I Misgendered My Parakeet!

And now I can add "budgee breeder" to the list of accomplishments on my résumé!

I misgendered my parakeet, Skylar de Green, in a recent post. Thankfully, the Thought Police have not raided my home¹, at least not yet. Or maybe I correctly gendered Skylar as a “he” at the time, and “he” subsequently de-transitioned and became a “she?” These gender issues get tricky, but I’ll try to explain.

Stock Photo of a Possibly Trans Male Parakeet (by Hanna Balan on Unsplash)

Skylar de Green is a turquois-green parakeet. When we got her from the Humane Society, Skylar was labeled a “male.” I will give the Humane Society the benefit of the doubt and assume that they didn’t simply misgender Skylar. Most likely, Skylar was identifying as “male” at that time. (Perhaps Skylar had been “groomed” by the Humane Society staff — a suspicious number of whom wear rainbow-pride paraphernalia — into believing that she was actually a he?) Assuming the whole “trans men are men” principle works for parakeets the same way it works for humans,² if Skylar was identifying as male at that time, then she was actually a he then, and the Humane Society was accurately reporting his gender identity. At any rate, we accepted Skylar’s gender assignment as reported to us by the Humane Society. [Don’t worry, all this gender stuff will become clear in a moment.]

When you adopt a pet from the Humane Society, they require you to take the pet to a veterinarian for a routine physical, so we did this. Apparently, Skylar presented as “male” during this examination, for the veterinarian also referred to Skylar as a “he.”

Later, this same veterinarian’s office contacted us to see if we would like to adopt more parakeets. We ended up adopting two more male parakeets (both still identify as male), whom my kids named “Todd” and “Gibby.” So at that time, we believed that we had three male parakeets: Skylar de Green, Todd, and Gibby.

A few weeks ago, Skylar de Green suffered a leg injury after a freak accident with one of the toys in the parakeets’ cage. As mentioned in the original post (the one in which I apparently misgendered Skylar), I had feared the leg might be broken, so I took her to the vet. Well, I guess it would be correct to say I took him to the vet, because Skylar was still identifying as “he” at that time, and under the Uniform Code of Social Justice (UCSJ), whatever gender you presently identify as, that’s the gender you are. I’m not sure whether this works retroactively. When you change your gender identity, does it mean that you always were that gender, from the beginning of Time? Is it correct to say that in 1976 Caitlyn Jenner won a gold medal in a men’s event, even though she was a woman then? Or is it correct to say Bruce Jenner won the gold medal and only later did he become a woman named Caitlin? And if archeologists dig up Caitlin’s fossilized skeleton in a million years and identify her as an adult male human, will they be guilty of a thoughtcrime? Anyway, Skylar went to the vet for the leg injury; the vet told us that his leg was not broken but only bruised and swollen, and the vet treated his leg with an anti-inflammatory medicine.

While Skylar recovered from the leg injury, he liked to hang out in a hollowed-out coconut house, apart from the other parakeets. During these moments of solitude, Skylar apparently began to question his/her gender identity once more. No longer happy to live as a “man,” she decided to “de-transition” and to identify as “female” again. Thankfully, the Humane Society had not performed “gender-reassignment surgery” on Skylar, so she was able to “de-transition” back to female without any difficulty. For the rest of this article, I will, therefore, use Skylar’s presently-preferred pronouns: “she/her,” even though at the time I did not know that he was actually a she.

After a couple days of convalescence, Skylar emerged from the coconut house and began playing and interacting with the other parakeets (Todd and Gibby) again. She must have informed them that she had de-transitioned, but she did not tell me. Sadly, I kept misgendering her and using her old pronouns. (I went to virtual confession on Reddit and did the penance assigned to me: I prayed ten Our Mother’s and ten Hail Oprah’s, which I hope will suffice, to purge my soul of this thoughtcrime.)

One day, Skylar suddenly returned to the coconut house and began spending most of her time there. At first, I was concerned that she might be sick, but whenever she left the coconut house, she capered about the cage with all of her usual alacrity. I didn’t think much else of it. Maybe she’s just learned to prefer moments of peace and quiet while she was recuperating, I thought. Maybe she’s just enjoying some “alone time.”

A couple days ago, I heard a faint chirping that sounded different than the sounds the parakeets usually make. I went over to their cage to investigate. Skylar was back in the coconut house. I shined a flashlight into it and peered inside, and — much to my surprise — I spotted a couple of small eggs. Oh snap! Skylar de Green is a hen! He is actually a she! And on top of that, an expectant mother! Then I caught a brief glimpse of featherless parakeet flesh — one of the chicks had hatched!

Recent changes to the dynamics of their little parakeet society suddenly made sense in light of this new discovery: Skylar’s return to the coconut house, Todd (one of the other parakeets) frequently standing outside the door of the coconut house, Skylar periodically poking her head outside to mash beaks with Todd (the father apparently feeds the mother, who then feeds the chicks), Gibby (the other male) acting like an awkward “third wheel” and trying to get Todd to hang out with him instead of with Skylar and the chicks, Todd frequently ignoring Gibby due to his newfound responsibilities as a family man, etc.

Now, I wonder about Todd, Skylar’s husband and the father of her chicks: was he romantically involved with Skylar while she was still living as a male? Does that mean that Todd was gay at the time? (Hey, if there’s stuff in the water turning frogs gay,³ then why not parakeets?) And now that Skylar has de-transitioned, does that make Todd heterosexual again? Or is he bisexual, since he was copulating with a trans male parakeet, and now is copulating (or has copulated) with a female parakeet (even though it’s the same parakeet)?

If I could talk to animals like Dr. Doolittle, I would ask Skylar de Green, the formerly trans male parakeet, and her husband, Todd, “So who is gay?” Kind of like this Ugandan television newscaster asked the trans male he was interviewing in this video clip below:

I would post a video of the parakeet chicks, but they still look like alien babies. Apparently they will continue to look like miniature ETs for the next few days, until they start getting their feathers. So instead of watching a video of featherless parakeet chicks, you can watch a video of Western Postmodern Gender Theory colliding with traditional African culture in a heartwarming way. “So who is gay?”

1. I imagine the Thought Police (d/b/a the FBI/CIA/NSA/DHS) raiding your home is similar to the scene in the Terry Gilliam movie Brazil in which agents from the Ministry of Information raid Harry Buttle’s home to cordially invite him “to assist the ministry with certain inquiries:”

2. The principle of “trans male parakeets are male parakeets” is also supported by the precedent of “trans cats are cats” — here’s an inspiring story about one puppy’s decision to “live his truth” as a cat:

3. Clip from Infowars broadcast in which Alex Jones talks about the social engineering promoting gayness by any means necessary, even if it means turning the frogs gay: