sylvie lehmers

performance : P.SL001

time : 1,36 min

text from Gender Outlaw : On Men, Women, and the Rest of Us

by Kate bornstein

1994

For a while, I thought that it would be fun to call what I do in life gender terrorism. Seemed right at first - I and so many folks like me were terrorizing the structure of gender itself. But I’ve Come to see if a bit differently now - gender terrorists are not the drag queens, the butch dykes, the men on roller skates dressed as nuns.

Gender terrorists are not the female to male transsexual who’s learning to look people in the eye while he walks down the street.

Gender terrorists are not the leather daddies or back-seat betties.

Gender terrorist are not the married men, shivering in the dark as they slip on their wives’ panties.

Gender terrorists are those who, like Ms. Millot, bang their heads against a gender system which is real and natural; who then use gender to terrorize the rest of us.

These are the real terrorists: the Gender Defenders.