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I am one of a growing number that are unhappy with the use of the word transgender. For me it isn't really about a dislike for other marginalized groups it is instead about a sense of identity. The word is supposed to be an umbrella term that covers diverse groups but in its current usage I think really does all groups involved harm. I think it loses it message and pushes others out that the word was originally meant to include like crossdressers. Speaking of those marginalized groups where are they in the supposedly large LGBT and Transgender groups? Where are the crossdressers in the Injustice at every turn survey done by the NCTE and NGLTF? All I see are post-op transsexuals in leadership, none of the other supposedly represented groups. I am transsexual and have never really felt the word transgender should apply to me. My logic is that I was born this way and in no way am I trying to break gender norms instead I am embracing the ones that match my internal sense of self. There are now plenty of medical studies that back my opinion up. http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/10/02/905711/-Trapped-in-... I think the community as a whole should really think about what is being lost by people accepting transgender as a self identity instead of accepting themselves for whatever part of the sprectrum they fall into.There has also been some media attention to this and others are speaking out about being labelled as transgender. http://www.thescavenger.net/glbsgdq/dont-call-me-transgender... http://iameverywoman.blogspot.com/2011/04/with-all-due-respe... http://www.npr.org/2011/04/01/135042281/listener-dont-call-m... I'm not seeking to have an angry discussion but instead to have an open adult converstion about what is at stake and how using transgender as an identity is losing what the word was intended for as an umbrella term.It also is being used to place none LGBT identified T people into the LGBT against their will with devestating effects on marriage rights for non LGB identified T's.
Comments
transgender
I can see your point, but for me, it depends on context. I see myself now as transsexual, but until recently I felt I could not claim that status as I saw no way to actually begin a transition, and I felt that particular term should be reserved for only those who were actively pursuing SRS. And before that, I was in a less-defined state, where I was not sure what I was, except I knew I was gender variant in some way. So I see the need for an "umbrella term" as well. Not to mention we are such a small minority, we need to count every one we can among us to help us keep fighting against discrimination.
Dorothycolleen
I actually dislike
any of the T words being applied to myself - I'm a woman, my passport, driving licence and birth certificate say female. I'm cured - no boy bits.
Trans as a prefix means 1. across or beyond; 2. on or to the other side of; 3. through. To me it implies in a state of change, moving from one thing to another. As I don't intend moving back, I think I can drop the name tag and just go with woman or female.
While this will never suit radicals in a number of camps, who will describe me as deluded or a bloke without a dick etc, most people seem to accept what they see or deal with - which is a woman.
Umbrella terms have their limitations and like generalisations, they come unstuck in the fine detail. The problem arises in the difference between the general public and smaller groups. Okay, the general public is also made up of smaller groups with areas of self interest or with common elements and it's easy to categorise any other group as a group not as individuals be it - black, white, male, female, hetero or homo, blonde or brunette, left or right handed, diabetic or non-diabetic, transgendered or non-transgendered. Unfortunately, we have to use terms to describe ourselves and others, some of which are not always sympathetic or accurate, but they have become established through use. We should all try to use them less, but with 6 billion plus people on this little planet, I'm not sure just how we accomplish it. But it's a good point.
Angharad.
Angharad
Angharad
I agree with you Angharad
I agree with you Angharad and I respect that Erin has made this a welcome home for all those stuffed under the Umbrella.
I've met you Angie.
I've met you Angie. You're a woman love and a f-----g awsome one at that! And I mean that in the nice way! See you in Sept.
Hugs.
Bev.
Growing old disgracefully.
Problem is I am reading
a bit of a straight identified T-woman not liking being lumped with LGB identified T-woman as you so pointed mentioned at the end of your posting.
Marriage equality should be available for LGB identified members also so that concern should disappear into a non-issue. That is solvable. So instead of linking the two issues, solve one then the issue of how we identified would have one less volatile element to it. No matter what though, if you are honest with your prospective mate, he will always know that you are an ex-male which is a difference from an oem female.
Yes, I know what you want but it is an impossible situation this day and age and we do not have the sheer numbers to push this issue out there and shape the discussion unless more of us are willing to be be a really public post-op. And I am not.
Kim
Kim
You don't solve one issue by making both groups have to fight for same sex marriage. Also by saying Heterosexual T women need same sex mariage arent you implying that we aren't women? I support LGB identified T marriage but not at the expense of the loss of both sides identity as the sex that they are.
Umbrella words
There is a commonality of interest to all of the gender-marginalized groups that is not shared by other groups that are based on sexual orientation. If transgender is not the word, then what is the word for that commonality?
If you deny the commonality of interest, and some do, that really does not mean that the commonality perceived by the general public goes away. And that is the basis of the shared interest. Words are words, and if one word is not doing the job then another word will be created to do it. But so far, there isn't a good alternative.
Transgender is the word for those groups and non-groups of people that share an interest in greater gender freedom in this society. Yes, that probably includes people that any particular member of this group (or group of non-groups or whatever) feels uncomfortable being under the same umbrella with. It does not change the reality that society and society's rules, expectations and laws are going to group these people together by marginalizing their interests in a common way.
It's the same thing in some other lumpy social groups. Some people of Mexican or Puerto Rican or Brazilian heritage object to the term Latino or Latin-American, saying that all of those groups under that umbrella are not the same. Yes, they are not the same. Just like bears, dogs and otters are not the same but there is a commonality there that can be recognized and it needs a word.
Think about all the Indian, Native American, First Peoples tribes in the Americas. There is a search ongoing for a term for an inclusive term for these people because they share common interests whether they are Native Hawaiian, Inuit, Arapaho or Seminole. First Peoples is so far the best term to include all of those in this grouping. But you know what? Yeah, a lot of people in those groups object to that term.
Society is lumpy. History is lumpy. Stand in line and take your lumps. :)
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
There is no word
Playing into societies misperceptions by buying into it doesn't solve the problem it only seeks to confirm they were right in the first place.Education about all the groups involved is the first place to start. The umbrella is a bad idea and it is unravelling. Ts and IS born people are starting to move together to cover medical processes involved. Those who are part timers or entertainers should ban together to cover their issues. Simply dividing to cover issues that the umbrella failed to acknowledge doesn't mean that I don't support drag queens or crossdressers rights just that their issues are non related to mine.As for gender queers how does that even begin to relate to people who either part time dress but are fully comfortable in their birth sex or those who are totally out of place in it and seek to become what they are on the inside? The only commonality is that some of society can't see those differences but from what I've experienced the vast majority can.Education is the key.
Sorry
I find your comments very hard to read because you run everything into one paragraph.
But basically, you're saying that transgender isn't --- what? Isn't the word to link the common cause and the common problems of several disparate groups together? Then, what is the word?
It looks like you're saying that those people in those groups all have to sink or swim individually. I'm sure that's not what you mean.
But yes, education is the key and education involves words and words have meaning and transgender is the word that has this meaning -- crossing gender lines. That's what it means and it is an appropriate word to link several groups, which all have their individual identities, just as each member of each group has his or her own identity.
Down at the bottom, it looks to me like you're objecting to transgender as a word because you see it linking you to people you don't want to be linked to. The irony is very hot in here, isn't it?
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Human being
Sorry Erin but I have never liked the word transgender or the implication of if you don't like it tough because we out number
you. Sorry but I see many of the people pushing the word transgender as bullies pushing forced inclusion under an umbrella
and into the LGB. Being free means being free to choose who you wish to associate with or which labels you want applied to
you. Umbrella terms serve no good purpose accept to steal peoples identities. The only umbrella terms I subscribe to are
woman and human being. I don't find the word Transgender to be a common cause word because I am not crossing over gender my
gender has been fixed since the day I was born. I am changing my physical sex to match my gender. Nor am I cross dressing
when I go out but you could say I was forced to cross dress until I transitioned. I don't see common cause between choosing
to cross dress and being forced to cross dress. Nor do I see common cause between having to medically transition into who you
are and choosing to stay as you are because your okay with it.Does that mean I don't want to associate with crossdressers or
others trapped under the label transgender nope not at all I'm here by my free will and I've chatted with them
of my own free will, matter of fact I can say I like more than a few of them even if they can't grasp that being born
transsexual isn't or wasn't a choice but being labelled transgender is a choice.
It does go beyond labels...
...but perceptions are also important. You noted above,
Nor do I see common cause between having to medically transition into who you are and choosing to stay as you are because your okay with it. (emphasis mine)
Not just a teeny bit of common cause? Consider this; many of us 'choose' to stay the way we are, not because we are okay with it, but because we either have no choice or the choices we have are problematic or will dramatically affect other people. I think the one thing you miss in the midst of all this is that while being transsexual isn't a choice, neither is being transgender.
I didn't ask for this any than you did. To absolutely beat a dead horse into the ground (sorry), I'm an adult survivor of sexual abuse as a child. I have flashbacks frequently and nightmares on occasion; the stress has cause my health to suffer and my autoimmune system is in the tank. But you know what hurts the most? The most painful thing that causes me to go to bed at night weeping silently? That my wife, who loves me despite the knowledge of this life I have here, still sees this as something we'll get through; a condition to overcome. It may change; God knows I pray it will.
I don't mind whatever label someone coins for the moment or the era; the one label I long to hear from the ones most important to me? Andrea Lena DiMaggio. And apart from those here who know me and care, it's not likely to happen in my lifetime.
Dio vi benedica tutti
Con grande amore e di affetto
Andrea Lena
Love, Andrea Lena
Did you take the vow?
Did you father the children? I couldn't do that I can't even conceive of it because my female gender identity was so strong at a young age. I bowed to family and religious pressure not to transition at a younger age. Does this mean I think less of you for where your at or that I think I am somehow better than you not at all. But I do see a difference there and I do see a difference in how much you were willing to stay in a male life or bow to societal pressure.You have to realize that I faced most of the same issues you did but I couldn't follow the path you did it wasn't even an option. If you haven't yet try talking to a good therapist to find out where your at it doesn't mean you have to stay where your at or that you need to transition. But I do think if you get a good one it can help you.
Here's a question?
...So what if I fathered a child or got married...does that make me any less of a woman than you. I'd beg to differ, and there are some folks here who's back me up. We have plenty of post-op transsexuals who were parents pre-surgery, some of whom are still with their spouses. I'm not in competition to see who had the most mitigating circumstances regarding our lives; you made your choices and I made mine. I have a great therapist. What you see here with me is the sum of the efforts of my family, my few friends and my many friends here who have walked beside me for the past two years. My heart's desire hasn't changed a bit; I still long for those things every woman wants, but two things stand in my way.
I can't reverse the events of the past sixty years; my life is what it is. And I can't ignore that things change; what I want or need has to be seen through the prism of the life I now lead with my family. Would I love to transition; of course. Do I have a freedom to do so; in a way, if I ignore all of the people around me and hasten to throw away 26 years of marriage to change a body that is 15 or so years away from its expiration date.
What I still don't understand is that you seem to be saying that you don't want to be labeled. That's all well and good, but in doing so, you seem to be somewhat exclusive; the subtle 'but' when discussing me. The distinction you've chosen to point out when all I want is what you've said all along in this thread; to be accepted for who I am.
Dio vi benedica tutti
Con grande amore e di affetto
Andrea Lena
Love, Andrea Lena
Something for you to think about Andrea
Have you ever read one of the countless stories out there about a boy or man who gets steered into crossdressing? Then steered into transitioning? Then wheeled into the operating room ? Then at somepoint they realize that they allowed it to happen and they really wanted it all along ? I think you've given me a great idea for a story.
Lisa
Eh?
I think that you're missing Andrea's point.
There was no choice. Willing to stay in a male life? When we grew up there was no knowledge that any other path existed, so there was no choice to take. Follow the path I did? There was no other path available at that time. Therapist? Don't make me laugh. Therapist? When you have as much experience of life as Andrea and I have (read: as old as) you will realize that in those days therapists were nasty people you stayed away from at all costs - ask Gwen 'Khadijah' Brown and Beverly Taff for details.
If I were forty years younger I would have transitioned by now. Forty years ago, transitioning was something people with money did by going abroad - I think Algeria was the place to go then. Needless to say, someone of my age at that time wouldn't have had the money, and any doctor would have just laughed at me.
Penny
There has always been a path.
Even before the "Operation" there was a path to take. In good times and bad times there has always been a path history bares this truth out. For some the path is a choice, for others there is no choice or price to high to pay.Hirja's (pushed to the bottom of Indian society),Kathoey Thailand(Permanently listed as insane),Two spirit (Native American culture), Women who fought in combat as men, all the other people in history books that lived as the opposite sex for one reason or another.
Lisa
That's just not true
If you you were a member of one of the groups you listed maybe. I was not. Or if you passed completely without medical intervention your alternate path might be to leave your entire life behind and try to establish yourself from scratch. In the world I grew up in there were almost 2 certain paths for the majority of us who couldn't pass without major medical intervention - the closet or death. Death by your own hand or by the bigoted haters who would kill you. The world we live in is a different place. There was not always a path.
Dead right Penny.
In 1952, Therapists were working deep in the dark. The only tools they seemed to have was a sublime arrogance fed by whatever academic over-achievment they reached and the indescribably narrow cultural, bigoted religious perspectives they were inculcated with by their parents and teachers.
The moment I was able, I removed myself from all contact with the psychiatric fraternity (I quite literally hid from them.)and after that I feel I never looked back. Once free of their censorious abuse, I learned to look inwards but it still took me decades to learn to tolerate what I found because I had to dissassociate myself from the shit that was loaded upon me right from the start.
Then I learned to love what I had found even though I still didn't understand it. On the way though I've plumbed some pretty awful depths and done some pretty wierd things (to myself I hasten to add.)in my attemps to 'get a handle' on my label.
The label 'transgendered' seems to me to me to cover enough varieties of humanity to satisfy all but the most anal amongst our community.
Finally I started to look outwards and these past couple of years I am finally finding an inner peace. Sadly this outing of myself is causing grief amongst my nearest and dearest. For now she has to come to terms with a situation she had not expected, namely her partner going out in a frock.
Life is never, never easy being transgendered and as I see it I'll be transgendered until I die. It's incurable.
For me the label transgendered, certainly applies to me! I'm not interested in the semantics. The hardest part is reconciling the dualities that exist within me and their appearences sometimes together but more often separately. The complexities are intense but I was never able to articulate these feelings as a child and young adult. I'm neither man nor woman and yet I'm both.
If ever there was a label to describe my condition then transgendered has to be it. It's the only one broad enough.
As for transexual individuals, I can quite understand that once they have had a successful 'transition' in either direction they can quite rightfully consider themselves 'cured' and their bodies now correspond to their sex. They are no longer in Limbo despite whatever features they may still have remaining from their flawed prior condition. All I ask of those transexuals who have transitioned however successfully is that they don't forget those who will forever be (at least to their own transexual eyes,) frozen in limbo as transgendered. We in the UK are reasonably lucky for society is getting ever more tolerant. Sadly this is not the case in many other countries, elsewhere around the planet.
It's all about education and my going out dressed is my effort to educate.
Posing outside Cardiff Town Hall on a busy Friday afternoon. (The only reason one cannot see any people is because they are all behind the photographer whilst passing us by.)
Growing old disgracefully.
It's still all one paragraph and no easier to read
Umbrella terms are how people think about the world. That's it. Protesting them because they are umbrella terms does no good.
Not a lot of point in discussing this with you since your sole point seems to be that you don't like the way people use words to define the world so they can talk about it. That's too bad because you really can't do anything about it, it's like complaining that blue should be called green because you don't like blue.
There is going to be a word for it. If it isn't going to be transgender, what word do you suggest?
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Education
While education may work for readers of broadsheets / 'quality' newspapers, a far greater share of the population read tabloids - who pride themselves on sensationalism and stirring up negative emotions at the expense of getting the facts right. The contributors / readers of those kinds of papers are unwilling to let themselves be re-educated on such matters as inclusion and diversity, preferring to stick rigidly to their narrow frame of reference (and perhaps fondly looking back at earlier generations when men married women, the men went out to work while the women stayed at home to run the house and have 2.4 children - except that nowadays as soon as the mother has recovered from birth, they're expected to go out to work as well rather than staying at home where they're not contributing to the economy and probably lazily scrounging off the state. Disabilities? As far as they're concerned, if you can walk a few steps and lift a book, you're capable of holding down a full-time job!).
So if you can persuade these publications to adopt an umbrella term for certain groups that isn't too offensive, it's better than letting them get away with "gender bender" and "sex swap" (almost invariably spelled "sex swop"), or even phrases like the wildly inaccurate "cut his [penis] off", suggesting it as a spur-of-the-moment lifestyle choice, or (even worse) suggesting it as a mechanism for "pervs" to gain access to segregated sex facilities to leer at the occupants.
Much as we'd like a more inclusive, diverse society, the only way to take the argument to the sheeple1 is to frame it in simple terms they can readily understand, preferably within as few words as possible - otherwise they will automatically turn off and decide it's "too complicated" for them.
Here in the UK, we've got an impending referendum on changing our voting system. The 'No' camp are proclaiming that ranking the candidates in order of preference (as opposed to marking an X against your preferred candidate) is very complicated - and will require machines to count the votes as human vote counters are apparently incapable of simple mathematics. They appear to hold the upper hand in polls - so if politicians and the media can paint counting up to between 3 and 12 is incredibly complicated and make the public believe it is, what hope is there for educating the public on gender / diversity / inclusion issues, when the opposition will troll out alarmist and wildly inaccurate statements - and have their views represented by the most commonly purchased newspapers?
So is it possible to coin a simple inclusive term that it relatively inoffensive to the majority of people for whom it would cover? Without one, promoting our cause to the likes of Sun or Daily Mail readers will be a lot tougher...
1) OK, that in itself may be an offensive term, but the portmanteau adequately describes those who take pre-formed opinions from the media sources they read/watch and blindly follow them, without objectively examining both points of view and making up their own minds.
There are 10 kinds of people in the world - those who understand binary and those who don't...
As the right side of the brain controls the left side of the body, then only left-handers are in their right mind!
This conversation is crap
And that is why I quit your group. You can set direction for you and no one else.
My direction is that I am a woman, and anyone who has a problem can just get over it.
Khadijah
Move forward quit looking back
Khadijah,
I honestly wish you the best in life.
Lisa
While you're saying this...
...please kindly remember that those who are pushing such negative actions against that dreaded grouping, "Trans-people", are the same sort that, whilst claiming the right to pray in public, will stand above muslims quietly and out of the way doing the same thing by themselves, placards brandished declaiming their obvious participation in "Nayn-ilevun" and their subsequent damnation to eternities of hellfire, screaming at them and reviling not only someone else's faith, but truly desecrating the one they claim. Thus, they are the same type who burn the holy works of other religions, inciting riots and anger against foreign invaders in their lands. The same group that will, even today, drag black americans out of their beds in the middle of the night and beat them, and rape them (not just women, but men as well; where's their vaunted heterosexuality then?), and kill them pour l'encouragement des autres (that is, to scare them to death, or at least, to vanish from the awareness and proximity of the lynchers).
Avoiding "category" terms, for which it seems you are arguing (though, as Erin pointed out, your prose is... unpolished and difficult to parse), in order not to get such people to not hate is a bit of a fools errand. If you, or anyone else, differs from them in the slightest, regardless of the labels attached, they will hate, and they will kill, and they will usurp the proper functions of government to perpetuate their monstrosities. They do this, not because of labels, but because of their own fear, independent of names. They will make up their own names to use. They will usurp any term applied. They will do so, not because it's a label, but because of hatred of anything not them.
If you have genuine concern about labeling behavior in human Culture, please go research a bit more. Your arguments are a dead end, rhetorically, and have been explored many times already. This doesn't bring anything new to the table, just a desire to stir the kettle a bit for whatever reason of your own. I could speculate as to what that reason is, but I think that would be... beyond pointless. I've got enough to do without worrying what you or anyone else wants me to call myself.
-Liz
Successor to the LToC
-Liz
Successor to the LToC
Formerly known as "momonoimoto"
What "Trans" means, and bigger issues.
Some seem to have this one track view of the "prefix" but there are other uses, such as in Trans-lunar insertion phase, trans-orbital burn, transbike wreck descent, transcontinental journey, and scads of other uses.
As Angharad says, and I agree, I did the stuff, including some things that were neither anticipated nor wanted. So, I am no longer trans anything. I am a woman. Using the word trans as part of describing myself just makes more pain. I am sorry to be such a selfish bitch, but there comes a time in life when you either have to move on and make the best life you can, or jump into an icy body of water.
Yesterday, I sat in a Mosque south of Cleveland with about 80 other Muslims, and listened to representatives of Homeland Security, the FBI, the US Attorney General's office, and other people explain their policies and the reasons for them.
Then I listened to the tearful plea of an American Citizen of Lebanese descent complain to them that her husband, a born in America, 20 year veteran of the Ohio National Guard, who had served in Desert Storm, is a fire fighter and medic, who converted to Islam, is constantly harassed by border guards at the canadian border. In front of his own wife and little children, they have seen him led away at gun point and hand cuffed. It has traumatised his children. This has been going on with him for 9 years.
So, in perspective, how important do you really think this trans debate really is?
K
I am kinda on the fence
I'm enjoying the acceptance that the word is gaining me, but resent the label that groups me with so many other trans* that don't share my goal of transitioning and disappearing.
I'm with angharad... I'm looking for a cure and don't want that label stuck to me like tissue paper on my shoe.
Dayna.
Call me a...
Call me a fence sitter...
As is said elsewhere, all of the folks commonly collected under the "transgender" label these days tend to be marginalized in many ways, and have some similar needs.
There ARE some differences though - at least as I understand it... For TS/IS people, there are medical procedures/hormones that can either together or in concert address their condition (As Angharad indicated, she's cured. As I've seen elsewhere, she is a lady with a trans history - being one example). The vast majority of others that are grouped under the trans label (at least as I understand it) don't need or want major medical procedures performed to be the person they are. This MEDICAL issue is a differentiator.
What does this mean to me? I think that there is both a benefit and a cost for having TS and/or IS people "stuffed" under the "transgender" label with all the other categories of people. Our country seems to LIKE labels. The problem comes in from the fact that we are a diverse group of people and the average person ASSUMES some similarity among those people where a common label is applied.
Anne
Complicated...
It is. People will always have issues with the fine print, and disparate groups will always have hiccups working together.
I am just as Angharad and others declare themselves to be, a woman born with deformities. Simple as that. My gender has absolutely nothing to do with my sexuality, as we all know, or should know, so the LGB side of things is really a foreign country. However...look at the recently-posted link to the transwoman in France, and read the comments. Every time someone posts something as simple and human(e) as "I wish you happiness" look at the ratings from others, the condemnation and hatred. This is not the place for a discussion on why that hatred exists; it just does.
That same hatred exists for LGB people, and it is expressed in the same ways, through violence and repression. That is where the need comes from to band together and make common cause, and that common cause is that human beings should have equal rights.
Of course, we come up against arseholes, even there, like Germaine Greer, or that...person Julie Bindel. Being a lesbian is a political anc conscious decision, apparently, and men (sic) have their cocks cut off so they can ogle naked women with impunity. There is also the regular "trannies riding on the back of the LGB movement" crap. I will be honest, I push the 'T' as hard as I can against prejudice from both sides.
In short, yeah, two different things, but I will never be accepted as 'just' a woman, so I have to take my support where I can. In an ideal world, who knows?
I am transgender
I don't see it as an identity, but rather a descriptive tool. As I've said before, I'm a large, imposing man with a female mind. I'm not transexual-I'm basically non-sexual, as in nothing works, sexually speaking. No erections, nothing. In my opinion, I'm an in-between, and transgender fits me fine.
Wren
I go with you Wren.
I'm transgendered though I'm keeping the lumpy bits cos they're useful to pee with in filthy toilets. I'm seriously thinking of an orchiectomy but no further.
I can just about pass in a dark club and I'm a size 12 to 14 UK size dress. My voice is quite feminine and my male organs are totally inoperable so it's 'No sex please' I'm tranny. I have grown 36 B cup breasts and they feel nice.
I find my friendships with my transgendered friends to be the second most rewarding thing in my life after my love of my wife. Until the internet helped me 'get out there' I lived quite a lonely existance with very few 'normal' male friends.
I far prefer female company and shopping, to male company and sport, except cycling which is gender neutral in my eyes.
I'm out now and quite prepared to be recognised as a 'tranny' when out and about shopping.
Relaxing in Cardiff taking coffee.
To hell with what other people think or say provided they don't physically attack me, I'm okay.
Bev.
Growing old disgracefully.
There are all sorts of ironies here
Including that this is primarily one of semantics, albeit one which is used to categorise real people.
However, the reason why we're arguing, hopefully with good nature, is that we refused to be categorised in the first place, at least in the original binary system - unless of course we were able to change sides. We're natural born dissenters whatever else we are, so don't expect agreement.
Some consider that transsexuals have a greater sense of the black and white elements of binary sex than the average person. The arguments here reinforce and refute it.
Perhaps it's a case of just Cogito ergo sum, good old Descartes; or should that be Existo ergo cogitus?
Finally, the Trans in whatever category gets placed upon us, might mean, we move on or outgrow it, hence some of the dissent - we've transcended a position still occupied by others but don't feel superior, just different.
Whatever each person's feelings or thoughts, I might just end on the fact that we only get one shot at life so take aim carefully.
Angharad
Angharad
Horses for Courses
Different people have different views about different 'grouping' words - and not just with regards to gender / sexuality. Witness the fuss over a certain pop star's inclusion of the words "chola" and "orient" in a recent pop song for an example. In the community she was brought up in, they may be perfectly acceptable terms for those groups of people, but many within those groups prefer other terms, regarding the terms she used as derogatory.
Back to gender / sexuality, in reality, it's a complicated multi-factoral spectrum (gender identity, sexuality, genotype, phenotype, mannerisms, preferred clothing, degree of variation within each category etc.) and there's a sliding scale between those that wouldn't dream of doing anything associated with the opposite physical gender, to those that desire to change their physical appearance to match that of their mental gender. But then you run into the obstacle of opportunity - some may have the opportunity to outwardly express their location on the scale (from those who adopt the appearance of the opposite physical gender occasionally / frequently to those who 'transition'); but others don't - and there are numerous reasons why (e.g. family, work, finance, predicted attitude of state / community etc.). For those who have had gonad realignment surgery (my own term - there's controversy over what to call the relevant surgical procedure), they may prefer to drop the 'T' label as 'down below' and in the chest there's little to distinguish them from a 'genetic' member of that gender.
As for those born 'between genders', even the terminology there's problematic. There has been a campaign by some to replace the term 'intersex' in medical usage with 'disorders of sex development', but again there are people who regard that term as offensive and prefer other terms, e.g. 'variations of sex development' - i.e. terms which do not carry connotations of disease / disability.
Hence finding a 'one-size-fits-all' label is fraught with difficulty. However, it can be useful for dealing with the unenlightened, and defining a relatively inoffensive term (even if it's not strictly accurate) is surely better than letting the media define their own terms ("Gender bender", "sex swap" etc.)
Let's attempt another analogy - paint. Say you want to redecorate your home, and you go to the local DIY store and select a colour from the paint mixing system. There, on display, is a board filled with cards showcasing the hundreds of possible colour choices available. You take great effort to choose exactly the right shade of colour and apply it to your walls. But will the vast majority of visitors notice the shade? No - they'll just note it as the predominent base colour (red / orange / yellow / green / blue / purple / black / white / grey). To your eyes the shade may be closer to red, to theirs it may be closer to orange. OK, there are probably numerous holes in that analogy, but the whole point of 'grouping' / 'umbrella' terms is to provide a label that is accessible to the public.
There are 10 kinds of people in the world - those who understand binary and those who don't...
As the right side of the brain controls the left side of the body, then only left-handers are in their right mind!
This is a weird one
I'm not much of a joiner. I don't do groups or teams or whatever well. I guess that devolves from being a loner as a kid, wandering off and trying to figure things out by observing and listening. I sometimes feel alienated here, which is maybe my insecurities whispering at me or others shouting from the sidelines.
Either way it's there often enough. So labels, I just shrug and go sure, whatever. People need boxes and subgroups to organise things in their world as they see them. I'm not that different. Yeah okay I live as Kristina, a pre op TS if we're being descriptive. So neither a women or a man in one sense yet male according to law. Yet I am a woman, but I'm not. Therefore I am trans in a sense, but I am not, if looked at differently. I am and I'm not but I might be maybe if.... use whatever word you like, I don't really care. But have respect or expect not to receive it.
If it helps to be under an TG umbrella in a downpour, sure, the stragglers always get picked off alone. I've seen enough of sideways looks and subtle condescension. Overt abuse, verbal or physical. Discrimination in various forms. Alone is hard and cold and even if the group is not exactly ideal or perfect or even comfortable, it's all there is.
Kristina
But it fits me
I understand the trouble some people have with the 'transgender' umbrella term, but it really is what I go back to. Crossdresser doesn't fit me, though to an outsider it might seem like that is what I do. Transsexual or transwoman seem to fit those who transition and live in the target gender 100% of the time. But I'm trapped in the middle. Whenever I tell someone I'm 'transgender' I use that as a starting point. It takes a few minutes to really explain how I fit into this space, and to do it I have to point out the other sorts of people who fit in under the term. After an initial conversation, and with poeple I don't really know, 'transgender' is just easier to use in conversation than 'part-time-transitioned-semi-closeted-non-op-but-will-someday-when-the-kids-are-older-transsexual'. People may find their identities get lost in the term 'transgender', but it really is the only one that I feel like I can use.
And it's a good place to start at when I come out or meet someone. Society needs to have a quick way to get us into discussions. They can sort out the details later in the conversation if it is needed. I'm just thankful that so many accept us and talk about us at all. I'm sure most people realize we are diverse group, not unlike (as someone above pointed out) Latinos or Native Americans. Sorry if it offends you, Lisa (and others).
Alison
It's only a label
It's only a label, people like to put labels on other people, it's give them comfort. Bud what is from importance, your meaning a bout your self or the meaning of other people? Me as a post op ts/tg and active in a few ts/tg organisations in Belgium have this meaning that what you think of your self is from greather importance than wat other thinks a bout you. I you feel like a woman, than you are a woman, this is your gender identity, no matter what your biological gender is. Trandgender and transexual are only words to put people like me and you in a catagory so simple is this! Yes i know, that's easy to say. The problem is verry complicated and for lot of ts/tg verry emotional. Maybe a have a solution, its also a label but i think is les painfull. Afther a long and verry emotional discussion in a ts/tg organisation where i being active in we found this word more usefull: GENDERVARIATION (genndervariatie=dutch). The word cover the ccomplete spectrum (cd-tg-ts and also m2f and f2m). The word is also verry usefull in another situation. Me and a lot of other ts/tg hava a problem with the words: Gender Identity Disorder or Gender Disforia, these are medical terms and can easly understand as a mental situation (dmv). In the first place we are not crazy, we are only people with te wrong body, so the word GENDERVARIATION can also used as a medical term.
I hope to have planted seeds for more and a fruitfull discussion about this topic in other ts/tg organisations. sorry for the bad spelling.
Hugs, Belinda
'People' has a nice ring to it...
Labels are problematic. No label is ever a comfortable fit for everyone who is grouped under it and by their very nature labels can be both inclusive and exclusive. More worryingly labels can also have a degree of judgement with them - of better and worse.
I personally don't identify as transgender or even transsexual (though accept the medical community prolly needs some sort of label for me so grudgingly accept it in that capacity). Yet saying all that I choose to still adopt a label for myself in that I identify as female, as a woman. Yet there are those within the 'woman' label that would claim the gender I was assigned at birth would forever exclude me from adopting it whether I was post- or pre- op. Sadly, even within the transsexual community there is a tendancy to sub-divide and exclude, let alone the much broader and often ill fitting LGBT. If someone can come up with better labels then all well and good, I would just ask that I have the choice in what labels I choose to identify with and others also have that right.
In an ideal world, we would be people not labels. :-)
"Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."
Lonesome No More!
I see the term transgender as a type of citizenship. A vague alliance of vaguely similar types that I don't have to be exactly like everyone else within it to belong to. This is my own decision, not a "you should" for others if they have a problem of it. There's another group I belong to, one of these "countries" they seem to want to stick everyone into, that I think was at its best when a Cajun possum farmer, a wealthy Bostonian blueblood and a Nevada cowgirl all recognized a certain quasi-mystical kinship with each other, and were glad that they all shared the same rights and duties, even though their lifestyles were so different and they barely spoke the same language. Now it seems like it's every man for himself and God against all, with all this mistrust and alienation brought about by the emphasis on differences. Identity politics might give us a certain clarity about who exactly we are---("I'm a left-handed soft butch transsexual lesbian, those right handed soft butch transsexual lesbians could never possibly get what it's like to be me.")---but it seems like a fragmented and lonely place to be. Maybe I'm intellectually and politically naive, maybe I'm just weak and can't stand on my own two feet, hoping for something that's basically untenable (like that communism shit I was into as a teen), but I like the idea of sharing an umbrella with a bunch of folks who aren't all identical to me. It gives me warm fuzzies. I don't even mind hanging out under the LGBTQetc umbrella, even though it might ultimately have no more reality to it than one of Kurt Vonnegut's "grandfalloons". Our goals may be somewhat at odds, and we may never be able to understand each other completely, but it seems like we're better humans when we try.
~~Hi Ho. Laika
What borders on stupidity?
Canada and Mexico.
.
Lonesome
AMEN. It is much better to be in a 'loosely' connected group than to be ALONE!
No two CD's are exactly the same, just as no two TS's are the exactly the same. BUT... We have one thing in common that differentiates us from the 'vanilla' people. We don't feel that we fit completely with our apparent gender designation. This one commonality gives us a reason to support each other (being TG).
May it ever be so!
Zip
I'd say something
Something like, "You're the wampeter of my karass," but that one always sounded vaguely sexual -- and I'm sure not by accident. :)
So, I'll just say, "And so it goes."
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Nearly forty comments
and the dust nicely disturbed. I feel this one could run and run but only round in circles.
As long as we respect each other, and I hope that comes as standard with membership here, we all have names - which presumably we're happy with, however unusual some are, so we have something by which to call each other. Maybe we should just stick to that.
Angharad <- (that's me, by the way.)
Angharad
Names
"Hi, my name is Steph, and I am a human being"