Myths in our community that need to die a quick death

[Cire]

Perverted to me brings to mind sick practices that harm others. Window peeping or cellphone cameras to look up ladies' skirts are perverted because they violate the person's privacy. I assume I don't even have to explain why rapists and NAMBLA members are perverted.

What one does with consenting others is not perverted so long as it's not harmful.

Thank you! i'm totally down with kinky, but pervert, as a word, brings up lots of negative stuff like sexual predators, incest, etc.
you're not ok with that stuff, though, right tekla, right Cire?

Apple to me means a long yellow fruit that needs to be peeled and grows in bunches. Let's just ignore the dictionary quoted and talk about how we "feel" words mean. Actually no, I've quoted my source and backed my claim. I can't control and don't care how you define words, just how they're actually defined.

Perverted to you means rapists and incest, ect. Perverted to others means gays. Perverted to others means us. As long as you use a definition based on your feelings, it can mean anything to anyone.

By definition I'm a pervert. I'm ok with that. Rapists are also perverts. By definition I'm a human. Rapists are also humans. Doesn't matter if some are bad, doesn't make me not a human or a pervert per that definition.

Doesn't matter though. I don't define myself as a pervert, I don't introduce myself as a pervert, but if the definition fits, that's what it is. Has nothing to do with shock or attention, but my acceptance of definition and truth.

[Kate]

Speak for yourself.  If you consider yourself a pervert.  Good. but dont imply that we/I are/am the same as you.

Agreed. But it seems some people will always enjoy the attention which being "shocking" and different and rebellious brings them.

Which leads to the myth that we change our sex to get attention, to be "special" and different and a protected minority of victimized gender-benders deserved of special recognition and publicity...

~Kate~

[Ell]

Apple to me means a long yellow fruit that needs to be peeled and grows in bunches. Let's just ignore the dictionary quoted and talk about how we "feel" words mean. Actually no, I've quoted my source and backed my claim. I can't control and don't care how you define words, just how they're actually defined.

Perverted to you means rapists and incest, ect. Perverted to others means gays. Perverted to others means us. As long as you use a definition based on your feelings, it can mean anything to anyone.

By definition I'm a pervert. I'm ok with that. Rapists are also perverts. By definition I'm a human. Rapists are also humans. Doesn't matter if some are bad, doesn't make me not a human or a pervert per that definition.

forgive me, Cire, but that's just silly. the language exists in the people first, in the dictionary later. context and implication are very important. and the word you are toying with has some very bad and serious implications.

but i'm not your momma. refer to yourself however you wish.

-ell

[cindybc]

Hi I can only say that probably since the age of three when I first heard the word, it was emphasised to me that it was not a nice word nor is the person that is labeled as such. Have you ever been called a pervert back in school, along with all those other nice choice words kids can cook up just to be mean and hurtful? I don't know or care that if the word has been scrubbed squeaky clean in the dictionary in this day and age. It isn't a nice word to me and never will. And I am a pretty open person. "Ding, ding," the bell goes off and the trap door under the contestants chair opens up and contestant and chair disappear in a little cloud of dust then the trap door slams shut again.

Cindy     

[Keira]

Its only possible to reclaim "bad" words when their meaning is narrowly used as an insult towards
you and has little other meaning, like "negro" or "queer". Queer had another broader definition, and its sometimes used in that way still, but it mainly was used towards gays.

A diminutive like ->-bleeped-<-, which is sort of pejorative, but not overly so, could be reclaimed.

But, I don't see that pervert will ever be reclaimed unless its in a joking matter (I have
seen it used in that way).

[Cire]

forgive me, Cire, but that's just silly. the language exists in the people first, in the dictionary later. context and implication are very important. and the word you are toying with has some very bad and serious implications.

but i'm not your momma. refer to yourself however you wish.

-ell

Consider implications? Pssh. I'd have to consider the implications of considering myself bisexual, consider the implications of considering myself transexual. Both of those terms have "very bad and serious implications" with many people, but I don't care.

This is an online forum. I don't call myself a pervert, I don't have a shirt that says pervert, I'm not refering to myself to anyone that matters this way. All that matters is that I meet the criteria of a definition. Whatever that implies is up to someone else. If I'm an apple, I don't care if someone else thinks of bananna when I say apple.

"Reclaiming a word" is a silly premise. It was never anyone's word, it's just a word.

[Ell]

ok, you wanna be a pervert, be a pervert. why argue about it and get all hostile?

[Natasha]

myth:  transsexuals are not perverts.  period.

In short, we live in a culture that has a Big Time tendency to demonize sex.

maybe so...but little detail though...transsexualism has nothing to do with sex.  this fact needs to be reinforced over and over again in order to "inform" cisgendered people that transsexuals are as "normal" as they are.

Not likely as long as the Transgender Community keeps linking themselves to homosexuals... and dragging transsexuals unwillingly along for the ride.

~Kate~

i know and this is why i'm in favor of a ts-only community!

[NicholeW.]

Is there some over-arching and valid reason to 'reclaim' pervert? Pray tell what it might be then?

Kate, your homophobia is showing. I was unaware that you had that problem with me and my partner!

No one is dragging me anywhere, at least not yet. Nor do I think that a political alliance drags anyone anywhere. Historically the LG world has been the world that tended to accept TSes and other 'fringe' groups more readily than the straight world ever did.

And i think that if the straight world is ever going to see that we are not JUST homosexuals, that we must first teach that to our LBG cohorts. TSes are a gender-based tribe with a sexual mixture that covers the range of human sexuality. Where, exactly, does anyone here think we are going to discover acceptance? From Focus on the Family? Maybe in 500 years.

The lack of acceptance of TSes is not the 'fault' of polys, LBG, androgynes, TGs, straights or BDSMs.

It's our own damned fault, to paraphrase Jimmy Buffet.

So many of us live in fear and our own reclusiveness that most people never even notice us. They notice the people like the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, Tr-Essers and others who walk openly and often in-your-face among them.

Most TS men and women would rather be simply left alone with insurance coverage for surgeries and anti-bias legislations for employments. Of course, to do that we would also have to openly admit who and where we are and refuse to continue 'blending' so well that most people never even know we are there after awhile.

In other words, much of our 'community' runs on fear. Me among the rest.

Ya know, I really do hate saying this, but if we are going to reach and gain acceptance then we have to get up, out of the house and allow people to know who we are. Allow them to know we have been teaching their children, pumping their gas, taking their bill payments, supplying their oil and water and electricity, fighting their wars and polishing their cars for ages while they never knew we were there.

I hate to admit that because my LAST desire is to be open and out, because I feel an internal hurt with the idea of doing that.

But, to blame the LBG and TGs for the lack of acceptance of ourselves is a cop-out and totally disingenuous.

It's our own damned fault.

The other answer is the one Natasha just suggested: a community of our own. Once they called that a ghetto.

Nichole   

 

[RebeccaFog]

Hi Nichole,

   Thank you for writing that.  I've grown weary of the effort of trying to even bother anymore.

   The thread was making me physically ill and now I can run away from it with one positive influence.

   Also, for TS's who do not want to reveal themselves in order to advance their own quality of life:  It is okay for you to be stealth, but you should at least appreciate the people who come out in order to make a difference.


Bye bye bye,

Rebis

[cindybc]

I agree with Ell.

ok, you wanna be a pervert, be a pervert. why argue about it and get all hostile?

I am who I am, I am a 62 year old trans woman, and damned well proud of it.  No one appears to know or care nor does anyone give me a hard time and I don't give anyone else a hard time. Actually I get along with pretty well anyone. I am just a likable person. OK that's enough, my arm is getting sore trying to pat myself on the back. 

Cindy

[Kate]

The lack of acceptance of TSes...

But the "acceptance of TSs" isn't my concern. Living my life as an ordinary woman is. You can't have it both ways, and sooner or later people who change their sex have to decide which they are: a transsexual part of some cult-like gender-variant "community," or an ordinary woman/man part of mainstream society.

Ya know, I really do hate saying this, but if we are going to reach and gain acceptance then we have to get up, out of the house and allow people to know who we are.

The people in my life know who I am. That's as far as it needs to go for me. I'm just not looking for acceptance "as a transsexual" as the TransGENDERED Community seems to insist and want I do. There IS no TransSEXUAL Community - there are only individuals, mostly mainstream, who just happen to have changed their sex.

I used to view the Transgendered Community as an annoying, though harmless entity. More and more though I'm realizing it's my enemy, as ruthless, impersonal and agenda-driven as any right-wing religious group, determined to alienate me from the very Mainstream Society that I count as my home.

~Kate~

[NicholeW.]

I split off my last post on this thread, simply because, like Rebis, I find no further good coming from the thread. It seems to me that it has become a lashing out at homosexuals, TGs, other TSes who differ in what they see and do from many of us posting here.

And quite frankly, yes. I doubt anyone ever thinks of my partner and I as 'homosexuals.' We are just a couple of women who make a great couple. We don't walk around with signs on our backs or stencils on our foreheads that read: LESBIAN.

The problem with this thread is that it has lost all sight, as best I can tell, of human beings and has raised the great I above all else. For me, that is more than I can stomach. 

Cheers,

Nichole

[Yvonne]

Do we need to get all upset at the beginning of a new year?  Here in Germany it's already January 1st and I thought I'd come here to see how everything is coming along.  I'm disappointed to say that it's the same as always and that saddens me.  Ughhh

[cindybc]

Yes Yvonne, I quite agree.
Happy Holidays

Cindy

[Keira]

Not sure if its worth it to post here, since everybody says they're not reading it 

But,I think the overiding issue here is that myth that there is a community.

A corollary to this myth is that its well defined
and everyone agrees who's in it and what's its agenda is (who sets this agenda?).

Being TS is not a good basis for a community and my opinion is the same for
the "gay community" as a whole. If there is such a thing really...

Most gays I know are closer to stealth TS than their mythic community.
One couple I know, their relationship is a non-issue and their presentation is middle of the road.
They are boringly normal and while some may know they're gay, its
just a small part of who they are not an overarching theme and as that
it just one more thing you know about them. They're absolute love of art is
what hits you when you see them and they are part of the art community
and own two galleries.

The tie that binds us pre-stealth is mainly a need at various level,
for political influence; that's kinda a weak basis for a community.

Post integration, stealth TS gain influence of women and in join a particular
women's community that suits them. There is more choice, which makes
this option more attractive than staying with other TS who if they are
transitioning, or out and proud, are in a much different place than them.

To join a community, you have to feel a commonality. What's common between
a transitioning TS and a post-op stealth TS? A shared history? Perhaps (not
even a certainty). But, for everything else, there is just about no common point.

Its the fact TS join another party that drives TS out activists mad.
But,  usually you join a party that support your more pressing
immediate interests. That's what everybody else does! Why should any TS be different.
It's slightly selfish, but it's also mostly human nature.

That's one thing we can agree on. We are human and as such we are complex creatures.

[Rachael]

The lack of acceptance of TSes...

But the "acceptance of TSs" isn't my concern. Living my life as an ordinary woman is. You can't have it both ways, and sooner or later people who change their sex have to decide which they are: a transsexual part of some cult-like gender-variant "community," or an ordinary woman/man part of mainstream society.

Ya know, I really do hate saying this, but if we are going to reach and gain acceptance then we have to get up, out of the house and allow people to know who we are.

The people in my life know who I am. That's as far as it needs to go for me. I'm just not looking for acceptance "as a transsexual" as the TransGENDERED Community seems to insist and want I do. There IS no TransSEXUAL Community - there are only individuals, mostly mainstream, who just happen to have changed their sex.

I used to view the Transgendered Community as an annoying, though harmless entity. More and more though I'm realizing it's my enemy, as ruthless, impersonal and agenda-driven as any right-wing religious group, determined to alienate me from the very Mainstream Society that I count as my home.

~Kate~

im with kate on this....
whats the point of acceptance?
why bother? if your transitioning to be TS, fine, im doing it to be a girl. i want to be accepted as a girl, not a tgirl, not a ts woman, just, a, GIRL.
The Trans community acts like a dead body, dragging people down with its agenda and insane views, this thread has exposed many...
why cant we be parts of the COMUNITY COMMUNITY?
R

[Shana A]

I happen to be an activist. Not just for trans or lgb issues, but various things that are important to me. These sort of discussions crop up in other situations. Not everyone wants to be an activist. That's OK, you aren't required to be one. On the other hand, every small thing that each of us does in our own lives can make a difference in how trans people will be accepted in the future.

Some people are going to protest visibly, others might recycle and buy compact florescent light bulbs. It all makes a difference. Do your part in whatever way feels right for you.

y2g

[joannatsf]

I agree with Ell.

I am who I am, I am a 62 year old trans woman, and damned well proud of it.  No one appears to know or care nor does anyone give me a hard time and I don't give anyone else a hard time. Actually I get along with pretty well anyone. I am just a likable person. OK that's enough, my arm is getting sore trying to pat myself on the back. 

Cindy

Except being 62, that pretty much says it for me too.  Being stealth has a smell of mothballs associated with it and I just came out of the closet a few years ago.  It's not like I advertise that I'm TS.  I live a pretty ordinary life.  I'm a middle aged professional woman and that's how I present myself.  But I'm not ashamed of being a trans woman either.  No one has ever asked me but I wouldn't be embarrassed by it either.  I'm a quiet activist.  My job involves vocational rehab so I do some volunteer work helping other TG's find jobs.  I'm not real big on protest marches but I did join the protest outside of Nancy Pelosi's office (she's my Congresswoman) when the ENDA revisions were announced.  I do the pride parade too but that's for fun!  I go with friends in the Magic Johnson Aids Foundation.  I think the straight community considers us queer anyway so I proudly embrace that identity.

[Ell]

The people in my life know who I am. That's as far as it needs to go for me. I'm just not looking for acceptance "as a transsexual" as the TransGENDERED Community seems to insist and want I do. There IS no TransSEXUAL Community - there are only individuals, mostly mainstream, who just happen to have changed their sex.

I used to view the Transgendered Community as an annoying, though harmless entity. More and more though I'm realizing it's my enemy, as ruthless, impersonal and agenda-driven as any right-wing religious group, determined to alienate me from the very Mainstream Society that I count as my home.

~Kate~

i don't understand this remark coming from a global moderator at Susan's.

on behalf of some very sweet people i know who are gender variant, i take great exception to this remark.

whether there is a Trans community or not, there is a Susan's community, and i think you've offended alot of the people in it. don't know if an apology is in order or not.

ok, you're a woman, not TS. we get that. still, you have spent lots of time at Susan's during your transition. you've received a lot of support from others here, and you yourself have helped alot of others.

unfortunately, as you have said, you were not born a female. no matter what surgeries you have to help present yourself to the world as a female, you will always know, in your heart, that you were born a boy. please remember that all gender variants have a very similar, heavy burden to bear.

for whatever reason, transsexualism has burst onto the stage around the world. it's probably not just a passing trend. it includes all kinds of gender variants. i see this as a very positive thing. it seems to me that lots of good will come of it.

there may not be much of a community now. maybe there never will be. but i have a feeling there will soon be alot more people who are transitioning or who identify as gender variant. these people have something in common with you: they're trying to find the courage to drag their lives out of the lost and found and finally start living.

-ell