Lets say society does evolve towards it's full potential and all of society totally accepts transgender people totally and absolutely with no questions what so ever as equal in every way as any other individual on the planet in every society . that there will be absolutely no difference of any man or woman as far as birth. do you feel there will still be transgender people who will need stealth even though society has granted stealth to all. ( disclaimer: I know I ask too many questions , but I use to be a philosophy major in college and since I've become a senior citizen I'm trying to understand life before natures last call)

Some still would want to remain stealth. It goes back that concept of binary and not liking being labeled a particular way. Not everyone wants to be defined by their being transgendered. Anyway that's my two cents.
Mariah

I just love your hypothetically evolved society and believe we are seeing movement in that more egalitarian direction.

Not every one is a talker... some people feel compelled to tell everyone about themselves which is one of the reasons why Twitter, Facebook and a plethora of other social media sights are so popular but the reverse it true for others personally I don't tell anyone much of anything (I have no social media accounts other then this website) and wont be running around telling anyone I was trans once I transition but not really because I'm trying to hide it more like I have so many more things to talk about.

so here's the real question... in that hypothetical society why does anyone need to say anything about their gender considering they would be accepted as what they present themselves to be.

Quote from: stephaniec on May 07, 2015, 10:16:48 PM
Lets say society does evolve towards it's full potential and all of society totally accepts transgender people totally and absolutely with no questions what so ever as equal in every way as any other individual on the planet in every society . that there will be absolutely no difference of any man or woman as far as birth. do you feel there will still be transgender people who will need stealth even though society has granted stealth to all. ( disclaimer: I know I ask too many questions , but I use to be a philosophy major in college and since I've become a senior citizen I'm trying to understand life before natures last call)

Its a linear approach.

Remember the early star trek series ?
They basically took people from life then and put them in another surrounding.
Some of their attitudes were advanced but it was mainly a fighting approach to problems.
That started to change a bit with the later series, where people started to be pictured as more evolved and with more emphathic capabilities etc.


hugs

Stephanie, I don't think gendering people is societal. I think we're wired to gender people. Babies can do it before they talk. It's necessary for the preservation of the species. I don't think any culture change will stop people from deciding whether I'm a man or a woman.

I also don't thing there will ever be "no difference" between the two genders. Men and women ARE different in a whole lot of ways (or else no one would ever need to transition, right?)

I will always want to pass and will always have a desire (unfulfilled) to be stealth.

I'm sorry , I wasn't very clear on that one statement . I meant not that there was no difference between the sexes , but we're live in a world where people are blind to the fact that someone may have started out with a different anatomy than what they are presenting now. Society plays a big part in why people want stealth. If society from day one didn't view any difference whatsoever on whether a person was female gendered physically or male gendered  at birth or later on why would the concept of steatlh be needed. It seems if everyone was blind to your origins as being man or women or anywhere on the spectrum , why would anyone feel the need to be stealth.

We are still gendered regardless of how accepting society is... Women and men will always be treated different whether people want to or not... women can be mothers and men can not, men are stronger and bigger then women. women have less hair and men have more (till we get older then  men tend to loose it) there are a lot of differences some big and some small but all effect how we treat one another.  Even as accepting as someone is to you being trans you will always be treated differently then other women and men simply because you are different in the back of their head and no matter how accepting society is that will always happen because we are human and that's how we work.

Quote from: suzifrommd on May 08, 2015, 07:08:00 AM
Stephanie, I don't think gendering people is societal. I think we're wired to gender people. Babies can do it before they talk. It's necessary for the preservation of the species. I don't think any culture change will stop people from deciding whether I'm a man or a woman.

I also don't thing there will ever be "no difference" between the two genders. Men and women ARE different in a whole lot of ways (or else no one would ever need to transition, right?)

I will always want to pass and will always have a desire (unfulfilled) to be stealth.

This is the truth.

This is why I want some degree of stealth. I won't be deep paranoid stealth but my history is strictly on a need to know basis.

I'm sensing a slight distrust on the ability of humans to evolve to the total acceptance of each individual as unique unto themselves and to present themselves to each other with no need to worry about the others total acceptance of how they present.

At my new job, the people I'm helping have always referred to me as "she," no questions asked. I never had to say anything. Me being trans hasn't come up at all. Now, I know they know I'm trans, but in my mind, I'm sort of pretending to be stealth.

that's what has surprisingly has happened to me in my downtown neighborhood all the clerks and manages at the stores and restaurants are being totally blind to my full time status even though I've been in the neighborhood for 20 years.

Quote from: stephaniec on May 08, 2015, 05:02:37 PM
I'm sensing a slight distrust on the ability of humans to evolve to the total acceptance of each individual as unique unto themselves and to present themselves to each other with no need to worry about the others total acceptance of how they present.

Indeed.

Determining gender based on appearance is instinctive.

Learning to properly gender trans people is learned behavior.

For me I just feel better when I don't have to tell people I'm really a woman. I would rather their instinct naturally tell them because instinctively they will treat me like one.

The best test is kids. Today I was at a theme park full of them. No stares no misgendering either.

Quote from: stephaniec on May 08, 2015, 05:02:37 PM
I'm sensing a slight distrust on the ability of humans to evolve to the total acceptance of each individual as unique unto themselves and to present themselves to each other with no need to worry about the others total acceptance of how they present.

Not distrust, but trust.  People generally can accept people with different political views, social upbringing, choice of clothing, career, etc, etc.  Even with total acceptance of these types of differences people still judge each other based on them. I think it is the judgment more than the acceptance that instills fear.  I trust that society will come to a general acceptance of trans-folk.  I also very much trust that it will always carry a heavy possibility of judgement and therefore a fear.

Quote from: stephaniec on May 08, 2015, 05:02:37 PM
I'm sensing a slight distrust on the ability of humans to evolve to the total acceptance of each individual as unique unto themselves and to present themselves to each other with no need to worry about the others total acceptance of how they present.

I don't know if I'd call it distrust. Just that it's unrealistic to expect that no matter how well-educated about trans issues, every single person will be able to override their own instincts (often subconscious).

To riff on an old credit card commercial: Some humans can override their own tendency to gender people and ascribe gendered characteristics to them. For everyone else, there's PASSING.

In some hypothetical society where gender is for all intents non-existent, I don't think there will be a "need" for stealth.

I see that need as an outgrowth from the societal expectations to demands placed on gender, and especially the roles. That imprinting starts in the crib, and pretty much does not end untill you are on the wrong side of the grass.

But, in such a society, how can there be reproduction? Humans do it by exchanging gametes. The mechanism to do so will also need some major evolutionary changes. The time scale for that is measured in tens to hundreds of millennium. With reproduction being omnipresent and a biological imperative for all living things, I doubt that such a hypothetical society can truely exist.

Therefore, there will always be a need for some to be totally stealth

Quote from: stephaniec on May 08, 2015, 05:11:53 PM
that's what has surprisingly has happened to me in my downtown neighborhood all the clerks and manages at the stores and restaurants are being totally blind to my full time status even though I've been in the neighborhood for 20 years.

My own experience of human kind in general and the experience of my support group members that are now full time, is that generally speaking people either don't notice or are too PC to say anything.

And a LOT depends on the neighborhood. Some are lot more accepting then others. At least on the outside. What they think and feel in their of hearts may be a far different story. That I can also attest to based on my experience living on both sides of the fence totally unknown

Quote from: JoanneB on May 09, 2015, 11:29:47 PM
My own experience of human kind in general and the experience of my support group members that are now full time, is that generally speaking people either don't notice or are too PC to say anything.

And a LOT depends on the neighborhood. Some are lot more accepting then others. At least on the outside. What they think and feel in their of hearts may be a far different story. That I can also attest to based on my experience living on both sides of the fence totally unknown

I did have a clerk at a taco place see me in a dress for the first time and got the impression the way he acted that he wanted to throw up, but he treated me like a regular customer/

I want to be able to visually (and auditorily)  pass, but I don't want to completely destroy my past life either, some of it yes, but I want to be open with people I know. i want to be both pretty and openly trans, like Laverne Cox, Janet Mock, or Andreja Pejic. Much of the passing part is more about being able to look at myself in the mirror than what others think of me. I don't entirely mind being a socially awkward nerd (okay, I wish I was a little more socially adept than I am now, but it is extremely likely that I have Asperger's), but I want to be myself in the right body that is using the right hormones. I want to be be able to be properly gendered in without people doing it just to be polite.

I think a society that is blind to your transition history is not just possible, but likely.

Please consider that the next 50-100 years are likely to be the last time periods in which large numbers of adult transsexuals need to transition.

More and more we are moving towards a society where being trans is identified early, where transition can start even before kindergarten, where medical interventions are becoming more and more sophisticated.

In a hundred years, we might not see any adult transitioners at all. And if we don't? Who would know that a child started as one gender then transitioned? Very few. And as it becomes a more and more accepted medical condition and practice, why would anyone even care?

Many such young transitioners may have never even thought about themselves as their birth gender in any prolonged or meaningful way.

By the start of the 22nd century, I highly doubt that anyone will even notice anymore. We'll just be who we are and accepted as the males and females that we are.