglovin.com/blogs/being-sophie-17676297 Instagram www.instagram.com/sophie.smallman TikTok www.tiktok.com/@sophies045
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AuthorHi, I'm Sophie. I hope you enjoy reading my blog. Please leave some comments on what you think of my blog x Archives
March 2022
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