Not a Bear

I am just below average in height for a Canadian male short.
I am fat.
I am gay.
I am hairy.

So because of those things, I am automatically put into a group of gay men. I am told that I am a part of the bear community.

If it looks like a duck, but it doesn't talk like a duck. is it still a duck?

Don't get me wrong, it's not that I don't want to be a part of the bear community, or that their's anything wrong with the bear community. It's that I don't feel like a bear.

But why is that? Almost anyone in the gay community will tell you that the bear community is one of the friendliest subcultures of our large and diverse community. But whenever I go to an event, I feel awkward and out of place.

Well, we need to take a look at what the bear community is.

So what is a bear? We all know the physical traits right? Hairy and heavy set. They model themselves after a cliched working class man, in fact a lot of the bear culture came out of the idolization of the lumberjack. Jeans, flannel shirts, the isolation from civilization with a bunch of other men. The idea of being removed from society with a bunch of other masculine men? Not a surprise that it became the fantasy of a lot of gay men in the early years of the gay community.
But there's also a heavy importance placed on hypermasculinity, and thus, there's some shunning in the community of any man who isn't this ideal of masculine. Now mind you, there's many bears out there that might not be mentally this ideal of masculinity, but they entire community presents it physically, and I've witnessed some putting down of any man who doesn't meet this expectation.

So why don't I fit?

Well, I have never subscribed to the gender dichotomy, I don't feel that I'm either masculine or feminine, I do have traits of both, and I am not ashamed and refuse to change myself because of someone else's opinion. I will not conform myself to fit into a community. Either accept me as I am, or I'll move on. Which probably explains why I don't really fit in anywhere.

But that's not really all, and I will admit, that the cliched lumberjack, and a lot of the men in the bear community, I find really attractive. But this body, this fat and hairy body that I am in, I don't feel like it's mine. It's hard to fit into and subscribe to a community that is pretty heavily based on body image and size, even when your body fits, if you feel like you're in the wrong body.

So I am a fat, hairy man, with a neatly trimmed beard, and I am not a bear. So please people, stop telling me that I'm something that I'm not.