Transgender Etiquette 101
Jillian Page
http://communities.canada.com/MONTREALGAZETTE/blogs/patentpending/archive/2008/05/29/transgender-etiquette-101.aspx"Tell them I'm not gay," Sue, a MtF transgender friend, told me when asked what she would say about ->-bleeped-<- to readers here. "Explain the difference between gender identity and sexual orientation."
Sue lives in-between official gender designations; she may never have gender reassignment surgery. She's still classified as "male" by the bean counters in the tax department. But she subjectively identifies as female, and is accepted by most folks as such. For her, and many like her, being attracted to males makes her a heterosexual. Being attracted to females: a lesbian. To both: bi.
The media reference guide of GLAAD, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, has a page devoted to transgender terms and etiquette. It describes sexual orientation as "an individual's enduring physical, romantic, emotional and/or spiritual attraction to another person." Gender identity: "one's internal, personal sense of being a man or a woman (or a boy or girl). For transgender people, their birth-assigned sex and their own internal sense of gender identity do not match."
