Nigel Dennis on the prospect of a genderless universe

From Cards of Identity again. Read all the way down for the punchline:

It was at this time that I began to treasure the words which were my father's only bequest to me. "Always remember," he had said, "that there is no such thing as pure male or pure female. Some wear skirts and some wear pants, but this is only convention. Every man is stuffed with womanly characteristics, every woman is fraught with man. The gap between the powderpuff and the cavalry mustache appears wide but is really a hair's-breadth. I tell you this so that when you grow up and find yourself behaving oddly, as I trust you will, you will know that it is quite apropos. After all, think of dogs."

[...]

When I filled out the application form for war service I wrote against the word SEX, "Church of England." The kindly sergeant kept insisting that this was an improper statement, but when I stood on my principles and refused to alter it he took me to discuss the matter with a young officer, who did his best to persuade me that my obstinacy obstructed the war effort. "You've no idea," he said, "how much classifying becomes necessary in a war. I'm sure your father was right about dogs, but that was in peacetime."

When I asked him, caustically, if the behavior patterns of dogs underwent a sudden, patriotic change when the drums began to roll, he answered firmly that from an official point of view they did. I could, he said, take my choice: be a male or a female for the duration and thereafter be as androgynous as I pleased. "A pretty pickle we would all be in," he declared, "if everyone started putting dog-notions onto application forms. I am fully in sympathy with you, because I know how hard it is nowadays to define just what one really is. Our fathers, or mothers, whichever they were, had no such problem to face; it existed, of course, but it was not yet recognized. But this is not a defined age, such as theirs was, which means that we who live in it must be all the more definite if were are going to achieve any kind of stability."

[...]

"Well, let's try it another way," he said. "Which sex--assuming such to exist--do you most enjoy flirting with?"

I told him I was not bigoted. My emotions, I said, responded to virtually any mixture, with little preference as to type, color, build, or stature.

He made a sound like a shotgun going off. "That's what I wanted," he said. "Remember it, next time you loose those dogs of yours. You are a born sailor." He wrote a huge M on my card and cried, "Good morning! Next, please!"