Verb or Noun?

[CaitJ]

What exactly about the woman is the descriptor "Trans" describing?

That she has a gender identity different to the one expected of her when she was coercively assigned her birth sex.

I am by no means questioning the validity of the decriptor nor an
individuals right to embroider it across the seat of their sweat shorts.
As a seven year old, I did not sob across the kitchen table from my Mama,
"I should have been born a ->-bleeped-<-" 

A black woman is a woman that was born with a virgina
A Jewish woman is a woman that was born with a virgina
A vegetarian woman is a woman that was born with a virgina
An octogenarian woman is a a woman that was born with a virgina
A necrophobic woman is a woman that was born with a virgina
A homosexual woman is a woman that was born with a virgina

One is quite capable of being a woman without a vagina, just as one is quite capable of being a man WITH a vagina. Genitals do not define gender.
I'm not sure what point you're trying to make by fixating on genitalia. Could you explain it to me please?
It would be much appreciated

[Cindy]

What is the point of this post?

A woman is a woman, a man is a man, an androgyne is an androgyne. . What sexuality they display is their's to decide. What primary and secondary sexual organs they have is due to genetics, surgery or magic.  I'm not big on magic.

I don't mind the discussion but HR you are getting close to being argumentative for no reason IMHO.

Cindy

[heatherrose]

The reason for this topic was to open a discussion about the eight-hundred pound gorilla in the room that no one seems to want to talk about.
We harp about not being treated with respect on comedy shows and about some uninitiate's ignorant use of the word ->-bleeped-<-,
while at the same time we trifle about whether we "pass" and talk about how our life long dream of being a Woman is
finally coming true and and in the next breath we describe ourselves as Trans and Lady Almighty forbid anyone call us on it.
It frankly leaves me scatching my head.

It was not my intention to be agumentative. Admittedly, my post before this may have seemed a little brusk, before I edited it myself.
I was trying to illustrate that there is and always will be, as much as we hate to admit to ourselves, a difference between us who were born
differently and they who were born as we yearn to be. I was rushed by real world constraint and did not spend as much time composing
the thought as I should have. Basicly, I feel, as do others from postings here by Kendra, Lord Kat, Perlita and rexgsd, that proudly
displaying perjorative labels is counterproductive. and trying to wordsmith excuses for doing so only makes us look like confusing idiots.

[Cindy]

OK

I'm just a little girl trying to be me and stop ->-bleeped-<- from flying from every direction. I don't struggle. I have no concerns and yes my life is  so rosy it shines a bright blue.

It's sounds as if you are doing it tough.

You are a friend. If you want  to hit me do so.

Sorry, I'm in one of those that cycles,  which is pleasing and horror at the same time.
I think there should be a Sue warning, don't argue with me at TOM, I'll rip them off and feed them to anything.

Ahh who the f**k suggested cramps,

I feel better when I've killed some men


Cindy

[heatherrose]

The last thing I would want to do is hit anybody my friend and you have nothing to be sorry for.

https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,92073.msg671276.html#msg671276
The penise thing, I plagiarized from some where, I forget, I believe I saw it in someones
signature here but I have echoed this sentiment for a long, long time.
When I first started me transition, I was told by a friend,
"If your going to be a woman, be a WOMAN." and that is what I have strove for.
I look around the world at the horrific treament imposed upon my brothers and
sisters by sexual caste systems employing third gender designations and then
I see those in "more enlightened" cultures who seem to willingly subjugate
themselves into self imposed sexual caste systems. My goal as I stated in my
original post is to align my physical manifestation with the pysche that I was born
with and be as much of a woman as I can physically be. I fully understand that there
are tens of thousands of deliniations along the gender spectrum and if one is
comfortable with identifying themselves as any one of the tens of thousands of these,
all the more power to them and may they be blessed all the more for it but if you shout
to the world, "I am woman hear me roar" then identify yourself as a WOMAN.
We have to struggle with enough crap imposed upon us by nature, we don't need
to make it anymore difficult by confusing the issue of how we identify ourselves.

[heatherrose]

They're not mutually exclusive. They're the same thing.
i.e. cis women are women, trans women are women.
Being a trans woman IS being just a woman 

While not mutually exclusive, they are not the same.
They have a comman denominator, which is that they are both women.
The difference being, no matter whether they are both 83 year old,
black, Jewish, vegetarian, necrophobic, homosexuals
one of the two does not, at some point in her life, have to announce
to the world that she is in fact a woman. 

A "trans-woman" cannot "just be a woman".
She must make the decision that she is not going to live in her
assigned gender and take steps to live as she chooses.

A "cis-woman" can "just be a woman".

[CaitJ]

A "trans-woman" cannot "just be a woman".

That's where we are going to have to disagree.
A trans woman can be 'just a woman'.
Please give me a reason why a trans woman cannot be 'just a woman'.

She must make the decision that she is not going to live in her
assigned gender and take steps to live as she chooses.

I'm confused here. You seem to be pushing for trans women to identify as plain 'women' but continually point out that trans women and cis women are different.
Don't you think that is rather counter-productive?

[katgirl74]

The second quote is more troubling, the use of decision and choice, I didn't just decide or choose to be a woman or to be trans or to be a lesbian, it doesn't help when our own community infuses that same "choice" language into discussions about what it means to be trans. Trans is an adjective, that, in my opinion, defines me less and less. During the early part of my transition, it was important to me because it tied me to a community and helped me to not feel alone. Now, it only serves to describe my medical history and it does little to describe or define who I am today.  I don't run from the term but it's not one that I use frequently any more. As for cis women identifying as cis, outside of some of those communities you mentioned most natal females probably never heard of cisgender, just as most straight people probably never heard of cissexual.

[Tammy Hope]

skipping to the end, plead ignorance if I'm repeating something someone else has said:

I've used and will continue to use "trans" as a shorthand descriptor  because it's a simple placeholder word for a broader concept and everyone i use it with knows what i mean.

I do not say "I am trans" in the sense of "I am a third gender" or "I am other"

But quite frankly, if I said even to my supportive friends (who are not transsexual) "I am a woman" they simply would not take it seriously. They understand the concept of being a person with a woman's mind and heart and spirit but an unfortunately disfigured body which looks male - but a person with a male body declaring "I'm a woman" would just seem silly to them. I traveled in that world long enough to know that.

And me saying it is not going to disabuse any significant number of them of that idea.

As for my own self-identification, I am a woman who has a condition, in need of a cure, that I colloquially refer to as "trans" or more properly, a condition known as being transsexual. I'm a firm believer in the school of thought that once physical transition is complete, one is not a transsexual anymore - she's been cured.

I really am not sure I have a point except to say that when it's necessary for me to discuss my situation (as in a job interview for instance) I really don't see a problem with saying "I'm trans" and i really don't think ANYONE sees this as an assertion of being "third gender" or anything similar.

[heatherrose]

I'm confused here. You seem to be pushing for trans women to identify as plain 'women' but continually point out that trans women and cis women are different.
Don't you think that is rather counter-productive?

Ya I know, if I were to ever have two non-contradictory thoughts and be able to
express them in a coherent manner, I wouldn't need as much help as I do, Huh?

I'm so glad we had this time together, just to laugh and sing a song.
Seems we just get started and before you know it,
comes the time we have to say,
So Long.

[valyn_faer]

Our identities are much more complex than just seeing ourselves as one thing vs. another, and our identities are not necessarily static. A big part of how we view ourselves depends on what the most salient aspects of our lives are at any particular moment in time. Then there's the issue of denial. If a gay person grows up in a deeply religious community and ends up denying that they're gay, then at that particular moment, they don't identify as gay. But perhaps later on they come to terms with being gay and thus identify as gay. Does this mean that they're not really gay because they didn't always identify as such? No, of course not. And maybe because there were such massive hurdles for that person to overcome in order to accept their homosexuality, they identify more as a gay person specifically, rather than a gay person incidentally. In other words, it's a more salient aspect of their identity because of particular hardships. The same can happen to someone who's trans. Our life experiences shape how we view ourselves. I'm a college student and 30 years old. While many of my classmates are also college students, I recognize that most of them have had entirely different life experiences than me because many of them come from middle class families while I did not. So for me, the identity of "college student" means something entirely different for me than it does for them. The same logic can apply to viewing oneself as trans or as a woman. Personally, I'm not going to pretend for a second that any ciswoman has had even remotely similar life experiences as me. They don't know what it's like to basically go through a second puberty at the age of 30 while going through college. And when they went through it, they had support from sisters, mothers, friends, etc. I don't have those things. Not to mention that their experience wasn't accompanied by feelings of gender dysphoria, nor did they have to hide it from their family the way that I do. I had no female friends growing up who were willing to show me how to apply make-up or how to style my hair in a particular way. My sisters certainly didn't include me in any of that. I wasn't even allowed to have long hair. I was forced by my family and community to behave like a "guy." Ciswomen don't experience this. So, why would I pretend for a second that ciswomen have had even remotely similar life experiences as me, when they obviously have not? Of course, maybe there are transwomen who have had life experiences more similar to what ciswomen experience. Good for them. You can expect that they would have, at least, a slightly different identity than me. But there's nothing wrong with that. Personally, I think it's important that our society learns that the transcommunity is just as diverse as any other group of people. It will help eliminate harmful stereotypes.

[Pinkfluff]

Do you consider yourself or aspire to be a member of a third sex,
a Trans, ->-bleeped-<-, T-girl/boy or any other T-variant?
If so, why?
If not, do you identify yourself using any of the above terms?
If so why?

Nope, I don't even like the term "trans" and it's variants. I'm just a woman with a medical condition, a kind of genetic defect. I don't even use the term unless it's the language I must use to explain things to people who need to know and who may not understand or misinterpret my explanation. "Trans" in a general sense typically means movement between two states or being in between two states. I'm not changing my sex/gender, I've always been female. Some people may not agree but I don't care. I accept only one definition of who I am -- my own.

Please give me a reason why a trans woman cannot be 'just a woman'.

Because current society won't let them/us.

You seem to be pushing for trans women to identify as plain 'women' but continually point out that trans women and cis women are different.
Don't you think that is rather counter-productive?

I think I understand the issue you have with this and generally I would agree, but it points to some important problems that those with this condition have. I'm sure if the rest of the country understood that I'm just a woman like all the others I'd have a job right now. Some of these differences are important because they affect our lives. They shouldn't, but they do. Hopefully one day that will change.

[spacial]

I was not going to post an incident that happen t e recently, but it bears importance to this thread.

Due to reasons out my control my GID has become more public where i work. I have been presenting as a female, and nobody seems to care, most of the girls I know have been very supportive. Well, the other day this guy came and tried to put his hand in my breast, I am fast, so I move back and slap the "bejesus" out of his hand to which the big idiot said: "hey, I was just trying to see if they are real." I just look at him while considering where to hit, he next said: "are you a ->-bleeped-<-?" Everybody in the cafeteria was frozen! I said: "I am just a woman, and I am going to report you." He started to apologize but I left. As I was leaving a man I do not know said to me out loud: "I will vouch for you" to which a bunch of ladies said "me too." I immediately went to my boss and reported him as a sexual harasser for trying to touch me in a sexual manner.  He is currently facing a disciplinary hearing. My point is that I do not think I would have gotten much traction if I have gone after "my eight as a trans-woman"

As I was reading this, I got the the point where that scum tried to touch you. I thought of myself, in that position. I would have tried the compromise, diplomacy, calming the situation, being the doormat.

I can't begin to tell you how utterly proud I am of you.

The reaction you got from the others was amazing, totally justified and demonstrates that they are decent ordinary people. Not heros. Just ordinary pople who did the right thing that we all should do.

Thank you so much for sharing this.