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Lately people have been telling me gender identity is a thing you feel - that you can 'feel like a woman', for example. But I legit don't understand what that means. Does feeling like a woman mean you want to wear women's clothes? Or have a vagina? Or get sexually pursued?

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Aella

@Aella_Girl

Like what is it about womanhood that is the thing that people 'feel like', in such a concrete way that they know that's what it's like to feel like a woman? I'm a woman and I have no idea what it feels like (besides what I listed), so I'm extremely confused about this.

12:44 AM · Apr 8, 2020

Replying to

Exactly. I don't "identify" as a man. I don't even know what that could possibly mean. It sounds limiting, like there are certain preferences I couldn't have, or behaviors I couldn't perform, without ceasing to be a man or having an identity crisis.

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and

I sometimes feel like a bat, but philosophers reliably tell me that it’s impossible to know what it’s like to be a bat.

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@TimothyChutes

Apr 8, 2020

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@Aella_Girl

From what I understand, it doesn't matter how they think being a woman/man feels subjectively, but if they feel like they're the opposite of what they are physically it causes them to disassociate and depersonalize.

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When I imagine passing as a boy for a day, I don't feel bad at all (besides incidental issues from that). When people online in games mistake my handle for being a boy's handle, I don't care. Sometimes I like it. Why would you be uncomfortable living as a girl?