Why transistion

This is the often one of the more debated, or argued, subjects with transpeople, who don't know how to explain why they transistion, and the non-transpeople who think they're nutcases who don't accept their birth sex and body. You can talk all you want about it, but it boils down to the understanding the question, "What if you were born in the body of the other sex?"

What would you do? And to a person, the answer is always the same, in different words, "I'd transistion, such as when Jennifer Boylan asked Oprah, "What would you do if you were born with a penis and testicles?" She instantly responded, "I'd cut them off!" That's the crux of the issue non-transpeople don't get until faced with the reality of being in the body of the other sex.

And in the end a transistion isn't really about all the clothes, makeup, etc., the stuff of life we use to get through the world and life, which the media likes to focus on to show transwomen are "real" women by the standards of normal society. They don't get all transwomen want to do is fit in and be accepted, and then get on with their life as women. Nothing more.

I won't argue some like the clothes, makeup, shopping, etc. Many women and many men, although they won't say so, like shopping. It's just all relative to the products. But then many women don't like shopping and don't care about clothes and makeup. If you don't belive that, watch women for awhile and you'll see the greater precentage wear little or no makeup and most wear everyday clothes for convenience, like jeans, t-shirts, etc. Just like men.

But the real reason people transistion is simple. To be physically whole and right. That's it. Nothing more. Once there, they're happy to be who they know they are and wanted to be, just a woman, like any other women, minus the obvious genetic differences which can't be added, not that they wouldn't want that too, only medical science hasn't gotten there yet.

That's not hard to understand. Where transpeople have long wanted, often dreamed and some prayed, to wake up with the right body, the rest don't realize how lucky they are they already have the right body. But then think if you didn't. You wouldn't feel whole or right, and you would want to do everything to change matters? It's the same thoughts, feelings and emotions transpeople have.

Not hard to understand then is it?

Suing for what

Update 12/29/09).--Apparently this may be a hoax. Or so says the attorneys representing Caster Semenya. They're in discussioin with the ASA and IAAF over her status and publicity, but they say a lawsuit isn't in the plans. So, I sit corrected about the story, but not my view if it happens. That won't change, only if the lawsuit is real or not.

Original Post.--I read today (12/28/09) that Caster Semenya is suing the International Associations of Athletics (IAAF) and Athletics South Africa (ASA) for a combined value of $138 Million. Yup, that's a lot of money. It seems, according to the news story, the IAAF and ASA mishandled her tests and public release of the results that she is a hermaphrodite. Like professional (even the "amatuer" ones are professional when the train 24/7) athletes have any right to privacy when they compete?

It's interesting to see almost everyone in the transgender community supported her when she competed in the summer games, and won so handlity it raised obvious flags something was right with this girl. Recently both the IAAF announced she could keep her medals and title from the summer games, but they didn't mention if she would be allowed to compete in future games, or at least not without some changes.

I for one sided with the other women athletes who were wronged. Caster is a unique person, no doubt, but she's far from being female on the same level as, to use a phrase, "normal" athletic women. I felt the complete test results should have been made public so everyone knew who she was. That's no different than any other athletes who assumes test to confirm their sex or drug compliance isn't private.

The problem know is we won't know exactly what she is, what form of hermaphrodite to better understand the situation. All we know is what has been released, which was she was born male with internal testes and possibly an external vagina, and no female reproductive system, not something women have. And the testosterone when the testes worked clearly effected her body and abilities, and unfairly as the other women athletes maintain. And I agree.

What the transcommunity fails to understand is that this isn't about one person alone, but one person in context. The international athletics organization have established rules for transpeple to compete, and Ms. Semenya didn't meet the critieria to compete in women's events as a woman or a (trans)woman. It's that simple.

And now she's suing. I'm sorry for her but, as I've said before, she stepped into the spotlight to compete, and winning, as she clearly did, put her being and history into the spotlight. She can't say now she was damaged and wants compensation for the embarassment and mental damages. She wanted to run and even if she knew the consequences or not, she knew she would get attention.

That doesn't merit suing the organizers. She has a legitimate complaint against some people in South Africa who let her compete despite knowing the truth, which we'll never know, yet anyway. The trial may open those pages. But she doesn't have a complaint beyond that. She should have known about herself and her condition, and she still wanted to compete.

No doubt she was a victim of gender politics. No doubt she was used by the ASA for their agenda. And for that she deserves some compensation. But she doesn't deserve to add to the gender politics herself by making her the issue. And I expect the ASA and IAAF will settle the matter for considerably less to avoid the publicity of a trial.

And that's the sad part of the whole thing. She's adding to the calamity, putting herself in the spotlight again. And maybe this time we'll get more information about her and the situation, which is exactly the opposite of what she wants, the public release of the truth. But she did flip the light switch on herself, and for that, she has no one else to blame.

And in the end, she proved she's as normal as everyone else. It's not about what happened. It's about the money.

A must read

Recently I found a blog about a mother with a young girl in transistion (ok, meaning born physically a boy and mentally a girl, and if you can't grasp that, then think of a girl born with a physical condition different than most girls). It's about Jen and her daughter Hope, found here. I can't begin to imagine all the issues being a mother and mom with someone like Hope, just trying to provide a safe environment for her to grow up surrounded by the world we live in today.

She does it with character and courage, for both Hope and herself. The number of families with transchildren isn't really known, and really shouldn't be known so the families can simply be families and not live in fear of public disclosure or being ostracized by friends and neighbor, because in the end, children are who they are. They don't hide themselves, only the truth occasionally when it's not on their side (haven't we all done that?).

It's only the transchildren who are pressured by their parents and siblings into not being themselves. These children learn to hide their innate sense of being in the clothes and behavior of their birth sex because it's expected. The will do this until they can open and express themselves as they've always known and felt. It's the sad reality parents don't see their children to help them than suppress, and some even oppress, them.

Rather than teaching love to their children, they're teaching the opposite, which will be expressed as angry, hate, and so on as they know and fear being discovered and the consequences. Worse so, they're teaching self-hate, which turns into other outlets to hide themselves. And this often leads to depression and all to often suicide, which is several times higher then non-trans children and teens.

But here we find a woman believing in her child to be themselves, and support that as best she knows, and facing all the problems of raising a daughter, an exceptional one at that. Thanks Jen for sharing.

Don't speak for me

I am tired of theses article and columns on "What is..." this or that type of sexual or gender identity. Like everyone has to inform the reader what sex and gender is all about. Kinda' like Sex and Gender 101. Well, it's just your opinion, as is mine on the same issue, but I don't speak for you and you don't speak for me. So stop trying to provide the definitive view of it because you think your understanding is right or better.

Yes, I know there are some obvious common language that fits the definition of sex and gender, but that's not the issue here. It's the definition of the terms, such as transgender and transsexual. There are as many definitions as Baskin-Robbins has had flavors in their history, and all are variations of many used before. Not even the medical community has common definitions outside of official books on standards such as the DSM.

And yes, I know I also define and use the terms and other words in the same idea, but it's always for the discussion and not meant for anything beyond that or for anyone else, just to ensure points and ideas in the essay are understandable. After that, the terms don't apply to anything or anyone else, not even me. Nothing more and nothing less. Not better or right, just mine then.

And yes, I have a fundamental definition I believe is fair and right for me, but that's it, just me. I don't expect anyone to accept my definitions, as I don't accept other people's definition. It's how I see myself, but I don't see others or think others should see themselves or see me. So, in the end, speak only for yourself. And don't speak for me.

Backward thinking

After President Obama signed the Hate Crime bill Wednesday (10/28/09) adding sexual orientation and gender identity to the list of people protecting, the religious and conservative "family values" organization came out of the woodwork to market the idea that this is wrong, somehow against America and "normal" values. Oh, how backward thinking they are and how they never will understand, and that's because they don't want to, see the truth to their own false arguments.

What they preach is that these are additional values on top of the rest of the rights and protections we have as citizens, and it creates special rights and protections. Well, it does protect gay people and transpeople, no doubt, but those people are not identitifed in the Civil Rights Act for protections which the rest of us have. They're excluded by definition and therefore excluded from rights and protections based on who they are.

The religious and conservatives need to refresh their understanding of the law, because they have it backwards. They have been denying rights and protections to gay people and transpeople under any law, and specifically excluding them from any rights and protections we have based on being homosexual or transgender. That's not what faith is about, and certainly not what God and Jesus would preach, and it's not American.

It's pure and simple discrimination on their part. And their arguments are the stuff of cow pasture material, and not worth much else. It's based on falsehoods and misunderstandings, all intentional to confuse people from the truth. And lying in the name of God isn't good, right or fair. They know that and should apologize to the transpeople of this country for their bigotry and hatred.

They know God accepts everyone, whatever their faith or religion, whatever your values and views, and whatever your sense of being. They know God does understand human diversity and while maybe not liking the violence and injustices done by people, he will accept them to see they understand the errors of the ways and life.

And they know Jesus would sit down and cherish transpeople as he would everyone else, to speak of love and kindness, and to speak against the words of hate. They know it's about acceptance. They know that, and still they speak against other human beings who have done nothing wrong or anything against the word of God or the teachings of Jesus.

In the end when they die and meet God, God will admonish them for the hatred and will remind them how wrong they were to treat people like they did and how backwards thinking they were when the preached of hatred and bigotry. And all the transpeople will still be admitted to heaven in spite of all their misguided rants.

Body Consciousness

I was struck the thought, which isn't rare but none to date have been really new, or news for that matter, that we all have a consciousness about our body, from really very little to the extreme, which isn't the vast majority of transpeople who want to be and live as the other sex and gender, with the exception of course of some like Amanda Lepore. But then she's extreme like many women who have undergone extensive and numerous cosmetic surgeries to change their body, face, and whatever else they don't like about themselves to be better accepted or beautiful.

What struck me was the consciousness of transpeople that makes their experience unique and separate from everyone else's experience. We all have some physical aspect of ourself we don't like, even hate, and wouldn't mind changing it. I'm no exception there as I was frequently reminded of what I wasn't when I was young. Being self-conscious about my body then would be an understatement. And it hasn't changed as I've aged, only the body getting older.

But what differentiates transpeople is the one thing about themselves no else experiences and can't understand why they want to change it. Simply their gentalia. It's what Jennifer Boylan described on the Oprah show once about the sex reassignment surgery all transwomen go through to become physicall (as medically possible) and legally female. All states require it to change your birth certificate, minus only two states to date which don't, Tennessee and Ohio.

Anyway, Jennifer Boylan explained why transwomen want a vagina to become as whole for themselves as women and female as possible, and to rid their body of the last vestage of maleness. When Oprah questioned why, Jennfer replied, "What would you do if you were born a boy with a penis?"

As you can imagine, Oprah said, "I'd cut it off!" All the explanation in the world about why won't match that one question, to translate their body consciousness to someone else in a way they can begin to understand. And that is the crux of the issue, if you can understand being born and living with your identity in the body of the opposite sex, then you know what's it like to be a transperson.

That's the defining part because the vast majority of men and women take their gentalia for granted. It's simply their innate sense of themselves and their body. They match. They may worry about other features but very rarely that, although some men and women have cosmetic surgery there too, but to fix or enhance the existing gentalia, not to change sex, but they don't know the feeling of hating being another sex.

And that's only that which makes transpeople different. Everything else is the same and why in the end we're all the same in just wanting to be comfortable in our own skin and with our own body. All they want is to be like everyone else where the body and mind are innately the same. That's not hard to understand, just being human and being yourself.

It escapes me

It escapes about marriages when one of the partners transistions. I was reading a forum where a women in transistion announced her (formerly his) wife was leaving her. And she was devasted. Like what didn't she see? This (in transistion) woman was dismayed her wife wan'ts as loving anymore and wasn't in love with her anymore. Like that's new or news?

I don't mean to be hard with these women but I'd baffled what they missed in understanding who and what their partner married and what they expected during their marriage. It wasn't a post-transistion lesbian marriage. Heterosexual women want to be married to men. To love and be loved by a man, not a post-transistion woman. What's not to understand?

And the transcommunity is always sorry about it. But no one wants to talk about the elephant in their marriage, like were you consciously blind or ignorant of the reality it's more than likely than not (like 90% or better) your marriage will end and your family disingrated into angry people, feeling betrayed by their husband and father. And it will take many years to resolve that, if ever.

I've been through a divorce, a very amicable one, but not for any transistion, just our lives and ourselves were so radically different we decided to let the other one find someone they would want to love and be loved. We've still been friends over the years after the divorce, and her second marriage. And we know we did the right thing.

But had either of us decided to transistion, it would simply be the choice of the other one to accept and make the decision to leave the marriage or stay with the new person. As much as transistioning women think it's only their body changes, everything changes, and everything between them and about them changes. What's not to see there?

But apparently it's easier to hope than see reality. It's easier to avoid the question to their partner, "What is best for you?" It's easier to just continue to think everyone will understand and everyone will adjust or adapt to what you want and who you become. Except it doesn't happen.

Then the truth and reality is standing there immediately in front of you as they turn the heads away and then turn their backs to you. And you are feel betrayed and unloved. Ok, that's understandable and lamentable. But it's not a fairy tale where everything works out and everyone lives happy ever after.

That's overstating the scenario because I know in-transistion women see and know what's going on. They have those conversations with their partner. But almost all of them subconsciously seem to think it will work out and their partner will be there through and after their transistion, and to want to stay married to them. It's about love, and it's always blind.

That's a sad reality but a true one. Transistions involve families, something often or frequently lost on those transistioning because the transistion takes so much time, energy and focus on it and everything around it, loved ones are just another factor in it. Important, but still not fully supported by those transistioning, which leads to the surprises by their partner and family.

This is all too often true across the lifestories of those transistioning and usually only seen in hindsight, when it should always be there, even above the transistion. It's why some don't transistion, despite the overwhelming feelings to transistion. They fear the loss of loved ones more. But this isn't commonly known because these people aren't visible or vocal.

And so we hear or read about another marriage dissolving from a transistion. Sympathy and empathy are helpful, but honesty would be better.

transistion or die

Reading the blogs and forums over Mike Penner - Christine Daniels' suicide, I keep reading about the (trans)people who faced the choice to "transistion or die." It's always interesting to read because they always say it in hindsight. I say always because those who succeed can't speak for themselves. But those who transistioned never talked about suicide, let alone attempt it, before or during their transistion.

So, it becomes a handy excuse or reason to transistion. I had to transistion because I would die. Really? I mean you lived to the moment you decided to transistion. You lived through your transistion. And you lived after your transistion. So, exactly where was this sense of suicide?

In truth it wasn't there. They may have talked about thoughts or feelings of suciide - note it's now a major aspect of anti-depressant warnings, but suicide is about a sense of failure. It's about being so depressed about yourself, and in your world and life, that you sense it's an answer. You can argue the rightness or wrongness of it, it's real at the time.

But it's only real in those who succeeded and the few who survived an attempt. And I suspect, it's less about their transistion, than fitting it into their life and world. They knew who they were, but they couldn't reconcile that with the rest of the world and everyone else in their life. There was no place for them.

Many argue transpeople fit into the suicide potential model, and it's true for some. But it's not true it fits into suicide, only those who attempt it and sadly those who succeed. Making suicide a reason doesn't make it right or make any decision you think is based on it right. Only handy to believe you made the right decision.

Understand, I'm not condeming those who use the term. It's helps knowing the decision to transistion was right. Only, it wasn't a reason to transistion. We choose to live and then we choose to transistion. It's disingenuous to use suicide as a reason when it was the choice we made than the excuse we use.

Gender politics

Why is it a sad day for women's international track and field sports? It was announced that the test resutls for Caster Sememya won't be released to the public, but she will get to keep the title to the races and title she won in Berlin in August. Why does this smell of politics between the South African sports union and the international sports federation? And under the table deal to keep from going public with the obvious?

So, what about all those tests, some of which were leaked and some of which prompted the doctors in South Africa to recommend she not go and compete in Berlin? Did they lie? Hardly. And what if in time, it is proven she is not female by birth and has not gone through a transistion required of transathletes, and in truth is an underdeveloped boy? And maybe the testes woke up to start working, which may explain the sudden burst in her times in less than two years.

I'm sorry for her, but being raised female doesn't make you physically female if the genes and resultant developement isn't there. The earlier repots cited she didn't have a female reproductive system - meaning no ovaries or uterus, she had undedescended testes, and she had elevated level of testosterone, even higher than normal female athletes. A girl she may be, but a female she is not.

I'm sorry for all the women athletes who were cheated of the truth and cheated of fair competition. In order to save face, organizers decided one person was above the rest. That's discrimination at best, and whatever you want to call it at worse. I think, all apologies aside to Caster, the truth should be revealed. It has in the past for female athletes, so why is this case different?

Everyone should have been up front about this. She put herself on center stage in Berlin. She should accept the consequences of that and the decisions what's fair for the sport, not herself, which seems what is happening. And the leaders are simply exercising gender politics as usual.

It escapes me

The studies show the first thing people look at and check when meeting someone new, or just watchiing people for that matter, is the face, followed by their facial expressions. The second, if they can, is the voice. And the rest are the overall person or body, their presentation, their expressions and behavior, and so on down the line.

It's human nature, and in spite of what we eventually like about them, we all follow this general pattern when we look at people. And as the studies have shown, it's down quickly and almost conclusively where it's difficult to change their initial impression. Hard as we may try, it's already done and the best we can do is make them rethink it.

So, do transwomen (I'll use this to dentote those in transistion), and post-transistion women (for legally recognized women who have finished and have had SRS and their documents changed) not know this? How many times have you seen one (either) and knew instantly they weren't female (by birth)? And how long did it take you to then identify them as former trans or post-trans (since you can't tell the difference from the outside)?

This is the argument the transcommunity makes about passing and the old issue, those who pass disappear into society away from the transcommunity, except those publically out or known. Those who don't are stuck. But they don't have to be stuck in some ways. It's called cosmetic facial surgery and there are quite a number of surgeons who will change the masculine facial feature to feminine features.

It's why some in the transcommunity will tell any transwoman and especially all post-transistion women, to get the facial surgery first if you can afford. It's about the impression and passing. You can and will get SRS later. Pretty straight-forward and good advice. So why do so many don't heed it when they can afford it?

This is what escapes me. When you're obvious, all the makeup, hair and clothes won't hide it. You can't do much about the voice, only good voice therapy works if at all, but you can do a lot about the face. I'm not talking pretty or better, but at least something plain or ordinary.

I know the answer. All transwomen want to get to their SRS and get their documents changed to be officiallly "female" and get on with their life. Except when they don't pass enough to get past the first impression, what good is it? Yes, I know they want to be and live as women, and they get there. But if it makes life harder because people see you differently as you present yourself, what's so good about it?

Even some of famous post-transistion women will tell you about your transistion, "Get facial surgery!" It overcomes 90% of the initial problems in life. If they see the face, they'll pretty much be more receptive and accepting of you as a woman than seeing a male face in female attire. That's the proverbial "man in a dress" they constantly argue about and what the public sees.

And that hurts other transwomen and post-transition women who don't pass enough. And it's why 90% of the post-transistion women, those who pass, run away from the term trans-anything and the transcommunity as fast as they can. They are and live as women, nothing else. They've long earned and deserve it.

So, it's always a "Duh?" moment when I see a transwoman and especially a post-transistion woman with a male or male-like face. They were rich enough to get through their transistion (since few health insurance plans cover much if anything with one), why didn't they spend $10-15K for facial surgery to help? It escapes me.

It's almost like they want to be separate from women, they don't want to disappear from the identity, and they want the label transwoman. I know it's not true, but it certainly appears either that way to me, that they're not being honest with themselves about their looks or their being blind about it. Overly critical, yes, I know, but I just don't see it.

And it's why it always escapes me.

Not even on-line

China has started to ban people in on-line games to be different. I don't mean a different characters, but a different gender. This was reported (article) that they've hired a company to use facial recognition software of the person Webcam image to determine if they're male or female.

And then you're allowed to create only names and characters under that gender. The commens are interesting, but the whole thing misses the real issue. Not only are they forciing the gender binary, they're forcing people into only those of the birth sex. Talk about killing the interest and creativity.

And this isn't not for what they say, the safety of women, but to actual make it worse for women, but establishing themselves as women so everyone will know. They can't play being male characters, so they're already at a disadvantage when the boys know they're girls.

Talk about a really bad idea. And if a boy is mistaken for a girl or a girl for a boy? What then? They have to provide a birth certificate they're really who they say they are? Yes, Mr. Chinese leader, there are people who want to be other people, even other genders on-line, just for fun.

It's just fun folks, don't make it worse.

Sorta being out

I was wandering the Internet, looking at Websites with alternative views of issues (not all alternative, some are too much or too extreme to bother with trying to understand them or worse have a discussion with the). Anyway I ran across the Feministing blog site. I won't argue that I'm more a (male) feminist than not. I hate all the rules, laws, and crap men, society, employers, etal. give women.

Anyway, on the blog is a post by a sorta, or pseudo, stealth transwoman, which is a contradiction in itself. As much as transwomen try to live stealth and completely deny or hide their past identity and status, it's impossible. That's an issue in the transcommunity argued to no end, especially by transwomen saying they're stealth, but really not because some people know and some of their past records haven't been changed.

But that's not the point here, which by the way a simple blood test will out any transperson and you're faced with the question by the doctor, "So, there's seems to be a difference between your blood results (genetic sex) and your documents, can you explain?" And so that argument goes. But it's another issues that confusing.

It's these transwomen who are sorta' out because the Internet allows you to hide your identity through pseudoname(s) and identities, which is excactly what at least one on this blog site (that I read and probably more) said she is, in between being stealth and being public. The latter through her on-line name.

But what bothers me the me the most is their hypocracy. They argue for a position or view on some issue, they stand up and speak, but then hide behind a false name and no identity. If you believe what you say, and you want people to believe what you say, then stand up for yourself as yourself. I do that here and will always do that. That doesn't make me better or smarter, just there.

More importantly, it does make me honest. If we want to believe you then put a name and face to the voice and words. Otherwise, you're no worse than a false prophet, because we don't know who you are. And you are what this writer wrote in the entry, you're dishonest at best and I don't know yet at worst. I may agree with your words but until I know who you are, I won't agree with you.

That takes a real name and face. And sorry, using being a transwoman and stealth a necessity isn't a reason, it's a cope-out. I know transwomen are the victims of many people who hate them, want to deny them rights and protections, or simply don't want to know they're living and working in this country. Transphobia against several hundred thousand people is discrimination.

That's why it's understandable maybe as much as 90% of legally recognized (post-transistion) women live pseudo-stealth life and world where only a few people know and most of their documents are correct. It's their safety and security to be stealth. But then you can't be publically vocal, that's dishonest and lying. I won't say anything with my Website or blogs that I wouldn't say in a public place.

And I am there name, face and voice. Anything less is dishonest.

Female and male

Why does everyone, and especially researchers in gender issues, make sex and gender an "or" thing, and mutually exclusive? Some psychologists have long argued there are no characteristics, expressions or behaviors which are universally inclusive to and mutually excluse of either gender. There are simply human characteristics where cultures and societies have establish general norms for each. And all have overlaps within those norms.

So why are researchers trying to prove this or that about human development as male or female when it's male and female. With the exception of a few very rare girls with no testosterone, we al were born with andl have throughout our life male and female hormones in our body and mind, which are necessary for the full operation and phyisiology of our body and mind.

We all have expressions and behaviors which cross sex and gender lines. Yes, everyone. We're all on the gender continuum from nearly all female and women to the nearly all male and men. It's simply the range of human beings. The median for each gender isn't that far from the center. And there is far more differences and a wider range of differences within one sex or gender than there are between the sexes and genders.

The only real difference is the reality of our genes, but even there, we're still a mix. We may have XX or XY chromosome but it's the genes inside and the epigenomes which determine matters, not the just the type of the pair. And some people have extra genes, some with conditions were the genes and hormones don't work, and so on down the line of people. Simply the normal and natural variation of people.

So, why do we persist in the binary rule of sex and gender? It never existed in evolution and nature and only exists as percieved social norm.

So, in the end, it's not about the "or" but the "and" between male and female. We're simply both and I find the continued work to define us as different absurb and ignores the commomality between the sexes and genders, all of them and not just two. We are simply people, living with what we're given and expressing and behaving as we know ourselves, just being.

If societies want to differentiate because of legal necessities and other reasons, ok, I'm cool with that. After all there are no good and valid reasons to differentiate,. And worse, to formalize the binary outside those needs isn't necessary when it discriminates people who don't fit the binary.

I've never understood it, why people must make that identity if something is male or female under the assumption it's mutually exclusive. Guys try hard not to be seen as feminine in any way or manner, forgetting they're already there to some degree, along every other guy. It's our society to make guys "male", even if it's dumb, stupid and wrong.

And even the self-help psychologists - and the pseudo one with fake degrees - reinforce it with the books on the differences between the genders, forgetting we're 98+% alike. Focusing on the small differences, which aren't universally inclusive or exclusive, doesn't help.

I'm not arguing evolution gave each sex and gender differences, and it's part of our brain and physiology. It was necessary for survival and becoming a thinking species. And many difference, experiments in nature, fell by the wayside as individuals didn't survive or pass on the traits. As animals, we're no different than the rest of the animal kingdom.

It's only our higher socialization and thinking which separates us now. But imposing social norms from that evolution is false, when you can find other cultures or societies which don't follow it or do the opposite. Norm is relative, not absolute and not scientifically based in our genes. And it also evolves with time and changes.

So, can we quit the male or female thing and try the male and female thing? It's far closer to reality and the truth. It's about the vastness of humanness we share that matters than the few and small degree of differences.

No thinking out loud

Why is that many people on forums don't allow just thinking out loud? Why are they so touchy that if you ask questions you get verbally pummelled? And if you ask questions just to open the discussion to more than just a us-versus-them mentality, you really get verbally pummelled?

As I've long told folks, I'm a tavern conversationalist. It's about just being in a place where people relax and enjoy the company and the converation in an open, light but still serious, humorous, and everything else you know and expect mode in a tavern on a Friday night. Just people talking and thinking out loud. Sometimes challenging, but always in jest. And always with a smile.

But in forums, if you don't agree, they rail at you like you're the enemy of their group. And then they wonder why people stop posting, stop responding and sometimes just leave. Open discussions aren't the allowed. And above all, don't play devil's advocate or express sarcasm. But it's also the case where some longtime members are allowed to do that, even play devil's advocate to provoke or prod or say worse things than you, but they're excused because they part of the group.

The rest of us, whether asking innocent or reasonable questions or just expressing our opinion, where everyone's opinion is equal and equally important, however, don't get the same response or treatment, even just being courteous or fair to all sides and views, but get treated like shit. That's not an exageration. They forget the discussion and go after the person.

And that's where they wonder why people get angry, and at them for being inconsiderate, unaccepting and hypocritical. They just don't seem to get what they have done and are doing. And when the owners and moderators support them, you begin to realize, it's never about being a forum. It's about a clique and club. A members-only club where others aren't allowed to participate at their level.

But then I've never been someone who just goes along. I've always asked the obvious question in opposition, always just to wake people up, make a point the discussion, or expresss alternative ideas. I like see all sides of an argument, even if I don't agree and even become angry. It's the right of people to express themselves and ours to listen. And it you aren't one of them, you become one of "them", the enemy. And I've been warned if not booted off forums for that (see past entries).

Anyway, it's just an observation. And I'll likely never stop being the one who asking those question and speaking from outside the box, but always tongue-in-cheek or with a smile. I'm only sad they just don't see that, take themselves too seriously and don't see their narrowness and attitude toward others.

What women assume

What women assume about their bodies, male to female transwomen must learn. That's probably the hardest thing for (genetic) women to understand what transwomen (in and post transistion women) have to relearn about their bodies and mind. During a transistion, hormone replacement therapy (hrt) and sex reassignment surgery - vaginoplasty (srs) changes everything. It's like going through puberty and menopause simultaneously in 2-3 years.

Women know what that would do physically and mentally and fortunately find 40 years between them to be their saving grace. But transwomen don't have that luxury, they already recognize and identify as female and women and want to transistion to physically be and live as women. It's who they are and what they go through to get congruence between the mind and body.

But many women just don't see and often wonder, some criticizing, transwomen for the whole array of issues, from just being trans to going through some periods which they knew years ago as girls. When you're older, becoming a girl and a meneopausal woman at the same time isn't often fun. Sometimes, you're a mental and emotional mess, but you plod through and get on with life.

And once you're through, you can be who you are, simply a woman and as female as medically possible today. You're not trans anything. You're still yourself of old, we all have histories. But they're now just one of many women in the world. And why that's hard to understand escapes me as transwomen aren't trying to change anything or stand up to force some issue.

They're just tryiing to get through life and work. And while women can and usually are gracious (ok, most women) with other women about what they go through, why can't they find the same graciousness with transwomen? And post-transistion women face many of the same health issues and risks, their bodies adapt to some of their family's history with women.

Even though women assume what they've learned over their life physically as girls and then women, it's all brand new to transwomen. While it's not the same, it's very similar. Female hormones have the same effect on the body and mind of both, one only has a different starting point from and with their genes.

The sad gift of being born with a body which conflicts with their mind and identity. That's all. And fixable. But with a huge learning curve not just to compress the physical and mental changes of puberty, often on an older (male) body, but also the social changes of living, just being in the world with the rest of us.

I won't ague that all transwomen pass what we normally expect of women, especially physically, but it doesn't change their heart and mind. They have to live with it and try. The rest, those who does pass, seems to escape the same judgement and criticism because we don't know. So what's the difference with just accepting all of them?

Even though we accept women who aren't the norm, but being born women, we give them the grace to be different. We don't condemn all women when we don't like a few. But some, and even women, do for the obvious transwomen. They assume the few are the all, and nothing could be further from the truth as the vast majority of transwomen pass and never discovered.

But they all go through the same process, the transistion, with all it's issues and problems. Ones women assume as normal and natural. But to transwomen, it's all brand new and need of help and support from women to understand and live with. Is it so hard you can't share and be a friend?

Both learn, the transwomen to just be women and women to have a new friend and renew what they already know. And you might even be surprised to learn something new about yourself too.

Stupid Media

I know this has been discussed, cussed and argued to death, but you would think the media would get it right when describing post-transistion women and now girls. And get it right when presenting the history and the perspective of themselves and their transistin. But I also know the media is about the story and more often the sensationalism than the truth and reality.

But there are times you have to shout at them, "What don't you understand?"

My case in point is an article about an interview with Kim Petras, article. The headlines reads, "Gender reassignment: 'I always wanted to be a girl...'", except she, as all transwomen and girls, don't want to "be" a girl, but as in the article, "I always wanted to live as a little girl." Semantics, but big difference.

Transwomen already know they're girls and women, they just want to able to transistion and live as one, to be legally and medically recognized as female. The article fails to convey that point, especially since they've written about other transwomen. But then what can you expect from some male journalist? Ok, kidding, but they're lack of professionalism and understanding is obvious.

The same applies to transmen (female to male transpeople). It's not about what you want to be, that's given. It's about how you want to life. And that's what the transisiton is for, to get through and get on with your life as you know yourself to be. You don't become the other sex/gender, because you already are, you just want to body to match.

While it appears a semantic argument, it's the essential argument in the description because this is where people ask, "So, you were a man (or boy in her case) and you wanted to be a woman (or girl in her case)?" No, not even close because they don't see themselves as a man or a boy, they're simply posing as one to get through life.

It's not about the body as the determining factor, but the mind, how and what it sees the person. It's documented transpeople self-identify as the opposite sex or gender somewhere between 3 and 6 from their interactions with other children. They don't see themselves as their birth sex and gender, but the opposite, and they see the contradiction with their body, and why they want to change the body.

So, if they can get it, why can't the media? Almost every time the media still confuses this issue about the person. And every time they get verbally pummelled by the transcommunity for misidentifying the person and misunderstanding the issue. And every time the media doesn't change except on rare occasion, usually by a journalist writing a different story.

Anyway, it's just a rant at the media. Kim Petras just wants a life and future as a girl and woman, and even if she knows she's the darling of the media for transpeople and doing an excellent job, she deserves that life and future. And without the media keep reminding her of the past and keep screwing it up.

Posing

I'm often reading bits and pieces of people's life story, usually post in a blog, articles, chapters in book, wherever, and like to find interesting nuggets of ideas, for me anyway, to think and write about. I was struck by one recently about a woman who born, raised and lived male for a long time before transistioning.

That's not new as there are more late (post-40) transpeople transistioning than ever, as the publicity about them eases and the medical community is more understanding to help those going through a transistion. There is a higher proportion today for young, even children and teenagers, transistiong as it's better for them then and in their future, and because the medical community finally got smart enough to treat them.

But that's not the point here. I was struck with the biography of one who said she "posed as a man" throughout her adult life. And that's probably the best word to describe it, posing. Because that's what transpeople do in the life before their transistion. They live a lie and they transistion to be true and truthful. True to themselves and truthful to the world.

And all the time before was just posing as their birth sex and gender. They simply passed to get through life. Sometimes they tried hard to live as that sex and gender, as you read in some of the biographies, but always in the end found it too much to live a lie. They transistioned into themselves.

And that is what's often not understood. Many ask a transwoman, "So you were a man and you switched sex (or gender) to live as a woman?" Well, that's the wrong question because they never really were a man, but only posed as one. It's the wrong question because they never saw themselves let alone believed themselves to be a man.

They simply posed as one. They acted it out, maybe partly to try to convince themselves they're not a transperson, but mostly to hide themselves from the world. They didn't want the world to see and know, so they posed. Until it overwhelmed them. The posing, the charade becomes a weight so much if crushes them mentally and emotionally.

The posing slowly kills their heart, soul and spirit. And when they shed the identity under the posing, they find their freedom, to be themselves, no posing, no acts, nothing but themselves. So don't judge a transperson from their past, judge by their present, because before it was all just posing.

Double Standard

I was reading the case in Australia where two transmen (men born female) won the right for legal recognition as male despite not complying with the law to have hysterectomies, see article. The Gender Reassignment Act requires transwomen (male to female) to have sex reassignment surgery and transmen to have a hysterectomy to ensure they don't have the reproductive organs of their birth sex.

The judge granted their legal recognition in violation of the law and the Attorney General there is fighting the court order. While that seems a fair standard, here in the United States, we have a double standard. Transwomen have the same requirements for legal recogntion, meaning getting your birth certificate changed, which is sex reassignment surgery, rarely covered by insurance and costs $15-20K.

The difference here is transmen only have to have hrt and "therapy" for one year to certify they're being and living as men. No surgery required even though almost all have a double mastectomy to get the male feeling of their chest without breasts. Only a very few have hysterectomies, and mostly to remove the possible of cancer later in life. And even fewer transmen go for sex reassignment surgery, which is problematic and expensive.

This means transwomen take 3-5 years to transision, although it can be done in a year or so if you pass, have money and very motivated with a good therapist and physician, while transmen usually transistion in 1-2 years, often about a year as male hrt is quick and very effective after a few months. Transmen usually fully assimilate into life as men before the one year period.

Transistions for transwomen often costs $30-50K with minimal surgeries and other expenses and can cost $50-100K with the suite of surgeries. Younger transwomen transistion for $20-25K because they easily pass and integrate easier into society. Ah, the advantages of youth and the reason the rate of young transwomen is growing. Do it young and have a life as a woman.

Transistion for transmen often only costs about half the common costs for transwomen since surgery isn't a necessity and sometimes mastectomies can be covered by insurance for health reasons. This means it's cheaper and quicker to transistion from female to male than the reverse.

So the problem? The standard. As we saw in the case of the Oregon transman who kept his female reproductive organs to have a baby when his wife couldn't, there's a disconnect between what's male and being a man than what's female and being a woman. The double standard for women apply more so to transwomen, a double standard on an already existing double standard.

But my point is about the surgeries. And while the transcommunity will argue it's not about the surgery because being a man or a woman is more mental than physical, it is about both. And it's unfair to make transwomen go down a different legal path than transmen. You can't give a woman a penis, although surgeons have made strides through grafts and/or artificial means, but you can give a man a vagina sans the reproductiive parts.

And so the standard sits for legal recognition, transmen can keep their female anatomy as men, but transwomen can't keep the male anatomy. I can understand the latter because no woman wants a penis and testicles. I can't understand the former, why a man wants to keep his ovaries and womb to get and be pregnant. While these will atrophy with hrt (Oregon man stopped hrt to become pregnant), it's the logic of it.

I agree with the Gender Reassignment Act in Australia. It clearly and fairly levels the standards between and for transpeople. It's fair and reasonable. And I hope he wins the day. I'm sorry for the two transmen, but they knew the standards and they decided not to comply. They should be held accountable and do what the rest of transpeople have to do. That's also a fair standard.

Update to letter

I wrote a "Dear President" letter, here, and I need to update it from additional information. I read that the Department of Justice (DOJ) is obligated to defend all lawsuits against the government, no matter how much they think the lawsuit is right and the law wrong. It's the law and their agency responsibility. And I ragged on the President about doing this.

And I later learned what the DOJ did to defend the law which, while still making me question the President's real view on this issue, makes it more acceptable. I learned the DOJ only challenged the law on some absurb aspect of the law which any good judge will throw out and allow the lawsuit to continue. I also learned, however, that the LGBT community, specifically the gay (men) community, want the judge to throw the lawsuit out.

It seems the challenge itself doesn't really challenge DOMA but the application of it to the couple in California where the application of DOMA doesn't apply to their case. In their view, it's a bad case to challenge DOMA. So while the President and the Attorney General are trying to put a good face and spin on a no win situation for them, the other side is hoping the case loses.

Kinda' reverse logic at work. So why not drop the lawsuit and find a better case? Or better yet, the President do what he promised, ask Congress to repeal DOMA? But that we know he won't because Congress won't, not with 2010 elections a year away and many of them up for re-election and facing the voters over marriage issues.

But still Congress should repleal DOMA. It's a dumb, politically minded and intented law, and has no value for real human rights.

Reparative Therapy

Well, yesterday (8/5/09) the American Psychological Association issued a press release about a report which repudiates reparative therapy, or so you would think if you read the summary (you can get their statement and link to full report. They call reparative therapy "sexual orientation change efforts (SOCE)", like a fancy name makes it different, scientific or more important.

Anyway, the APA clearly states that homosexuality is not a mental disorder and can't not be changed. But then they hedge their bets saying one's personal faith and religions, especially when practiced as part of an organized church or group, can create conflicts in the individual, and thus should be treated.

Not for their homosexuality, but for the conflicts with their sexual orientation and their faith, religion or church. The APA has long removed homosexuality from the DSM standards and have long criticized reparative therapy, and you would think this would put the final nail in the coffin for reapartive therapy.

Or so you would think. So why hedge over religion and give the homophobic religious groups the right to continue to pursue reparative therapy disguised as religious or faith healing? This isn't going to change their practice, and may in fact cement it with the APA subtle blessing, meaning calling their efforts scientific.

After all they're only trying to help the person with their faith to rid them of their homosexuality. I doubt this will stop the religious folks from saying it's clear then that homosexuality can be healed through religion or faith. It's the person who has lost or misunderstand what God is saying to them. Or so they can say.

All that despite the evidence show reparative therapy has not and does not work, and they give the religous community an out, and to continue, even if they misunderstand and misuse the APA report and recommendations. All this is like the APA saying. "We're absolutely certain about homosexuality, but we could be wrong about their faith and their homosexuality."

Yeah right. The status quo officially rolls on.

Cool Interview

Update 10/12/09.--The video has been removed by YouTube due to copyrights, so you'll have to find it elsewhere or snippets. So much for a cool interview. But it doesn't change the substance of the essay.

This is a cool interview with Kim Petras. I still think she shows how stupid psychologists and psychiatrists who believe in reparative therapy for young transgender people or believe children don't or can't understand let alone know their gender identity. There are many who believe the opposite and supporting changes in the DSM-IVTR and upcoming DSM-V. The APA would do well to just listen.


Also found on YouTube

I think her story shows just how far off therapists are who deny a child or teen's gender identity, expression and behavior are with their theories and rules regarding medical help to transistion when it's clearly diagnosed. She also show the professionals who are helping young transgender children and teens are working. The greatest harm with the transistion for any young person when it's clearly identified, is to delay it, especially past purberty. You can't undo puberty and transistioning begining at and during puberty, as Kim demonstrates, proves it works.

And while I realize Kim now is a very public (young) spokeswoman for transpeople, especially transchildren/teens, which she seems to be doing very well, she deserves a life, especially where her past was something long ago. We see her as she is, a terrific young woman, and it's time now to give her that, a life.

Thank you Kim and your loving parents and family.

Change and surgery

I was reading some of the news about Chaz (formerly Chasity) Bono's transistion from a woman to a man, and noticed almost all the news media got it wrong, very wrong. And when Mara Keisling, NCTE director, conducted an interview with CNN, she tried to correct the information but really dug a deeper whole for many in the transcommunity. While she was close to factually correct (some facts were underreported), she didn't seem to convey the message.

The point she seemed to want and did make was that when someone transistions from either gender to the other, surgery are options for them, and it totally depends on them, the necessity for surgery, their medical approval for surgery, their healthcare insurance and finances - especially the latter since many insurance companies don't cover the surgery, and their personal interest to be whole and complete, and fully legally recognized, in their life in the other gender.

This is one of the contradictions with transistions. To legally change one's birth certificate in the US from one sex to the other, all states require sex reassignment surgery (SRS) for male-to-female but not female-to-male. I've never found a good explanation for this except that the latter is extensive and invasive surgery and expensive, clearly off the radar for many transmen. The law only requires the letters proving living for a minimum period as male with the history of hormones.

But for transwomen, surgery is a legal necessity and for most it's what they want, the problem is affording it. When it costs $8-10K for overseas surgeries and twice that in the US and Canada, it's not hard to understand why Ms. Kiesling's comment was off. The numbers support that while most don't have surgery, the numbers who do is large, which means there are far more transpeople than people think.

And this last point is one of the issues in the transcommunity, is surgery necessary to be be a complete and whole woman? And the responses are always interesting and often self-contradictory. That's because most transwomen will swear the surgery isn't necessary to be a whole and complete woman, but then after their surgery will say it's all about the surgery, meaning having a vagina is part of the experience of being a whole and complete woman.

There are many, some say most, that surgery isn't necessary even if it was available and/or affordable. But they find it difficult to argue against the question, how many genetically-born female women would want a penis and testicles in place of their vagina. It's the rhetorical question in the room and puts the non-surgery transwomen left being and feeling different from those who want the surgery. And while many of those can't afford it or it isn't available, it doesn't change the contradiction in the comment about non-surgical tranwomen.

What's also interesting with the media about Chaz is the wholesale acceptance of him by the media. The media will degrade, demean and dehumanize almost all the other transpeople. That's ok in their eyes and normal. That's what angering about the events over Chaz. She's now between the proverbial rock and a hard place because if she wants, as she says, her privacy with the transistion, she'll anger the community for not being a good public spokesperson.

And if she becomes a spokesperson, she'll lose her privacy, time and really her life. It's the catch-22 that many public profile transpeople have to deal with, be out and public or be criticized by the transcommunity. Those who have been through it eventually fade into a low level of public participation, but it never goes away. It becomes their public identity that's never lost or forgotten.

It will be interesting over the months to a few years how much Chaz does and how much he can change the public perception of transpeople. It's hope she does what a few have done and not what many transmen in the past have done, which is become men and disavow the transcommunity, especially transwomen. Some simply decide to join the mainstream and disappear, often not even recognizing or identifying their history.

This is the usual goal of transwomen, to mainstream and become invisible. Many do and chose to walk away from the community. That's the normal reaction, but for many it's impossible and they're obviousness can't be hidden. It's the reality of many transwomen. Almost all transmen, however, can transistion to become invisible, and seen as just men. The transistion with hormones changes everything imaginable about their bodies and their minds. It's like they were born male.

And while many transmen become invisible, most simply decide not just to stay invisible, but simply not even speak up, even in the face of criticism and worse words about transpeople. They decide to just watch and allow it to happen. Chaz, as other transmen have, can change that, even in the smallest way. To show both transmen and transwomen are normal people with the same normal issues and struggles in life.

So, I raise a glass to him and what he can do. Now, will he do that?

Dear President

Dear President Obama,

After reading the latest news from the Justice Department supporting the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) of 1996 in a lawsuit trying to overturn it, and after hearing you espouse a political view that the DOMA should be repealed, I find your hypocrisy on the issue not just troublesome, meaning you were simply politically posturing about your view during the campaign and then said the marriage is between a man and a woman, but appalling.

You courted the LGBT voters for your expressed view against DOMA, and now you sit silently letting others do your bidding for what you really believe and mean, and the LGBT community is left holding the empty poliitical promise bag. No November 11th president-elect treats for them, just the trick of hiding the truth. At best you were less than truthful, and at worst, you lied. Which is it?

Yes, we know the political game during campaigns. You've managed to lose a lot of promises in your term as president, but this one sticks in the throat more than any. You don't really believe in equal rights and protections for all Americans when it comes to marriage, and you certainly don't believe in gender neutral marriage you said was ok with you. But that was then and this is now.

So you let the Department of Justice to leak the truth. All you have to do is say you won't seek to block the lawsuit and you won't oppose if it goes forward. Let the justice system work. But you know you won't because you'll lose the center-right votes supporting unequal marriage.

And you certainly won't ask Congress for a bill to repeal DOMA, only that you would support one and just maybe sign one. Yeah, right. we've heard that promise from you before. And now we know it's political bullshit. You know DOMA nullifies any equal rights marriage law any state has or is proposing. This gives you the out to say it's a state's issue while leaving DOMA in tact to protect your political ass.

Now we know the truth and reality of you and about you. You're anti-LGBT rights and protections unless the overwhelming wave of Congress threatens to inundate you, and you'll suddenly turn the boat and go with it than turn to go against it. You're no different than any other politician who's occupied your chair there.

And we thought you were different. But now we know better. And once lost, trust is harder to rebuild. Trust me, I know. Mine in you has long burned to the ground and won't be rebuilt anytime soon.

Back of the Bus

Welcome transpeople. And by the way, please use the rear entrance and exit and move to the back of the bus. The LGB movement really doesn't want the "t" people interfering with their fight for legal protections and rights. To them "t" people just impede the progress and interfer with the process for turning legislation into law.

I mean just transpeople. Not the other transpeople often described as transgender under the umbrella term, but those who transistion to be physicially and legally the sex and gender they identify as, meaning (trans)women and (trans)men. These people go follow the medically prescribed proceedures and the legally defined process to become legall female or male from their opposite birth sex.

The rest of the transgroup, the drag queens, transvestities, cross-dresser, transsexuals (ie. non-op), and gender queer people, don't want the other transpeople messing up their world, so they push them to the back of the bus, and if they could, out the back door, to leave them at the bus stop standing alone.

Too tough? Ok, maybe, but reading the last few years of news about adding protections for transpeople, it's clear the LGB folks and the elected reprsentatives, like Barney Frank, don't really want to touch the issue of adding transpeople to the hate crime legislation and especially to the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA). Those bills failed before because of opposition to adding protections for transpeople.

Transpeople are often considered the step-child of LGB's because they're not the same. LGB is about sexual orientation. Trans is about gender identification. And while real transpeople transistion to live as their identified gender, more non-transpeople have use the transgender umbrella term to attach themselves to being "one of them" for the medical protection when it doesn't apply (read the DSM, cross-dressing isn't a mental health issue).

They're not really transgender. Ok, my opinion. But there is a signficantly distinct difference between a transvestite a cross-dresser and others who identiify as their birth sex but just like to play dressup as the other gender. To them it's fun. They can't identify, and often cringe, at the notion of the medical proceedures to become the other gender. But they like to use the term when they dressup for the medical protection.

There is a big difference to a man playing dressup on weekends calling himself a woman when he's dressed up but doesn't want to be one and a transwoman who does transistion, including the sex/gender change surgery (srs) and legal documents, to live fulltime as one. And while the LGB movement recognizes both, they will support the former because many gay men are drag queens, transvestites and cross-dressers for work or pleasure.

But gay men don't want to recognize those born male but identify as female (it's becoming a known biological condition of birth) and transistion, especially giving up the one thing gay men love the most, their penis. Transwomen want a vagina to be complete and whole as women. While some don't have or elect not to have srs for various reasons, they're can't be legally recognized as female, they're still legally male and men.

But the gay men will still accept them because it's ok they keep their penis. And it's why the LGB folks will not really support or pursue adding transpeople to "their" legislation. And it's also why the transpeople are better off getting rights and protection under the Civil Rights Act as happened in the Diane Schoer case.

Simply put the trans folks should do what happened to them, jettison the rest of the transgender folks and follow their own course. Build, drive and carry their own bus to and for their freedom. This is what former Senator Bill Bradley recommended yes ago. Simply put all the LGB and T rights and protections in the Civil Rights Act.

Then everyone rides the same bus and sits anywhere they want, just like everyone else in this country. And the LGB community can't discriminate against transpeople without facing legal action. Transpeople can't simply walk away into the real world of people.

The old adage

You know the one that says, "Do as I say, not as I do"? So applicable almost everywhere with everyone. And mostly from everyone. And why it's interesting listening to the life stories of post-transistion women, especially those long transistioned and living as women, invisible as the rest of us. And why, you ask?

Because they will all advise transwomen comtemplating let alone beginning their transistion with one phrase, "Don't!" Simply don't transistion. They will argue that a transistion is the worst thing you can do and go through and then have to live with and as. You see, as a transperson, and especially a transwomen, you become visible, not lost in the crowd of your birth sex and gender.

You become different and obvious. You're, in a sense, as a person you become mutt, someone accommodates but never have to accept as real, and certainly not one of them, men or women. They will tell you think again, and again, and don't transistion. Stay as you are and accept yourself.

But when you ask them if they could have stayed, to a woman, they'll tell you they couldn't. They had to transistion. It was their only choice in life and with life. They did it and survived. But then they'll say don't do it. Not even know if you're no different than them about yourself.

I've heard this over and over from them about transwomen just starting. So hypocritical. Harsh? Yes, but honest too. They don't see they're the old adage which everyone knows is only said to lie. It's not about the positives you'll know and feel, it's always about the negatives, the pain, the hurt, the anger, the abuse, even the violence, and more so the discrimination.

Yet they did it for their own sanity and being. And they advise everyone else not to, like the others have choices like they didn't or did and chose then. I'm doubting or questioning the wisdom there for many people. A transistion isn't fun and isn't always successful. In fact quite the opposite.

Most women who transistion end in being worse off than when they started, only now as women. What's not said in the life stories are the failures, not just with that person, but the many who haven't written. Not all the don't write life stories are failures, many are successes. But far more are failures.

And that's what these women are saying. Not about themselves so much, but of those they know or saw. What they're really saying is, "Get real first.", and not "Don't!" That's not being hypocritical, just pragmatic, from experience and knowledge. That's fair to a point. But it's not fair making it universal as they do.

That's what hypocritical. Saying one size fits all. It didn't for them, or at least they survived and came through relatively ok, some even better. But they assume failure fits everyone else. As one might say today, "Not!" But then understand the odds aren't with you and are stacked against you. Understand that and you'll be ok, or at least mindful of the reality.

So maybe they're not saying "Do as I say, not as I do.", but "Don't do as I did, but find your own way."

LGB and T

I read an interesting column this last week by Sonia Horan about the myths of inclusion of transpeople in the LGB community. While she focuses on the highlight moment of betrayal by the LGB community with transpeople, she does present an excellent, in my view, perspective of what's wrong with the inclusion.

I'm not against the inclusion of transpeople in the LGB community, they've been there since the beginning in the late 1960's (and what many gay people quickly forget many of the folks at the Stonewall event were transpeople of the whole flavor) and they've been there throughout the history of the LGB issues, along with getting much support from members of the LGB community for the issues and causes of transpeople.

But the world of LGB and transpeople are fundamentally different by the very nature of the identity. Homosexuality, in its many flavors, is just another being, expression and behavior of human sexuality, as is heterosexuality. Gender identity, on the other hand, isn't about sexual identity, but gender identity. It's about how people see themselves and how the body reaffirms that identity or not.

Transpeople have a degree of mismatch between the mind and body, from the slight to the extreme, and that being expressed in the whole range of expression and behavior, including cross-dressers, female illusionists, androgynous, and transsexuals. They simply want to be and live as they see themselves. It's not hard to understand, but it's not about sex as many psychologists like to describe.

The last group has been a whole issue by itself as seen in the latest fight in and with the APA over gender identity in the DSM-V due out in 2012. People described as transsexuals, meaning gender identity, want to live fulltime, and some physically transistion, as the gender they are. This requires being obvious in public and being obvious for transphobia in the range of reactions, from violence and death (recent Angie Zapata case) through public humulitaion and to discrimination in employment, housing, health insurance, etc.

In addition the transgender community has the whole range of importance with issues. Those who identify as the other gender but life primarily as their birth gender, eg. cross-dressers, who want the freedom to express their alternative lifestyle in public without fear of retaliation and discrimination, often expressed as the "Bathroom issue" allowing men who dress as women use the public women's bathroom.

Transsexuals believe themselves to be the other gender and want everything it takes to live as that gender. Their issues are health insurance, employment rights and protections, legal documents, and so on. Male-to-female transsexuals simply want to be women, no less and everything more. To them their transistion is a means to an end and once completed, meaning surgeries and documents, they're not trans-anything, just women.

Homosexuals don't have to be obvious or public. They can simply dress as everyone else and no one will every know. Their gender identity isn't a conflict, they're as straight as the rest of the world. To them, it's about sexual attraction, something expressed in the privacy of their home, and only by choice in public at events.

This is where homosexuals have the advantage. They don't have problems near on par with transistioning transpeople. They don't want to change their sex. Few want to dress and go in public as the other gender. Few face the obviousness of simple standing in a public place being seen as different. They're free to be invisible.

This is where the worlds, issues and causes diverge and never meet, and where the two sides have different agendas. The LGB community doesn't have much need to be concerned with the same issues facing transpeople. It's not their experience, and this is where the transpeople have often been forgotten, usually intentionally by simply not including language in communications about LGB issues and causes.

In short, it was always easy for the LGB community to forget and only when the transcommunity raise their voices did they get inclusion in LGB issues and causes. But they always have to remind the LGB community of their existence even when their voices are ignored, such as in the ENDA bill in 2008 when gender identity and expression was removed by Representative Barney Frank, Congress' most openly gay member. He was supported by the HRC who jettisoned trans identity in support of the bill.

History has shown that when the transcommunity goes on their own they have more and better success in acceptance in every aspect of their lives, issues and causes. They succeed when they simply don't put LGB in their communications. And history has shown that they also get more success when they focus on the issues of in and pre-transistion and post-transistion transpeople.

The transcommunity has discovered they don't need the LGB community, and can use them when it's convenient or they have shared interests. Something they had done to them, except now being treated as the unwanted stepchild by the LGB community, they've found their own identity and voice. And they're building a choir, while facing the simple reality of their people.

But it comes with a catch. When a transperson transistions, meaning completing the medical surgeries and legal process to become their target gender, then don't identify as transsexuals anymore. They're simply men and women, just like everyone else. And to avoid all the problems and discrimination associated with the trans identity, they leave. The estimates are upwards of 90 percent and more.

This leaves the remaining 10% to fill the void. These are the ones who either out of fate, meaning their identity became a public issue due to their career, life, work or events, or out of choice. Few transpeople come out as trans out of choice and do to work in and for the community, most of them were visible and active in the community before and during their transistion. They simply continued the work.

But even that small group of activists have done more by themselves for transpeople without the LGB community than has been done with then over the last 3 decades. They discovered not only their individuality, but their community identity. And while some transgroups still align themselves with LGB groups for the larger issues and causes, they've also discovered more success by themselves.

And that's the point. Uniting despite difference is important, but uniting for your own uniqueness is more important. Shared needs, interests, experience and values bring its own unity. It's not a guarrantee of success, that takes dedication, discipline and vision, but it removes the divisiveness of differences.

This is where the T without the LGB will succeed. It could use the LGB's help but history now has shown it's not essential or necessary, and not even helpful at times. Stepping out of the shadow into your own light has its own rewards. Transpeople, working for their own identity, has seen and found that. And discovered it works.

And just maybe a few post-transistion people won't leave or will return to the community to help. There's always hope, especially when success is clearer and brighter standing equal and alone.

When BS is just that

Yes, sometimes bullshit is just that, pure, simple, unadulterated bullshit. Ok, you're game for what? Well, I was reading about autogynephilia which some therapist use to describe transsexuals and why they want to transistion and become women, the imagination of being and having sex as a women. So what's the problem?

Well, a researcher at the Institue of Advanced Study of Human Sexuality, which is a think-tank for a bunch of quack psychologists who want to label people than treating them and labelling with their own terms which in reality is degrading and demeaning, did a study of 29 women at a hospital to find women have autogynphilia. Huh?

Autogynphilia is a term used to describe people, except they restrict it to women and transwomen, who imagine having sex as women. Like that's new or news? But a term restricted to women and transwomen?

This is because they focus their research on women and transwomen forgetting one simple fact of human nature. It's called masturbation. Everyone does it and everyone imagines themselves in both roles during their imaginary sex. That's human nature and human imagination.

But these folks decide to focus this label toward one class, transwomen, and now they're focusing on women, to compare them to transwomen and therefore put all women in the class of people. Except they forgot one thing. Even men imagine having sex as women. Studies at universities have shown at least 50% of the male respondents admited this and many of the rest fudged their answers.

What they're trying to do is establish the reason transwomen transistion is for sex, either as gay men wanting to be women for sex with men or as suffering autogynphilia and wanting to be and feel like women for sex with men. It's a self-fulfilling idea about people just enjoying sex, whether with someone or by themselves.

Now they want to add women too. And yet, they don't put this label on men or female-to-male transsexuals (transmen). What, men don't like to masturbate? Men don't wonder what it's like to be a woman during sex? Get real, men masturbate more often than women and every man wonders what sex is like as a woman.

This very small study is pure bullshit. But it's not just bullshit, it's sexism at its worst, to all women.

It really isn't

Why does everyone make a big issue over Sex Reassignment Surgery (SRS, also called Gender Reassgnment Surgery or GRS)? I've read too many descriptions, personal, scientific and medical about the importance of this sugery to the individual, and how much the person has to look into their heart, mind and soul to know this is the right answer for them. What don't they understand?

When someone wants to transistion to the other gender complete with the sex change to have the body match the mind, they've already gone down that road and there isn't anything left to discuss or ponder. It's innate and intuitive to them to be which requires the surgery. It's the old adage, "It's a no-brainer."

That's not hard to understand. But why does everyone want to stick a lot mental roadblocks and garbage in the way? Like they know what other people want, and they really know what transpeople want? How can they possibly really know? Like we know them and all their deepest inner thoughts and feelings about who they are?

This is one of the most tiring questions people in transistion frequently get, "So, why do you want the surgery?" Like to be a whole person that I know I am? There's nothing more to say except that. There are times when I hear this question I want to ask the other person (male because they're all those who ask the question), "So why do you want to keep your dick?"

I loved the response Jennifer Boylan gave to Oprah on her show when Oprah asked Jennifer, "So why do you want the surgery?" Jennifer responded to Oprah's question with, "What would you do if you were born with a penis?"

It's that simple folks, so get over your own fears, they're not those who want the surgery. We don't put mental roadblocks in your way of change, or ask you dumb questions about why you want to do something. So let these people get on with the life and accept them as they are.

Is that so hard to understand? LIke compassion, understanding, acceptance and peace with your fellow human beings? So don't make the judgement, expess the statement or ask the question. They've long left that at the station years, if not a lifetime, ago.

When something isn't

Yup, it's another conumdrum. And it's in the transgender community, like that's new or news, but really more in the medical community. I watched the recent eposide of "In the Life" about "Revising Gender" with Linda Hinton. It's an excellent nutshell description of the conumdrum minus one element, the health insurance companies.

The American Psychological Association (APA and not to be confused with the American Psychiatric Association, also APA) writes the Diagnostic and Statistics Manual, DSM and often called the Diagnostic Standards Manual. It define all the mental health conditiions, disorders and diseases mental health experts can diagnose, and everything outside the DSM is consider normal or a nonpathological condition.

According to the medical community, anything described in the DSM is considered worthy of medical intervention and help and is usually covered by some type of health insurance or by a state or federal program. In short, you're considered mentally abnormal (their words not mine, just google "abnormal psychology") and should be treated, and that treatment should be partly, mostly or wholly paid by someone other than yourself.

In the DSM-IVTR (latest revision), Gender Identity Disorder (GID) is described along with treatment. But since GID was inlcuded in the DSM in 1980, shortly after homosexuality was removed, the APA has not pushed for insurance coverage, until this year (as short as it is so far), except they only "recommend" insurance coverage. And most health insurers have explicity exclusivity clauses in their coverage for GID treatment, specifically identify sex-change transistions.

Ok, but that's not the issue here. GID didn't exist before 1980 and to and for many people doesn't belong in the DSM in any form, manner or description. Yet the APA is currently revising the DSM for DSM-V to be released in 2012 to not only be more inclusive of GID but to expand and almost make it a pathology, meaning if you are diagnosed, you're one sick person.

Yet, while the APA lists treatment which "cures" GID, and along with the WPATH, has the complete procedures a patient goes through to become "normal", aka "cured", they still don't identity it sufficiently to require insurance coverage. Meaning you're sick but not sick enough.

Many in the transgender community argue that GID is a bogus condition which shouldn't be in the DSM, but is simply another expression of human being and covered under WPATH (formerly HBIGDA). The reality is that we're all transgender to some degree, just that most have characteristics of their birth sex so it's not an mental issue. Some, however, have more characteristics of the opposite sex to the point of wanting to be and live as one of the opposite sex.

That's not a crime, or a mental health condition, it's a problem with the body. The scienfitic evidence is starting to show GID is a neurobiological condition introduced in the fetus and reinforced in early life. But the APA fails or doesn't want to recognize those facts, and most important one which hits them in the face.

The APA is exercising their morality over the definition of "normal". GID isn't real but a group of white men imposing their opinions and morality on the rest of society and the few who want to be who they know they are. And imposing the DSM only excerbates their anxiety, fear and stress about themselves. The APA is creating a problem than solving one with their morality.

Because GID isn't. It isn't anything beyond being human. But that's only half the story.

If GID were removed from the DSM, as many want, then people lose the right for health insurance coverage, if it were covered. Since the APA doesn't require coverage, then everyone wanting to transistion faces the $25-50,000+ cost for it. So the person is left writing checks for something that will stigmatize them for life, having a mental health condition.

So the transgender community is stuck, and the APA knows this and does nothing, or very little (not to ignore the efforts of some in the APA to get change) to help beyond stigmatizing a class of people because of the APA's morality of "normal". If it's removed, as it should, then all bets (coverage) are off and the medical communtiy can simply forget it, like homosexuality.

Except people need help to get the therapy, drugs, and sugery to change from what they are to who they are, It's that simply. A simple solution to a personal issue. It's not rocket science but the APA refuses to see the light and the people for their own morality. In the end GID isn't but not being is worse than being, and being is worse having to live with the DSM which doesn't do much except tag them as abnormal.

And almost nowhere is GID covered by insurance. This is changing but only slowly and with employers than health insurance companies. The latter is like the APA, we don't like you and therefore won't help you, but don't forget those premiums to cover any sickness you have, except GID. One might get the idea there's a collusion between the APA and health insurance industry to impose their morality?

Ok, I've rambled around the issue, kinda like the In the Life show did because the issue is broad and deep, and historic and current. And the new DSM only looks to make matter worse for those with GID. What happened to the ethic, "First do no harm"? This seems to me that the APA should be doing. Looking a helping people (sorry to use their classification) GID. If you define them, shouldn't you be helping them?

So, to the APA where is your help? I don't want to hear your morality, I want to hear your help. That's the least you can do. The next is demand health insurance coverage. It's good science, good medicine and good humanity. Or did you forget that?

The catch-22

I was reading a column by Amber Crowder about the catch-22 women in transistion face. And while I could have just as easily added my comments about the essay and the other comments, I decided to post my own column, because I find a lot of the younger women in transistion have and see it correctly.

Why they see it better is open to discussion, but I think it's simply they don't have the history of the transgender community to deal with. They can make their own clean, fresh start with their own perspective. And in many cases, like Amber and her column, they get it right. And that's why the community should be letting them be in leadership roles in the community than many of the pundits and curmudgeons who have been there for decades.

And what does she have right, beside that essay?

Easy, and it's what some of those adding comments miss. It's not about "classic" or "traditional" transsexual, it's about being and women in transistion want to be complete women. And that's means sex/gender reassignment surgery (SRS or GRS depends on your country). As much as those transgender women who don't have or don't want surgery make the case it's not necessary "to be a woman", it's about being a whole woman, complete with the body.

Every post-transistion, or legally recognized, woman will tell you that before their SRS they felt it wasn't about the surgery, and having a vagina, and that after the surgery, they will tell you, "It's all about the surgery." It's that simple. Nothing overwhelming or earth shaking, just their wholeness of being.

And it's not about what type of (trans)woman you are or what others think, it's about the full recognition in the law, since all states minus two, require it to amend birth certificates and change the rest of your documents, and it's about recognition with women. You have nothing to hide, ok maybe your history a little, but afterward you can just be and live in the world as a woman.

All of the pre-SRS or non-SRS transwomen can argue all they want about being, they don't and won't know the truth and reality of being the whole woman with mind and body. It's not an agrument against their living and being, that's ok if it fits their lifestyle. But it's not what the argument is about. It's about personal acceptance and recognition.

Amber is right about the the catch-22 of healthcare costs. While only a few insurance plans cover transistion costs and a few government and company plans cover the costs, most women in transistion have exclusions in their healthcare coverage if they have any healthcare plan. And that's the catch-22.

While the medical community defines Gender Identity Disorder a condition, down from a disorder, they don't require medical intervention let alone require the health insurance plans to cover treatment. It's all treatable with medical care, namely therapy, hormones, and surgeries, and the patient becomes whole. And only this year has the medical community changed its view to "recommend" coverage.

That's the real tragedy. A curable condition which isn't covered and isn't affordable by 90% of the patients with it. What other condition would we call that insane? What about their oath about first do no harm? What don't they understand denying coverage is the harm, and denying coverage is the cause of many suicides and deaths among those in transistion.

And the cure is easy. Remove the exclusions and add acceptance and inclusion. It's not rocket science and it's cheap. That's helping people. And Amber has it right.

Conundrum

The transgender community has a conumdrum. Like that's new or news to or about them? No, it's not, they're always the stereotuypical walking conumdrum with all their diverse members and issues. But that's another issue. This one is about visibility or really invisibility. I was reading the call by some in the community instead of a Day of Rememberance they hold for all the (trans)people who have been killed by violence against them they proposed a Day of Visibility.

They want all transpeople to become visible for a day. It's about being out and proud versus being stealth and invisible. The reality is, when I do a back of the envelope calculation on the numbers of post-transistion women, the number of public post-transistion women is about 5% of the total number of post-transistion women who aren't. It's the reality that they prefer being invisible and simply going about their lives as women.

And that's the conumdrum facing the transgender community. Post-transistion women aren't transgender, but simply legally recognized females and women, meaning those who have completed the medical process, under the Standards of Care, to be physical women (as much as possible) and the legal proceedures to be legally female (birth certificate and all necessary docments). The last thing they want is to become visible.

So, the conumdrum is that only those who are out and proud become visible. When faced with the potential problems and lack of rights and protections, why would a post-transistion woman become visible? Now the vast majority live with just a handful of friends, family and co-workers knowing their history. So, why step out of the shadow into the light for a day? It doesn't make sense except to those who are out and proud and want more to be like them.

I know or have met post-transistion women in the course of my life. We all have, it's just that we likely didn't know it, because they're not obvious. They're just like any other women you meet, only their past is different. They identify as women and are legally recognized as women, so why would they want to become visible as transgender?

The problem is that the transgender community is a diverse group, which many see ranging from the female impersonators thorugh transvestites, cross-dressers, transexuals, and in-transistion women and men. So why would any woman who has gone through their transistion to life silently and quietly as women want to be recognized as one of them?

It's not that they don't support transgender people, they do. It's just that they don't see reasons to go back in their life, something they left and went through a lot of pain and hurt to get through it. They don't see the need to be visible again, and face all the realities that entails in today's society. They're done and have gone on with their life.

I don't think anyone disagrees with the importance a Day of visibility would do for the transgender community. It would be important. But that said the transgender community hasn't recognized the damage it would do to those who are post-transistion women. The last next they need or want is to be portrayed again as less than women, not because the transgender community won't respect them, but society won't.

Just look at the news stories about transgender people and transsexuals. It's neither pretty or nice. It's why the media mistakenly uses the term transgender to describe post-transistion women, because in their minds and what they think is the readers' minds they want to distinguish genetic women from legally recognized women. It, to them, is about their view of morality of being "normal".

And that's why the vast majority of post-transistion women leave the community and never again identify as trans-anything once they've completed their transistion. They're said, done and gone. And becoming visible again? That's not who they are. They're simply women, and deserve the same in return, only visible as women, nothing more.

And that's the conumdrum the transgender community has, but more importantly it's also the totally mistaken perception they give society about all post-transistion women. So why would these women want to come back to the community and become visible. Some of them didn't have a choice. Their life and work circumstances required being out or they were outed in the press.

And if you listen to them, they don't deny the transgender label, they simply ignore it or use it to describe who they were than who they are. It's about the past. They accept the label from the media, and many do an outstanding job presenting the whole positive side of being formerly transgender men or women. That's the visibily which helps.

And no one doubts if all post-transistion women stood up in America, they would amaze everyone as to the diversity and postive role models they have been as women. But we know that visibility would be lost on the media because it's not a story. The media wants the label as the story, not the people. And that's why they're invisible and will likely remain so.