Welcome to my blog! My name is Verity McFadden and for this blog I want to discuss the influence of media on identities and the ability of media to help understand aspects of themselves. For this blog I want to focus upon the LGTBQIA+ and neurodivergent communities, since I am part of both communities. I identify as nonbinary and asexual (specifically aro/ace). Each post of this blog will focus on a different form of media that will include video games, TV shows, movies, books, or other mediums to explore how media can be a helpful tool to finding out who we are as people.  

For this post I want to talk about the graphic novel/memoir by Maia Kobabe titled Gender Queer.  

Just a heads-up Maia Kobabe does uses the Spivak pronouns of e, em, and eir, so when discussing Gender Queer I will be refereeing to Maia Kobabe as e, em, and eir. 

Synopsis

Gender Queer is autobiographical account of Kobabe’s struggles of finding eir identity and concluding that e is genderqueer and asexual. The graphic novel delves into eir early childhood to eir adult years and showing eir journey to realization of who e is. 

My Relationship to Gender Queer

I bought and read Gender Queer in either 2022 or 2023 because I heard online and wanted to check out for myself. I remember crying when I first read Gender Queer because it served as mirror to my own internal struggles with my gender identity and asexuality. I felt seen and understood by this book. In a way this book finally helped me understand that I am nonbinary and never really felt like a girl. 

Book like Gender Queer can be great tools in helping queer people piece together their sense of self and show queer people that they are not alone in their struggles and can find acceptance. 

Gender Queer and Book Bans

One last thing to note is the response that Gender Queer got when it was published. Gender Queer was met with backlash from conservative groups and organizations due to the content within it. Gender Queer has been banned in both school and public libraries, which can represent a reluctance to let queer oriented literature be read in our country. For anyone who is interested in reading Gender Queer you can buy at Barnes & Noble or any bookseller or you can find in the library of St. Cloud State University. For anyone interested in learning more about nonbinary identities or other queer identities or needs support The Trevor Project is a great resource to use.