Becoming Invisible

The goal of many, and some say most, in and post-transistion women is to become invisible in their life and work, as women, and to let the label of their past and transistion fade into the distance of time. This is accomplished by many when they're recognized as women, and nothing is in the words, and any public announcements or notices, about their former sex (not gender as they've always self-identified as female).

As they say, they arrived, if only for a moment, but it's like cresting a hill and on the way down you lose all sight of the valley you left behind. It's simply becomes a memory, always there and ready to become visible if the situation or circumstances happen. But then you'll be long over any stress of the, "What if they find out.", and will simply say, "Ok, and?"

It's also the bane of the transcommunity when this happens. Not just when the vast majority escape the transcommunity shortly after finishing their transistion, meaning getting their documents changed, but when your past isn't even in the discussion in your life and work. They simply are women.

The transcommunity sells this as the goal of transistioning women, but also harbor the silent, and sometimes not so silent, wish, post-transistion women hang around the transcommunity. Some do because they have little choice, it's their public identity, not by choice but circumstances. And some do by choice.

And some really less by choice than reality. For a variety of reasons some simply find it hard to assimilate into the world of women, usually they don't pass well enough to become physically invisible. It's the sad reality of social standards of presentation, expression and behavior. Try as they do, becoming invisible just doesn't happen.

Some ignore the signs and simply plow ahead in their life, and many find acceptance and support, but it almost always comes with a cost and a price. It's always work convincing people you're real and really who you know you are. And some just forget even trying and just try to live quietly without the hassles.

What's even sadder is that the transcommunity doesn't help them outside of using them. While facing the world with all the problems of being visible, the transcommunity uses them to show the problems of being visible, adding insult to injury. When they need the help to become invisible, they get used for being visible.

And the transcommunity wonders why post-transistion women become invisible and walk, if not run, away from the words and even the community, and criticizes those who do for being invisible. They expect them to become visible and be used. Like that helps their life and work? To relive what they want to forget?

It's why becoming invisible is so important in the lives of post-transistion women. Just to be themselves as we all are and do. And without the fear of what Satchel Page said, "Don't look back, something may be gaining on you." Or in their case, someone in the form of the transcommunity.

Transgender activists

They come in all flavors. They espouse the whole gamut of views and opinions. And they say they represent the "transgender community." All different, except in one aspect they're all the same. They're all overly sensitive to criticism, intolerant of alternative or opposing ideas and especially opinions, loud and demanding not just to be heard but to be heard over the crowd and by everyone.

And worst of all, they won't listen in return, they only talk or write louder to overwhelm other voices. They simply want you to listen and agree, silently. No words, or even a peep from you. Just nod in agreement to show them they're right and they're smarter than anyone else in the room.

What's the beef here then? Well, in one recent court case a Wisconsin judge overruled a law prohibiting Sex Reasignment Surgery (SRS) for inmates diagnosed with Gender Identity Disorder, meaning transsexual inmates can't get this surgery paid by the Department of Corrections, or really the taxpayers. I don't have a problem with the law but with the judge and his decision.

Why, especially when it's a treatable condition and the surgery is one, and usually the final, step in the process to transistion from male to female? Because SRS isn't covered by any other state program there, not covered by the health insurance companies there, and only covered by a very few employers there. Why should it be a freebie at taxpayers' expense when they don't pay for SRS for ordinary people?

I'm for SRS being covered by health insurance. And a few do, but it's not mandatory by the federal or any state government in their healthcare insurance regulations. And if anyone needs SRS which is the transistioning women to complete the process to live as whole and complete women and be legally female, they deserve it first and foremost and well before felons and inmates.

You see all the ordinary transwomen struggle to live and work, and finding ways to pay for the cost of SRS. We're not talking a cheap surgery here. It's $15-20K in the US, not including travel and other expenses outside the clinic or hospital. It's more in Europe but cheaper in Asia, usually Thailand, but then the travel and other expenses are far higher offsetting the total cost to be about the same.

But you can't make this argument to transgender activists. They only believe anything is better, even when it's not right or fair. Just progress is ok with them, even when it's ethically and morally wrong, let alone financially unwise. There are far better ways to spend money on inmates than SRS for the handful of transgender women in prisons.

Why should the many transwomen who can't afford it not be able to access program to help pay for something identified in the DSM as a mental condition when inmates can get it free, and then avail themselves to the other free services to change their birth certificates for their sex. They could go in man and come out women, all paid by the taxpayers.

And people are supposed to say it's ok? And they'll write the checks?

Sorry, I'm for the surgery for those wanting or needing it but there has to be some sense of priority who gets it and who pays for it. But I'm not sorry or am I for what ever advances the progress for transgender people at any price or cost, especially when it's paid by others not in the transgender community.

This is one of the many views I differ with members of the transgender community, and especially the activists. They lose touch of the greater world which we all live in and must abide by for the beterment of all. The common good as they say. Transgender activists seem to lose that view.

And worse when you voice your view, as an alternative, in opposition, as questions, or however, you get verbally pummelled into submission. And if you don't submit, your ignored or worse removed from the discussion, as I have been excommunicated from forums and my responses not approved or removed.

But it doesn't or won't silence me. As in my rules for this blog, it's mine, not yours. Censor me on yours and I'll do likewise here. I want civil conversation with open ears, mind and voices, especially with humor and a smile. That's what's missing from transactivists, realism and humor. And I'll keep poking at that too.

Susan Stanton

I've been reading the reviews, blogs and columns on the recent documentary CNN about Susan Stantion and her transistion from the time she came out when she was the city manager for a small city in Florida to her recent job as the city manager of another city in Florida. I'll be honest to say I didn't watch the documentary, for several reasons.

First, much of these documentaries are the same, with the same life story and same career story. Susan's isn't significantly different except she chose to come out in a public forum (city council meeting) without privately consulting the members to know how they would react, let alone vote to retain then him as the city manager through her transistion. In short, she screwed herself by not doing her homework behind closed doors.

Second, she villified the transgender community during the months following her outing and then firing. Despite all the best advice from many leaders in the transcommunity, she let loose a litany of demeaning and denigrating comments in interviews separating herself as a woman from the rest of the transwomen, either in or post transistion. And yet she had just started her transistion.

Third, she sought out the publicity for her plight and transistion. She gave interviews whenever and wherever she could to tell her story of her situation as a real woman (not trans anything) and her firing. She wanted the spotlight and when she was criticized, even by the transcommunity, she continued to criticize transpeople, including calling many of them, "men in dresses". This despite the reality she was marginally passing herself.

Fourth, when she wasd fired, her contract guarranteed her a full year salary and health insurance. While trying to make the public believe she lost her job and wasn't making money anymore, and was looking for another city manager job, she was financially fine. We're talking low six figure salary with benefits too.

In addition, shortly after her firing she set herself up as a consultant for transgender issues and programs. For a modest fee, of course, she would travel to the place, give talks and promote transgender rights. All like she was suddenly an expert about and on transgender issues and people. Yes, while criticizing the very same community and people in interviews.

So it showed she was in it for the money. But then poor she wasn't. Nor humble.

And lastly, she sold her story to CNN for the price of her sex reassignment surgery. While many transwomen go in debt for their surgery - it's not commonly covered by health insurance but is covered by some employers now, she was handed a check in return for the rights to the most intimate details of her life and transistion.

Others have done this with or for documentaries, most in exchange for partial or full payment for the $15-20K surgery. But Susan had the nerve to deny the fact after she confirmed the fact. She simply lied about it to make the documentary in progress look like an honest one and her volunteering for it. As they say, yeah right.

Susan Stanton doesn't represent the ten of thousands of post-transistion women. She doesn't have the right to claim her story as one, only one as a greed, publicity seeking bitch. Yes, transwomen can be bitches too, she's a shining example. She was lucky to find a new job in the same career at about the same salary and benefits as her old one.

Except for a year of missing salary, using her savings, retirement and other investments to live, she really didn't lose when the vast majority of transwomen lose their jobs, usually their career and almost all their savings during and after their transistion. Yes, she lost her wife and children. That's the reality, very few transistion and keep them in marriage.

Some transwomen fair better with supporting employers, some resurrect their career years later, and some find new careers where they end up personally and professional better. But they're not the majority of transwomen. Susan kept her career with only a slight lose of money, with her major bills in her transistion costs paid by CNN.

She's not the example but the exception. And not by herself, but by luck she sold herself for the documentary and lucked out with getting a new job. Her story isn't the norm, but one created by her for her self-presevation defining herself as a woman and not transgender. Don't mistake her sympathies for the transcommunity or her empathies for other transwomen, it's not real.

It's all a show for the show. And she can seperate herself of the rest of transwomen and not one of them. Yeah, right. And they don't claim her either. Not unlike a bottle of wine gone bad. No one wants it and it can't disguise itself. She's not the hero, or heroine, and she's more the evil queen who can't stand the people other attribute her to in their reviews, columns and blogs on her and the documentary.

Your time is better spent with the young transwomen and their stories. They're the future, they're more honest and really need the help. People and life stories like Kimberely Reed and others. Or better yet, those in college or starting their careers trying to find acceptance to just get on with their life and career. They're worth our attention and support. Not Susan.

It's not about fairness

I was reading the column by someone with the Organisation Internationale des Intersexués (OII, an Intersex organization) about the International Olympic Committe (IOC) and how the IOC has never treated intersexed athletes with respect and fairness, including the recent events with Caster Semenaya of South Africa. I've expressed my view of her and noted she's not by definition intersexed, just an under developed male, and has no right to compete as female.

But the OII seems that all intersexed people should be able to compete in the sex and gender of their choice, despite any obvious or less than obvious advantages they have over non-intersexed atheletes, as the Caster case also showed (3 times the level of testosterone as female athletes). They think somehow people can just show up, announce their sex and gender, and compete accordingly.

And they expect the IOC to agree to allow it. It's about fairness in their mind. Except the OII fails to understand it's not about fairness for a small group of people and less so athletes, but the whole of the athletic community. It's a relative fairness, and as much as you want to complain about the binary sex and gender system, and intersex and transgender atheletes are discriminated against, it's what is.

And the OII fails to understand many professional organizations have rules and proceedures for transgender athletes to compete in the new sex and gender, Marianne Bagger and others have demonstrated this quite professionally by following them to compete openly and fairly. That's what the Athletic Association of South Africa should have done with Caster, make her transistion first, then compete.

That would be fair. But I suspect, when she does transistion, she won't be as dominate as she was in the Berlin competition in 2009 when the complaints were lodged against her. I won't argue the IOC mishandled her case, badly in fact. That's obvious, and they're simply trying to fixing their own problems. And they even botched that. But at least they issued rules for her for future competitions.

In the end the OII needs to take a step back, take deep breath, and see the larger picture, and then put themselves in that instead of trying to make their own picture of the world, and their view of fairness no one else agrees with. They need to get real about themselves and more understanding of others. Now that's fairness for all of us.

Enough already

Update.-- I'll forgive the new MTV show "Transform Me", or at least from the first episode. I watched it later (rerun) and thought it wasn't all that bad. Some younger transwomen, as some older ones have, want to just be like other women and it's fair for them to try and improve their looks, makeup and wardrobe. I still think it's kinda' hype, but I guess ok hype. I just wish there was a way to lose the trans label for post-transistion women, it's unnecessary and unfair.

Ok, this is rant about several things, which means you can really ignore the rest if you're not into reading my personal rants or vents at the world around, about, with transgender people and the transgender community. It's really boring, except of course as an exercise for me to yell from my corner of the world standing on my soapbox. Ok, enough explanation. Onward.

First, enough of the documentaries about people's transistions. I won't argue the recent film, "Prodigol Son", is excellent and worth seeing once. This is about the TV documentaries of individuals from childhood to post-transistion, such as the recent one by Steven/Susan Stanton. She wasn't liked by the transcommunity when she transistioned and no one wants her see or hear her again.

One reason people do this, invite the cameras into the life like that, is simple. It's to pay for the sex reassignment surgery, in part of more often entirely, as with Susan Stanton. Selling yourself to get the surgery doesn't do justice to the many who need it more and can't get insurnance which covers it (rare anyway) or pay for it out of pocket, or at least not without going in debt for $15-20K.

The other reason is the life stories doesn't change. There's too many common threads running through the life of those who transistion. There's already a wealth of books and documentaries of self-destructive people who finally got through their transistion with some sense of being. It's the sad reality of the discrimination, but also for the bad decisions by the individuals.

And lastly, with this one, Susan Stanton not just criticized the transcommunity and other transwomen, she distanced herself from it by calling herself "a woman" as opposed to "those" transwomen. In short she pissed everyone in the community off enough no one had any sympathy for her when she found herself of need of it, especially from the very community she villified.

What we need of stories of successful post-transistion women, and there are far more of them and their stories. That's what's needed, not another see where I've been through story.

Second, Logo TV channel. Enough RuPaul and his dumbass drag show. And I'll add the new "Transform Me" show looking for transwomen to become beautiful women. What happened to just being ordinary and human? Why do we have to expect transwomen be stereotypical women who only want to look pretty?

It's stupid. It's ok to look good, and some of these shows are ok to see people transformed, but it's not the norm of women. Just sit at a local mall and watch women. How many dress up with clothes and makeup in public? Let's get real. Some shows do and are real about their transformation, but most push wanting to look beautiful.

Third, stop the confusing ideas of what's transgender and who's transgender. It's not right or fair to the many post-transistion and the many in transistion to be thought in the same way as drag queens, cross-dressers and other pseudo-transgender (neither of these are in the truest sense of the DSM) people.

There are significant and clear differences between those transistioning and especially those who have transistioned. They don't need or deserve the label the pseudo-transpeople claim as transgender and forget to distinguish. There is a clear and obvious difference and distinction between those being and living as women and those pretending to be women.

Clothes don't make you a woman, being does. Pretending and playing dressup doesn't make you a woman, living as one does. Dressup is fine when it's for the occasion as women do, but not when men want to wear the clothes for fun. The former take the clothes off and they're still women, the latter resume their life as men. Big difference.

It's the very reason the vast majority of post-transistion women walk away from the transcommunity and forget their past. It's not them and not what they want to go back to. And it's not what we need to see, especially in the life documentaries and in the shows. It's about being real and human versus pretending. Don't confuse the latter with the former.

Ok, I feel better.