I walked into the student center where some of the other students were already gathered. About a dozen already, dressed in North Face jackets and baseball caps, many of them tapping on their cell phones and scowling for some reason. It didn’t feel all that welcoming when I arrived, and nobody said hello, but I knew why I was there. It was already 8:07 pm and it looked like students were still trickling in. I tried some small talk with the girl sitting across from me. As I was trying to introduce myself, she interrupted me and said “What are your pronouns?”

I’d never been asked that before. After a brief pause, I answered “Uh, male?”

“You mean he/him/his?” She replied.

“Yeah, I guess so.” I said.

“You’re cis. We always ask for pronouns here before engaging, so please think about that in the future.”

“Oh ok, sorry.”

“Don’t apologize, just do it.”

“Sorry. I mean okay. What are your pronouns?”

“My pronouns are she/her/hers.”

“Nice.” I said.

“Why is that nice?” she said indignantly.

“Oh. No reason. I don’t know.”

“It’s not any nicer than any other gender identity and you shouldn’t be implying that.”

I blushed as it occurred to me I was on the receiving end of a lecture.

“Just because you don’t know you’re doing it doesn’t mean you’re not participating in cisgender supremacy.”

“Oh, Ok sorry. I mean, I won’t do it again.”

“You should apologize for subjugating other gender identities, or misgendering someone, for that matter.”

This was all happening a lot faster than I could keep up. My apparent uselessness at understanding gender identity was starting to show with the beads of sweat across my forehead. I tried to divert the conversation.

“So what was your name again?”

Before she could answer, the president of the Decisive Student Action committee walked in and called the meeting to order. Straight black hair, skin practically untouched by the sun, black rimmed glasses that sat neatly on a perfectly sculpted nose. Nanette. This was why I was here.

She had told me about the Decisive Student Action committee in our Aboriginal Studies class and said if I wanted to make a difference, I should start going to meetings and demonstrations. I would’ve honestly joined the chess club if she told me to. I had been into her since sitting behind her in class last semester. I hadn’t done much research on the DSA since she had invited me, but it sounded pretty generic, and I was pretty sure I could figure it out once the meeting got under way.

Nanette kicked off the meeting, welcoming visiting members of the campus Antifa Club, Democratic Communist Student Association, and the Rage Against Israel Club. I looked around the room and could pretty much tell who was who, since everyone seemed to be sitting in groups, and none of them were talking to each other. Nanette proposed that we go around the room introducing ourselves and establishing pronouns before beginning the meeting.

Ten minutes later, it occurred to me that everyone in the room went by the usual pronouns. There didn’t appear to be any non-cis people in attendance. For that matter, I had never met a non-cis student on campus before. Anyways, I was too proud of myself for correctly describing my pronouns to the group to worry about that.

Nanette began the meeting with the hottest topic of the day. President-elect Donald Trump was an illegitimately elected president, propped up as a shadow agent by the Russians, and Hillary Clinton was the rightful president. She said the electoral college was a tool of white supremacy and had to be abolished, although I don’t remember that coming up when she talked about the electoral college a few weeks ago. She said that the DSA had to do its part to remove Trump through civil disobedience. I was beginning to get an idea of what the Decisive Student Action committee was all about.

As I was feeling a little unsure about being there, Nanette asked everyone if they had their weapons. The sweat beaded back up on my brow as the other attendees nodded their heads yes. In a blistering moment of self-doubt, I wondered if I had gotten myself in way over my head, and if I really wanted to be here late at night in an empty student hall with this group. What weapons? What kind of group was this? My heart raced even faster as everyone reached into their jackets, handbags and satchels, one by one taking out and setting on the table in front of them..

Dildos. About twenty dildos of various lengths, shapes, and colors.

One by one, the glass table we were all gathered around began to resemble a novelty store. The rubbery, multi-colored fauna was making me visibly uncomfortable, but the two girls in hijab headwraps seemed surprisingly unphased. My fear gave way to confusion. How were these weapons? And why were we supposed to have them?

Then the fear came right back as a sense of dread came over me. I didn’t bring one of my own.

Looking around nervously, I got the attention of the girl I had talked to before.

“Pssst.. Hey… Her.”

“What?” She whispered back at me. “That’s not how gender pronouns wor-“

I interrupted her. “Does anyone have an extra one of… those?”

“What? No!”

Realizing how much I wouldn’t really want someone’s hand-me-down, I reluctantly said “I kind of need one.”

Much too loudly, she replied:

“Well you should have thought about that, and brought your own dildo!”

I looked up to find the room silent and all eyes on me. I felt like such a schmuck for not having a dildo. Nanette seemed to deflate with annoyance.

“Did you not read the email about the demonstration?”

I told her the DSA’s emails must’ve gone straight to my spam folder. She said that was no excuse.

“The ‘Cocks not Glocks’ demonstration tomorrow is about Gun Control. We’re using THESE-“ She waved hers in the air combatively. I could almost make out a name scribbled onto it in sharpie. “-to make our statement and compel our representatives to adopt responsible legislative controls.”

The other students muttered in approval. I zoned out for a moment trying to figure out just how that was going to be an effective means of accomplishing that, but she interrupted my thought process by sharply pointing ‘Antoine’ at me. It was at a better angle now and I could read the name.

“You’d better have a dildo by 8:00 am tomorrow when we start. We’re trying to make a statement here.”

I assured her I would have one by the morning. She carried on with the meeting.

“I know we were planning on disrupting the College Republicans’ meeting by setting off the sprinkler system and fogging the AC vents with butyric acid, but those fucks at Project “Truth” put out deceptively edited video that makes it look like we were going to set off the sprinkler system and fog the AC vents with butyric acid, so we have to call it off for now.”

“Mother fuckers.” One student muttered under his breath. Everyone shook their heads and seemed to fume.

I raised my hand.

“What?” Nanette snapped.

“So… were we going to do that? Or did they edit the video to make it look like we were going to do that?”

“Shut the fuck up.”

Everyone looked at me with palpable disdain. I sat back in my seat and resolved to just ride out the rest of the meeting. Deep down I was hoping my chances with Nanette weren’t shot.

After the meeting, we had our marching orders on when and where to be tomorrow morning. On the way out, I tried to catch Nanette and save face, but I was interrupted by a black male student who stopped me and pulled me aside. He sported a polka-dot bow tie and his non-prescription glasses had thicker rims than Nanette’s. Impressive. He told me it was obvious that I was new, and I looked lost. But he assured me that if I was willing to stand with him in the fight against racism and sexism, that he would overlook the fact I was a white male.

“Thanks man?” I said with less than 100% assurance, and I shook his hand. I tried to turn it into one of those hip, hand clasping handshakes, but he told me to just stop, and for about 5 excruciating seconds I really didn’t know what to do with my hands. He finally released me from my turmoil.

“Ok. Bye.”

As he walked off I was the only one left in the empty student hall. Trying to salvage some resolve, I wondered if it was really worth trying to fit in with this group just because I was so into Nanette.

My inner struggle amplified ten-fold later on as I was trying to check out at Pat’s Taboo Emporium of Lust, with the Samoan 500. An economical, semi-premium model that wasn’t the biggest dildo on the shelf, but I think still very respectable and reasonably priced. I caught a smirk on the cashier’s face and couldn’t stop myself from responding.

“It’s not for me.” I said without thinking.

“Oh. Really?” she said.

I stammered. “It’s uh.. It’s for….”

Her eyes widened with interest behind her black winged eyeliner.

“It’s for..”

I wasn’t getting out of this one. I had to answer with something, and I answered with the best possible thing I could think of at the moment.

“It’s for social justice.”