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US - Joanne Herman: "What It Means to Be Trans..." [2007-10-09 Advocate]

Submitted by kareng on Sun, 14/10/2007 - 20:32.

US - Joanne Herman: "What It Means to Be Trans..." [2007-10-09 Advocate]


COMMENTARY

October 09, 2007

What It Means to Be Trans

LGBT leadership just went on record in a big way by insisting that 
ENDA should be trans-inclusive. Maybe now it's important to know what 
"transgender" really means

By Joanne Herman

For months now, an amazing coalition of LGBT organizations has worked 
tirelessly toward passage of the first transgender-inclusive 
Employment Non-Discrimination Act bill in Congress. Yet in a weak 
moment at the very end of September, key legislators got cold feet 
and threw us out. Reaction was immediate and overwhelming. Almost all 
of the country’s LGBT organizations -- the list continues to grow -- 
spoke out loud and clear in opposition to this ejection. Legislators 
had no choice but to give a trans-inclusive ENDA another chance.

If the developments of the last few days have you wanting to know 
more about what “transgender” really means, you’ve come to the right 
place. In the next 800 words I’ll cover the key things you need to 
know. You may not be aware that I’ve actually written 20 Advocate.com 
columns over the past two years on transgender awareness -- you can 
find links to all of them on my own Web site. But no matter; I’ll 
include links below where my back columns provide more information on 
particular topics.

Let’s start with terminology. The trans-inclusive ENDA covers 
employment discrimination based on sexual orientation (who you love), 
gender identity (who you are), and gender expression (how you look 
and act). The last two are a bit of a mouthful, so they often get 
referred to as the “transgender-inclusive” parts for expediency.

Unfortunately, because of the stigma associated with any adjective 
beginning with “trans,” many people affected by issues related to 
their gender identity or expression also deny being transgender and 
could be missing the fact that this bill is for them too. These 
people include the man or woman who occasionally dresses in drag, the 
intersex person born with any one of a number of conditions that make 
their sex inconsistent or ambiguous, the swishy man whose feminine 
behavior provokes catcalls, and the masculine woman who gets harassed 
when she uses the ladies’ room.

Those who are more classically included under the transgender 
umbrella include transsexuals who transition genders as I did, cross- dressers who have an opposite gender presentation only part of the 
time, and gender-queer people who have a unique gender presentation 
all of the time. Sexual orientation has no relation to any of this. 
As an example, I proudly identify as a lesbian in my new life while 
my two best friends (also trans women) identify as straight.

What is the prevalence of transgenderism? For many years all we had 
to go on were the low numbers from the American Psychiatric 
Association, dating from the decades-old beginnings of transgender 
understanding. But trans woman Lynn Conway, a brilliant computer 
scientist who developed technology used in most computers today, 
applied her analytical smarts a few years ago to come up with a 
better estimate -- 1.5% of the population, or 15 people per thousand 
in the population. Comparing with the Williams Institute’s latest 
statistic for gay/lesbian prevalence, that’s one trans person for 
every three gay/lesbian people.

If that seems too high, it could be because transgender people have 
been highly closeted in the past. Those who transitioned genders 
often chose to live “stealth” in their new gender -- never admitting 
to being transgender -- because of safety concerns, societal stigma, 
and prejudice. And as GenderPAC executive director Riki Wilchins 
observed in her recent Advocate.com commentary, even the gay rights 
movement previously forced gender-nonconforming gays into hiding, 
arguing “that we are ‘just like everyone else,’ except that we sleep 
with same-sex partners.”

Part of the stigma about being trans comes from the fact that “gender 
identity disorder” is still in the American Psychiatric Association’s 
catalog of mental disorders. Why hasn’t it been removed when 
homosexuality was removed in 1973? Because for those of us who need 
hormones and surgery to feel authentic in our new genders, 
paternalistic medical guidelines still require a GID diagnosis. Some 
believe that the diagnosis enables doctors to provide treatment when 
they might fear accusations of malpractice without it.

Lambda Legal’s analysis says an ENDA without protections covering 
gender identity and expression would be inadequate for gays, 
lesbians, and bisexuals too. That makes it clear that we all need to 
rally behind trans inclusion in ENDA. Do what you can, even if it’s 
just forwarding a link to this article to a friend. Help show that we 
truly want equality for all.

-

Herman is the first transgender member of the boards of the Point 
Foundation <http://www.thepointfoundation.org/> and Gay and Lesbian 
Advocates and Defenders <http://www.glad.org/>, and is a member of 
the advisory board of the National Center for Transgender Equality 
<http://www.nctequality.org/>. Links to all of her previous 
Advocate.com columns can be found on her Web site <http:// www.joanneherman.com/>. Photo: Marilyn Humphries Photography. 
Copyright Joanne Herman 2007

--

© 2007 PlanetOut Inc.



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Trans is a prefix and not an identity

Submitted by Diane Logan on Fri, 04/01/2008 - 15:11.

Since Charles Prince coined the term transgender to help hide those embarrassed by their transvestism  that term has become so much a lead in to misinformation. Question: What is trangenderism? I knew what it once meant...transvestite, she-male, gay crossdresser, drag queen and quite often street workers in drag. Where did it ever list transsexuals since Prince himself always thought ts's to be delusional for wanting to change sex?

I know too many 'trans' types who should cotinue to be listed under the DSM as GID. That is exactly what describes a person who is driven by a fetish to mimic women and satisfy their sexual arousal all the while connecting to an delusional brain gender that honors their limited connection to that sex.

Look at the big difference between Harry Benjamin Syndrome, (HBS), (aka transsexual), and let us see if we might clearly make the distinction. An HBS born person usually is very aware of feeling 'different' from a very early age and long before puberty. They come to know that their brain and body are in contradiction. For many clothes of the opposite sex was rarely the issue but the need to correct their body to brain was the constant motivation. I could be bare naked and still would want to be the female I am. It has nothing to do with the clothes on my back but the driven brain, heart, soul and body that needed to be in congruence, one with the other.

Puberty appears to be the trigger stage when most of the transgender seem to arouse themselves into their GID state of mind. Ask any transvestite if he could have free surgery  to be a woman would he accept it. I suspect over 90% of them would run for the woods.

So, to somehow join these two obvious unrelated groups as if they are a little bit alike is a fallacy and not only should they never be cousined under the same gender warping label but should be separated as having but only a little bit in common. Usually less than most other women have in common even with their own sisters.

Gender as a social construct is confusing as the term trans-gender clearly implies. To trans-sex is a medical term and agreed by many experts to be a biological condition. So, how then can a term advanced for the benefit of transvestites and their wants be somehow linked to those in need to bring their body into conformity with their brain? If I have a heart condition needing repair they do not throw me in with people undergoing chemotherapy since both are separate and distinct conditions. The same analogy should be applied to those who are transgender and those who know themselves to be HBS/TS...two separate and distinct conditions. The former a learned and nurtured psychological manifestation and the latter an inborn neurological intersex anomaly as shown by viable research denied by those tg's who do not want us removed from their cloaking tapestry after so many years as their backup shield to hide behind. 

Let Herman and her ilk run to the gay bars and bash most of those, many of whom are post surgical, but her harm to the actual HBS/TS's is diminishing. Her linkage to us all as being simply part of the GLBT just because she needs that crutch  is doing each and every woman or man that underwent sexual  corrective surgery a terrible injustice for it mocks all we stand for and our need to be whole and unconnected to trans anything. We are done with 'transing' and to add any such prefix to our womanhood is insulting to us. I may be straight, gay, lesbian or bi but I have never been transgender and my clear identity is that I am a woman first. That fact does not take a back seat to my sexual orientation ever as it seems to be for so many of the 'Joannes' of this world.

Diane 

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Equality... its just a myth

Submitted by Sian on Sat, 20/10/2007 - 21:37.

Yeah, it sure is a strange world... though it isn't just the Americans who are complicated. The conservatives who deny us equal rights don't mind us paying equal taxes though!

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Damn funny world hey Sian ,

Submitted by kate on Mon, 15/10/2007 - 00:39.

Damn funny world hey Sian , when bills have to be passed at all to give humans , human rights. The Americans are sooooo complicated .

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Sadly, this Bill

Submitted by Sian on Sun, 14/10/2007 - 22:26.

Sadly, this Bill (irrespective of Trans inclusion or not) will not get past Dubya's desk. Even more sadly, I don't think it would get past probable-president Hilary's desk either.

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