I was just wondering how severely transition affects your ability to get and keep a job. I just read somewhere on a transphobia article that the unemployment rate for MTFs is 70% is this true? If I transition I still need to be able to survive. I can accept to a certain degree that it will complicate things. But I fear being unemployed and never being able to keep a job again. As someone just out of college I am already having a hard time. However the thought of not transitioning feels like I would be denying everything that I am. Here is the like to the article on transphobia. Yeah, wikipedia not exactly science. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transphobia

I transitioned on the job over a year ago and still am with the same company. It was kind of important that I let the company get to know me rahter than announcing my GID immediately.

You can be lucky, you can be unlucky. Unfortunately every employer is different.

I know it will be a few years before going full time, and am in the Graphic Design field. I think I am probably in a good situation considering most people in my feild are open minded, and it is pretty much a 50/50 split of men and woman. But I am scared that is all.

Not to scare you at all, but I've been fired twice because of my transgender issues.

The first time, I had a really great boss (I thought) and we were close and I was moving up in the company. Whenever she'd come to our store, her and I would go out to lunch and chit chat. I was her golden boy. Then, one day, I decided to come clean to everyone about my transgender issues. When I told her, she seemed shocked, but okay about it at the time. However, no more lunches, no calls, all of my suggestions were dismissed and I was constantly rebuked for undermining her authority position (which I didn't do), and within a month and a half of telling her, I was fired for very dubious reasons.

The second time, my boss was an a-hole. He was a military vet and despised my long, pretty hair which he told me to get cut. I poured over the manual to make sure that I wasn't breaking any rules. I was effeminate then, but overtly girly. One day, he pulled me aside and said I no longer worked there. He said "I don't like working with ->-bleeped-<-s." Tennessee has an Employment at Will policy, so employers can fire any worker at any time for any reason. Also, gender identity and sexual orientation aren't protected here (though, to be fair, I'm not homosexual - I just got lumped in under the flag).

There is at least a little glimmer of hope: The job I work now is awesome. I love the company and the people. My boss is supportive of me, though I haven't told her about transition plans. I feel that if I did transition, I could and still keep my job. Only time will tell, though. I'm lucky that I'm getting into IT work because it's one of those fields where you don't necessarily have to be the face customers see.

Federal law negates this statement.

QuoteEmployment at Will policy, so employers can fire any worker at any time for any reason.

Wisconsin also has an at will policy but you still can't be fired for anything the federal law says you can't be fired for. That won't stop you from being fired for any number of made up or exaggerated reasons.

I've been trying to estimate its effects lately myself. I'm not sure how much influence transition and the economy are having. I've done at least 10 interviews in the last 6 months, both over the phone and company visits, but still unemployed. I often wonder if they don't like what they see when I meet them in person or when they do whatever background check they do. There's only one person I knew from school who isn't working in engineering, and he's a black gay man. Seems fishy to me. There's no way I could pretend to be something I'm not though. I'm not willing to sacrifice my honor and dignity for anything.

I was full time and working for a year.  But now I have been unemployed for over a year.  I an going to attempt to go back to school and up grade my skills.  I am hoping that will get me a job.

Quote from: LordKAT on January 29, 2011, 03:01:04 PM
That won't stop you from being fired for any number of made up or exaggerated reasons.

So right!  I was fired for trumped up charges 3 yrs ago, but I offered to sue them, with 3 human rights organizations behind me.  Yes, they reinstated me, with back pay.  LOL....that GM  has since been fired.

You have to know your rights, know how to leverage them, have the brass to stand up for yourself, AND know your job.  Otherwise you are a prime target.

People at work have no idea, and im hoping to keep it that way =].

I've wondered for sometime about turning the table on some of these people and their prejudices.

I'm not one to turn my head and walk away from something like that, especially if I have nothing to loose.

Has anyone ever turned the tables on their attacker and try labeling them a bigot publicly or embarrass them into stopping?

@KillBelle - There is no way anyone at your work is going to suspect a thing! Wow! (I'm jealous.)

-M

Ugh... Employment and school is the reason why I cannot go full-time until this May. I'm stuck in a job where I'd be fired (and expelled from my school) if I came out as trans without showing "remorse". It's stupid, I know. It's a "Christian" college, and it's a weird situation - if I came out and said that I was transitioning, I'd be fired and expelled, but if I said "i'm struggling with '->-bleeped-<-' and trying to 'beat' it," I'd probably receive "get well" cards be told that I could take off as much time as I need. Thanks, double-standard.

Quote from: n00bsWithBoobs on January 29, 2011, 11:36:20 AMThe second time, my boss was an a-hole. He was a military vet and despised my long, pretty hair which he told me to get cut. I poured over the manual to make sure that I wasn't breaking any rules. I was effeminate then, but overtly girly. One day, he pulled me aside and said I no longer worked there. He said "I don't like working with ->-bleeped-<-s." Tennessee has an Employment at Will policy, so employers can fire any worker at any time for any reason. Also, gender identity and sexual orientation aren't protected here (though, to be fair, I'm not homosexual - I just got lumped in under the flag).

There is a real good chance that you could have sued based on that comment, regardless of at-will employment.

Quote from: ClaireA on January 29, 2011, 07:42:16 PM
There is a real good chance that you could have sued based on that comment, regardless of at-will employment.

He told me this in the middle of the VFW building (Veterans of Foreign Wars) in a semi-crowded room where not any one of the older gentlemen there wouldn't have backed him instead of me. It's where we had our weekly meetings. My favorite decoration was a poster on the wall that had a soldier against the backdrop of an American flag with the word "Republican" under it next to a picture of a drag queen in a pride parade that said "Democrat" and underneath had "Need we say any more?" Aside from there being only JUST within the last month new government policy to protect sexual and gender identity in government jobs in the state of Tennessee, I just think I would have been ganged up on and had some crazy ol' country boy ->-bleeped-<- visited upon me if I had raised a fuss at the time. This was several years ago and it was kinda well-known that employers got away with that kind of behavior around there (without repercussion).