Generika’s Queer Quarter began to develop a similar reputation to San Fransisco, Manchester, Soho, Cape Town. There was a solid core of “alternative” businesses and the local securiforces, unlike most of the world’s, actively looked out for them. Online, the Quarter’s massive pink pyramids of data needed ever increasingly complex security measures woven around them by Veto, Sam and their trainees, to ward off constant pings and forays by rogue hackers and corporate and state invasions. Generika’s queer community became well known for their tech agility and ability and soon “queer” and “tech” became as interchangeable as “gay” and “hairdresser” once were.
In Blue’s absence, Helen became more and more involved in the Queer Control panel. Scar pictured it as a kind of navigation system, with plenty of switches and flashing pink lights. Scar’s intolerance of green was growing and she knew that if it matched her problem with purple, her cyberspace time would be pretty much over. There was still too much DOS colour out there in the data wastes. She spent more time in her forge then, with the metal and fire.
She was working on an eight (of course) foot high Sheela Na Gig one day, when Seti arrived. She crept in and sat in a corner for who knows how long until Scar noticed her, ears blasted numb by PJ Harvey through her earfeeds. Seti had arrived with one of the many groups of refugees to the Quarter, from some far out community that didn’t want her, because she wasn’t conforming to what they thought a girl should be.
Skinny, with a shaved head and bruised eyes, Seti never spoke. The medic who counted her scars said she probably never would. She was diagnosed with severe trauma and there seemed to be no place for her, even in the Quarter. Helen had started to take her cycling, they’d go for miles on wheels and if Seti didn’t look happy, she seemed to be at peace with the buzz of the tar beneath her and the air rushing past.
She pitched up at the forge the following day too, seeming perfectly content to just sit and watch. Scar flicked the musicfeed room-wide and Seti swayed her head very gently to the beat. “I don’t know what happened to you, kid,” said Scar, “but maybe it’s time to beat that out.” She began to teach Seti to shape steel. Seti hammered and twisted with the music blasted, totally focused on her tongs and tools. Scar hauled her off from time to time so she’d eat and drink, she got the feeling that, left to her own devices, Seti would just keep going till she dropped.
The Sheela Na Gig was completed, eight feet of her standing in the workshop, ready to take on the world. Seti welded and shaped what was looking more like a copy of the Sheela every day. Scar began work on another figure, same dimensions. Hammers, tongs, flames, welding torches … eventually Seti just stopped, arms at her sides. The figure stood tall, proud and completely bare of features – or gender either. “Androgyne,” said Scar to Seti, “androgynous.” She looked at the figure, looked at Seti and then said, “Genderno?” Seti nodded and pointed to herself, Scar nodded too. “Can you talk?” asked Scar and Seti nodded. “Are you going to?” she asked and Seti shook her head. No. “OK,” said Scar, “most people talk too much shit anyway.” That was the first smile anyone ever saw on Seti’s lips.
In the end, Seti built fifteen of those genderno figures and Scar built the fifteen hackers, surgeons and slashers who’d been out there the day that Blue didn’t make it back. And she built Samanth0r in her coma. She told Seti the story and Seti feverishly designed and animated it on Scar’s old terminal. “We’re making our memories solid,” said Scar to Seti, “this is good shit and I think other people should look at it. I haven’t sold a thing for about six months, so how about we show the fuckers this stuff for free?” Seti nodded and grinned and the two of them started getting their creations out there into the air, on to some empty dock space. Fifteen gendernos lining up, looking like lost souls and the fifteen, fighting fit and ready for anything in front of them, a steel/human barrier.
The only way to see the “insteelation” was from the top of the walls around the otherwise bare concrete space; you got a kind of angled bird’s eye view of challenging and disturbing humanity. Scar wondered if anyone would care, let alone understand.
After Veto and Sam saw the photos, Veto built mercurial silver 3D copies of them online and Sam sent them, like little on-screen envoys, like spam, like a virus; out into the world. And nobody really did know what to make of them, but they liked their shapes, especially the minimalist gendernos. Alessi and Ikea were the first to incorporate the stylised figures into their designs and a fast threat of copyright litigation convinced them to credit the original artists, as well as labelling them “genderno.” Bingo, it was a gender[free] meme, now in a loft apartment near you … and a magazine, website, screenfeed, coffee table, restaurant, you name it.
The fashionista world was the next on the uptake and both virtual and corporeal mannequins began to look genderno, with clothing cut to challenge gender. It was a very postmodern little revolution and entirely unexpected. It was the kind of viral, street and cyberhighway branding that could only ever be exploited, never planned. Seti became a cult figure and was paid insane amounts to go to places without saying a thing. She probably varied her (should we still be saying “she”?) facial expression about once a session and the clips became instant YouTube hits. Gender confusion was fashionable again for the first time since it’s last brief appearance in the 1970’s. David Bowie was God again. Drag Kings and Queens ruled the streets and on occasion, had to be discouraged from roaming around in gangs beating up anyone who looked too male or too female. By the end of the year, the Genderno figure was more recognisable than the Oscar. “Gender!” yelled a Bowie wannabee from a sold out stadium and the audience roared, “NO!” in response.
The whole thing didn’t affect gender on a global scale, but the fact that it became cool and as one fast food ad had it, “hip to have no hips,” meant that the “freaks” escaping their satellites to get to cities, were welcomed by instant acceptance and probably modelling contracts. everyone was also, of course, still trying to be far too thin.
No comments:
Post a Comment