When I transitioned I was only interested in one thing: changing my sex. Transition for me started a very, very long time ago, in 1969. It was a roller coaster kind of thing and not a walk in the park, though I doubt it is for anyone. Information was the main obstacle. In my very early years I was raised in rural Louisiana nowhere near any large metropolitan area. It was way pre internet, and obtaining any information on anything even vaguely related to transsexualism was almost impossible. A little while after entering college I came upon a paperback copy of Benjamin’s The Transsexual Phenomenon…not long after that I started, for lack of a better word, the journey. I persevered and succeeded.
Unlike some back then, and most today, I accomplished my transition almost entirely on my own. I didn’t attend support groups. I didn’t belong to any clubs. I didn’t attend any conventions. In most regards, I didn’t even know there were such things until much later. And, unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, I didn’t come to know and use the internet until 2002, long after the fact. When I came upon the inevitable obstacles faced in transition I negotiated them myself. Then and now, I never saw myself as the armor plated warrior forging forth on this “do or die” quest. I just knew there was something that needed to be done and set out to do it the best way I could given my circumstances…there were a lot of stumbles.
I never lived under any delusions during this time. I was quite educated and fully understood the limitations of sex change surgery. Intellectually, I realized that there had to be some biophysiological reason for being how I was, even if there was little scientific research at the time to justify it. In the same vein, I also knew that there appeared to be no reason for me to suspect that I was in anyway physically intersex. It would be a lie to say that there were not times when I wondered why I was what I was…but, not at all a stretch to say that I never spent a whole lot of time thinking about it. I was what I was, had very much come to grips with it and that, as they say, was that. As well, though I certainly wanted to pass, be seen, and accepted as a female, whether I was or not was not of any particular importance. I did the best I could, which was actually quite good…much later on I had a bit of cosmetic surgery and, of course, did much better.
Way back then, though I had run into a few others while working for a short time in a New Orleans female impersonation bar, the Gunga Den, I had no transsexual friends. Regardless of what any of the neo modernists say these days, at least in New Orleans, there were two distinct groups…transsexuals and everybody else, the queens. The queens knew who they were and transsexuals knew who we were…the difference between us was very apparent, and both groups recognized that. There was almost always mutual respect and there was no hierarchy. When, on occasion, there would be scuttlebutt that one of the girls had their sex change everyone wished them well…invariably these girls then simply disappeared. I longed for the day that would be me.
As an engineer, I had used the internet, but only as a tool to facilitate my career. In 2001 I bought my first computer and signed up for internet service. Probably like many of you I was blown away. It wasn’t long before I discovered the huge amount of information that was on the net about transsexualism. At first, I was mesmerized. I was stunned with all of the information, envious of the TS girls who now had virtual “how to” manuals on gender reassignment. I spent hours and hours in my free time jumping from link to link absorbing everything I could on the subject…I was fascinated. However, it wasn’t long before I sensed something was just plain wrong with the cyberspace picture I was looking at.
I noticed that though there appeared to be different factions within the TS/CD cybersphere, there was still a sense of recognition that transsexuals were different than the rest. Even ten years ago, though some say transgender as a group has existed for decades and roll out the data to prove it, the term transgender did not saturate the net as it does today. For the most part, it seemed that when transgender was discussed it was in the context of a political movement, not an identity…that’s how I tracked the term. Then more and more, astoundingly fast, almost exponentially, it seemed that people were not part of the transgender, they were a transgender. Less and less one ever saw anyone admitting to being a crossdresser or transvestite, almost overnight it appeared that all of the crossdressers and transvestites disappeared. I thought that strange. I still do. And, then there was the GLBT. Again, even ten years ago GLBT was not a given. Oh, it certainly was there enough to say it was established, but one easily saw just GLB as much as they saw GLBT written on the internet. That too quickly changed, and by 2003 GLBT was as prevalent as transgender was.
But most disturbing to me was the threads I encountered on the online Yahoo Groups. Blogs didn’t permeate the internet in the early 2000s…Yahoo Groups, and others like them, did. I was not prepared for the shock. Reading some of these group threads I came to find out that I was transgender and if I said I wasn’t I was simply in denial. I was told in no uncertain terms that because I was transgender I was expected to accept and support whatever cause these online transgender divas and their posse said I should…and, if I didn’t I was transphobic. I learned I was also to do the same with regard to the gay rights movement…and, if I didn’t I was homophobic. If I disagreed with the transgender philosophy in any way I was termed a bigot, was said to be self-loathing, and suffering from an internalized something or other…and called more names that I care to remember, or repeat if I did. I was informed that there was absolutely no difference between me and a transvestite because we were all on what they called a gender spectrum and to say otherwise meant that I felt myself superior to everyone. Being stealth was a huge no-no; I was told I was still in the closet and living in shame. The fact that I was post op only meant that I had privilege and nothing else, everyone else was just as female as I was and none of them needed to have sex change surgery to be that way. Further, me having GRS would never make me a real woman, just a transgender woman…I most definitely could never escape from being transgender. Many of the transgender took great pains in insulting gender reassignment surgery…calling it an aftermarket vagina that made no difference at all…the old “when archeologists dig up your bones a thousand years from now they will label you a man anyhow” insult that is still trotted out to this day. The list of things I was told and expected to do and support went on and on. The leaders and vast majority of participants in these groups would not and did not tolerate any opposing position to their view of transgender. There was really only one way…the transgender way.
I was pretty stunned by those online groups. I joined quite a few. In each one I posted a couple of time offering up alternative ideas, experiences, and points of view. Each time I was shouted down in a hail of insults that redefine the term vile. I left every single Yahoo Group I ever joined within a week or so…sometimes after only a couple of days. And, within a few months of discovering them, backed completely out of their internet debate everywhere. I didn’t enter back into it for several years.
As vicious as the Yahoo Groups were they paled in comparison to the advent of the blogs when they came into vogue. Though there were relatively few Yahoo Groups, I one day found there were hundreds and hundreds of transgender blogs that picked up right where the online groups left off. They spouted the same transgender ideology…they had the same types of leaders…and, they were just as static, just as nasty and just as insulting. There was, however, a difference. First of all, the transgender movement and the gay rights movement were absolutely and completely welded at the hip to each other…debate one of them and you quickly found yourself debating both. But more importantly, by 2005 there were hundreds and hundreds of thousands more people online than there was just a few years earlier. The sheer volume of transgender exploded onto the internet in just a few short years and each and every one of them had scoured cyberspace. Many of them were a walking textbook on gender theory and the history of everything related to gender. They spoke of the early transsexual pioneers as if they were best friends. The vast majority would tell you they were transgender but, of course, were also quick to add they were transsexual…transgender “is an umbrella” don’t you know. Crossdressers had apparently become extinct and only a transphobic bigot would even mention the word transvestite…everyone, it seemed, was transsexual. On these new and most numerous blogs saying certain things or holding certain opions would get you banned and silenced in a heartbeat. The transgender movement had evolved to cult like status and they were not interested in debating anything.
However, some of us, admittedly a very, very few of us, started to challenge the transgender. Amazingly, a few of us managed to do so and were not banned or silenced in the process. Our experience didn’t match up with what the transgender were insisting was our case. We didn’t feel oppressed; we didn’t feel in danger when we walked out the door each day. Healthcare wasn’t an issue to us, doctors treated us just fine when we went in. We didn’t understand why gay men should be able to speak on our behalf just because…in fact, we didn’t feel any innate personal connection to the gay rights movement at all. We could see no reason to be out, proud, and vocal about being transsexual. Also, we felt we had left transsexualism behind when we had GRS and felt no compulsion to other ourselves by being trans something or other. Many of us were heterosexual, some engaged or even married and resented the insinuation that “we are all queer”, which we quite often heard. We didn’t support every single cause the transgender raised anymore than any other man or woman might or might not. We were told that things were the way they were regardless if everything in our personal book of experience said differently…whether we liked it or not. There were many other conflicts we had with the transgender but the most grievous was that we felt we were being held captive within a movement we never asked or wanted to join and had never in anyway felt any connection to.
These objections went over like the proverbial lead brick in the comment threads of the blogs. The transgender as a whole continued to speak, grant interviews, lobby, and star in documentaries stating their ideology, never once acknowledging not everyone who was transsexual agreed with all, or even most, of what they were saying. We were told repeatedly that no one was holding us captive to their movement in the same breath that we were also told we should “not let the door hit us in the ass on the way out” …which, of course, implies that we were. To the transgender, we were traitors to there movement. There was no debate. There was no discussion. The transgender responded to our objections to being colonized and, by proxy, being represented by them with the same insults, shout downs, and silencing that they claimed conservatives and hate mongers presented to them…what being good for the goose definitely not being good for the gander.
We were branded transsexual separatists. The transgender hated us.
We are called separatists because we don’t want to be represented or associated with a transgender movement that has claimed forever that they don’t hold us captive but represent us anyway. I know…pretty screwy, huh? Though we don’t buy into identity politics and the transgender know it, we are still condescendingly told that we have the right to identify anyway we want. Others take great pains to point to the fact that our numbers are quite small…as if that matters. Well, if the wishes of a few are unimportant, by their own logic, the mainstream and society as a whole should have every legitimate right to ignore the transgender completely. That, of course, is unacceptable to the transgender. Again, what’s good for the goose doesn’t apply to the gander.
Most of us that would be known to the transgender as transsexual separatists actually support much of what transgender represents. But, because we don’t march in lock step on every issue and want no part in their movement as far as the transgender are concerned we may as well not agree with them on any.
This is the story of why I, and others who might agree with me, are called transsexual separatists and why the transgender hate us.
If calling bullshit on pregnant men…a women can have a penis…castrations redefined as gender reassignment surgery…con artists who claim to be intersex…spontaneous sex changes…the cultural elimination of transvestites…transition by bee sting…men with penis preaching feminism to feminists…change of birth certificate just because…non op transsexuals…gender spectrums…cock as neoclit…etc ad nauseum because I don’t agree with every transgender absurdity, despise their lack of acknowledgement that many feel as I do, and reject being held captive by a political movement I feel no connection with…then I’m proud to be referred to as a transsexual separatists.
64 Comments
An excellent if depressing summary of the situation. I suppose you’re preaching to the choir, but with all the crap out there, I figure it’s good to put information like this out there too. Then someone searching might just find what you wrote instead of the crap.
Amen. Please allow me to offer a perspective on Harry. In 1967 when I first read his book I was revolted. As a caring male doctor he had indeed identified a small subset of humanity that required understanding but he applied typical male control logic to transsexuals and foisted the concept that only after living as a woman for an extended period of time the medical community should grant the “right” to hormones and then after additional assessment allow SRS. That may have worked in New York City or San Francisco but it was a DOA in places like Kentucky and Alabama. But, that is now ancient history. In the world of 2012 I simply do not believe anyone who says they are not surgery tracked because of this or that reason. My response is … get a job, live on the cheap, do whatever it takes to save for a few years and go for it. If you can’t do that then it is obviously not what you are. That probably sounds harsh but I am tired of all the BS I encounter on the web and even in real life. Separatist? You betcha.
I wouldn’t belong to any group that would have me, or has a member.
Well said.
Separatist? Oh, you mean you identify as women. Well, of course they hate you.
Awesome comment.
I wish this had been the first thing I read on the internet. It would have saved me considerable difficulty.
How can you be a seperatist from something you never joined or took part in?
More transgender illogical thinking
“How can you be a seperatist from something you never joined or took part in?”
I’m really not trying to be petty or derail here, but am I taking this out of context?
“every legal and social perk associated with being female.”
Should that read “perceived”?
Sorry to stray from topic
This will probably get auto-deleted, but what the hey. I’m an optimist; I hope for a decent conversation.
An interesting post, and quite educational. Thank you for writing it.
Your argument is marred by one problem: you lump *all* transgender folk into one barrel. So you’re complaining about being lumped in while doing exactly that to others. For instance, I’m transgendered, but I think you’d have a hard time arguing I advanced the arguments you assert I must, because of your assumption of my membership to some group or other! I don’t lump you in as “all transsexual women”; I consider you a person, an individual. With some opinions in common with some other folk. Nothing more and nothing less.
As far as those opinions go, I argue that “transsexual separatists” – a term I use as a convenience; perhaps I should coin another term? – seek to deny safety and rights to others for no apparently good reason. The driving force for all this is an overt hatred of “men in frocks”. And a mistaken impression that some speak for all. Granted, a lot of vocal activists like to give the impression they represent an entire community, but it’s impossible to argue that any one transsexual woman represents the entire community, and (therefore) it’s also impossible to consider that any one (or ten) transgendered individuals represent “their” entire community. Painting an entire segment of the population with a broad brush because of a few, no matter how numerous those few seem, is a bit “off”, a trifle unfair, wouldn’t you agree? It’s not acceptable to do that with other segments of the population; so why is it reasonable for these one or two segments? You complain of broad brushes in your post, and then proceed to paint with one! Like I said, it mars your basic argument, which is sound and definitely worth airing.
Personally, I see nothing wrong and much right with acknowledging that the two “basic” communities are different. Indeed, I wish it were considered the case more often. Not for prejudicial reasons, but because the actually are different. There’s some overlap, but that’s to be expected. But when the denial of basic freedoms (to be treated equally, for instance) is sought, or the use of prejudicial rationalizations that have the solidity of a paper colander to justify the desperate dogmatism, I start to get a tad offended.
In a half-hearted defense of some of the arguments you resent, I can offer that “transvestites” and crossdressers haven’t gone away; the language simply changed. As it does.
(Goodness knows, it often takes me a year or more to stop arguing against some shift in the language!) It should also be noted that gender, as an overall concept, has only recently started to solidify in both language, basic concepts, precepts and a common(-ish?) understanding. We, collectively, know more about gender now than we did 10 years ago; what is also immediately apparent is that we know very, very little about it. In other words, there was a lot of nonsense spouted awhile back; folk being folk, it’s going to continue. I remember some of those Yahoo groups as well; like most (all?) Internet groups, only the choir is welcome. The Web has never fostered understanding and mutual comprehension; it has enabled concise groups and lethargic opinion, however. Other than that, the Internet is the Internet; it’s been a haven for vitriol and understanding alike since before the Web was invented. Just as a “word to the wise”, it’s generally safe to assume that when someone speaks for an entire community, they neglected to ask that community for permission. I speak for me, you speak for you.
Like I said – thanks for writing your post. I found it quite informative.
Probably against my better judgement, but I’ll let your post in this time…provided I don’t track back to your blog and see a different tact. If you are interested in discussion or debate I’m all for it. On the other hand, if the intent is to post here and then go back to your own blog and slam me in the most vile of ways I’m not interested.
I fully realize that I’m generalizing in my critique of all things transgender but from a general perspective I feel I am more than quite accurate in doing so. Obviously not everyone in a group agree with everything the group as a whole expounds.
I am confused when you say that transsexual separatists seek to, in your words:
What specifically are you referring to? I know on my blog, TS-Si, and others that one can repeatedly read that we in no way feel anyone should be the subject of discrimination and in no way condone violence against anyone, including and specifically the transgender. Further, I think, and have stated on this blog more times than I care to count, the transgender and the GLBT as a whole should absolutely lobby for any right they don’t have but feel they should. Those are verbatim words I have written…I don’t know how to be any clearer in my position. Upwards of 70% of the US population already reside under laws that prohibit that discrimination; I think it should be 100% and one day think it will be. Only a barbarian would try to justify violence against another because they are in some way, any way, socially different. I don’t know of one so-called transsexual separatists that does…can you name one?
““deny safety and rights to others for no apparently good reason.””
You won’t get a response to this. I have tried numerous times. None of us “separatists” want to deny safety to the transgender community. That is utterly absurd.
Oh, how quaint. I just go to CaroLINES and see I have yet another article all to myself under the “Transsexual Bigot” category. I think I am up to having 20 articles now on that blog. I guess I must be doing something right.
What goes on between you and Carol is between you and her. Here is not the place to bring it. I won’t let either of you bring it here. Carol’s comment was on topic and reasonable…as long as someone takes that approach they can post here. If she, or anyone else, takes it even slightly to the personal level I will delete every comment that’s associated.
Just saying…keep things positive.
I kind of thought it pertained to the ‘broad brush’ aspect as anyone who bucks the transgender umbrella is fair game as a “bigot” to Carolyn Ann. I will make no further comments.
I understand sweetpea…just a reminder…keep things positive.
DELETED SA-ET 01-18-12
I TRIED TO COOL THIS OFF BUT YOU EVIDENTLY WON’T BUY IT. I’M NOT TAKING ANYONE’S SIDE. I’M ALSO NOT GOING TO LET ANYONE, YOU INCLUDED, TURN MY BLOG INTO A FREE FOR ALL. MISGENDERING IS PARTICULARLY UNCALLED FOR. WHATEVER YOUR GRIEF WITH EITHER OF THE TWO PEOPLE YOU SPEAK OF DIDN’T HAPPEN HERE. COOL OFF AND TRY AGAIN, OR TAKE IT TO ANOTHER BLOG.
I am interested in discussion; and no, I said pretty much the same thing on my blog.
If you don’t mind, and you’re interested in such a discussion – can we hold it on my blog? I have almost no rules (no spam, no outting and that’s the end of the rules) and no inclination to delete, censor or deny that which I don’t like. You can ask Dana about that; she’s said some pretty little words about me and they’re still there.
Hopefully I’ll see you over at my place, so to speak.
No thank you.
Okay. Sorry.
There’s plenty to discuss in your post and in the comments. I would have enjoyed such a discussion.
Can I be presumptuous, and extend an invitation to any whom wish to have such a discussion?
My apologies re Dana. We really don’t see eye to eye on some things, and have an adversarial relationship in pretty much everything else. I have no idea why she’s using you as a proxy; she could have her say on her blog, or on mine.
Dana was upset and I completely understand why. I’ve been where she was at many, many times.
I apologize for my previous post. I should respect your guidelines! I get pretty upset bout all of this sometimes.
BTW, I told you that you wouldn’t get a response about :
“deny safety and rights to others for no apparently good reason.”
“What specifically are you referring to? ”
A lot in the transgender community think just like Carolyn Ann. They think we want them to be harmed or don’t care about their protections which is utter BS. Carolyn Ann did not answer your question because it is a made-up philosophy. Nobody that reads your blog wish any harm to the transgender community.
However, we most certainly receive our fair share of demonizing and dangerous rhetoric from them. Transsexual taliban, NAZIs, brownshirts and a lot of other truly hateful names. Names which could put us in the path of actual physical harm. I do not go to any transgender pride marches, TDOR, etc, because I truly don’t feel safe around them.
Carolyn Ann, please show evidence of your statement “deny safety and rights to others for no apparently good reason.”
Thanks
No need to apologize, but thank you for doing so. With regard to Carolyn Ann, let me say this and then how about we leave her completely out of this thread which is about how why some of us are referred to as separatists. And, Dana, my comment below is not aimed at you.
First of all, anyone, including her can come here on my blog and post, as long as they don’t go back on there blog or another blog and call me every name under the sun. But, if someone is interested in discussing the topic of the day, they are welcome, I just require that it is done respectfully. When I wrote a few months ago that I had had it up to the teeth with the blog scene I meant it. Perspective has nothing to do with it; I don’t take sides. There are some who I used to let post here that I don’t anymore. I see those people as nasty, vile, mean, and subversive and want nothing to do with them…they represent everything about blogging I hate.
Now, my question to Carolyn was somewhat platonic; it she wanted to answer then fine, if she chose not to that is fine as well. She invited me to take this debate to her blog; I politely refused.
Next, I have written several blog posts in which I say in so many words that I don’t care. I meant that when I wrote it and feel the same way this very second. The name of this blog is TG Non-Sense. And, many if not most of the blog posts are meant to point that out. But, I will say again, I can’t foresee anything that the transgender can do, or want, that in the end will effect me one way or the other. If was pre op, I’d be way more concerned.
Let me give you a couple of examples. Louisiana has allowed post ops to change their birth certificates since 1968. Now believe me when I tell you that Louisiana absolutely requires that anyone who wants to change their birth certificate prove they’ve had GRS…I know that because I’ve done that. My point in this example is that the Feds are not going to get into the business of dictating how the States handle birth registration. So, let’s assume that the transgender go all out on the “changing of birth certificate” cause. Some states, maybe like California, may end up allowing that. Some states, at this very moment, appear to be pretty lax in allowing the BC to be changed…so maybe they will allow the TG to change their BC. But, a few states, like Idaho and Tennessee won’t even allow post ops to change their BC, it’ll be a cold day in hell before they let the TG. But, for the sake of discussion, even if every state in the nation allows the TG to change their BC…I wouldn’t vote for it…I don’t think it’s in the best interests of pre and post op transsexuals…but if it happens, I really don’t care. As a side note, I think the TG have a long, long way to go in getting this “right.” I think that is TG Non-Sense.
Another example, that the TG can point to as more of a success is the use of public bathrooms. City after city, municipality after municipality is allowing the TG to legally use the girls bathroom. The TG just can’t seem to understand that women do not want to go to the bathroom at McDonalds with their children and see them there. They just don’t understand that women don’t want this, they refuse to respect that. Nonetheless, they continue barging into women’s spaces. Again, I wouldn’t vote to allow that, I didn’t do it when I was transitioning, and don’t want to see the TG in my bathroom when I use it. But, it is going to happen, and my attitude is so what? As another side note, except on the rare occasion I may have been in a gay bar, I can’t remember ever running into any transitioning person in a public restroom.
Now, the GLB has really one holy grail, same-sex marriage, and once they attain that, one is going to see them take a back seat on activism. And, when they do get their “marriage equality” the little interest they might currently have in all things transgender is going to evaporate. But, the transgender have the acceptance thing to overcome. And I believe the issues they keep forcing on people are going to blow up in their face one day. With the tack the transgender is following, sooner or later there is going to be a huge backlash against them.
Regarding name calling, no one on the internet can say they have been called more names than I have. I agree that it can be disturbing. But, conversely, so what if someone calls you a name in their blogs. Of all the names I’ve been called I have not personally known one of the people who called me them…no one. As my husband says, being called a name on the internet is like someone making a face at you on the internet. So what? Monica Roberts is a bigot and a racist…but no one but some of the GLBT pays any attention to her, or even knows who she is. The same goes for all of the trans activists and every single TG blogger who lives…nobody but other TGs even know who they are. At most - AT MOST – they are big fish in the extremely small sea that is the transgender…and no one in the mainstream knows who they are, cares who they are, or pays any attention to them whatsoever.
Lastly, most if not all of us who are called separatists and, I think, the vast majority of post operative transsexuals are not in the least inclined to be visible. Even those few of us who point out TG Non-Sense do so mostly for the entertainment and strictly part time when there’s nothing else to do. I speak only for myself, but I think anybody who thinks they are going to stop the transgender juggernaut is going to be defeated…they are not a transgender movement but a GLBT movement and won’t be stopped until society as a whole says “enough of this non-sense.” I’m happy just to point out transgender absurdity now and again.
Susan, you wrote:
“it’s arguable that regardless of what surgery a MtoF has they can never actually change their biological sex.”
This notion is almost always accepted out of hand. It’s conceptually wanting, though, if one gives it enough thought. Currently, there is not a way to change gonadal sex where one is able to produce gametes opposite to the ones the gonads one is born with produce but the term “biological sex” can be very misleading. It isn’t chromosomes or genes that make us who we are. It is the effects genes have or don’t have on a person that makes a person what they are. Not all effects happen genetically and sometimes when genes are involved in producing sex characteristics the relationship is not directly related to genes that are considered directly related to sex determination.
Outside of this one point, I find myself in agreement with almost all you have written in THIS post.
Agreed.
A simple question.
Personally I find separatism somewhat naive politically and the categories it reinforces rigid and less significant than some I find more meaningful. That’s not to say that I can’t distinguish between differing groups and different needs, and don’t find that distinction meaningful, or that I’m particularly enamoured of the spectrum approach.
But definitions in terms of what one isn’t, don’t inspire much trust, especially as the history of separatism is also one of separating elite groups. ‘HBS’ in it’s Goiar form allowed for around 1 in a hundred post ops fulfilling the criteria. Only the other day ‘MKIA’ was crawling to rad fem hate groups saying that the transsexual condition only affects 1 in 30,000 or so : in other words 10 – 20 % of the post op population, if one goes along with Lynn Conway’s figures. ‘Anne’/'Anna Rosa’/ ‘Annie Rose’ is a prime example of those with a habit of going onto the blogs of post-ops and calling them transgender.
As I said, a simple question. How many of the post op population, leaving aside pre ops and other more questionable categories, do you view as actually part of the community you want to separate as?
well done Susan, well done!
Well, Sophia, I appreciate you entering the discussion, but I really don’t want to bring specific people into the conversation unnecessarily. What Anne or anyone else does or doesn’t do on other blogs is really none of my business. I am in no way referring to Anne but must say that there are a few who would most definitely fall into the separatist camp that I have nothing in common with and I don’t at all approve of their tactics…some of them I won’t let post on my blog anymore.
Now, to answer your question, which was:
I’m not sure I understand your question accurately so I will give you my opinion based on the two ways I read it…both answers are obviously subjective.
If you mean how many post ops I think are actually leaders of and incorporated within the transgender community I’d have to say not very many, very few of the overall number of MtoF who have had GRS. I also think that most of that group are gay or lesbian. I’m not inclined to list them, but there are less than a dozen or so high profile post operative activists and as far as I know they are all gay or lesbian. Even if you tripled or even quadrupled that number and brought it up into the 36-50 range that is not very many post ops…even if one arbitrarily increased the number to say 500 – an average of 10 high profile post operative transgender activist per state – it’s still not a very high number. Maybe there’s more than that, I don’t know…but if they are I don’t see them in any of the media. It is only worth mentioning the number is almost exclusively gay or lesbian because there is little difference between the transgender movement and the GLBT as a whole. I firmly believe that transactivism is motivated as much or more by the person being gay or lesbian as it is by them being any subset of being gender variant.
If your question is how many post ops do I think would be classed as separatists I will guess way, way more than are transgender. Now, the transgender movement reading the preceding statement would immediately say “Bullshit…show us the numbers…where are all of those people.” To which I would respond with the same question back, i.e., show me all of the numbers that show the transgender movement is based on the majority of known or guessed living post ops.
They can’t do it and here’s my logic on why they can’t.
A year or so ago, Conway and several others used pretty sound statistical tools in an attempt to reach the number of post op transsexuals. When all was boiled down the numbers these different groups came up with guessed at somewhere between 40,000 and 60,000 who are post operative transsexuals. If someone would like to dispute that number I’d be fine with it, but kind of following along with the studies I read and the fact that I have more than a little formal training in statistics those numbers looked to be about right. My question would be “Where are all of those post op people at?” One doesn’t see anywhere near that number even in combined (all subsets of gender variance) surveys, petitions, rallys, protests, etc. so where are all of these post ops. Continuing, post ops as a general rule then must be stealth, semi stealth, extremely private, or just don’t give a damn…and, I do think that is the case. Now, if one correctly assumes that there are some of these “not-to-be-seen” post ops out there who are active within the transgender movement, that still leaves a huge number who aren’t…for whatever reason. Contrary to what the TG movement says, we don’t see this these post ops being murdered, only a very few of any subset of gender variance meet that end…and frankly the vast majority of those are not indicated as post op. So, we are right back where we started…if they are not huge numbers of post ops active, protesting, and other wise not visible then where are they…and, more importantly, if things are as bad as the transgender movement makes them out to be, why aren’t they visible. My answer to that is that most of them do as I’ve done…they transition to being female, have GRS, and then go about their lives as females along with the rest of the population.
Make no mistake, I am called a separatist and I comment here on my blog about the issues, but as is said, no one can say I am separating from a movement I never belonged to in the first place. Being referred to as a separatist is something I’m called, not something I feel I am. In the scheme of everyday current events I am way more interested and concerned about the nation’s national security, the environment, the economy, my swimming pool staying clean, pleasing my husband and countless other issues than I am, ever have been, or ever will be what the transgender are up to. The transgender, as a rule, at almost every turn exhibit a chip on their shoulder that one just seldom if ever sees, as a rule, from the post ops.
Apologies for the personalisation but it seemed necessary to give at least some examples.
Originally I was only trying to distinguish what members of the possible groupings you’d view as transsexual and qualified to be within that separate community. Whilst you and I might draw the line in different places, and indeed I may not even qualify under yours, at the same time most of us would distinguish between performative gender and seeking to change life and body to match a different sex/ gender identity. It does seem to me that members of the ‘separatist’ community do go rather further and police narratives, eg terming late transitioners as transgender rather than transsexual, post op or not. Certainly don’t want a personal argument here but am happy to provide links to support this, and it’s hardly a point that needs arguing. I don’t know what percentage of the post op population are late transitioners, but would imagine that few would support a separatism that left them in limbo.
Presumably, though, your response is to the point of transgender as meaning those who support a transgender political agenda. Frankly I’d say that really depends on how you want to break that down. In terms of hate crimes and legislation against discrimination based on gender expression I’d imagine a large majority of post ops would have common cause with LGBT efforts. My own experience of knowing a dozen or so post op women, none of whom are particularly out or obvious,is that violence is a present fear for many and an actuality for some whose appearance I personally would never have thought warranted it. Survey evidence does seem to support this. I do feel you let yourself open the accusation that your personal life history is different enough for you to ignore such evidence.And given that the most vulnerable time for a transsexual is during transition, saying that most murders aren’t post ops doesn’t mean that most aren’t of pre ops rather than, say, cross dressers. The answer as to why the occurrence of violence isn’t more visible lies, I’d presume, in the reluctance, especially of post ops, to broadcast their status, as well as often well founded cynicism as to prevalent attitudes in law enforcement agencies.
In so far as trangender efforts on employment and access to medical and emergency services go, again there’d seem to be strong evidence of common cause. Whilst there might be the occasional time when performative transgender people would seek to use such, actually the main beneficiaries are transsexuals. Most european legislation on these matters tends to be based on permanent performative transition at the least, and encounter little opposition thereby. Issues of documentation and status may be negatively affected by an association with LGBT umbrellas, but hardly by that much. And given that a majority of post ops would seem to be LGB anyway, the question seems to be moot.
Why aren’t there more visible transsexual activists ? The obvious answer relates to how large a number of activists are visible in any socio-political grouping. If one were to take a figure of 300 post op transgender activists how many is this likely to represent ? If one were to take a figure of 1 for every 200, activist to supporter ratio, then it would follow that the entire population of post ops in the US could be behind the transgender movement. Obviously that’s arbitrary but I can remember similar ratios being used to bolster the ‘separatist petition’ support.
A last point. These sorts of debates are apt to inaccurate categorisation when applied universally. I personally live in europe and move within an international community of people. Transgender, in the political sense, varies enormously from country to country. US issues and delineations of transgender and transsexual are not universal ones by any means – the ‘bathroom bill’ meme being only one obvious example.
Apologies aren’t necessary, Sophia, but thank you. A while back I became completely disgusted with the state of blogging and how online debates so often devolve into complete derails. Now, I try to head off any comment that I think might spiral into personal attacks with a gentle warning. There are no “sides” here, only positions. I welcome anyone to come here and discuss civilly their position, no matter how much I might disagree with them. Now, to my reply.
I see your point, I do, but, honestly I’m not inclined to qualify or disqualify anyone in particular; I think anyone who would read my blog would know pretty much where I line up on the issues. Yes, there are some transsexuals who feel they are the authority on all things transsexual. I’ve seen blog threads that seem to go on endlessly in the early/late transitioners and who is Type V vs. Type VI vein. Personally, I’m not really sure what the point of those types of debates are…and don’t care; I don’t take part in them. I must repeat, I am called a separatist, but that’s not how I see myself. However, if my comments and essays set me up as a separatist that’s fine, I think what I think.
With regard to hate crimes and violence, I certainly don’t sanction violence against anyone. I do question the survey evidence you allude to. A review of the TDR site shows that the vast majority of the deaths there appear to be from those involved in the sex industry…others are from simply engaging in unsafe acts, like being out on very lonely streets in very violence prone neighborhoods late at night. A few have been killed by their boyfriends. Recently a girl was killed after she set up a guy in a drug bust. Almost all of these people were killed because they were engaging in one way or the other in some form of unsafe activity. It’s not popular to say what I just did; I’ve been accused of blaming the victim for doing so. There is no justification for killing another person but if one engages in unsafe activities they have to understand there may be some very serious consequences in doing so. I just don’t believe that one a transsexual/transgender who acts responsibly has anywhere near as much reason to worry about being the victim of violent crime as is put forth.
I really have only this comment on the employment issue, medical, emergency services, or the number of actists, etc. that you allude to. There are several very well know cases in which the medical community failed miserably…the ambulance crew who didn’t treat a trans woman and left her to die and the FtoM that was the subject of the movie Southern Comfort are two that come to mind…but I just can’t believe that there is this wholesale discrimination by the medical community against all things trans…my opinion. With regards to employment, there seems to be this mindset within some who transition that after they do they are somehow owed something. Transition can be difficult for someone who doesn’t pass at all. Gaining employment for anyone is not any easy proposition. I am all for employment non-discrimination legislation but if anyone thinks that legislation is going to eliminate it I think they are mistaken. There are handicapped, black people, white people, trans people, gay people, and other ethnic groups that are discriminated against all the time…discrimination is not just a GLBT issue, it’s an issue for everyone who walks the planet. I have some very strong opinions on how and why anyone even vaguely related to anything trans are discriminated against and am not going into them on this thread.
I disagree with saying most of these hate crimes are the fault of bieng in bad professions or doing something wrong. Sure sexwork has its risks but it is often the only work allowed for a transperson,even if i choose to starve. same with bieng out on dark streets in bad nieghborhoods late at night,ever think they might be homeless, shelters dont accept us? Ive been disowned by my family,annexed from friends. Ive elluded groups of bashers chasing me in a truck before, ive been to the ER only to be told “sorry,we dont treat that condition here,but well fix your nose”, finding employment is damn near impossible. Ive thrown food away from restaurants cause i cant trust it. Ive been harrassed and dismissed by every faucet of society including police and medical for simply bieng me. All that as preop TS who can barely afford her hormone regiem,let alone continue with electrolosis or dream of affording surgery yet. socialy a preop TS faces the exact same discrimination as a TG,perhaps moreso by living fulltime. it is this i see the use of umbrella corp. and have my own misgivings over its inclusion of cd/tv but from a protective view,i do see there inclusion even if the condition is only dissimilar to ours.
Thank you for you comment, Jayowen, I can tell you are sincere in it.
I’m not saying that most hate crimes are the fault of the victims, only that choices have consequences. I don’t doubt there are instances in which people do whatever it is they have to do to survive, including sex work. I also realize there are homeless transgender people that are not welcome in some shelters. For years and years and years and years I have been estranged from my family; they want nothing to do with me and I can’t remember the last time we had any contact…I understand your point on that issue as well. And, I certainly don’t question that the problems you’ve encountered actually happened. You conclude your comment by saying “it is this [that] I see [as] the use of the umbrella.”
My question to you is how has the GLBT helped you with the issues you’ve faced? Have they kept you from being harassed by the police and stopped you from being treated differently in the ER? Have they brought your family back? Have they helped you get a job? Have they eliminated groups of bashers from chasing you down? From your comment I’d say they haven’t.
The topic of this thread is why some of us are called separatist, not what has the transgender done for me lately. I’d like to ask you if you think that us so-called separatist haven’t at one time or the other experienced the same things you have? I’ve already told you my family has completely written me off…do you think others who may feel like I do or have successfully transitioned all have a hunky dory family life? What you are experiencing my friend is what almost all of us have gone through at one time or the other. I’m not trying to dismiss your very real issues, but to be brutally honest that’s what transitioning is all about. I’m not saying you hold this position, Jayowen, but many who transition seem to think that in order to successfully transition all they need to do is make a proclamation and in some way it just magically happens. I’ll tell you what I think in spite of the fact that I will open myself up to an onslaught. The single most important variable that will determine a successful and rather uneventful transition is for the person to be able to present themselves as a legitimate member of the sex they are transitioning to. I know, I know…that elitist, lookist, sexist, and a billion other ists and isms of one sort or the other…but I think it is the absolute truth. And, doing so can be quite difficult. A MtoF who is transitioning but can’t present as even a reasonably vague facsimile of a female is in for a very hard time. There are many, many, many who succeed in being able to present and be accepted as their target sex, but very, very, very few who can do so without a lot of hard work. Again, I’m not trying to dismiss your very real experiences, but the reality of transitioning and how maybe that experience should be are two very different things.
I lost my entire circle of friends of more than thirty years and almost all my family. This was the norm when I transitioned so you get no boo hoo points with me for that. In addition I, personally, took in a substantial number of “street girls” and provided them the opportunity to bootstrap their lives. Pretty much all of them returned to hooking because they liked the easy money, long and the short of it. I suspect most of them are dead now.
The fundamental problem here is that transgender activists and their staunch followers have created the illusion that transition is simply a matter of switching attire and falling into lockstep with the notion that the everyone has the right to present in any way they please, with absolutley no consequences.
There are consequences as you have found out. Being true and honest to yourself and who or what you think you are is frought with danger, even more so if you are one of the many people that attempt to just jump off the bridge of social norms and go headlong into a transition without having either the resources or the right looks to pull it off.
I have been where you are, but I have the looks. It wasn’t hard for me to be accepted because I could immediatly assimilate into the new gender and continue to live and work and earn. However, there were several times when I could not continue to go ahead in the female gender role and had to step back due to finances. Transition costs money and living and working as a female in this world, even assuming you can, is not the best way to save a pot of gold for the necessary surgeries that had to come.
That was the focus for me, to obtain the surgery, not to just “present” as a female. Thats where the Transgender differ exponentially from those born transsexual. It’s not about being true to yourself and damn the torpedoes, its about attaining the goal, and that goal was SRS.
The singer “STING” once said in an interview with Rolling Stone magazine that during the early years with the Police on the punk rock scene, he would have worn a boat anchor through his nose if that was what it took to become a successful singer that could go on to play and sing the music he wanted. Transition is no different. Sometimes you have to step back and take out the garbage for a while longer if that will get you where you want to go.
Transgender is not about surgery or about being a woman, it’s about playing a role. It’s about presenting as without actually being a part of. Its a social revolt that gets people into a world of trouble they didn’t bargain for. All they were told is to just go out and do it, be yourself, demand your rights.
You don’t need to let us know how that works out for you … we already know.
Wonderful article.
Agreed. Thanks for this history.
Fantastic article. You have done a great job at expressing how I feel. I take issue with Carolyn Ann’s statement that we “seek to deny safety and rights to others for no apparently good reason”. This seems to be an issue often brought up as factual, but it’s not as far as I have ever seen. Personally, I don’t want to deny any ones rights.
Yep, every time I have ever posted an article like this or my own commentary they come charging out from under the woodwork with the same repeated slams. And it’s the ones who most desperately want to keep their penises and live in a gay sexual world who attack us most viciously and tell us that we with our “faux” “pseudo-” vaginas that we are just as fake a woman as they are with their penises renamed as “neo-clits”. And it is they who are the separatists who want to separate themselves as legally “transgender” and to define themselves as some less and something other than a Real Man or Woman
And they plead poverty because we’re all rich elitist essentialist White Women who identify with cissexual women and believe that Real Women don’t have and use penises– while they say that what’s between your legs doesn’t matter- it’s what between your ears. But if you really believe that next time you have sex– stick it in your ear!
But it’s not surprising that those who could afford SRS plead poverty rather than say out loud that they want to keep their penises. Because when they actually do come into some money they always make an excuse as to why they couldn’t go through with it. But now they could no longer hide behind the real cost problem that keeps so many who are legitimately transsexual from attaining surgery. Even in places like the UK and Canada where government health systems cover SRS, true transsexuals are stuck on long waiting lists in lines behind those who will go through the program to get free hormones but when the time comes will never climb onto the operating table, even for free surgery.
Separatism sure. But we identify with cissexual (cisgender) women and men– and we refuse to separate from the mainstream, from the human race. It is the transgenders who want to separate us from our natural allies, the real women and men that we join after our transition, who accept us as women among women and men among men and as a part of the Great Sisterhood and Brotherhood of Real Women and Men and not as members of the Otherhood of Binary Defying 3rd Genderqueer Gender Outlaw Gender Rebel Fantasy Role Pretenders. Cissexual people and the sexual binary of the human race of female and male are not our enemies as they are the enemies of gender variants.
All I ever wanted to be was a woman and nothing else but a woman, a respected woman among woman and a female bodied one at that. And that is what I became. And that is the one thing that they can never do- be accepted and respected as women among women- because they can only function as the only women in a world of gay men and they are jealous of us and our legitimacy as real and legal women, so jealous they wish to claim to be just like us while forcing us against our will under their male-bodied transgender dictatorship and umbrella while eradicating the word transsexual and our distinct identity..
They will never find the acceptance, respect and legitimacy that we have earned and I refuse and we refuse to be identified as anything other than the real women and men that we are. I am a woman of transsexual history, but it is history, 35 years ago when my transition ended and I haven’t “transed” anything or varied gender since!
I can’t add anything, you said it so wonderfully already. I can only add my voice to the resounding chorus of “AMEN!”
Ok, despite my better judgement, I will offer my opinion as the comments here seem to be civilised and well moderated.
Concerning transgender as a political movement or activism alliance, I have no problem with supporting and working towards common interests.
However, despite the protestations of the leaders of the transgender movement, common usage of the term transgender HAS changed. People DO now say that “I am Transgender”. I even caught one of those self same transgender leaders using the term like that and when I called her on it she claimed it was just poetic license – hmmmm.
That Kool-Aid must just be soooo inviting!
Well I’m sorry but that usage of transgender is entering into realms of identity politics and I want no part of it.
I have no problem with people who do wish to identify as transgender, trans*, 3rd Gender or whatever their heart and soul tells them they are. I just don’t want to be under an umbrella where my specific issues, needs and concerns are subsumed by those who have different needs and a different agenda. Especially when that agenda rides rough shod over other people who are just expected to shut up and move over to make room in their space!
Thank you
Thank you, my true sisters whom speak up for the truth and see’s through the lies of those whom are not of the medical need but yet think they are one of us when they are not,which doesnt help the coarse of anyone as me whom is pursuing the need for to end transition with the op… as among those whom are taken what isnt theres for dis-honest reasons that is making it so much more difficult as its becoming a free for all jump on band wagon and i’ll have some hormones for sexual pleasure as for me its medical and waiting times and lists etc is so overwhelming in lenght in UK and me in WALES is worse than ENGLAND within UK is killing those who really need it…
Having been totally mischaracterized by a certain not to be named “individual” who has commented above, I feel compelled to respond and AGAIN try to clarify my personal views and perspective. I find it ironic that those who try to misconstrue what I have written take that tiresome tact of of trying to manuever those that disagree with them into a position of explaining or defending that very concept which we eschew and that THEY maliciously burden us with.
In this case, “seperatism”. How can I be accused of being a “separatist” when I live, love, and function within the mainstream of society? How can I be a “separatist” from some group, (the TG), with whom I have NO association with and with whom I have NOTHNG in common other than perhaps inhabiting the same planet?
And to clear up the most offensive point, HOW or WHY is disagreeing with certain SELF-PROCLAIMED and SELF-INDENTIFIED TRANSGENDER ACTIVIST/BLOGGER, “calling or accusing them of being transgender”? I AM sorry Susan, but when arguements such as this one….”But definitions in terms of what one isn’t, don’t inspire much trust, especially as the history of separatism is also one of separating elite groups. ‘HBS’ in it’s Goiar form allowed for around 1 in a hundred post ops fulfilling the criteria.”….WHICH DO NOT EVEN MAKE ANY SENSE are offered in support of personal attack, I must protest.
WHY, I ask, are those of us who have suffered and struggled through the trials and tribulutions of full blown “sex-change” and who now living happy and fulfilled lives within the mainstream skewered with the pejorative use of the term “elitist”? I mean, how “progressive” is that? Is that not what all these so called, wanna-be TS-types long for…to be accepted as women? Why is it when some of us DO make to that “promised land” that we are vilified for pointing out that in THIS world, (that world away from or “separate” from the TG Ghetto, women have vaginas, NOT penises.
LOL…believe me, girl, I feel your pain. You certainly don’t have a monopoly on having your position twisted inside out in the interest of winning the debate.
As to the rest of what you said, Anne, I think you’ve hit the point.
The fact is that you can’t be accused of being a separatist from something you never belonged to in the first place. You might have a different take on things, but I think the big brouhaha on our avowed disassociation from the transgender movement is the loss of legitimacy that accompanies that rejection. It’s the fact that we do and have made it to the promised land that is the rub. Many, if not most, who transition will never be able to make the jump from being trans something or other…to just female. Those who don’t just don’t have the motivation to do so. Some I think are not even inclined to try, preferring instead to hold onto a trans identity; they are no interested in leaving the trans ghetto (I doubt many of them even know what the trans ghetto even is), instead preferring to reside as a safe member in what can only be described as a subculture that agrees with them.
I think one of the biggest things the transgender movement simply can’t come to grips with is the fact that we feel absolutely no connection to them. Their movement seems to think that we are somehow innate connection to them…that we have things in common with them. How many times have you heard that “we [transgender movement] have more things in common than we have differences [with separatists[.“ The transgender movement just can’t come to terms with the fact that we, or at least I, have no more in common with the transgender movement that our next door neighbors do who have never even heard of them…they just don’t get that…it’s not in their paradigm. Of course, that’s OK with us, we still support them on many, though certainly not all, things. But, the transgender movement can’t understand that we are different, not better, but very, very, very different…and that there is no connection at all. And, just one last comment…beating the transgender movement up over it, one on one and on a personal level is fruitless in my opinion…they are not going to change their perspective nor their tactics.
I have followed all of this with great interest. Speaking for TS-Si, we are in general agreement and sympathy with what SA-ET said in her post.
We have always defended — and worked for — the fundamental rights and social progress of all people. Sad to say, that respect has not always been returned in kind.
Long before we founded TS-Si, both Lisa Thompson and I were subjected to irrational abuse. Sometime in the 1990s, we saw how principled disagreement turned into a justification by transgender activists for forceful imposition of sanctions against people born transsexual who just wanted to find their way and be left alone.
And we do distinguish between individual people who self-identify as transgender and those transgender activists who seek erasure of public recognition that people born transsexual work on correcting a medical condition — and do so at any cost.
A very high proportion of us want little or nothing to do with the GLBT sociopolitical construction, seeing it as an proven impediment to attaining our goals: equal rights and rational attention to medical issues. The transgender activist claims that pursuit of full correction outside of the GLBT construction is exclusionary (and “separatist”) and an attack on transgenders is a logical non sequiter.
At best, it reduces to the literary form of non sequiter that is a comedic comment orthogonal to the discussion. At worst, the claim is a pernicious attempt to stifle rational discussion altogether.
Once we founded TS-Si and began feeling our way toward where we are now, both Lisa and I have been physically stalked and our sites subjected to intense system attacks. Such things continue to this day and all of it has been based on the same nasty resentment.
We view this as a piece with a generally dispiriting development in our society: the elevation of violent adolescent male behavior to a cultural norm. It is fanboyism run riot.
You are called separatists, for your elitist attitude.
How would you define our elitist attitude? Or, another way for me to ask that question, Amber, would be what is it about the attitude of what you envision a separatist to be that makes them come across as having an elitist attitude?
if elitist means I am a female bodied and woman identified woman, guilty as charged. Funny thing, the only people who have ever challenged my womanhood since transition have been transgender identified people. I will echo what others have stated: I do not separate myself from other women with terms like “cis” and have essentially no problems with even radical lesbian separatists…..go figure. Transgenders are the separatists, not women with transsexed or intersexed histories. They are the ones who oppose the binary virtually when everyone in the world other than themselves works within and insist they are no different from standard variety women and men.
Amber, this is amazing. Right here in this thread your can find ample evidence that most of us who are post-corrected do not in any way act in an elitist fashion. Yet, the charge remains in place. Who exactly are you talking about and how does that relate to what SA-ET wrote in the first place?
One answer might be the ownership of an asserted narrative to distinguish sex/gender through the primacy of surgery.
Two points.
For myself I self-describe as hopefully pre op. I don’t know whether or not I’ll at some point be able to get medical clearance for possible GRS. I’m a woman socially, a woman emotionally,and a woman cognitively. According to the original post here, I’m talking bullshit if I say I’m a woman, because I’ve got a penis,an object that I can’t physically or emotionally use sexually, regardless of these facts. I’d disagree with that, though I would term myself a handicapped woman. Of course a possible answer might be that this isn’t elitism but just going along with social norms, the flaw being that such norms don’t allow for any of us. And in my experience there’s a universal female reaction to surgical sine qua non narratives that they’re terribly demeaning to women.
The second point is that I would assert that it’s an elitist narrative to put forward that gender/sex can be reduced to the two components of performance and surgery. Essentially it says that you might not think like a woman, or feel things the way most women do or feel any real sisterhood with other women – so long as you’ve had surgery and can put up a good front : the blogosphere contains rather too many examples of such women, both TG and TS. And it leaves out some of the most important parts of transition. I’ve read a number of ‘separatists’ who talk of transition being a short easy process, because they’re already women. And they’re not, none of us are, because we haven’t gone through that second adolescence. Male adolescence doesn’t have any bearing on the process of our female one, of changing with the changing modes of understanding the world, on a corrected neuro-hormonal level. And whilst natal women can’t ‘fail’ their adolescence, we can, simply by clinging to those shreds of male identity that we used to get by. Surgery may be highly desirable and some level of performance may be essential but the combination fall far short of fully encompassing a corrective process.
Proposing that all women of male assigned natality, as I’d describe myself, need to go through specific processes to qualify as their ‘target’ sex/gender does seem elitist when those who qualify by those self same standards put them forward. And to deny that there’s not space between that Scylla and the Charybdis of acceptance based simply on self assertion, seems to me to be a needless separatism.
Sophia, please excuse my tardiness in responding to your thoughtful response to what I said.
You said “One answer might be the ownership of an asserted narrative to distinguish sex/gender through the primacy of surgery”.
Corrective surgery is not proferred as a way of making a point about the distinction between sex and gender. It is one aspect of a process that resolves a deadly misalignment between our brains and anatomical sex.
As I am sure you know by now, I am all for people going their own way and doing whatever works for them, provided they do not trample on the rights of others. That is part of the reason why I so fiercely support pre-ops, wherever they are in process, but am wary of so-called non-ops who would deny our existence by claiming we exemplify nothing more than an option in a banquet of social choices.
In my daily life, I am immersed in the actual world of women, most of whom would laugh at the petit presumptions of transgender ideology.
Ah well, I suppose we’re all to some extent elitists in terms of the borders of our imagination about the criticalities of the condition. Personally I can see non op as a possibility for some older transitioners,both because my imagination is possibly more lurid than your own, and because I might be more aware of the more calculative nature of decisions past a certain age. What I can’t see is denying an urge for GRS, however strange a mediation of it the individual is going through.
But there are places where imagination gives out. Perhaps we might share a specific elitist notion that a TS who doesn’t seek and find immersion in the actual world of women is strange indeed…
Using the term ‘transgender’ as a general umbrella which includes transexuals makes some sense to me. No system of categorisation is perfect however. The demands of personal identification, political organisation and medical usage are clearly not going to be met by one taxonomy. If we accept this and respect the right of everyone to identify as they see fit, perhaps we can avoid intolerance and conflict within our community.
Calling a female bodied, woman identified woman with a transsexed or intersexed history a “transgender” is an insult to her womanhood and a primary example of the hypocrisy of the transvestite community’s claims that “misgendering” someone is the worst possible insult when doing so is a deliberate act of misgendering that woman as some sort of “less than” woman or third gender. Cora, if you cannot grasp this then you are openly admitting you see a female bodied, woman identified post corrected woman as something somehow different than any other woman and makes you a transphobic bigot in my opinion. Call me a transgender to my face knowing how I feel about this and you will taste my cane across your face.
Sorry to have to put it in such strong language but enough of us have told enough of you transgenders this is how we feel for years and years and years now and there simply is no excuse for it anymore.
No need to apologise catkisser although you might have stepped on my point a bit. A female bodied individual who identifies as a woman isn’t trans anything in my opinion, they have arrived at one end of the traditional gender binary (if that is how they choose to conceive it). I personally find greater ex
No need to apologise catkisser although you might have stepped on my point a bit. A female bodied individual who identifies as a woman isn’t trans anything in my opinion, they have arrived at one end of the traditional gender binary (if that is how they choose to conceive it). I personally find greater explanatory power in a gender spectrum approach and prefer not to get too hung up on the conceptually overladen terms: man and woman. But that is how I choose to conceive of my own identity, nobody elses.
Now, you mentioned something about a cane?
I believe that was a nice written story about how thing you saw have change and how the movement have changed. I hear you on how the meaning change and now includes or is overshadow by those redefine gender as a spectrum or with no boundaries. I understand how it can feel your voice my not be heard in the changing landscape of things, but I always felt that change won’t happen if we remain separate. In my mind, I picture a room of extreme democrats and republicans can’t seem to agree on anything. What matter to someone who has been a community organizer, is that People is power. The masses, the organization, the unity is power. When face difficult challenges we need to be together. if we want to demand our right to work, live and go to school, we need some kind of power to make change. If we fall into the Willie lynch letter syndrome, we will just be divided. I understand that your saying the movement has changed and a lot of the ideas are about gender spectrum and gender queer politics. I would still try hard to get your voice heard. I think everyone input is valuable and I heard about a technique called non-violent communication. If youtube it, you’ll find out it’s a way to get our needs heard. We all can connect and relation to those basic needs and I think that is one way to shift the landscape. I think its important not be spereated but at the same time have everyone’s voice heard, but when we really face the opposition, there can’t be any compromise.
I strongly support the right of every human to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I prioritize advocacy for legislation based upon my perception of what I perceive as most important to rectify the greatest injustice existing at any given time within our country. That is why I supported civil rights in the sixties. It is why I supported the ERA and still do. I would prefer ERA to be enacted ahead of DOMA repeal and any ENDA (inclusive or not). I would also prefer ERA passage ahead of any same sex marriage rights. For all the lip service GLBT groups give about oppression where is their support of ERA?
The CG crowd (that’s the cross gender groupies) agitates for bathroom privileges while ignoring simple equality for women. That sounds misogynistic to me. The CD’s who work for men’s pay scales during the week and go “en femme” to gay bars on their nights out want to level charges of elitism? Several dozen post op M2T bloggers level charges of Separatist at women with nary a peep about women earning less than 80% of men holding equal jobs in our economy? This can’t be good.
When I try my best to be civil in internet discussions I often find my statements parsed into phrases to trash my views by taking what I said far out of context. I laugh because my hide has become rather impregnable after many decades of similar abuse from men. What they fail to comprehend is that character assassination on a ditz is a total fail because I operate at an emotional level and not a logical one. I don’t need to logic through shit to know its odor. Been there, cleaned it up, smelled it.
Hope I haven’t offended anyone.
awesome. you echo my experiences almost to the letter.
what do we do about it? i’d love for the transsexual separatists (if that is what we are called) to have a strong public voice – to speak out against the trans absurdities. i am over having my voice stolen and misused by groups that insult and marginalise me, who shout me down whenever i try and claim my own space. i’ve nothing against what they want to do, or how they want to be. i do however, object to being derailed and disrespected.
i’ve started a fb group, ‘post trans normality’, to try and connect with like minded people. are there other such entities existing already? can we get political? there must be thousands upon thousands of us.
“What do we do about it?”
Well, flowirin, the obvious thing to do about it is just what you suggest…but there is an issue with that. The issue is that though I agree with you that there must be “thousands and thousands” of us, I think the vast majority of those thousands are simply not inclined to go public with their identities. Many, if not most, of those thousands are just not inclined to give up their rather stealth existence. Personally, I’m one of those.
My intent here on my blog is to influence those pre ops coming up the ladder who, aside from my blog and a very few others, have only the rewritten history of the transgender to go by.
DELETED 01-31-12 SA-ET
TAKE YOUR FEUD SOMEWHERE ELSE…MOST OF WHAT YOU’VE SAID HAS BEEN SAID WAY, WAY TOO MANY TIMES ALREADY…I JUST DON’T CARE ABOUT ANY OF WHAT YOU SAID IN YOUR COMMENT. YOU ARE WELCOME TO COMMENT BUT KEEP IT SHORT, ON TOPIC, AND LEAVE EVERYBODY ELSE OUT OF IT.
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[...] of this because of something a friend shared recently about in which the author posited she is a transgender separatist. The argument is alluring, though with further reflection, it feels Barmecidal at best, and [...]