Kvar

Kvár : a newly created Icelandic word for a person of no gender

What is being non-binary?

I don’t take part in this.

– Regn Sólmundur: Being non-binary is being outside of the gender binary.
– Whether it’s being a woman but not quite,
– a man but not quite,
– being completely in the middle,
– or completely outside of it.
– When people ask me my gender I answer …

– Embla: Being non-binary doesn’t necessarily mean the same thing for me and the next non-binary person.
– I don’t relate to feeling in my heart or my soul that I’m a woman or a man.

– Alda Villiljós: For me, being non-binary is never having found myself in either male or female …
– … having always felt that it wasn’t quite right.
Gender? Male – Female
– And then many many years of testing things and changing and realizing how much gender can flow …
– … and that it’s okay. That it can change.

– Viima: It’s the feeling that I don’t relate to any gender.

– Embla: There is such an incredible amount of socialization based on looks and gender from the moment you’re born.
– Society treats people differently based on their genitals,
– on what sort of body they have.

– And there are few things that bug me more.
– This gendered socialization is ridiculous and I don’t relate to it.
– That’s also what this word means to me.
NON-BINARY
– With this definition I’m not part of the system that’s constantly categorizing people.
– I don’t take part in this.

An outdated idea

– Regn Sólmundur: When my mother was pregnant with me, my feet were always crossed.
– Nobody could see my genitals so nobody knew what I was until I came out.
– And it’s a …
– And even then nobody knew.

– I see gender more in the fourth dimension.
– It’s not possible to place me on a two-dimensional graph.
both — male — female — neither
– I would need more dimensions.
– We live in the fourth dimension; time, space, surface and whatnot.

– Embla: I think gender is a spectrum with varying depths in the tones.
– I think each and every one of us experiences gender differently.
– Alda Villiljós: We can’t necessarily explain it with words. It’s extremely personal and at the same time universal.
– I often say that there are as many genders as there are people.
– Because one cis woman doesn’t define her gender in the same way as the next cis woman.
– I think it’s incredibly varied and depending on the individual.

Hranfsunna often believes that gender is a spectrum …
– … but you can be in the middle without necessarily being non-binary.
– The other day I was speculating so much whether I felt masculine or feminine and in the end …
– Can’t I just be here?
– I don’t have the energy to think about this.
– It’s not a part of me right now.

– Alda Villiljós: Often, I like to point out that both cis and trans people experience their gender individually.
– You can ask fifty men how they define their masculinity or why they feel that they are men.
– What is it that makes them men?
– And you’ll definitely get fifty different answers.
– Or at least forty.

Alda points out that some people would probably mention genitals …
… but then you could ask what happens if people lose them?
– Gender is just some feeling.
– Most people can’t describe clearly.

– Embla: If we look at communities from older times, some gender roles made sense.
– There wasn’t really a need for that many people who could produce sperm. They were more dispensable.
– But you need a lot of people with a womb to keep a whole community going.
– So that it made more sense that people with a womb stayed at home.
– And also, it’s just hard to go hunting when you’re pregnant.
– I think, I haven’t tried it.

– It made more sense to look after the people who gave birth to children than the people who could father them.
– But we’re not there anymore, so far from it.
– This is an outdated idea. It’s not relevant anymore.

Two alternatives

– Hrafnsunna: I tried playing with dolls.
– I tried fitting in.
– Sometimes.
– But it didn’t work out.
– At the same time, I wasn’t welcome among the boys.
– When we are young we understand gender in such a simple way.
– We are quick to pick up the stereotypes.

– I think that if it hadn’t been imposed on me that being a woman meant certain things …
– … and if I wasn’t treated like a woman …
– … I would be more willing to be a woman.
– This wouldn’t bug me if there wasn’t any discrimination,
– discrimination in both and all ways.
– There are all kinds of variables that affect how we communicate with each other
– but I feel that this one in particular is given quite the weight.

Embla works as an instructor for kids from six to sixteen years old.
– At my school, I notice that gender expression is fairly liberal.
– But sometimes you hear …
– Girls are so much like this …
– And it’s obvious that it’s coming from something external, like their parents or the TV or something else.
In such cases, Embla tries to get the children to think about why they have these ideas about gender roles.
– Why? What do you mean by that?
– Most often they have no clue.
– I think it’s incredibly unconscious.

– Regn Sólmundur: When I was a kid, my mother called me her only son, because she only had three daughters at the time.
– I was the only son because I was such a dude and always playing with the boys.
– I had a lot of close male friends but my sisters hadn’t had friend patterns like that.
– When I reflect back, I think I was a rather trans masculine child. Because I wished that I was a boy.
– I put socks in my underpants and tried to pee standing up; just the typical trans boy behavior.

– But then I always felt so ashamed.
– I think kids have such an infinite capacity to feel shame.
– So that I didn’t dare telling anyone how I felt.

– And in fact it didn’t matter because my male friends treated me like an equal.
– Then, when I start nearing puberty, my male friends stop treating me like their equal.
– It hurt incredibly.
As a result, Regn started doing anything to fit in.
– But of course I never felt good doing that.
– I developed an eating disorder and became obsessed with being as feminine as I could.
– It was just destructive.

– Viima: Everyone, in my opinion, loads their children up with all kinds of hopes and expectations.
– I was made to wear dresses and my hair had to be long.
– I was feeling this feeling of not fitting, kind of feeling like I was done some sort of forcing.
– My gender expression was trampled on and that felt bad but I couldn’t explain it.
– Because I new I wasn’t a boy but how could I say that I’m not a girl when I don’t even know that it’s possible to not be.
– So I kind of like submitted to my fate. I couldn’t say anything other because I knew I wasn’t a boy.
– There were no other options.

– Of course, throughout the world history, all kinds of people have always existed,
– but in our cultures, it’s just been overruled completely.
– We’re given these two models, here pick one.

– People don’t easily grasp what it means to be agender.
– They start thinking, usually
– but you have a legal gender.
– Yes, I do, because it’s impossible to not have a legal gender in this world.
– We’re all forced to have a gender.
– Why?
– I don’t know.