male privilege

i'd like some male privilege please. i'd like to have people make those manly assumptions about me - that i'm confident, experienced, unemotional. i'd like for people to be surprised to see me cry. i'd like for people to assume that i know how to fix a car (even though i don't). i'd like to not get skeptical stares and conversations while buying guitar strings at the guitar center, or followed into the rare and expensive acoustic guitar room, only to be left alone after i pick one up and start strumming - proving that not only can i hold one, i can play, too (and well, i might add). i'd like to not be scared at night when i'm walking swiftly in the dark to my car, hands clutching my keys, ready to stab any given hidden rapist. i'd like to know the secret straight man handshake (how do you know when to shake, knock fists, hit knuckles?). i'd like to be thin.. wait.. right.. well.. i'd like to be thin, sure, but in the case that i'll never be thin, i'd like to be considered a beefy, cuddly lead singer of a band (think smash mouth, scott on american idol), not a fat girl singer (think carnie wilson, mama cass).

i'd like to kiss my wife in front of my straight friends without a) creeping them out, b) making them uncomfortable, or c) turning them on . i'd like to check into a hotel with my wife, and not have to explain why we want a king-sized bed. i'd like to call a flower delivery place, and not be hesitant of their reaction when they ask for the message on the card. i'd like to be able to call a love song after hours radio show and dedicate a song to my wife without disturbing the dj. i suppose some of these things i could, and on some level should, do.. you know.. be that lesbian activist i used to be in college. get out there! make ourselves heard! we're here! we're queer! get used to it! but there's truly nothing like that stare.. or that uncomfortable silence/look-away reaction that happens when acting lesbianly in a straight environment. it's almost like you can hear the gasps as if they've just seen buffalo run past them. ooh! is that what i thought it was?? did you get a picture?? real live lesbians??? when, if i was a man with my wife, they would have treated us like squirrels. what i would give to sneak under everyone's radar. to go unnoticed. to kiss my wife goodbye in the morning (or hell, even make out - which sometimes happens) without knowing that the security man is looking, and watching.

i can deal, and have delt for years, with 99% of the first paragraph. i'm used to the guitar center, to crying, to being the fat girl singer. not having to deal with that shit would be a welcome perk.. but just that. a perk. that second paragraph, though, i have issues with. maybe that would all change if we moved to a blue state - somewhere where lesbians roam free, and seeing one on the street wouldn't phase anyone.

i've read a lot of ftm blogs of guys who used to be hardcore lesbian rights activists and have had problems dealing with the onset of male privilege. some are reluctant to accept and embrace their new identity - as a man, with privileges they've been denied all their life.. and in fact, have spent time fighting against. i honestly feel like i would feel no shame in cutting my lesbian ties. i'd have no desire to get an ftm symbol tattooed on my body, or put an ftm sticker on my car. i'd transition into a straight, straight man. i'd want to watch football, drink beer, spit, smoke cigars, get a tattoo on my wrist/arm/somwhere very visible, wander around in the house shirtless.. mow the lawn shirtless, swim in the ocean shirtless. (hell, maybe that's my driving force and i just need to join a nudist colony.) now there's nothing saying i can't watch football, drink beer, spit, smoke cigars, get a tattoo on my wrist/arm/somwhere very visible, while staying a lesbian.. in fact, with the exception of smoking cigars (which i'd love to do btw), and the tattoo (also top on the list) i do all those things regularly. but i can only imagine that it would feel differently as a guy.. that it would feel more normal, more internally accepted. i've spent most of my adult life doing all those things, but always with the awareness that girls don't do that sort of thing.. but lesbians do? accepted, but conflicted. attaching my actions and feelings to my sexual orientation, and not to my gender, which is apparently what i'm attempting to get at here. i think maybe if i could disassociate the two, i'd be making more progess in my struggle to figure myself out.