Genderqueer Buddhist

Impeccably Zen

oatsquare — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 15:50:36 +0000

This is kind of old, but I’ve always loved this post that Another Queer JuBu wrote about the following real estate ad in Chelsea:

Another Queer JuBu already made some great points about the misrepresentation and commodification of Zen that’s going on here, so I’m not even going to touch that one right now. (I’ll save that kind of ranting for another ad, maybe those SmartWater ads they have these days that say “Pure Zen”.) Anyway.

What I’m kind of curious about is this woman in the picture. She’s clearly attractive, and looks to be of Asian heritage (in keeping with the “Zen aesthetic”?) She’s vaguely seated in a meditation posture (and appears to have no pants on?), but yet is looking out, as if inviting the viewer in.

When I look at this picture, I get the sense that this young, attractive woman of Asian descent is being used as a part of the scenery. In other words, the presence of her body in this picture is being used to contribute to the “impeccably Zen” aesthetic the company is trying to sell.

Okay, I know, using women’s bodies as a marketing tool is hardly new, and neither is exotifying the bodies of women of color, but I’m kind of fascinated by how apparently sex and attractiveness is also equated with the Zen aesthetic. Just what, exactly, does pop culture think Zen is? I’ve never quite been able to work it out.

(And if you like analyzing advertising, do check out Sociological Images, if you haven’t already.)

On Being Trendy

oatsquare — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 10:26:25 +0000

I was reading an old journal entry from about a year ago, where I worried about being taken seriously as a genderqueer person or as a Buddhist. These are both things that people have told me are a “trend” or a “phase,” and despite the fact that I’d really prefer not to consider myself someone who goes along with lots of trends and phases (although, I mean, when you think about it, who doesn’t have their phases, and further, what’s wrong with that, really?) it turned out that both of these identities and ways of moving through the world were too important to me to give up. I realized I’d just have to live with or work through the fact that some people saw it as a phase.

Here’s a journal excerpt from last summer:

One night, I told my friend I couldn’t go drinking with him because I had to get up at four to get to the zendo by five so I can sit on cushions with ten other people, all older than me, for six and a half hours.

When I said this, my friend gaped at me a little, but after that, I noticed that he stopped saying anything about my “Buddhist phase.”

Another time, I told some friends that I couldn’t give my number to a certain guy, even though he was totally cute and totally nice and even into me, because he’s a straight guy, and I’m not really a girl, I just tend to play one in real life. They’ve heard how I’m not a girl before, but I guess it just hasn’t sunk in. They’re surprised when I say this to them, but for the first time, start asking me questions and trying to understand what it means when I say I’m genderqueer.

This all makes me wonder: Do I have to prove my right to my identities through sacrifice?

Do people only believe I’m who I say I am when they see me giving things up to be that way?

Is it that they don’t want me to be happy or something?

Okay, so maybe it got a little dramatic there at the end, but really, what is this thing about legitimacy? I feel like it’s fairly common to look over at others and make these kinds of assumptions–that they identify the way they do because they think it’s trendy, or that they only joined this Buddhist sangha or that activist group for the cool factor–and only when we see people suffering or giving things up do we take them seriously. But don’t we all suffer? Aren’t we giving things up no matter what? Is legitimacy something that can be bought?

What does it really mean to consider an identity “trendy” or not?

And also: What about accountability? Are identities only legitimate when the people who hold them are accountable to others’ potential questions and criticism? Is that how we buy legitimacy? I really don’t know, dude. And accountability deserves a post (or several) all to itself. So I’ll just stop here. This is a blog for questions, not answers.

Why this blog?

oatsquare — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 19:32:12 +0000

Ever wondered what it’s like to be a twentysomething female-bodied genderqueer Zen Buddhist who also works at being a reproductive justice activist and white anti-racist ally?

Me, too. But I’m working on figuring it out. (And hey, these are all complicated terms that mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. But we can get into that.)

This blog is for anyone who has ever asked me, “Why don’t you grow your hair out, if you like boys?” or “Why do you get angry sometimes, if you’re a Buddhist?”

It’s for anyone who wonders how I can be an activist if I don’t believe in free will, or whether I’m being culturally appropriative for being a Buddhist.

But more than that, this blog is for me, and for the questions that I ask myself about genderqueer politics and Buddhist practice (sometimes in relation to each other, sometimes separately). Does “American Buddhism” exist? What’s the relationship between gender identity and sexual identity these days? Why is Dunkin’ Donuts running an ad for iced coffee that says “See what Zen tastes like”? What does Zen really taste like? How can one be female-bodied, femme, and genderqueer, but not be a girl? Etcetera. There are a lot of questions, you see.