The resulting mainstream culture around masturbation (including pharmaceutical organisational practices) has become stale, and girlboss-ily gender essentialist.

‘Trophy Boys’ is a camp extravaganza starring femme and non-binary folks in drag as the awful private school boys of your dreams/nightmares.

I grew up as two things: a closeted queer and a closeted Justin Bieber fan. Just like any other girl in my year seven English class, I was writing ‘JB’ over and over again in my notebooks with big love hearts.  I couldn’t care less if Justin Bieber had a girlfriend, or if the paparazzi …

The heart of this story is a karaoke booth in LA’s Koreatown where four queer Arabs are belting Queen at the top of our lungs.

It made me hate being a boy. Not because I didn’t want to be one, but because the world around me was letting me know I was doing a bad job at trying.

When I wore pink for the first time since transitioning, nothing changed. Years of testosterone didn’t leach out of my bloodstream, like rivulets of sweat running in reverse. My chest stayed a glorious flat expanse, pectorals underscored by my top surgery scars as if in emphasis. The pink cotton shirt was soft, and I liked …

I am a male-presenting non-binary individual: I have stubble, body hair, a deep voice, a balding head. All of these align with society’s acceptable image of masculinity. However, I also wear makeup, which deviates from an acceptable form of masculinity. For me, wearing makeup in public gives me a lot of anxiety, though I’ve done …

As a child, I gravitated towards whatever connected with me on an emotional level. The first film I remember loving was High School Musical at around age nine. I only discovered the reputation the film had when I entered secondary school a few years later. At best, it was considered an embarrassing thing to like, …

I write about gender a lot. Usually I do it through fan fiction, stepping into the shoes of the few well-represented trans characters in the media to explore how they experience their gender. One such character lives in the far future, a gender utopia where nobody’s transition is questioned, and gender roles are a figment …

It is late November 1943, and a man in his late 30s walks down the dingy streets of Montmartre, Paris. He smokes the last precious breath of a cigarette whilst a truck carrying German troops rushes past him, splashing water onto his pants leg. This man has recently left prison with a large manuscript for …

In the morning I study piano and in the afternoon I lift weights. The piano part is unremarkable for me. My childhood home had a piano, and I studied music through high school. Playing music isn’t just a thing I do: it’s part of how I see myself. It’s part of how I want to …

For a long time, I’ve struggled with aspects of my masculinity that I’ve always deemed to be outside of my control. I’m short, baby faced, lean and my voice is slightly high. I got stopped the other day from entering a raffle at a market because the woman running it didn’t believe that I was …

My very first images of masculinity and femininity came from the pictures that hung in my family’s prayer area, inside a small hallway closet with doors that opened like an accordion. Inside I saw gods and goddesses, either balanced on one leg in a dance pose, or standing with their palms together in prayer. At six …

I had not walked into the barbershop for three months, but the barber remembered my face. He is a Turkish guy in his late sixties. His strength and agility dance in his hands. He is a quiet man with a wide smile that appears every so often. His grin is like a slice of light, …

When I realised the man in the bed next to mine thought I was a cisgender man, I thought it might be safer to play along, in case his reaction to the truth wasn’t positive. Worst case scenario, he could turn violent or aggressive. Even though he showed me no aggression whatsoever, I was instantly …

“You faggot, may god damn you. Alas, life is nearing end.” I will never forget these exact words from a Facebook comment, written tauntingly on a picture of a person who looked neither masculine nor feminine. What upset me was not only the comment’s homophobic language, but the fact that the man who commented is …

My whole life, I have relied on other people to help open jars for me – something conventional Western narratives of manhood, and most 90s sitcoms, would designate as a one-way ticket to Emasculation Station. A lot of guys have a problem with admitting they are physically weak, or worse still, deferring their jar-based tasks …

Growing up, I was called mukhanath, or hermaphrodite, not because my class mates were certain that I had both a penis and a vagina, but because I was colored outside of the masculinity circle. They chose to assign me both organs because I didn’t have a rough voice, I wasn’t loud or violent, I liked …

At lunch time, the mother and daughter behind me in the queue pointed and whispered. They thought I couldn’t hear them, but I could. On my walk home from work I got stares – a few of them were accompanied by winks or smiles, but most felt highly judgmental at best, hostile at worst. It …

Breaking gender norms by existing as a masculine-of-centre female presents far more challenges to other people than you’d think. It contributes to awkward situations, from enthusiastic thumps on the back from blokey blokes and playful physical flirtation from women (more unnecessary and often unwanted physical contact), to an expectation to take the lead romantically, which …