Feminist theorist Judith Butler criticizes gender as something culturally constructed while “sex is just as culturally constructed as gender.” According to Butler, the distinction between sex and gender turns out to be no distinction at all.
In Anne G. Sabo’s essay, “When My Husband Came Out as a Woman,” Sabo reveals the struggles and mixed emotions she experiences as her husband makes the transition to become her soon-to-be wife. Similarly to Butler, Sabo believes gender is variable and fluid. But when forced to confront the fluidity of gender firsthand, she discovers her “politics” were in some ways at odds with her feelings. Sabo says:
“If I’d been free to write about this in July, this would have been a quite different post; an exuberant one! And not one about groundlessness and grief. But if my politics at first got ahead of me, I’m hoping that my personal might eventually catch up with it. Because I don’t want to lose this big love, my best friend, my child’s other parent, my spouse, my lover.”
