Gender Game Songtext
von Alix Olson

You wanna give me a shiner
′Cause I look like this and I got a vagina
See I'm familiar with this gender game
I played this war many times before on the playground of my identity
When puberty hit like dodge balls and freeze tag
Does sissy fag
My best friend dissed me
Common interests
Different anatomy

See vagina meant quieter, caretaker, peacemaker
Vagina meant keeping lips closed, keeping body posed
Vagina was silent dolls and no action toys
Vagina was punches when I played with the boys
So I learned to take it in the stomach
I learned to fight to make friends
And as I learned to make that bullshit end


Vagina became a slippery slide for my little finger
Vagina became a quiver that lingered
Vagina became what I looked for, worked for, stood for
I viva la vagina all over the place
I revitalized vagina′s grace
I discovered vagina's taste
I became a fine diner
I put my face in vagina after vagina

And then I was faced with some other
Lip service putting me in my place
The vagina should not be the liberator
But dictator
Of the shoes we wear
The hair we crop
The palms we clasp
The way we walk
The space we use
The threads we choose

Well I refuse to follow suit
And I gotta confess my straitjacket's a dress
You know it used to be a crime to wear
Clothes that didn′t scream vagina
I wear these shoes so I can move with my own easy spirit
I don′t shave my legs 'cause it gets cold
Besides my legs rebel against the bloody hell of shaved and sliced


And since when is my body hair something to judge
Is furry a male privilege
Or a patriarchal plot by July
I don′t cut my nails 'cause I′ve got hammering to do
I'm pounding out my path as I cruise this gender landscape
As I peruse the choice between silence and violence

Matthew Shepard was bent, you hang him to a fence
Brandon Teena was murdered as a liar for hiding his vagina
And I can′t even sit in a restaurant without causing a stir
What do you have sir?
What do you have sir?
What do you have sir?

I have a vagina
Yes I've got a vagina
And you can still call me sir
'Cause I can′t cure this visual disease of yours
But I don′t give a damn about sir or ma'am
So in the F or M boxes they give
I forgive myself for not fitting in
And blame the world for lack of clarity
I deliberate

Penis, I got one you know

I write down D for dildo
I write down D for don′t know
I fill in F for fee-fi-fo-male
Yes I'm a giant vagina
And I am too big for these boxes they give
Too real for this gender toyland
Built over soiled contradictions
With Barbie bricks and Ken cornerstones
Built over the skulls and bones of our transgendered ancestors
Danger

She-men working above and beyond you
Yes we are deconstruction workers
We are exposing unfounded bedrocks that bed us with one sex
That wed us to one gender
We are overturning those stones
We are throwing them back
We are making revolution

A gender evolution
We are invoking strategy
We are revoking shame
And we are calling it
We are calling it

Refusal to be named