The way a lot of people see me versus how I see myself is very fractured. On the outside, you may see a woman, feminine features, a ‘small’ frame. On the inside, you’ll see a pile of flesh, literally. That’s all I see myself as, a pile of flesh with a pink bow on top to signal to outsiders that I am feminine. But what does it mean if I still see myself as a feminine thing but not a woman?

I still like to participate in things that are aesthetically feminine, I still love the color pink, I still love painting my nails and doing my hair, and trying out makeup. But I want absolutely nothing to do with tasks that are seen as traditionally ‘woman’, I DO NOT want to have to depend on someone else, I DO NOT want to be nurturing and selfless all the time, and I DO NOT want to care for kids, I don’t even like the thought of my body going through a menstrual cycle. I know that not every woman does these things that I just listed off, but many people assume that to be a woman, you have to have a desire to do at least one of them. Most would argue that these feelings aren’t that big of an issue; after all, I do have a choice of whether or not I can do those things. But it’s the fact that people’s outside perceptions will never match how I feel on the inside. Roxane Gay talks about how a lot of people project assumed narratives onto your body without being interested in the truth; while she was referencing how people treat you when you are overweight, this is true for every visible identity. No one will ever look at me and assume that I’m just a person who happens to be feminine; they will always see me embody femininity on the outside and expect me to fulfil the role of a ‘woman’. What makes it worse is that I’ll never be able to explain away that woman label; it doesn’t matter if I try and act selfish, it doesn’t matter if I look like the Babadook if it was supposed to represent processed sugars instead of grief. If i dont look like a man, then I must be a woman.

In today’s time you many people expressing their concern with an emerging panopticon-like society that we might have to live with in the coming years, with the installation of flock cameras and increasing amounts of surveillance that is being added into everyday routines. But what most people aren’t aware of is that this phenomenon has been an issue for years even before the announcement of cameras being added inside of the latest model AirPods. In my opinion, I think the only reason why these things are becoming such a big issue now is because overwhelming amounts of surveillance are starting to affect the ‘normal’ groups of people.

It can be argued that lots of minorities have experienced the feeling of prying eyes watching every little move that they make, forcing them to overcorrect every little action that they do. We see this happen a lot in sports and how a lot of people react to athletes of color. In the book Citizen by Claudia Ranken, we see how Serena Williams is constantly expected to perform a certain way and if she’s ever seen as ‘stepping out of line’ she is met with constant backlash from the facility she plays for and on social media. In the 2012 Olympics, she celebrated her gold medal by doing a celebratory dance and almost everybody has assumed that she was doing a crip walk, which is a dance associated with a gang. Most people with common sense would know that she was NOT crip walking, and she was just simply celebrating her win like anybody else would. The controversy of her celebration was blown out of proportion, and she was criticized for being unprofessional. It feels like a lot of people were watching her excessively, waiting for her to mess up so that they could jump down her throat and spout ignorance without being labeled a racist (although, I would say that assuming that anytime a black person dances has something to do with a gang kind or is). Another example of this happening in sports is how Lamar Jackson is treated in by fans and the NFL. While I’m not that much of a football fan, his record shows how he is a very good and capable quarterback. Despite that, he is constantly faced with ridiculous amounts of criticism whenever his team messes up with something or loses a game. He also gets ranked very low compared to more mediocre quarterbacks, and it’s to the point where it’s obvious that he’s being below the other players that are more aesthetically pleasing to the American eye (white).

It’s ironic that everyone is suddenly concerned about the overwhelming amount of surveillance technology being added into everything even though this was never something that was brand new. In a way, society had created their own panopticon specifically for the groups of people who were deemed as odd or unusual and tech companies decided to expand that to include everyone else.