A Transgender Conversation
On Sunday night I went to the Boston-area Transgender Day of Remembrance vigil, held at the Arlington Street Church and the Public Gardens. It was mostly a young, knowledgeable crowd and the tenor of the night was quite sober, as we remembered all the known transgender murder victims around the world.
On Monday I bumped into an acquaintance in the South End (a gay man) who said some pretty nasty things about the trans community (i.e. "they're dragging us down," "they should get their own movement," "a man wants to cut off his junk so he can then be straight, I want nothing to do with them!") He even compared the trans community to NAMBLA (!) for wanting to attach to "our" civil rights struggle.
To hear such hostility was pretty awful.
In retort, I reminded him that there is a wide spectrum of gender identity as well as there is for sexual orientation and that the two are in fact discrete, but that when others discriminate they attack similar fundamentals ... like our personal freedom, liberty, privacy and freedom of expression.
Granted, it takes time for many gay individuals to understand how hard it is to live with the gender that you were assigned ... just as it is hard for straight people to understand same-sex love. But to hear such open hostility only sets us all back. I only wish I had a better line of defense at the time.
What do you think?
posted by Blue-Xela @ 9:44 AM
4 comments
4 Comments:
I think the public relations strategy for the fight for gay marriage has intensified the marginalization of the queer activists, genderqueer folks, and trans community by using a "we're just like you, we're normal don't worry we're patriotic" mantra that no doubt set the mindset of our community back many years. One thing that jerk is right about is that Trans folks and their allies are going to have to fight hard and we are probably going to have to do it without the financial or other support of the "leaders" in our community who clearly do not have the needs of the most marginalized people in our community at the top of their priority lists.
It's certainly a valid point.
But a huge part of it too is just a general lack of education about transgender plight/issues for the general population and even the GLB population.
Then again pr as we know it is sort of "education light" for television and radio.
I think you just ran into an ignorant jerk. Our community has them too. Think of the age-old battle of gay men vs. lesbians and the completely marginalized bi folks. Even the trans* community has jerks.
I was just at a leadership conference -- in fact, it was the International Gay & Lesbian Leadership Conference -- and during the wrapup, there was a transwoman who spoke up. She said that although she was the only trans person at the event, we all had made her feel completely welcome and included during the conference and training sessions. She thanked us for that, and we gave her a round of applause.
Barney Frank again spoke at this year's conference and included the T in GLBT in reference to legislation (I think it was hate crimes legislation). That's a huge (if only incremental) step on the national level.
The fight for trans recognition and rights continues, takes far more education and awareness than the G/L/B fight, and while they are different fights they are related. Transfolk are our family too and we must support them as they've supported us.
To Mark's comments about the "support of [our] leaders," I'd like to remind him we are our own leaders. And he's well on his way to becoming one himself.
To his comments about the marriage fight leading to queer marginalization: The short answer is no. In fact, transfolk are among the leaders in the marriage fight because some states require them to have same-sex marriages based on their birth gender -- sometimes this benefits the couple, sometimes it doesn't. Those who changed gender after marrying may now be in a same-sex marriage, or may find themselves in legal limbo. Make no mistake: the trans aspect is a big part of marriage rights, and marriage rights are a big part of trans rights.
Well put.
What we have to remember to is the best way to resist all this cultural bullying is to stick together.
And maybe someday we really will be able to "celebrate" gender expression and sexuality instead of fearing it. I think a lot of this hate is based on fear.
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