Lovelyish

I’m very glad you’re happy with and sharing your story about gender identity. Very educational and inspirational!

No.  I’ve never meet a person that identified as androgynous, but I have meet a few people that are asexual.  I took the test for kicks and it said I was masculine. LOL.  I knew I was really a fucking drag queen.

I clicked the link, and the sexism implied by the personality traits there bothers me greatly.

It placed me firmly in the masculine category. I present very strongly as feminine and identify strongly as female. To be fair, this is more of a qualm with societal stereotypes about men and women than with the quiz in particular – the quiz is simply a specific example of these stereotypes.

I can be independent, assertive, opinionated, and ambitious and still be like a woman. There’s nothing wrong with being a man, and there’s nothing wrong with having a personality that is classically considered “feminine,” but I think it’s a damn shame that I’m “masculine” because I’m not a non-confrontational, soft-spoken nurturing type.

To be clear, OP, I’m not arguing that you’re outside of the gender binary – based on the way you feel about yourself and the way you present, I’m 100% on board with what you identify as. My criticisms are specifically about the overall standards of masculinity and femininity rather than how you feel you fit into (or don’t fit into) those standards/identities.

Huh. It put me as androgynous, leaning masculine. That doesn’t surprise me. Honestly, I think most women are stupid and care about stupid things. I don’t identify as androgynous, I identify as a woman, I just think that all the other women are wrong. Lol. 

I tried to be androgynous for a few years… And by “tried” I mean, “I made an authentic attempt to express my asexuality due to a very late onset of puberty by wearing clothes of both genders.” Then puberty hit like a sledgehammer and in the sporadic growth spurts I discovered skirts (pants always ended being too short…). I never really got around to discovering boys but once adulthood hit I discovered men. 

Ha. I scored just barely feminine. I can’t say I’m surprised, I’ve always likened myself to the nerdy equivalent of a tomboy that likes to overdress for the sheer fun of it.

Hmm the way I learned androgeny was that you were completely 50% masculine, and 50% feminine at all times.  Otherwise you’re just slightly more masculine than feminine or vice versa most of the time and not truly androgynous.  Prior to learning that I felt relatively androgynous.  I have a lot of feminine physical features, and act in feminine ways, yet still feel as though I’m a man and act like one from time to time.  So now I’d just say I’m masculine with some feminine like qualities rather than truly androgynous.

According to the test I’m androgynous leaning towards feminine though, which is no real surprise.

As expected, it placed me in the undifferentiated category. That is how I land on most everything, right in the middle. LOL I’m a little bit of everything I guess!

@Edeline_Wrigh@xanga - I think what you are saying is true now, but maybe wasn’t so true in the 70s when the test was introduced…Or at least not in a world where the older generation was still holding onto more traditional ideas of femininity. 

@LupusInvictus@xanga - That’s quite possibly true in regards to the test, and I do think things have changed in the last 40 years, but I’ve come across enough similar stereotyping recently that I’m convinced it’s not completely gone and had some pent up rage to boot.

It does specify “traditional masculinity-femininity,” but IMO some of that still permeates how people perceive and treat the genders.

I am smack dab in the middle of androgyny according to that test. But I could’ve guessed that.

I’m really glad you wrote and posted this.

I took the test. It put me in androgynous, but almost touching the line between that and masculine.

Sounds like you’re just… being human…. No one says that to be a woman, you MUST be girly and wear dresses all the time. No one says that if you’re a man you must  be in sports and scratch your nuts every half hour.  @_@

I consider myself a woman who is athletic and loves getting dirty. I also love wearing dresses and cute things. Doesn’t make me any less female or any more male. I think stereotyping the sexes and people making this type up is just silly. Being yourself is accepting who you are, not getting excited for finding a stereotype label to set for yourself.That’s just my opinion however.

@Edeline_Wrigh@xanga - Oh man, I TOTALLY hear you on the sexism part of the test. I think there should definitely be an updated version of this test, because the old version of it is definitely very gender-typical. It was made in the ’70′s for pete’s sake! But despite that, I still identify with Sandra Bem’s original definition of androgynous — very masculine and ver feminine at different times. I just wish there were better words to explain that with.

And@ShirleyD@xanga: I agree, it IS about being human. I may be wrong, but I think Bem actually said that androgynous people actually had it better than people who were completely adherent to their expected gender identity, because they could just switch around and be whatever they wanted at the time. I wasn’t hunting around for a label when I came upon the concept of androgyny, for sure. It just sortof found me.

This is so helpful to me. I’m the exact same way!
I always thought of myself as a gay boy trapped in a girl’s body (since I like boys, but i still have some masculinity) LOL but now there’s finally a way to describe it! It’s awesome to know I’m not alone on this. Thanks for the post!

This is really cool. I’m glad you are happy!!

I hate gender stereotyping, but I do feel a need to conform to an extent…  I’d kind of like to feel the need to be really extreme one way or another, I’m going to take the test, guessing I’ll be just over the feminine side…

I love that male model who looks like a chic, I find it so interesting! Andrej Pejic  

It’s not bad to express differences in personality. I’ve never been “girly-girl”, myself.

But funny enough, the test says I am feminine. I don’t mind that. I think it’s largely because I  put that I am shy and I love children.

Join the club ! David Bowie pulls it off rather nicely I think. Φ ≡

Once again unnecessary terms are coined and supported by poor research.

That battery is good for a grunt. But there’s nothing scientific about  it, that you couldn’t tell yourself.
Why should it matter whether we identify as “fem”, “mas” or..”andro”…..
What does that say about us as individuals? And how can be ignore the social implications?
Anyway, I think the post was interesting nonetheless. Thanks for sharing your view.

my daughter is a tom boy she’s four but she still likes to be girly too. she’s definitely a tom boy cars and bikes trucks etc are her favorite toys .
She’s tried pissing standing upright on multiple occasions ..

Every person who commented on this post after taking the test said it scored them as androgynous. I would guess, from my own deductive observations of social evolution, that most people, when distanced from the ideas of stereotypical gender roles, fall pretty close to the middle. Another caveat is that it’s pretty obvious which of the adjectives would be more feminine or masculine according to those old gender roles and I wonder how many people unconsciously or even slightly consciously fudge their answers to match how they see themselves. It seems like it would be difficult to NOT bend your answers just slightly to get the results you want. Yes?

I was placed in the “masculine” category, but I don’t consider myself masculine in the least. Just because I’m independent, assertive, and outgoing doesn’t make me masculine. I’m sick of all the labelling that happens these days. I completely agree with ShirleyD. I’m going to be me, and fuck the labels. I’m a woman, I consider myself feminine, but I have traits that apparently are considered typically masculine. That doesn’t make me androgynous. That makes me ME. I’ve had very short hair pretty much my entire life (which actually made the kids in my 8th-grade class spread the rumor that I was a lesbian–which I’m not–but I didn’t grow my hair out, because I. Didn’t. Care), but I love dresses and eyeliner. I’m a runner, but I watch chick-flicks. I played with Legos and with Barbies as a child. Why are you trying to make these things mutually exclusive (except if we get overspecific and call ourselves “androgynous”)?

I’m sorry, WriterBrit, but I find your generalizations about gender roles to be offensive (particularly the “I actually shuddered at what being 100% woman implied in American society. It wasn’t pretty” bit–pardon me for being a woman, I’m so sorry that it makes you shudder) and extremely closed-minded. On your Happily Cynical page, you say “it meant I didn’t have to be girly if it wasn’t true to me just then. I could do whatever I wanted. It was like I finally realized I had superpowers my whole life, and didn’t know they were there.” What this sounds like to me, is that for whatever reason, you’re way too obsessed with stereotypes, and you rely on some arbitrary definitions to define yourself. If you’d wanted to dress in a more masculine style, you could’ve done that. You didn’t need to “discover” this “new identity.” Ughhh, I really don’t want to get this deep into it, and I’m trying not to offend, but really: please just learn to accept yourself WITHOUT all the labels. I appreciate what you’re trying to do, and in a way, I suppose your “coming out” is a form of courage in and of itself, but it seems wholly unnecessary to me if you’d've just had the courage to ignore convention in the first place. 
Again, I’m not trying to offend, and I hope I didn’t; I just keep seeing this insistence on labelling and it’s driving me up the wall. Just be yourself, because to be perfectly honest, no one else really cares that much.

I prefer to dress in androgynous type clothing- as a female this doesn’t mean wearing a suit and slicking my hair back either. I feel most comfortable in attire  that doesn’t particularly stand out or scream any particular gender. I rarely feel comfortable in dresses and my idea of fancy is very plain and simple. I feel most like me in fitted slacks and a plain button up long sleeve shirt. 

I love the look of androgynous models too! I think it really says something to be a good looking human while equally representing either gender. Have you ever laid your eyes upon Andrej Pejic?? ohhh my: http://static.mamamia.com.au/wp-content/gallery/andrej/Andrej.jpg

or how about Michael Tintiuc! http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l88xwr0xQK1qb90czo1_400.jpg

I’m right in the middle of androgyny!

Miss J rocks!

@TheBottomandBack@xanga - THIS.

I’m out the outer edge of masculinity which somewhat surprises me because I like most things girly and 6 inch killer heels but I guess I am a strong personality and a bit aggressive…

Being androgynous is very important to me and means a lot to me. I absolutely refuse to fit into either the male or female category; I’ve been like this for my entire life and have never met any other andros when I was little so I really didn’t have any influence, I’m just being me. I think I’m a lesbian but when people bring it up or ask, I don’t like using the word lesbian or gay because to be true, I don’t think that ANYONE can be ENTIRELY one or the other. It’s just a label and a word. But I haven’t liked a guy since 4th grade, and he looked andro and I dig andro girls so he had the look. I already have a small breast size so I don’t hide them or anything, and mostly younger people are the ones to mistake me for a male (probably because they’ve never met a girl with short hair and flannels before). My favorite color is gray and other earthy-tone colors. I don’t like pink or pastels, and don’t own any clothes that color. I have a lot of snakes and am into reptiles and amphibians and am pretty muscular, but I think my voice and my name are both giveaways. lol I don’t care what anyone thinks of me. In fact, I tend to be able to get along more easily with everyone because I can usually have at least one or more interests in common with whomever I maybe having a conversation with.