A incomplete list of all the genders that are out there…
And this was me… till a couple of years ago… Which is not too different from what a lot of people are today… And I would say this is ignorant thinking caused by decades of ‘conformist’ education…
So, I was one of those people till about a couple of years ago who would equate lack of gender conformity among people as a result of ‘woke-ness’ and even make fun of those people who would say that there are actually 30+ genders, etc etc.
I was wrong!
A rather short facebook interaction with a cousin who is my age & who I am confident is sane, and has studied this stuff led me to start reading more about it too. And the more I read some of the new science as well as some really old stuff led me down to the path that resulted in this article. Also, a few days ago, I chanced upon a Gallup poll done in the US which triggered me wanting to try and encapsulate what I believe is the end of gender & sexuality binary in India, whether people accept it or not.
So, what is gender? Most of us have grown up with the idea that there are two genders – male and female.
We typically associate male with:
– having XY chromosomes
– a specific kind of genitalia + reproductive system
– testosterone as a primary hormone.
We tend to think of female as:
– having XX chromosomes
– a specific kind of genitalia + reproductive system
– estrogen as a primary hormone.
Now these biological markers usually end up grouped together, which also creates the 2 ‘groups’ which people identify as genders. The key word here is USUALLY.
What about people who fall outside of these groupings? People may have different combinations of chromosomes, hormones, genitalia that don’t come from the same ‘group’. They’re still natural. They’re still human. They’re NOT an aberration, nor are they abnormal. Given this reality, can there really be only 2 groups (or 2 genders)? Or are there multiple, caused by different combinations of these 3 biological markers?
Now before we talk more about gender, we cannot escape talking about sexuality or sex since one is kind-of linked with the other, though not as much as we think. A combination of biology + upbringing + self-awareness ends up with people identifying themselves as being attracted to one sex or another or to both or as being fluid across these options. So while gender & sexuality are closely intertwined, considering there are both physical & mental constructs, they do not always line up, thereby creating situations where people are biologically of one gender (in the traditional binary gender sense) but may be sexually attracted to the same or another gender. And often-times, though not always, they end up being attracted to people of another gender professing the same or different sexuality. Yes, it is a little complex to understand (took me a while too) but you need to. It is important & critical to understand the concepts of gender, sex & sexuality and to understand those human beings who generally fall under the LGBTQ umbrella.
Anyway, this article is not about the complexities of interpersonal attractions across gender, sex, etc. It is about the prevalence & general widespread acceptability of gender & sexual fluidity in india, which I argue should be fait-accompli, since it is not something alien to our culture.
While the concept of gender & sex binary has never really existed in Bharat, I believe we are (and if we are not, then we should be) making good progress towards the end of gender & sexual binary in India.
Here’s a tweet by Shamir Sanni which he posted after the Indian Supreme Court struck down Sec 377 – “From gay Sufi lovers to Hindu transgender women. India’s sexual fluidity was always a dirty, barbaric concept to its western invaders and it is crucial for the LGBTQ community here in the west to understand this. This isn’t India becoming ‘westernised’. It’s India decolonising.“
He is absolutely right and I urge people not to freak out and think that this is some ‘woke’, new-fangled idea. It is not. Bharat has always been a gender fluid society. It’s just that many people don’t acknowledge it for whatever reason and hence have built up some sort of resistance against accepting it. But I believe they will eventually have to (accept it). There’s just too much science, logic & data behind it. IMO, this is the modern day societal equivalent of the “The earth is not flat and the sun does not revolve around it” moment. And just like that one, this one too will involve a compete change in our thinking and in how we perceive the world & ourselves in it.
If you observe carefully, gender fluidity is actually all around us. It has always been a part of our world. There are many many references to gender fluidity in nature, in many other species too (Ricky Gervais did a hilarious stand-up comedy set on this). There are also many many references to gender & sexuality fluidity in our mythology, even by our Gods (more on this later in the piece).
In the modern world too, the change has been happening – slowly but surely, over decades & generations. As our understanding of ourselves has evolved, so have concepts of gender, sex, sexuality, and the intersection of all of them.
A recent gallup poll in the US brings out this eye-opening data point that the % of US population who identify as LGBT has gone up from 4.1% to 5.6% of its population (from approx 13mn to 19mn) between 2016 & 2020.
However, more than the above, the really interesting data point is their generational demographic.
% of those who identify as LGBT in:
Generation Z (born 1997-2002) 15.9%
Millennials (born 1981-1996) 9.1%
Generation X (born 1965-1980) 3.8%
Baby boomers (born 1946-1964) 2.0%
Traditionalists (born before 1946) 1.3%
Sexuality of those who identify as LGBT:
54.6% of LGBT adults identify as bisexual
24.5% say they are gay
11.7% identify as lesbian
9.2% are fluid or unsure
There also seems to be increased fluidity to sexuality in the younger generations where 72% of GenZ LGBTs are bisexual but all generations older than them have a 50:50 split between bisexual and homosexual.
I would urge people to not ignore this as a US-specific data point, a ‘western’ concept, a ‘woke’ concept or a ‘modern-day’ concept. It is more likely than not that there will be many countries which have similar data +/- a few percentage points.
If we in India go back & look into our past, we find many LGBT references & examples in our mythology. Here are a few:
- The Rigveda says Vikriti Evam Prakriti (meaning what seems unnatural is also natural)
- The Kamasutra has an entire chapter on erotic homosexuality – both for men & women.
- God Vishnu exhibits gender variability. Mohini is his female avtaar.
- Vishnu as Mohini procreates with God Shiva to give birth to Lord Ayyappa. He is also referred to as Hariharaputra (the son of Vishnu [Hari] and Shiva [Hara]).
- Vishnu in his incarnation as Krishna in the Mahabharata, again becomes Mohini to marry Aravan/Iravan (Arjun’s son with the Naga princess Uloopi). Selected to be sacrificed for the Pandavas’ victory in the Kurukshetra war, Aravan has one last wish of not wanting to die unmarried. As no woman comes forward to marry him, Krishna takes the form of Mohini, weds him and after Aravan’s death, is seen as a hero’s widow. Their marriage is still celebrated today, with the Koovagam Festival becoming one the largest annual gatherings of trans people in India.
- Androgynous Ardhanarishvara – Lord Shiva has often been held as the ultimate embodiment of masculinity, but his Ardhanarishvara form is an androgynous composite of God Shiva and Goddess Parvati, his wife. Parvati wished to share Shiva’s experiences, and thus wanted their physical forms literally to be joined to show that the inner masculine and feminine coexist and can coalesce.
- Lakshmi-Narayan – A similar union occurs between Lakshmi, the Goddess of wealth and prosperity and Vishnu, her husband Vishnu, forming the hermaphroditic or androgynous Lakshmi-Narayan.
- Shikhandi – One of the greatest warrior mentioned in our myths is Bhishma – the only mortal to have the ability of choosing the time of his death (ichha-mrityu). And when he ended up fighting on the side of adharma and needed to be taken down, it was a combination of Arjun & Shikhandi who took him down. Shikhandi was born a girl (named Shikhandini) to King Drupada but later transformed into a man named Shikhandi. Now if that isn’t gender fluidity, I don’t know what is.
- Budh & Ila and gender fluidity – Budh while representing the planet Mercury in astrology also has a gender fluid history. Brihaspati, when he discovers his wife Tara pregnant with the child of another god, curses the child Budh to be neither male nor female. Budh later on marries Ila, also cursed to switch genders every month because she trespassed into the forbidden love-grove of Parvati and Shiva. As a man, Ila is known as Sadhyumna. Their children later established the Chandravanshi line of kings – the dynasty which forms the Kuru dynasty – which is the principle dynasty in the Mahabharata.
- Gender fluid Arjun – Arjun, too, receives a curse from the apsara Urvashi when he spurns her and the Pandav prince has to live his exile for a year as a eunuch. He becomes Brihannala, the dance tutor to Princess Uttara of the Matsya kingdom.
- In Addition to the above, we also see:
- Late 19th century Bengali novels detailed lesbian relationships.
- Sufi Muslim books described romances between two men.
- Many temples in India constructed between the 6th & 14th centuries have graphic images & carvings of sexual fluidity (non-binary) on their walls.
Bharat has always had a distinct worldview accommodating gender and sexual variance. Albeit in a minority, but still very much a natural occurrence. It is woven into our lives, our genetics and the narratives of our epics and our ancient texts and is very much present in both our society and in our arts. Now we can look at LGBT acceptance as a ‘new age’ thing or we can look at it as going back to our roots. It doesn’t matter. It is here to stay. Gender binary is finished.
So, the last, and probably the most important thing is the answer to the question – What Next? How do we go ahead from here? How do we start to introduce this change into our lives, into the constructs of our society, our education system, into our language, colloquial references, even our medical & healthcare professionals’ thinking. At some point (sooner rather than later), we’re going to have to start figuring this all out. While all indications so far are that gender & sexual fluidity are in a minority (a sizeable minority, but a minority all the same), that doesn’t mean that we can ignore it. How do we introduce these concepts to children? At what age? And until we introduce them, how do we allow the natural biology of children to continue to inform them of who they are? This is an extremely complicated and incredibly hard road to walk down on and I fervently hope those walking on it are the smartest people ever. Coz they need to be…
References:
https://www.upworthy.com/new-poll-shows-a-big-increase-in-the-number-of-americans-who-identify-as-lgbtq
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_themes_in_Hindu_mythology
https://indianexpress.com/article/parenting/blog/storytelling-lgbt-themes-in-hindu-mythology-5273332/
https://www.mygwork.com/en/my-g-news/a-brief-history-of-lgbt-india
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homosexuality_in_India#Religious_opposition