3 Long Islanders on the nonbinary and genderqueer experience

There are those who identify as men. There are those who identify as women. And then there’s Micah Schneider.

They, the pronoun Schneider uses, “grew up as a girl,” the Huntington resident said.

“I tried really hard to fit in as a girl, and it never really felt right,” they said.

Later, at Hunter College in Manhattan where Schneider was studying psychology and sociology, they watched a YouTube series in which a character used the word “nonbinary.”

“I was, like, ‘Oh, OK,’  ” said Schneider, 31, director of programs at the LGBT Network, a Hauppauge-based nonprofit. “And then the more I read about it and listened to other people’s stories, the more I realized this feels really right to me, and that term really fit, and that experience was exactly what I was experiencing of not feeling connected to my gender. I didn’t feel like a boy. I didn’t feel like anything."

Schneider said they just felt like something totally different.

“I want to be clocked as nothing,” said Schneider, who earlier this Pride Month, which runs through June, married Grace Mullen, 28, who uses she/her pronouns. “But our culture doesn’t really have a good way of experiencing that third other-gender category.”

DEFINING BINARY

GLAAD, formerly known as the national Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation advocacy organization, defines nonbinary as “a word used by people who experience their gender identity and/or gender expression as falling outside the binary gender categories of ‘man’ and ‘woman,’ ” according to the nonprofit’s website. An estimated 1.2 million U.S. residents between the ages of 18 and 60 identify as nonbinary, according to a 2021 study by the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law. Most are white, under the age of 29 and live in cities, according to the research center, which focuses on “sexual orientation and gender identity law and public policy.”

In some ways, the nonbinary identity is often misunderstood, said Robert Vitelli, chief executive officer at the LGBT Network. The reason is partly societal, he said. Think of the fervor over gender-reveal parties, or commonly asking what the sex of a baby will be, he explained.

The language around the nonbinary identity is often new to people outside the LGBTQ+ community, he said.

“People define these words in different ways, people use them in different ways,” Vitelli said. “That’s OK, right? Because, at the end of the day, people just experience gender differently.”

And, it’s intensely personal, according to Vitelli.

Here, three Long Islanders who identify as nonbinary or genderqueer share their experiences.

TAlKING ABOUT IT ON SOCIAL MEDIA

Jesse Blaze Snider

Westbury’s Jesse Blaze Snider, 42, said he “never felt like a man or a woman” but rather “an idea that happened to be in a body.”

A publisher, podcaster, comic book writer and musician, Snider in May discussed being nonbinary in a lengthy Facebook post where he also opened up about, in the past, struggling with extreme depression and suicidal thoughts. He said he began identifying as nonbinary eight years ago, sharing it on the social media platform because he said he feels “the culture has weaponized the LGBT community” and because he wants to help others understand what the label means. He had earlier shared the news with family members and close friends and mentioned it from time to time on his podcast “Coolest Geek Alive.”

“My nature has always been more feminine,” said Snider, who said that since childhood he has often been mistaken for gay.

Divorced with four children, Snider lives with his girlfriend, an electrician “who does what all the boys do,” he said. She reminds him of his mother, Suzette, an artist he describes as a dominant force within the family who power-washes the house and paints every room, he said.

He said his father, Twisted Sister front man Dee Snider, also provided a role model for him when it came to figuring out what genders mean. “He’s creative and has that feminine connection, but have you ever seen Dee Snider on stage ... looking like a monster man in women’s clothing?” he said. “I mean, he is a balanced masculine feminine.”

When he walks through the world, Snider said he looks “like a tough guy.”

“I’ve got a beard, I’ve got a mohawk and I carry myself with a lot of strength and machismo,” said Snider, who played semiprofessional football for many years with the Brooklyn Mariners. “The moment I see a friend, the moment I relax, my shoulders drop and my wrists go limp and I’m very feminine. That’s more my nature. That’s the way I kind of prefer to be, mostly because I love everybody, and I’m trying to kind of give love to people and show them that I care about them, and I’m not trying to sit there being rigid and make them feel like I’m some strong person that’s gonna beat them up or something.”

THEY CALL IT ‘GENDERQUEER’

D’Aaliyah Hill

D’Aaliyah Hill, 23, a Farmingdale State College public health student, medical assistant and social work intern from Bay Shore, prefers to describe their identity as “genderqueer.”

“To me, genderqueer just means that even if I present as female that’s not necessarily what I identify with all the time,” they said.

They also use genderqueer because they’re Black. “I just don’t feel comfortable saying that I’m nonbinary because I associate it so much with a white queer experience,” Hill said, adding that they have known few Black people who identify as nonbinary.

Hill grew up in Jamaica, where, they said, they were a tomboy. Hill recalled being forced to sit in the cab of an uncle’s truck with their mother instead of in the back of the truck with boys. They were also tutored on how to walk and sit in a more feminine way, they said.

When Hill moved to the United States at age 11, they found that they were able to put words to things that they didn’t know there were words for.

“The very first one was bisexual,” Hill said. “Like that, for sure, I always was.”

As Hill got older, they became more comfortable expressing themselves. “A lot of the friends I made coming here just happened to be queer,” they said.

When filling out forms asking for gender, Hill said they “would probably [prefer] to just put female for safety reasons and not having to explain myself. But I wouldn’t, among my friends say, like, I’m a woman or I’m a man or I’m neither. My presentation is just different.”

LANGUAGE BOUNDARIES

Micah Schneider

Navigating a binary world as someone who identifies as nonbinary can bring unique challenges, especially when it comes to revealing that they are “not like some mythical unicorn that only exists on the internet,” said Micah Schneider. Before the two got married June 7 at the Peconic River Herb Farm in Calverton, Schneider and Grace Mullen spoke at length about their “language boundaries,” even drawing up a 15-page document for vendors and guests on needs such as not referring to them as the brides but calling them celebrants instead.

As for Jesse Blaze Snider, after coming out he said he faced “a lot of misunderstanding,” even from those who know he had been married and is currently in a heterosexual relationship.

“I literally had a friend of mine who called me at a certain point ...​​​​​​ and thought that being nonbinary meant ...​​​​​ asexual,” Snider said.

Hill said they pick and choose their battles.

“It’s OK if you never understand what it means to be a nonbinary,” they said. “It’s OK if you never understand what it means to be a sexual minority or a gender identity minority. You know it’s OK if you never understand how they feel.

“You don’t need to understand to stand in solidarity. You don’t need to understand to still see us as human.”