gay — gggglitch?

“...cyberspace [is] conceptualized as a disembodied realm of information that humans enter by leaving their bodies behind. In this realm, so the story goes, we are transformed into information ourselves and thus freed from the constraints of embodiment. We can take whatever form we wish, including no form at all…[Yet,] it is necessary to insist, once again, that embodiment is not an option but a necessity in order for life to exist.” –N. Katherine Hayles

Compared to purely physical, un-mediated bodies, cyborg bodies are afforded exploration of the
i
n
f
i
n
i
t
e
assemblages of physical possibilit
ies. The flexibility of cyberspace allows cyb
orgs a level of experimentation that is
unprecedented in the
phys
ical realm.

“[The Internet is] a significant social laboratory for experimenting with the constructions and reconstructions of self that categorize postmodern life.” –Sherry Turkle

“The new possibilities of transsexuality are an argument for the positive interpretation of the cyborg for feminism… these include cyborg-fusion, crossovers of various kinds through transplantations, genetic forms of reproduction and through transsexual technologies.” –Sue-Ellen Case

Compared to AFK,
cyberspace can afford cyborgs greater freedom of expression without the same threat of being ta
rgeted with acts of physical bodily violence.
In particular, many cyborgs may exercise
this freedom to experiment with various assemblages of gender and sexuality
.

“With this techno-field, gender identifications, oedipal narratives, phallic fictions, the mind/body, nature/culture split, even the boundaries of the body can be transgressed.”

In other words, cyborgs are queer.

“To rectify this problem of the body’s ubiquitous presence and seeming invisibility is to begin to examine it as a material entity, beginning with an interrogation of those categories, like gender, that have contributed to the body’s contradictory status by serving as an alibi for a notion of identity that exists as pure information.” – N. Katherine Hayles

While the physicality of cyberspace differs from
A
F
K experience, cyborgs involved in gender experimentation online engage in an active construction of their o
wn ideal embodiment. For some marginalized individuals, this experience online saves lives.

“Far from being left behind when we enter cyber-space, our bodies are no less actively involved in the construction of virtuality than in the construction of real life.” – N. Katherine Hayles

“Gender’s power and ubiquity make it a social institution… [a] structure produced and maintained by widespread, deeply embedded practices, legitimated by rarely questioned beliefs and values…gender makes one category of people subordinate to the other.”

An ideal form of mediation is imagined as being fully transparent, “where the medium produces a perfect symmetry between copy and original, and, thereby, erases itself.” Simila
rly, individuals with different gender identities, sexual orientations, or manners of
self-
expression outside of a normative gender binary and heterosexual culture are expected to remain invisible. Other
wise, they risk punishment, often manifested in forms of bod
ily harm.

“Music does not just passively reflect society; it also serves as a public forum within which various models of gender organization (along with many other aspects of social life) are asserted, adopted, contested, and negotiated.” –Susan McClary