Curiosity, Desire, and Deviancy

The nature of having (and being) a body

BY QUINN MCCLURG

I will preface this article with two things: one, I am a trans woman; two, when we are born, we are born into inherent deviancy. I am not preaching Catholic guilt nor original sin, but rather, the sheer absurdity of a (mostly) blank-slate-child trying to fit into all of societies’ respective norms and pressures.

I like to think that humans, similar to any other newborn or unguided creature, automatically tend toward curiosity and pleasure; for me, my curiosity led to an utter fascination with the feminine, followed by attempts to imitate it. Even now the compulsion is near impossible to explain, but I felt it now as I did then: a compulsion beyond base desires, attractions, or possessions, more in the realms of becoming, being, and understanding.

But, compelled or not, I was still a child, small and ignorant; no matter how unfamiliar I was with societal norms, I was still governed by them. Often these norms were enforced by other parties’ resistance (parents, peers, politicians, “professionals,” etc.) and my own deepening social and cultural awareness (through media, education, socialization, representation, etc.). In the face of this hegemony, I learned how to forget, fear, repress, be ashamed, and “belong.”

I lingered in this compulsory conformity all throughout high school; I tried not to further the intolerance of the hegemony I lived under, plus I was in no place to put anyone else “below” me. Still, without the proper tools, awareness, or communities, I didn’t understand that my constant dissociation and dissatisfaction was out-of-theordinary; but, unwittingly, I carried it in every part of my body, my identity, and my psyche.

Later, the more I understood how much I deviated from imposed social, psychological, and biological norms, the more I felt as if none of them mattered or were inherently meaningless to begin with. Although, ideally this may be true, my nihilism made me ignorant to the endless histories of violence that created and enforced such categorization or normativity to begin with, not just in gender, but in wealth, race, religion, orientation, or any other kind of existence. Existence within a monolith is a void of rejecting those unbelonging; I didn’t feel comfortable in the insecure absence that was white, cis masculinity, but I couldn’t have truly understood any other identity without the experience of being outside my own. Thus, from my denial, I became a “man-I-guess,” unfortunately ignorant and unable to understand. I like to consider my later identity adjustments to nonbinary and agender as indicative of a somewhat furthered education and deepened awareness.

Experience, though, was still a different, lacking matter. Unknown to me, I was still harboring those nameless and “deviant” compulsions, but needed adequate genderfuckery to recognize them. The first time I had makeup on, I was confused; the first time I wore a dress, I was disgusted; the first time I was a bottom, I was ashamed. But it all felt so. damn. good—I hated how good it felt, and I hated that I wanted even more of it.

It took me a while, but I followed my means of pleasure and curiosity to the ends of killing the misogynist, monogamist, racist, cop, and conformist in my head—it took uprooting every societally ingrained notion that I never realized I had ever learned. The more I learned about hegemony and intersectionality, violence and retaliation, courage and grace, the more understood identity in itself. Then, my own identities became crystalized within myself. And, of course, in identity and resistance, the work will never be easy, nor will it ever be done.

Here, it would be incredibly easy for me to talk about how difficult it is to have (“have,” as it’s hard to feel like you can “be”) a trans body, a woman’s body, or any kind of body at all. But let me start over.

As a woman, I will never fit the societal ideals of a woman; as a trans woman, I will never fit the biological ideals of a woman. But I don’t let “failure” bother me because firstly, most women, no matter how cis or normative, probably do not feel included in these ideals anyway; secondly, the unattainability only makes me feel more affirmed. If I hit a mark, despite the impossibility of it all, I feel affirmed; if I miss a mark, I can be affirmed knowing I am a still-living example of genderfuckery and deviation from societal norms.

I continue to remain curious about where our collective deviancy may take us next—maybe more pleasure, maybe more pain, maybe more understanding. But, as I said earlier, no matter how positive the change, our work will never be easy, and our work will never be done. So strap in: you were born a deviant—you better start acting like one.