I was thinking about what it takes to transistion. Not someone who easily passes and goes through it to get on with her life never needing to look back, only forward. Not someone who has all the dynamic energy to go through it and live, and often fight, for acceptance by others and the public, surficially passing but not past the first moments.
But someone who wants to transistion but faces not just public embarrassment and even humiliation, overt if not subtle or covert, but more so personal fears about themselves, which often grows into self-hate. They want and always fear the worst because they don't see themselves as good enough.
This is often the case with many people, usually children and often teenagers. When you add all the problems and issues of being in the wrong body and being seen by others and expecting to act as someone you're not, just outwardly, it's only spirals into something and someone you hate, yourself.
Well, it's somewhat in a song, Crosby, Still, Nash & Young's song, "Everybody I Love You", in the lyrics:
Know you got to run,
Know you got to hide
Still there is a great life
Lingerin' deep within your eyes.
Open up, open up, baby let me in.
You expect for me to love you
When you hate yourself, my friend.
When you are the one you have to let in and the one who is your friend. Yourself. When you are the one you hate but want so much to love. When you are the one you fear, as a failure as you were and as you may be. When you just stand there and nothing feels good, only hate.
All the words of others don't and won't change it. You let youself in only to find someone you don't like, then, now and ahead. You let yourself in to find someone who wants so much for acceptance, not just of the world, but of you. It's not just about finding love, but overcoming hate. your own for yourself.
And it will never leave, never leave you alone, never let you have a life, never let you feel good. It will always be there in the corners and recesses of your mind, waiting for the moments when doubt and fear sneak into your consciousness, to become present and sometimes overwhelming.
And you need a friend, yourself. The question isn't when but if, as sometimes the weight of the hate becomes suicide. And that if often lingers through your life, never more than a thought triggered by unknown events to become real again, and it takes all your energy to survive through the if, in hope of it being a when.
And it's the when that starts the friendship, but never a guarrantee, just a hope for the possibility of a promise. A promise to yourself. That's when you are your best friend and everything else just becomes what happens, something you can live within yourself to know it won't become hate again.
But ah, that's what you stand there and wait for in your mind, with your body and for your life. To find your friend. Yourself.
Friday, April 29, 2011
Separate and Unequal
I was reading the story of the law firm and lawyers who quit working for the supporters in Congress with the legal case to support the DOMA after the Justice Department, and really President Obama, decided not to support the DOMA in both the enforcement and legal challenges, currently going through the courts to eventually land in the Supreme Court.
It shows what the GLB community has gained since the first legal challenge to discrimination based on sexual orientation in 1961, and more so since the late 1960's following the Stonewall riots in New York City, which by the way wasn't about gays or lesbians but about transgender people who were the ones who fought back, far more than the gays and lesbians.
But this situation and the DOMA shows that the GLB community is separate and unequal, more in reality, than the T(rans) community. It's been that way since Stonewall and it will continue as long as gay discriminate against transpeople, treating them either as cross-dressers and drag queens, the former being mostly straight part-time men and the latter mostly gay men performing as women.
And often treating them as less than human. Gays don't really like transwomen, as many women and many lesbians don't like them either. But gays don't because it's about their penis and manhood. Gays don't mind and often like men who play at being women, they don't like them when they actually become women, physically and legally.
Overblown? Not really. Consider all the support the GLB community voiced for all-inclusive ENDA a few years ago to get the transcommunity support and work on the bill. But when it was clear it wouldn't pass, and they blamed the transpeople, they dropped the T in the bill faster than you picking up a hot skillet off the stove.
And in recent rounds to get it passed, they did the same thing again, but were suprised when the transcommunity wanted assurances of inclusion beyond words. Gee, like transpeople don't trust gay men anymore? Really they don't. I wouldn't and don't. At least on issues.
Gay men aren't really any different than other men, only their sexual preferences are different. Gay men are just men being men, and all the reason never to trust them farther than you can see them walking away from you in a crooked hallway, meaning about 10 seconds after they stop talking.
And that's the crux that the transcommunity has learned over the last decade and decided to forego help from the GLB community as seen in recent discussions with politicians and the White House. Stand alone and proud and do what you know is right, and if the GLB community wants to be there for you, great, but for your cause and issue, for your results to get fairness and equality, and not for anything or anyone else.
This is where the DOMA is interesting in that it never defined who was a man or a woman since that is the jurisdiction of the states, and where there is the full range of diversity of legal definitions. The DOMA never distinguished between a genetic man or woman and a legally defined (by surgery and birth certificate) man or woman, and the states differ.
Something the gay community never wanted to discuss to confuse the argument for their case, which was simple, recognition for gay men in marriages, and lesbians get a free ride if they join the fight. And transpeople? Well, that's another fight later. Or so said the gay community. Let's not confuse the politicians and public.
But the real issue to them was association with transpeople. They didn't want and don't want transpeople to have the same rights, have the equality in work, life, marriage, etc., and have the same protections from discrimination. At least not in the same deal as them. It's ok to covertly support transpeople, just don't make gay men be overt about it.
That pesky penis thing they deep-down don't like when transwomen have "that" surgery (SRS/GRS) to become women. It really it scares them that some women-born-male aren't men and want to transistion to be whole and complete women, physically and legally, and some men-born-female, keep their vagina as men. Alien concept to them and alien they think they are.
It's why the DADT policy never touched on transpeople and the DOMA hasn't. The gay community kept it out of the discussion. The seperate and unequal concept. The transcommunity can help the GLB causes and issues with nuggets of vocal support, but, in the end, not legal support. Some gays did help transpeople and the transcommunity, but they wouldn't and didn't stand up when the pressure was on passage of the bills.
And that's the lesson learned. The transcommunity has learned to be separate and equal, and then be inclusive as equals, not forgotten people.
It shows what the GLB community has gained since the first legal challenge to discrimination based on sexual orientation in 1961, and more so since the late 1960's following the Stonewall riots in New York City, which by the way wasn't about gays or lesbians but about transgender people who were the ones who fought back, far more than the gays and lesbians.
But this situation and the DOMA shows that the GLB community is separate and unequal, more in reality, than the T(rans) community. It's been that way since Stonewall and it will continue as long as gay discriminate against transpeople, treating them either as cross-dressers and drag queens, the former being mostly straight part-time men and the latter mostly gay men performing as women.
And often treating them as less than human. Gays don't really like transwomen, as many women and many lesbians don't like them either. But gays don't because it's about their penis and manhood. Gays don't mind and often like men who play at being women, they don't like them when they actually become women, physically and legally.
Overblown? Not really. Consider all the support the GLB community voiced for all-inclusive ENDA a few years ago to get the transcommunity support and work on the bill. But when it was clear it wouldn't pass, and they blamed the transpeople, they dropped the T in the bill faster than you picking up a hot skillet off the stove.
And in recent rounds to get it passed, they did the same thing again, but were suprised when the transcommunity wanted assurances of inclusion beyond words. Gee, like transpeople don't trust gay men anymore? Really they don't. I wouldn't and don't. At least on issues.
Gay men aren't really any different than other men, only their sexual preferences are different. Gay men are just men being men, and all the reason never to trust them farther than you can see them walking away from you in a crooked hallway, meaning about 10 seconds after they stop talking.
And that's the crux that the transcommunity has learned over the last decade and decided to forego help from the GLB community as seen in recent discussions with politicians and the White House. Stand alone and proud and do what you know is right, and if the GLB community wants to be there for you, great, but for your cause and issue, for your results to get fairness and equality, and not for anything or anyone else.
This is where the DOMA is interesting in that it never defined who was a man or a woman since that is the jurisdiction of the states, and where there is the full range of diversity of legal definitions. The DOMA never distinguished between a genetic man or woman and a legally defined (by surgery and birth certificate) man or woman, and the states differ.
Something the gay community never wanted to discuss to confuse the argument for their case, which was simple, recognition for gay men in marriages, and lesbians get a free ride if they join the fight. And transpeople? Well, that's another fight later. Or so said the gay community. Let's not confuse the politicians and public.
But the real issue to them was association with transpeople. They didn't want and don't want transpeople to have the same rights, have the equality in work, life, marriage, etc., and have the same protections from discrimination. At least not in the same deal as them. It's ok to covertly support transpeople, just don't make gay men be overt about it.
That pesky penis thing they deep-down don't like when transwomen have "that" surgery (SRS/GRS) to become women. It really it scares them that some women-born-male aren't men and want to transistion to be whole and complete women, physically and legally, and some men-born-female, keep their vagina as men. Alien concept to them and alien they think they are.
It's why the DADT policy never touched on transpeople and the DOMA hasn't. The gay community kept it out of the discussion. The seperate and unequal concept. The transcommunity can help the GLB causes and issues with nuggets of vocal support, but, in the end, not legal support. Some gays did help transpeople and the transcommunity, but they wouldn't and didn't stand up when the pressure was on passage of the bills.
And that's the lesson learned. The transcommunity has learned to be separate and equal, and then be inclusive as equals, not forgotten people.
Friday, April 15, 2011
If You Don't Understand
If you don't understand transgender people, or don't understand the circumstances or situations of the lives of transgender people, then ask and learn. Don't speak up until you have not just some knowledge and maybe some experience, but some understanding, and more so, compassion. Otherwise, your words are simply showing how ignorant, how insensitive, or worse, how hateful you are.
Knowledge, as they say, is power, understanding is being human. Power doesn't make you better. Understanding does. And expressing your humanity makes you a human being.
Why the thought? An essay about late transistioners, found here. The writer who obviously transistioned early in life when she had the opportunity and support, doesn't seem to understand late transistioners and their families. So why is that reason to write something which is just "I don't understand" followed by a lot of bitching about them and their families?
And yes I don't understand why she even wrote it. It's one thing to write something to ask questions to understand, but it's another to write something with the intent of not understanding but complaining about them. Maybe should she consider what her transistion would have been like if she didn't have the support and opportunities she had.
She needs to imagine if she had to wait into her 50's or older to transistion and try to understand all the reasons someone would wait and all the issues someone would face making the decision to transistion and then transistion. She might find not just some understanding but some compassion and be less hateful toward others.
What's the old adage, "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." Why couldn't she have just kep quiet and kept her hate to herself? Or ask to first understand? I don't know, but as they say, I won't hold my breath waiting.
Knowledge, as they say, is power, understanding is being human. Power doesn't make you better. Understanding does. And expressing your humanity makes you a human being.
Why the thought? An essay about late transistioners, found here. The writer who obviously transistioned early in life when she had the opportunity and support, doesn't seem to understand late transistioners and their families. So why is that reason to write something which is just "I don't understand" followed by a lot of bitching about them and their families?
And yes I don't understand why she even wrote it. It's one thing to write something to ask questions to understand, but it's another to write something with the intent of not understanding but complaining about them. Maybe should she consider what her transistion would have been like if she didn't have the support and opportunities she had.
She needs to imagine if she had to wait into her 50's or older to transistion and try to understand all the reasons someone would wait and all the issues someone would face making the decision to transistion and then transistion. She might find not just some understanding but some compassion and be less hateful toward others.
What's the old adage, "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." Why couldn't she have just kep quiet and kept her hate to herself? Or ask to first understand? I don't know, but as they say, I won't hold my breath waiting.
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Jennifer Boylan's Testimony
Jennifer Boylan posted her testimony on her Facebook page (FB login required), first video here, about a bill before the Maine legislature to repeal protections for transgender people, currently protected along with LGB (add T) people from discrimination.
She makes several excellent points but one which is prominent in the transcommunity, and one would say divides the community itself into several groups and is reason why many post-transistion women leave the community, not identifying as transgender, which they aren't in my book but just men and women where anything trans is their history but who they are now, and don't rarely if ever get involved again.
In short, it's often an argument within the community to divide those who pass and those who don't and the rest in the middle wanting to pass more and not be identified with those who don't anytime. Yeah, that argument, do you look like a women despite your past.
And those who don't pass in any sense of the word where they're clearly and obviously not entirely female, the problem almost all crossdressers have since they're still men underneath with no interest to transistion but merely present themselves as apparent women (often called playing dressup), become the poster children of those wanting laws against all in and post-transistion women.
Strange it's not a problem with the men's bathroom. Why? Because men don't care and aren't worried other weren't borm male. Just do your business and leave. But with the women's restroom, every anti-trans person is afraid of potential threats, even though there is no evidence of it and no case of anyone being arrested for anything they're worried about.
But it doesn't stop them from using non-passing (trans)women and more so crossdressers, who aren't transgender, as examples of "men in dresses" wanting to attact women and assault children. Yeah, right. But they can't prove there is a threat let alone a risk, realistically anyway.
It's an imaginary issue to excite and incite people against transpeople. And Jennifer Boylan puts the argument to rest. It's only a reality in the imagination of those who hate anyone different than them, by race, color, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and gender identity. A bunch of strait-laced, uptight people with their head somewhere other than on top of their neck.
Anyway, Jennfier Boylan is cool, smart and hard to argue against.
She makes several excellent points but one which is prominent in the transcommunity, and one would say divides the community itself into several groups and is reason why many post-transistion women leave the community, not identifying as transgender, which they aren't in my book but just men and women where anything trans is their history but who they are now, and don't rarely if ever get involved again.
In short, it's often an argument within the community to divide those who pass and those who don't and the rest in the middle wanting to pass more and not be identified with those who don't anytime. Yeah, that argument, do you look like a women despite your past.
And those who don't pass in any sense of the word where they're clearly and obviously not entirely female, the problem almost all crossdressers have since they're still men underneath with no interest to transistion but merely present themselves as apparent women (often called playing dressup), become the poster children of those wanting laws against all in and post-transistion women.
Strange it's not a problem with the men's bathroom. Why? Because men don't care and aren't worried other weren't borm male. Just do your business and leave. But with the women's restroom, every anti-trans person is afraid of potential threats, even though there is no evidence of it and no case of anyone being arrested for anything they're worried about.
But it doesn't stop them from using non-passing (trans)women and more so crossdressers, who aren't transgender, as examples of "men in dresses" wanting to attact women and assault children. Yeah, right. But they can't prove there is a threat let alone a risk, realistically anyway.
It's an imaginary issue to excite and incite people against transpeople. And Jennifer Boylan puts the argument to rest. It's only a reality in the imagination of those who hate anyone different than them, by race, color, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and gender identity. A bunch of strait-laced, uptight people with their head somewhere other than on top of their neck.
Anyway, Jennfier Boylan is cool, smart and hard to argue against.
Saturday, April 9, 2011
Really Cool Ad
In wandering around the Internet I found an editorial criticizing the clothing company J Crew. I like some of their clothes, but the ad is really pretty cool, shown here. It shows a parent loving their child and letting them express themself as they know they are. How cool is that?
And of course, the right wing, conservative folks picked this up to write the typical crap about gender "confused" kids and promoting transgender children. Well, as the comment (below column) noted, transgender kids, if given a loving home and supportive parents, aren't confused, and kids are kids. If you let them explore, they're fine and they'll be fine.
This ad helps both parents, noting to be there for them and let them just be kids, and kids, to explore and express themselves. After all it's just polish and pink is just another color, one many men as well as women like. Look at all the men's pink golf shirts of past years' styles. And many amateur and professional athletes wear pink as symbols of support for women's causes, like breast cancer.
In short, to all the uptight (and tight ass) conservatives who want to define sex and gender for all of us, get a life. It's just a boy, just polish and just a color. Go express your anger at freedom and liberty for all somewhere else than at the toes of a boy who's mother loves and supports him.
And of course, the right wing, conservative folks picked this up to write the typical crap about gender "confused" kids and promoting transgender children. Well, as the comment (below column) noted, transgender kids, if given a loving home and supportive parents, aren't confused, and kids are kids. If you let them explore, they're fine and they'll be fine.
This ad helps both parents, noting to be there for them and let them just be kids, and kids, to explore and express themselves. After all it's just polish and pink is just another color, one many men as well as women like. Look at all the men's pink golf shirts of past years' styles. And many amateur and professional athletes wear pink as symbols of support for women's causes, like breast cancer.
In short, to all the uptight (and tight ass) conservatives who want to define sex and gender for all of us, get a life. It's just a boy, just polish and just a color. Go express your anger at freedom and liberty for all somewhere else than at the toes of a boy who's mother loves and supports him.
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
A really Bad Argument
One argument, as defined by the OED, is "a reason or set of reasons given with the aim of persuading others that an action or idea is right or wrong", is being the devil's advocate to put forth a position which is bad to begin with and then gets worse the longer the writer, or speaker, continues to propose it. Really? And here?
Or rather with transpeople. Roland Hulme wrote a piece, found here, which suggests transpeople, at the end of their transistion should not be able to get their birth certificates changed to reflect their innate gender from their birth sex.
He used the recent law suit in New York City brought to remove the necessity for surgery, the standard in 48 states (Ohio and Tennesse excludes that right) for transwomen to get their birth certificates changed from male to female. The laws in most states allow transmen to get the change without surgery as it's medically risky and too expensive.
The problem there is many, maybe almost all, transpeople oppose this lawsuit. The petitioners' case has merit as some transpeople can't get surgery for medical or financial reasons (the latter is the common rule for most transpeople as it's not covered by the majority of health insurance plans). But the case includes a transman who can get a judge's order for the change, something a transwoman can't get, necessitating surgery.
The reason they oppose the lawsuit is that it removes the dividing line between the in-transistion and post-transistion women, and some men (exception for them in most states) being surgery (sex/gender change surgery) and creates an indeterminate and indisguishable area defining sex and gender under the law.
This opens the door for early transistioners to get the change to be legally female while being mostly male, and it allows crossdressers and others who dress as women for personal or professonal reasons to find someone who'll agree to cerify their transistion when they're not in transistion or have any goals or plans to transistion.
And as we know, it opens the door to the proverbial media hype that even most transwomen oppose, the "men in dresses in women's bathrooms" idea or the disguse of the ultrafeminine dressup model idea. Neither of which are how transwomen want to be seen. They want to be, live and get on with their lives as women, real, ordinary women.
Transwomen, in-transistion but especially post-transistion, want to be women, and not seen or feared as crossdressers, transvestites or anything the media tries portray them for hype and ratings. And they want to be legally defined and identified as women. That's the law. Something Mr. Hulme doesn't understand.
Oh yeah, he's playing devil's advocate all right. But does he really, as he suggested, believe birth certificates are absolute documents and not fluid? We know can change your name, correct mistakes for parents and other information to get an updated or amended birth certificate. And we know intersexed people can get their sex marker changed from mistakes at birth (assigning the wrong sex) or after surgery to correct it.
I had three birth certificates issued for me for two name changes in two weeks. Is he suggesting my first one was absolute? And if I decide to change my name from what my parents decided three times, he would deny me that right? And all the transwomen and transmen the right to be who they are physically and mentally and not just defined by their genes?
The devil's advocate got his argument lost in his own details, which is mostly his own ignorance of the facts and his own inhumanity for others.
Or rather with transpeople. Roland Hulme wrote a piece, found here, which suggests transpeople, at the end of their transistion should not be able to get their birth certificates changed to reflect their innate gender from their birth sex.
He used the recent law suit in New York City brought to remove the necessity for surgery, the standard in 48 states (Ohio and Tennesse excludes that right) for transwomen to get their birth certificates changed from male to female. The laws in most states allow transmen to get the change without surgery as it's medically risky and too expensive.
The problem there is many, maybe almost all, transpeople oppose this lawsuit. The petitioners' case has merit as some transpeople can't get surgery for medical or financial reasons (the latter is the common rule for most transpeople as it's not covered by the majority of health insurance plans). But the case includes a transman who can get a judge's order for the change, something a transwoman can't get, necessitating surgery.
The reason they oppose the lawsuit is that it removes the dividing line between the in-transistion and post-transistion women, and some men (exception for them in most states) being surgery (sex/gender change surgery) and creates an indeterminate and indisguishable area defining sex and gender under the law.
This opens the door for early transistioners to get the change to be legally female while being mostly male, and it allows crossdressers and others who dress as women for personal or professonal reasons to find someone who'll agree to cerify their transistion when they're not in transistion or have any goals or plans to transistion.
And as we know, it opens the door to the proverbial media hype that even most transwomen oppose, the "men in dresses in women's bathrooms" idea or the disguse of the ultrafeminine dressup model idea. Neither of which are how transwomen want to be seen. They want to be, live and get on with their lives as women, real, ordinary women.
Transwomen, in-transistion but especially post-transistion, want to be women, and not seen or feared as crossdressers, transvestites or anything the media tries portray them for hype and ratings. And they want to be legally defined and identified as women. That's the law. Something Mr. Hulme doesn't understand.
Oh yeah, he's playing devil's advocate all right. But does he really, as he suggested, believe birth certificates are absolute documents and not fluid? We know can change your name, correct mistakes for parents and other information to get an updated or amended birth certificate. And we know intersexed people can get their sex marker changed from mistakes at birth (assigning the wrong sex) or after surgery to correct it.
I had three birth certificates issued for me for two name changes in two weeks. Is he suggesting my first one was absolute? And if I decide to change my name from what my parents decided three times, he would deny me that right? And all the transwomen and transmen the right to be who they are physically and mentally and not just defined by their genes?
The devil's advocate got his argument lost in his own details, which is mostly his own ignorance of the facts and his own inhumanity for others.
Crossdressers aren't trans
I ran across, visually of course, an editorial by Brian McNaught suggesting crossdressers should be in the LGBT definiton as transgender, see article. Well, in his opinion, but not in reality. Crossdressers, as he rightfully says, outnumber transwomen and transmen, those in transistion, and probably by an order of magnitude.
After all, while the entertainers, often called female illusionists or impersonators now, are mostly gay men who like pretending and getting attention as women, the vast majority of the rest are heterosexual men, often married with families. They're not gay and while many do go through facial hair removal to help, they don't go through any medical care to transistion. They don't want to transistion.
In short, they like their dicks and they like to play dressup. That's not transgender. It's not in the DSM-IVTR or will be in the DSM-V, although there are some suggestions to find something there for them to be medical and therefore protected as a condition. Yeah, right. weekdays they're ordinary men and weekends, pretend women. Gee, that's a psychological disorder?
Not according to psychiatrists and psychologists who call crossdressing a hobby at best and a fetish, transvestism, at worst. But when they don't need or want therapy, don't need medical professional help tor transistion, don't want surgeries to become women and don't want to change their birth certificate and records, they don't face discrimination just being who they are in life and work.
Mr. McNaught missed the point that in many fights for equality for LGB and then LGBT folks, crossdressers have been the problem, allowing opponents to use them as an example for all, the proverbial "men in dresses in the bathroom" argument. And after LGB people are protected, transpeople get shuffled aside as something later for fear of being identified with crossdressers.
This happened in Tacoma when it took three votes of the council and the failure of the third voter referendum to reverse the council's vote to add transpeople to anti-discrimination in housing, jobs and other activities of life. And even then the third time almost passed allowing discrimination when they used crossdressers as the poster child for transpeople.
This has also happened in organizations where crossdressers formed their own organization from LGBT organizations because they (CD'ers) outnumbered and dominated the political agenda of the organization before the transpeople jettisoned them to get some real progress. The CD'ers only wanted protections for them and wasn't interested in transpeople.
Any wonder why the LGB people hate the T (transpeople) and the transpeople hate crossdressers? I won't argue some crossdressers eventually transistion, but the percentage is small (<~2%) and those leave the crossdressing community for the transcommunity and eventually as men and women.
In the end, crossdressers aren't anything like bisexual people, and aren't transgender by any stretch of the imagination, but that seems to escape his imagination for the sake of an arugment. Maybe he should ask the professionals, or better yet, ask some real transpeople.
After all, while the entertainers, often called female illusionists or impersonators now, are mostly gay men who like pretending and getting attention as women, the vast majority of the rest are heterosexual men, often married with families. They're not gay and while many do go through facial hair removal to help, they don't go through any medical care to transistion. They don't want to transistion.
In short, they like their dicks and they like to play dressup. That's not transgender. It's not in the DSM-IVTR or will be in the DSM-V, although there are some suggestions to find something there for them to be medical and therefore protected as a condition. Yeah, right. weekdays they're ordinary men and weekends, pretend women. Gee, that's a psychological disorder?
Not according to psychiatrists and psychologists who call crossdressing a hobby at best and a fetish, transvestism, at worst. But when they don't need or want therapy, don't need medical professional help tor transistion, don't want surgeries to become women and don't want to change their birth certificate and records, they don't face discrimination just being who they are in life and work.
Mr. McNaught missed the point that in many fights for equality for LGB and then LGBT folks, crossdressers have been the problem, allowing opponents to use them as an example for all, the proverbial "men in dresses in the bathroom" argument. And after LGB people are protected, transpeople get shuffled aside as something later for fear of being identified with crossdressers.
This happened in Tacoma when it took three votes of the council and the failure of the third voter referendum to reverse the council's vote to add transpeople to anti-discrimination in housing, jobs and other activities of life. And even then the third time almost passed allowing discrimination when they used crossdressers as the poster child for transpeople.
This has also happened in organizations where crossdressers formed their own organization from LGBT organizations because they (CD'ers) outnumbered and dominated the political agenda of the organization before the transpeople jettisoned them to get some real progress. The CD'ers only wanted protections for them and wasn't interested in transpeople.
Any wonder why the LGB people hate the T (transpeople) and the transpeople hate crossdressers? I won't argue some crossdressers eventually transistion, but the percentage is small (<~2%) and those leave the crossdressing community for the transcommunity and eventually as men and women.
In the end, crossdressers aren't anything like bisexual people, and aren't transgender by any stretch of the imagination, but that seems to escape his imagination for the sake of an arugment. Maybe he should ask the professionals, or better yet, ask some real transpeople.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
