Stealth members, sticking up for trans issues

[Nicole]

Got a weird question.
I'm as stealth as anyone, my family know, of my friends only 2 that I'm aware of know that I'm post op trans.

Anyway, one of my friends is dating a guy, who is very funny at times, but on our trip to Thailand for a wedding made a number of transphobic comments and i've noticed that he's still doing it.

I've pulled him up a few times, but beating on the point is starting to look like I'm keen on the subject.

Its a hard one, while we get along and part of this girls life, the transphobic comments really have me questioning whether he's a friend I want in my life.

One of the comments he made was about a she-male (talking about porn), a term I hate.

one of my friends did tell him to stop it cause he's coming off very homophobic and he laughed.

[Myarkstir]

Sounds like someone may be in denial

[Nicole]

I don't think it's that, he's a few years older than her. He's also from a tougher area where most of my friends are from an area that's very LGTBAIW friendly. My best friends school was the first in Australia to ban degrading use of the word gay, that was 20 years ago.

[Myarkstir]

All i know is that peoplee who talk way too much about something means they have some form of interest. Your friend seems to talk a lot about trans girls for someone who says he doesn't like them.

Just my experience 

[Contravene]

Got a weird question.
I'm as stealth as anyone, my family know, of my friends only 2 that I'm aware of know that I'm post op trans.

Anyway, one of my friends is dating a guy, who is very funny at times, but on our trip to Thailand for a wedding made a number of transphobic comments and i've noticed that he's still doing it.

I've pulled him up a few times, but beating on the point is starting to look like I'm keen on the subject.

Its a hard one, while we get along and part of this girls life, the transphobic comments really have me questioning whether he's a friend I want in my life.

One of the comments he made was about a she-male (talking about porn), a term I hate.

one of my friends did tell him to stop it cause he's coming off very homophobic and he laughed.

I know she-male is used as a derogatory term at times but I see it used more often to refer to a type of porn fetish and a cis guy would probably have more exposure to it being used in porn too rather than hearing the term being used to degrade trans women. If it's something that he's constantly bringing up for no reason then chances are it's a fetish that he's into and he's looking for a safe way to bring it up and talk about it under the guise of making fun of it.

[Nicole]

It's not that he always brings it up, it's just that he seems to be the one who does.
I'm also talking about in general, could be a story on tv about a trans person and people start talking about it,

[androgynouspainter26]

I say you ought to stick up for what you believe in here.  Witholding truth may not be unethical in a situation like this (Personally, I'd kill for the chance to stealth), but saying nothing is wrong.  I think that as trans women, we have a responsibility to defend our sisters, even if it's just by correcting an asinine biggot. 

[androgynouspainter26]

This attitude of mine is not the product of an entitled culture.  It's the product of a marginalized one.  I'm not going to smite you with this. I don't really get why you're being so aggressive over this though...it was an honest comment.  We all owe our community something-we owe the people who came before us respect, and the kids who are going to come after us help.  The only way a community as small and disadvantaged as our survives is by taking care of our own, even if it's in as small a way as standing up for what's right.  If we can't look beyond ourselves, our movement is doomed. 

Listen-you are not compromising yourself by defending someone else.  I'm not saying she ought to out herself, that's not what I'm saying at all.  Hell, I wouldn't do that to prove a point.  What I do mean is that we all have a shared responsibility to stand up for what is right, and if someone is defaming one of us, we should stand up for them, even if it's not in a way that involves divulging our trans status.  That's all...to me, it really is a moral issue.

[androgynouspainter26]

Oi.  Spoken like a truly bitter person.  Listen, in the unlikely event I ever get to that point, stealth, I will not hesitate to stand up for what is right.  It is perfectly possible to be a decent human being and not out yourself.  If a cis woman said something, people wouldn't all of a sudden think she's trans.  If you look good enough for stealth, chances are you could easily say something.  And yet, so many people choose not to, and it's a disservice to us all. 

You talk about standing up for yourself...well, when someone makes derogatory comments about one trans person, they're insulting us all.  Including you.  They are saying that people like you are invalid, and unworthy of their identities.  Our identities.  I say our, because the individual cannot make the world a substantially improved place.  Attitudes are changing, and they are changing because many individuals cis as well as trans are finally gathering the courage to just say something.  I feel bad for you, that you don't feel secure enough to take part in that.  And I sincerely hope you find yourself in a place where you might be able to make the world a bit more open minded.

Anyhow, take what you will from this...I don't want to get into a war over this.  But in my mind, there is no greater sin than apathy.  Nothing has caused humanity in general as much harm as apathy.

[Nicole]

Ok, if I was to start over today, everybody would know and I would scream it loud & proud.
However I came out when I was a teenager, at a time when trans people were freaks because of shows like Jerry Springer & Rikki Lake, so when I came out, after years of bullying, after being bashed by boys at my school for being a "sissy" a word that to this day tears me up when I hear it, my mother packed us up, we moved back to her home state and we started a life where I was born female, always lived as female and my new friends only knew me as female.
The ones who know, my family and 2 of my very best & closest friends know for many reasons, one held my hand as I woke after SRS.

The only regret I have is that I've not told my unbelievable amazing group of friends and that I've lied to them all this time.
I also know that all wouldn't think twice if I told them that I was trans, but I would lose friends for lying to them all this time.

So my stealthiness is not because I'm hiding that I'm trans, it's because I don't want the people in my life that I love to think I've lied to them for 15 years

[Susan522]

I am going to make some personal observations here based on more than forty years of having lived a relatively normal, and exceedingly satisfying. life as the simple older woman I have grown to become.  As I type this, I am on my way home from a delightfully pleasant visit with my husband's son, his son's wife and their two children, our grandchildren.

Happiness is watching the smile on my husband's face as his five year old grand daughter strokes his beard and says, "so soft...", or pats on his stomach, smiling and laughing and squealing, "Belly!"

Happiness is watching our son, (Yes! I now have a son and, a daughter-in-law)...play with his daughter, threatening to put her inside his belly while she laughs and screams in delight.

Happiness is watching our now 14 y/o grandson mature into a strapping young man excelling in soccer and his academic pursuits.  He has joined NROTC his Freshman ear in HS and plans to go to college on a military scholarship to study computer sciences

These are just a few of the simple joys that come with leaving all things trans* far behind us and long forgotten.  These are the hard earned rewards that Androgenouspainter "would kill for".

Do not feel guilty for your hard won success.  Relish it.  Revel in it and pass it on if you can.  Do not be seduced by some siren's song, attempting to lay a guilt trip born of  jealous envy upon you.  You owe these cyber strangers nothing!  You, who have made it to that almost mythical land of "stealth" and return to offer a hand of help or a word of advice...what have you received in return for your troubles?

My question to you all is, "What is trans*?"  Is it some perpetual state of being?  Is it some "identity" different for all, yet sufficiently tangible and/or homogenous to form a "community", to which you owe some allegiance?

I did not correct my physical deformities to join some club or "community" where others tell me who I am or how to think, or to whom "I owe some debt".  No!  I went through my own personal hell, (without "their" help, thankyouverymuch), so that I could live MY life, MY way, as the happy, getting older grandma that I am, and enjoy MY life with my man and our family , without some "wanna-be activist in training" telling me I owe some nebulous and essentially non-existent "community" some unspecified debt of servitude or "respect".

This is your life to make of it what you will. Like anything else in this life, you will have to learn what is right for you and work for it.  Those of you who have had it relatively easy, and have been blessed with parental support from early on, do not throw that precious gift of personal privacy away lightly based on the words of a stranger.  Once it is gone, it will be gone forever.  Use your head and do what is right for you.

[Carrie Liz]

Sorry... didn't catch the parts about having basically tried already, but he's still doing it anyway.

Never mind then.

If you've already said something and he's still doing the same damned thing, and others are calling him out on being homophobic now and he's just laughing about it, forget him, some people just don't want to change.

[Lostkitten]

You don't owe anyone anything just because they are trans. If it bothers you personally, mention it but if you are stealth then you can also say you know someone else. Or let it be.

There are no other trans than you who is bothered by it, because he says it at moments he thinks there are no transgenders around. I told people about transgenders about the past and to them they were just sissies. When I came out they just said that was typical guy talk. Some men think they have to have certain thoughts.

[Dread_Faery]

Read up on intersectional feminism, it should give you to tools to correct him without needing to out yourself to make your point.

[Dread_Faery]

And could we call it trans antagonism, calling it a phobia is ableist.

[Alexis2107]

All i know is that peoplee who talk way too much about something means they have some form of interest. Your friend seems to talk a lot about trans girls for someone who says he doesn't like them.

Just my experience 

haha you don't know how right you are ..... sometimes they are testing the waters to see how others react and information they can find, otherwise.

[Devlyn]

As a person, you have an obligation to stand up for others. It has nothing to do with being transgender. Some people fail at it much more spectacularly than others.

[androgynouspainter26]

As a person, you have an obligation to stand up for others. It has nothing to do with being transgender. Some people fail at it much more spectacularly than others.

Damn right.

[suzifrommd]

The only regret I have is that I've not told my unbelievable amazing group of friends and that I've lied to them all this time.

If you've allowed them to believe you're a woman, you haven't lied. You ARE a woman.

If I don't tell people that I had some other medical condition, would I be lying? No, because no has a right to my history until I'm ready to share it with them.

Why should being trans be any different?

[Devlyn]

Reap what ye shall sow.