Title: Gaydar Jamming
Date: 2022-05-08 21:00
Category: commentary
-Tags: anecdotal, ideology
+Tags: anecdotal, ideology, homosexuality
Status: draft
Two related anecdotes on the power of ideology over observation—
-One day in high school journalism class, the topic came up
+In my high school journalism class back in the mid-'aughts, there was this fat Latino boy, L., who had distinctly "feminine" mannerisms. (I'm not even sure how to describe it in terms of lower-level precepts, [as if the memory is encoded by category](/2020/Dec/crossing-the-line/). You know it when you see it.)
-[topic of handwriting ]
+One day in high school journalism class, the topic of gender and handwriting came up, and it was remarked that L. also "wrote like a girl." Being the [proud antisexist ideologue that I was at the time](/2021/May/sexual-dimorphism-in-the-sequences-in-relation-to-my-gender-problems/#antisexism), I [wrote in my notebook](/images/crossdreaming_notebook_samples.png) about how this observation about L.'s handwriting was disturbing.
+Naïvely, of course, you'd think it would be ideologically validating: L. and his manner and his handwriting were living proof that not all boys are masculine! But everyone—even the smart sexists—knew _that_. No, the disturbing part was that if "feminine" handwriting—potentially—indicated "feminine" behavior more generally, that implied that _"femininity" was a valid concept_, which was not an assertion I was inclined to grant.
+
+Ideology isn't my style anymore.
-[One of my old notebooks](/images/crossdreaming_notebook_samples.png)
very distinctive voice