Does Judith Butler subvert gender binarism? Let’s talk about sex(ual dipoles)

Abstract

It seems that there are compelling arguments why gender is not an ontological category. Although the deconstruction of the ontological accommodation of the subject (and of our world) has opened up new possibilities of understanding the subject and its structures, some pitfalls can be detected in the relevant literature. In particular, the theory that rejects essentialist understandings of the subject implicitly retains vestiges of the ontology that it rejects. A case in point is the anti-essentialist view on gender in its implicit reliance on the gender binarism that it meant to discard. In the present article, I critically engage with Judith Butler’s position on gender identity and with her aim of subverting gender binarism. Butler has based her position on grounds of gender as a non-ontological category. My main argument is that her effort to subvert gender binarism in and through the example of homosexuality is not as fruitful as the relevant literature has assumed (consider, for instance, that Butlers’ work has been highly influential in feminist and queer theory, cultural studies and other fields). Gender binarism subversion in and through the example of homosexuality is problematic because homosexuality adheres to the body binarism, thus to its “raw” corporeality, as much as heterosexuality does: in both heterosexuality and homosexuality, the sex of the body still determines one’s sexual orientation and her/his choice of partner(s). Thus, contra assertions to the opposite, I argue that homosexuality remains trapped in the “metaphysics of gender substance.” I conclude this article by discussing why bisexuality escapes the body binary and thus gender binarism.