Today's Battles

At Qweerty one of a breed that's all too common. When Feminists talk about the Patriarchy, and the arrogance of male privilege, this is what they mean.:

At the risk of sounding controversial, I visit Queerty because I am a gay white male. I have no interest in 'women issues'. While I'm not opposed to sporadic and infrequent attention to lesbians, I do not want this blog devoting any more time to their cause....Simply because I am gay does not mean I care about lesbians, bisexuals or transgender persons. I don't even know why some people try and group us together as one cause - GLBT - because we are not. I can see some purpose to grouping G + L and even Bs together, but not Ts. I am quite comfortable being male, and I hate being associated with crossdressers. I find Ts offensive and do not want to extend any rights to them. Remember, had we not tried to press for "gender identity" clauses in all legislation, but instead limited it to "sexual orientation", gay marriage would be legal in every state. I have to agree with straights when they observe how bizarre and socially-inept crossdressers are, with their drug use and alcohol abuse.

Transgender persons should fight their own battles, because at the moment they're hindering the rights of gays, lesbians and bisexuals everywhere.

p.s. I am not opposed to lesbians reading the blog.
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btw. In terms of transvestites, I do not hate them. I like the one that appeared on the Tyra show recently. She was very human, although obviously depressed and (before Tyra rescued her) was homeless. This is embarrassing: as gay men try to gain acceptance, we need to do so on the basis that we are educated, affluent and have greater disposable incomes (due to a lack of dependents). Crossdressers go against everything we work to attain.
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I am quite content with how I live my life and, unlike you, I don't need to pretend for a moment that I must have the support of crossdressers so to be successful. I'm very happy surrounding myself with men, both gay and straight, and women, lesbian and straight. I don't need to go looking for peasants or (not to be mean) heshes for some form of validation.
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I did not matriculate with a Juris Doctor in Law so to defend transvestites. I did so for selfless reasons, to work on bringing marriage equality for gay men and lesbians everywhere. It pains me when all our hard work is undermined by crossdressers, most of whom as Tyra shows, are welfare recipients, homeless and addicted to illicit drugs. They're embarrassing and as a "community" bring out reputation into disrepute.
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I will also be the first to admit that I have not done enough to stop Prop 8 or work towards legalizing same-sex marriages. I practice commercial law (and don't believe in pro bono work) so naturally I'm very busy. However, I HAVE made a personal commitment to work towards legalizing same-sex marriage this year. I am happy to boycott businesses, picket churches, etc., and by the end of the year I will know I have made a difference. Yes, I can accept that as of today, I have done very little for our 'cause', but that will change.

Sure it will. Part of my reply:

You're supposed to be a lawyer, right? JD from UCLA?

Does the name "Shannon Minter" ring a bell? Here's a hint: on the legal team opposing Proposition 8 before the California Supreme Court. While you are doing … what, exactly?

I can understand your spiteful jealousy of someone in the limelight like him. Someone actually doing something about gaining same-sex marriage rights, rather than sitting dotting i's and crossing t's on foreclosure memoranda and bills of sale.

He's also a Transman. One of those people you wouldn't give any rights to. You know, the unemployed drug addicts, not someone big and important like you.

Most of our opponents are people of goodwill. But sometimes you do run across the genuine article, a grade 'A' Arschlock as they say in Germany.

Moving right along... to the Billingsgate Gazette:

I'm not a stereotypical gay rights activist, not some out-of-stater wearing a clown wig and rainbow face paint, hysterically shouting rhyming cliches while tossing glitter. I'm a pro-capitalist, Republican-leaning professional who's held an 8-5 job since college and my wardrobe is very conservative. I'm a fifth-generation Montanan, educated in a wonderful rural school and a proud alumna of Montana State University. I also happen to be a trans-woman.

A tragic fact about my situation and that of many others with regard to current Montana law is that, even though I'm highly qualified for my job and even though I've, through my effort and ideas, brought millions of dollars to the company where I've worked for nearly 20 years, I could at any moment and without recourse be eliminated from my job simply because I am transgendered. Further, if that should occur, I'd find myself facing a hostile job market in which I could be denied a chance at any job for which I apply simply because I'm part of the minority GBLT community.

A woman after my own heart. I gave a smidgin of support in the comments, to show she's not alone.

Thence to the Gainesville Sun, and the Independent Florida Alligator, where I gave essentially the same comment on both. "Re-use" it's called, not re-inventing the wheel.

" This campaign is about dishonesty. It's about deliberately stirring up hatred based on natural fears for childrens welfare. Using children in a way that amounts to abuse and bearing false witness.

Getting down to fundamentals, it's about the fear that the law will allow paedophiles to thrive. And preventing that is worth removing existing human rights for some, and making sure that others are never granted them.

When you look at the facts, in the 20 states and nearly 200 other counties and cities with similar or identical legislation, such fears were also raised, and often by the same out-of-state groups. They've always proven groundless.

But maybe Gainesville is different, unlike every other part of the USA. No-one who has seen some court decisions recently could say that there aren't some very "progressive" judges out there. So why do I say this is dishonest?

Because the law, even after amendment, still prevents discrimination based on sex. Any judge so "progressive" as to allow a man claiming to "feel like a woman today" to use a female restroom would have no compunction in letting a man who didn't feel anything of the sort do it too. Because you can't discriminate based on sex. That's what the law says now, and will say even after amendment. Exactly the same wording.

The fact that this has never occurred in Gainesville (or anywhere else in the US) proves that this legal theory is a beat-up, a Big Lie endlessly repeated to stampede people with fear. To terrorise them. The lawyers at the Thomas Moore legal centre know this, they just deliberately conceal it, and hope that by shouting loud enough, no-one will notice.

The people of Gainesville are being played for fools. They should be outraged at it. But unless someone draws this to their attention, how are they to know? If no-one in the 5th estate researches it and publishes it, they may well fall for it. "

Rather than being "collateral damage", it's obvious what the real target is. It's not a bug, it's a desirable feature. They just lie about it.

Finally, at After Ellen, a very good question :

I asked my friend, "If you were given only two options: 1) you could die OR 2) you could become a transman, which would you choose?" And she said that she would choose to die because being in a man's body she would feel trapped since her mind wouldn't match it. I, on the other hand, said I would choose to become a man. She said, "But wouldn't you feel trapped in the wrong body like how transgender people do before they transition?" However I don't believe I would, I think I would feel fine about it. It's not that I have ever felt trapped in the wrong body or wanted to transition. I just don't think I would feel trapped if I did.

What do you think? Would you choose option 1 or 2?

The responses are consistent with the hypothesis I advanced in BiGender and the Brain that some people are BiGendered - able to function to some degree in either gender role - but that most are not.

I made my choice, but I cheated by being TS in the first place. Rather than a descent into nightmare, it was a blessing beyond belief. Of course, I had to live through 47 years of transsexuality first.... I never came close to suicide though. Nowhere near.

People survive being blind, or quadraplegic, or brain-damaged, and still manage to lead worthwhile lives. Even with a male body, even when things feel terribly, awfully perverse and horrible, all the time, you can still help others. Even if your own life is irretrievably awful, you can still live, and even have a few moments of joy amidst the unending horror. You can save lives, and make your death worthwhile by heroic sacrifice rather than a meaningless self-destruction.

That's what kept me going, anyway.

It does for a lot, and that is a partial explanation of why so many of us end up in the military. A chance for a death with honour, a death with meaning, and a death which means someone else whose life is worthwhile gets to survive instead. That is a great victory. Victory? No, a veritable Triumph against impossible odds, spitting in the eye of an unjust Fate.

So, dear readers, what would you choose? An involuntary partial sex change, without full reproductive capacity, or suicide? Comments are open.