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I had not posted for last week so I decided to compare and contrast the two speakers who came to address us in class.

Their situations seem very different. Katie was born with an intersex condition called Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome, and considers herself a girl. Alexander was born as a girl, but later in life came to the conclusion that he felt more comfortable assuming a male gender. While the details vary, both of these individuals deal with the pressure of "passing." Alexander explained passing as meaning the ability to have society recognize you from the outside as the gender you have chosen.

This applies to Katie as well, for while she did not choose her gender (she mentioned always knowing she was a girl, and when her father told her, "Don't worry, you are still a girl," her automatic response was "Of course I am a girl!"), she still had internal struggles with being generally accepted as female. She said at one time in her life, there was nothing more that she wanted than to be able to go through puberty the way other girls did. She wanted to buy tampons with her mom, and have her dad be awkward about dating boys and talking about sex. If a stranger took a glance at Katie, he would know she was a girl. Perhaps because of the certainty people possess about Katie's gender, passing is more of a personal quest for her. If that same stranger were to look at Alexander at this point in his life, they might be unsure as to what Alexander's gender is. For Alex, passing depends on the opinions of society. He said he hopes to pass one day.

The conversations we had with both Katie and Alex reinforced the idea that people really are afraid of what they cannot fully understand.