The Diaries of a Sozzled Scribbler #25

Transcribed by DMETRI KAKMI

15 February 2021

What follows is a phone conversation with my amanuensis, Dolmio Kukurbit, who is a cis-male and therefore lower down the evolutionary scale than us gender non-conforming people. The fact that he’s also one of those old fashioned homos makes it worse.

I edited out Dolmio’s stupid sissy cis-questions so you only get my words of intersectionalist wisdom.

Hello, is that Dolmio Kukumber?

Dolmio, I’m ringing to tell you I realised I was falling behind the times and becoming kinda like retarded.

What? Oh, it’s redundant? Sorry, yes, that’s what I meant to say. Silly me.

I decided to you know like keep up with the times, so I decided I’m a woman, like every man in the country, right? Because like who wants to be associated with toxic masculinity? Like Meryll Frost said, inside every great man is a grating woman.

What? Oh it’s great woman. Sorry. All the excitement is making me mix up my words.

So aaaanywaaay now that I’m non-conformist woman, I got rid of common sense and any connection to reality and got loads of tats and piercings. And a beard.

What’s that you say? Tats and piercings are symbols of conformity? Why, pray tell? Because everyone has them? Yes, well, you would say that, wouldn’t you, Dolmio?

Stop trying to destabilise my revolutionary fervour. You’re just scared women like me are going to take over the world and turn you into a sperm donor, if there’s any left in you at your age.

So  aaaanywaaay on my journey to becoming a bearded lady, I changed my name.

From now on I want you to address me as Salonge Salieri.

What do you mean it sounds like a drag name? How dare you oppress me with your homophonic assertions.

I don’t care if the correct word is homophobic. Shut up and listen. When the oppressed speak, those in power must listen. They might unlearn something.

So, like I was saying, because I want to challenge the patriarchy and bring down capitalism, I’m going to be a lesbian, too, and start eating carpet. But I haven’t found a good recipe for preparing shaggy rug yet so I’m holding off on that tasty meal.

The message for the world is this:

I’m a lesbian who wants to be addressed as He/Him.

What’s that, Dolmio? Using the pronouns he/him undermines my femininity?

Who are you to tell me what is and isn’t feminine? It sounds like a contradiction in terms, but why should I be limited by outdated gender pronouns that are invented by the patriarchy to control and restrict me and to tell me what I can and can’t be?

This new identity automatically makes me an activists. And like oh my goddess I’m so excited because I’m going to open my own BoobTube channel and… What now!

Oh, it’s YouTube. Sorry… Hee, hee. I made a Fallopian slip of the tongue.

It’s a Freudian slip of the tongue, you say?

Isn’t Freud one of those privileged dead white men who was part of the patriarchal colonialist hegemonic project that oppresses minorities, like white middle-class inner-city people with bad educations, the latest laptops and free wifi wherever they go?

Yeah, nah, I prefer Fallopian because I am woman. It’s all in me. Everything you want done baby, I’ll do it unnaturally. Whoah, whoah, whoah…

Besides there’s nothing wrong with a slip of the tongue in a fallopian tube. If you think there is, you are misogynist.

And you know what? I’m starting to hate you, sitting there mansplaining every thing to me. I don’t want you to correct me when I make a so called ‘mistake’, okay? I don’t care about your good intentions. I’m here to tell you it’s not a mistake. I’m reinventing language and pushing boundaries with my neo-pronouns as a non-binary person. Just ask Michelle Foucault.

Yes, the great French S&M wanker was a woman underneath all those ugly masculine trappings.

Apology not accepted, Dolmio. You are CANCELLED.

I will vilify you and destroy your life on my YouTube channel. Why? Because I’m right and you must agree with me, even when my pronouncements have no basis in reality.

Newsflash: Nowadays feelings trump facts.

What’s that? You want to ask a question? Salonge gives you permission to speak.

Why would a woman want to use the he/him pronoun? It’s none of your business, you revolting attachment to a penis. You just have to obey. That’s all you have to do. Is that too much to ask?

Oh my goddess, I’m exhausted. Being offended all the time and trying to change the world one micro-aggression at a time is tiring. I think I will stop being a woman and become one of those nice oppressed and marginalised Báhn mì people.

I think you mean BAME.

Shut up, defiler.

À bientôt, mes amies.

The Sozzled Scribbler was born in the shadow of the Erechtheion in Athens, Greece, to an Egyptian street walker and a Greek bear wrestler. He is currently stateless and lives on gin and cigarettes.

Dmetri Kakmi is the author of Mother Land (shortlisted for the New South Wales Premier’s Literary Awards in Australia), and the editor of When We Were Young. His latest book is The Door and Other Uncanny Tales. He does not endorse the Sozzled Scribbler’s views.