Use of the word "->-bleeped-<-"

[meliaMANNEQUiN]

i think it's derogatory and i don't like it. depending on the intentions of the person using it, though, it doesn't always necessarily offend me.. but i try to discourage people from referring to me with that word.

[Ribbons]

Transpeople can sometimes use it in a way that's comical, sarcastic, or lighthearted enough for me not to care. But I would not take kindly to be called that word.

It's connected to ignorant stereotypes and is often used in a derogotory context. It's like many words.. 'Meant to be lighthearted or in reality just a corrupted version of a normal word, but eventually twisted into an offensive way.

[Padma]

Just want to say: I wasn't having a great time the last day or two, I don't know why this thread pushed my buttons so much, but I'm sorry if I came on too strong on my "side" of the argument.

[Rock_chick]

No need to apologise hun, we all have times like that, and to be honest, discussing transgender language is an absolute minefield due to the strength of feeling involved.

[michelle.ch]

I wonder if it iss less offensive in the English spoken outside of North America? A popular MTF transgender website in Australia (with 700 members) is called "->-bleeped-<- Radio".

Many people in New Zealand still have no idea that "negro" is an offensive word, because no-one has ever told them. They have a pretty good idea about the other n-word though.

On the other hand an Australian described it to me as a "user's word", meaning the sort of word that a "->-bleeped-<- ->-bleeped-<-" would use.

I also had it yelled at me out of a car a few months back in a way the yahoos in the car presumably expected to insult me..... I have to say it did no such thing and instead took me back nostalgically to my teenage days and early twenties when people would yell "->-bleeped-<-" out their car windows at me. Since I had committed the inexcusable sin of getting off my butt and actually walking somewhere instead of driving, I guess I deserved full extent of their ridicule and scorn. 

I must say that it looks like one's experience with the word has a deepest effect on one's opinion of it, and if  I had had any of the experiences some of you have had, I probably feel much worse about it than I do.

[blackswan]

To me, ->-bleeped-<-, she-male and lady boy are synonyms, and that's not what I am.  What I am is female.  But hey what people choose for themselves is none of my business, and if it doesn't bother them, more power to them, but personally a "->-bleeped-<-" isn't what I am. 

[Padma]

A popular MTF transgender website in Australia (with 700 members) is called "->-bleeped-<- Radio".

Those Aussies love a good cheeky pun, don't they? That's a play on "transistor radio" . I love that the gents' urinals depongers are called "trough lollies" over there, which is presumably a play on "cough lollies" (which we in England would call cough sweets...)

When I was living in the dodgy part of Cambridge (England) a few years ago, I got stuff thrown out of SUV windows at me and had "->-bleeped-<-got!" shouted at me (for wearing a white fleece jacket, oh the horror). The really surreal part of that was that these guys had England flags flying from their vehicles, and had no idea how Americanised they were with their vocabulary and big trucks - and would have been deeply insulted if I'd had the balls to yell "Go back to America!"

[tekla]

big trucks

You might find this funny, but in the US SUVs are considered a 'mommy car' and most are owned and driven by women.  Real 'Marican men drive huge pickup trucks with rifle racks in the rear window, guns in the racks and a bumper stickers that read "Gun Control Means Using Both Hands".  And they all have Confederate flags on them to boot.

[Padma]

Apologies for the misuse of terminology - when I said "SUV" I meant fkn' big pickup truck with enormous wheels and the specifically chosen ability to traverse sleeping policemen* at 60 mph, whilst hurling plastic water bottles and verbal abuse at the obvious homosexual in that last bungalow. Over here, at least those few years ago, we didn't know the niceties, and SUV was just a generic term for "stupidly big gas-guzzling American kind of vehicle"

*aka speed bumps, intended to encourage citizens to stick to the 30 mph limit on said road. such hopes are as dreams.