Cyndi Richards
"is currently searching this website for folks with character, compassion, integrity and intelligence, not necessarily in that order. All others need not apply for my "friendship", and YES, I really did "approve this message"."
Journal Entries for Cyndi Richards
Quiet Down, Vaginas. The Boners Are Talking.
May 4th, 2012 4:35 pm MDT
Quiet Down, Vaginas. The Boners Are Talking.
For both men and women, it's a fact of nature that our hormone levels fluctuate and drop as we age. These fluctuations can have plenty of deleterious side effects, including loss of bone density, mood swings, and low libido. In ladies, this transition is called menopause, and we quietly medicate it with hormone treatments. In men, this is called OH MY GOD WHERE IS MY BONER???, and we medicate it by freaking the fuck out.
Now, that's not to say that a loss of libido in men is something to be taken lightly—in my personal life, I am a vocal fan of the male libido (under appropriate circumstances, of course—such as bed, rather than my pelvic exam).
Testosterone is a fascinating, tricky, and vitally important chemical for both men and women (if you've never heard this knotty and often upsetting This American Life episode, you're welcome). But testosterone therapy, a fairly new pharmaceutical phenomenon being touted as a "fountain of youth" and the successor to Viagra, is worth pausing over:
Like the millions of women who have opted for hormone replacement therapy, men are choosing to get their hormone levels in line. As many as 13.8 million men older than 45 in the U.S. have low levels of testosterone, according to a 2006 study in the International Journal of Clinical Practice. The male sex hormone begins to decline after age 30, and tends to drop about 1 percent each year, though the level of decline varies. Lower-than-normal levels can lead to a loss of libido, a decrease in bone and muscle mass, and depression, according to the Cleveland Clinic.
But it's not exactly "like the millions of women who have opted for hormone replacement therapy." Obviously women seek hormone replacement too, but as far as I know (although the kids are nuts these days), pre-menopausal women don't seek hormone replacement for fun in the way that some men are doing with testosterone.
See, it's not just men with low testosterone levels who are seeking testosterone treatment—it's also young men who just want a little extra zing in their boners. It's recreational:
"Am I making a deal with the devil? A little bit, but I have to think about my quality of life," Murray said. "It is like I'm in my 20s again."
Murray said he doesn't have any obvious symptoms of low testosterone levels. He simply wants to raise his energy level and give his bodybuilding regime a boost. That sort of endorsement may offer promise to the pharmaceutical industry.
[...]
Other experts worry that some doctors are misprescribing testosterone as a cure-all for a variety of problems. The Cleveland Clinic's Sabanegh said he sees men taking testosterone to help with erectile dysfunction or low libido when they are trying to conceive a child. Yet testosterone treatments can make men infertile, a side effect doctors sometimes fail to consider, he said.
This has doctors worried. There can be dramatic and dangerous side effects for men who seek testosterone treatment when they don't actually need it—including infertility, prostate cancer, blood clots, liver damage, and serious addiction—and yet the quest to market and sell testosterone treatments is still "a race!" It's in "hot demand!" It's changing lives! Side effects? Bah. Full speed ahead! Let's do this! SAVE THE BONERS!!!
And in the meantime...um...where's my lady boner pill again? Oh, yeah. It's dead. Because of possible side effects. Cool.
So, just to be clear: When men's libido is in danger, we're going to barrel headlong toward bigger, harder dicks no matter the consequences (and that includes TUMORS), because this is an emergency! But when it comes to women's libido, well, be careful, ladies. Don't hurt yourselves. And anyway, your problem is probably just about intimacy anyway. Sssh. Have some pomegranate juice.
In case it's not clear, I'm not saying that I want to take dubious lady boner-pills with horrible side effects. I don't. But the contrast in urgency between "curing" male sexual dysfunction (go go go! Rush rush rush!) and helping women have more satisfying sexual experiences (who even knows what's going on with those crazy lady parts?) is striking. And more than a little condescending. But hey, men might have Viagra and testosterone deodorant, but at least I have KY Warming Gel. Because my main problem with my vagina is that it isn't burny enough. You really get me, science.
Things I've Learned from the Easter Bunny
April 8th, 2012 11:02 am MDT
Things I've Learned from the Easter Bunny
The grass is always greener in someone else's basket.
Good things come in small sugarcoated packages, but keep your paws off other people's jellybeans.
Anyone is entitled to a bad hare day, but sometimes everybody needs a friend who is all ears.
While some body parts are meant to be floppy, a cute little tail attracts a lot of attention.
To show your true colors, occasionally you have to come out of your shell.
The right Easter bonnet can usually tame even the wildest hare.
The best things in life are often sweet and gooey.
Always walk softly and carry a big carrot.
Never put all of your eggs in one basket.
Going Down?
April 6th, 2012 3:42 pm MDT
My ongoing transition has always been greatly enhanced by studying the writing and advice of cis-women. I like to think of it was catching a glimpse at the "other team's play book", if you get my drift.
In addition to that, I have always put serious stock in the old adage that it truly IS "more blessed to give than to receive".
With that in mind, I offer the following item, gleaned from a popular women's site. Although some here may experience a little cognitive dissonance resulting from their own personal gender-identity vs sexual orientation issues, I believe the relevancy of the author's perspective remains valid nevertheless.
Read on and discuss?
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You Like To Go Down, So What?
According to an article in this month's issue of Esquire, the blow job is all but becoming extinct in favor of cunnilingus. In an informal poll, conducted by the writer Geoff Dyer, eight out of 10 of his "more mature male friends" preferred "eating p**sy to having their dicks sucked." And guess what? The two who preferred BJs were gay! He uses this data to assert that the excitement that surrounded fellatio beginning in the '70s has all but faded.
Clearly, that must be the case, if his friends say so. But it's not just his friends. He says blow jobs are out in pop culture as well. I mean, Michael Fassbender's character in "Shame" tells a man in a bar that he wants to go down on his wife. It's of no consequence that he's a sex addict, I suppose.
And in a scene from Jonathan Franzen's Freedom, Joey Berglund says he considers getting a blow job as "little more than a glorified jerk off." Should we talk about how he had been sleeping with his neighbor since he was 13 or something? Perhaps I should remind Dyer of the entire page in Jeffrey Eugenides' The Marriage Plot dedicated to the sucking of Mitchell Grammaticus' c**k.
Dyer says of his perceived decline of the blow job:
"[Cunnilingus] was regarded in much the same way as paying for a round at the bar: You had to do it, but if you could avoid it, you did. It would be a mistake, though, to see this change as meaning that men have gone from being selfish recipients to selfless givers of pleasure; it's just that what constitutes pleasure has shifted."
Pleasure has shifted for whom? For men? He didn't poll any women did he? And just because his "more mature male friends" (what does that mean anyway?) prefer giving oral sex, doesn't mean any of them would refuse a blow job when open mouth came to d**k.
Well, I've conducted my own informal poll in my bedroom over the last decade and I think you'll find my research fascinating. According to my data, 100 percent of men don't turn down blow jobs. I've never had it happen. Not once. And I've had my share of bedfellows. Some like BJs more than others, but they all like them.
On the cunnilingus front, my informal poll found that nine out of 10 men like eating p**sy. There was a religious guy I brought home once who told me he didn't enjoy giving oral sex. I laughed and sent him home. Every other guy I've invited into my bed has been more than happy to put his face between my legs. For how long? That's a whole other story. I will just say that some are more enthusiastic than others, and some are certainly better at it. But 90 percent are eager and willing.
On a more frustrating note, 80 percent of the men I polled seem simultaneously concerned and unconcerned with my pleasure while between my legs. Sure, they want me to enjoy myself. That 80 percent was eager to please. But what it takes to please, to really please, often eluded eight out of 10. Even when explained to them explicitly — very explicitly. The wanting to please, 80 percent of the time, did not translate to orgasms. My poll also found that 100 percent of the time, wanting something bad enough does not make it so.
On a more serious note, none of this matters really. What matters is what both partners are into.
I personally don't always enjoy receiving. Sometimes I like giving a good BJ. Call me old-fashioned. Maybe men are more into into going down these days, maybe they're not. So what? If they are, should we reward them for being more excited about it? Should we praise them for being less inclined to avoid our vaginas? Maybe cunnilingus is becoming more mainstream, the way fallatio did in the '70s. Or maybe the crappy economy is making it more erotically charged for a man to have a woman sit on his face. But this much I know: Enthusiasm for eating pussy is not to be worn as some badge of honor, some mark of modernism or male sensitivity. Some of the biggest assholes I've ever been with have been the most enthusiastic givers of oral sex.
Men, don't ever mistake giving cunnilingus for having "given" in bed.
All in all, Geoff Dyer's findings don't mean d**k (pun intended). Let's be clear: Just because men enjoy eating pussy doesn't mean blow jobs are dead.
The Bully Backlash
April 5th, 2012 5:57 pm MDT
WARNING - RELIGION & POLITICS ARE DISCUSSED BELOW!
As a "recovering Catholic", I spent quite a bit of time studying most of the major monotheistic belief systems of the Western world, and discovered good AND bad equally distributed amongst most all of them. To that point, the most profound words of wisdom I read in all that time came from a Rabbi who stated "To do unto others as you would have done unto you - THIS is the Law. All the rest is simply commentary."
To this very day I can find no reasonable argument to that observation, and I honestly believe the whole world would be a much better place if everyone thought that way.
With that said, it constantly breaks my heart when virtually everyday I read about so-called "Christians" who stridently profess their "faith in Jesus", and then procedd to act in ways that are decidely UN-Christ-like.
Ironically, I have more respect for the lunatics from the controversial Westboro Baptist Church ("God Hates Fags"), who at least are not afraid proclaim their insane bigotry "in the name of the Lord" loud and proud, be it at gay pride parades or military funerals or whatever, than I have for the sanctimonious slime-bags focused on in the article below, who practice the ultimate in religious hypocrisy by their inexcusable actions against innocent kids.
May they ALL rot in their own little circle of Hell, assuming there actually IS such a place.
Read on and discuss...
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The Bully Backlash: How the Christian Right Is Attacking Efforts to Help Kids
By Katherine Stewart, Comment Is Free
Posted on April 4, 2012, Printed on April 5, 2012
http://www.alternet.org/story/154863/
For four years at his Tennessee high school, Jacob Rogers was bullied for being gay. He repeatedly appealed to school administrators for help, but didn't get much. Around Thanksgiving of last year, it got so bad that he quit going to school. In early December, not long after turning 18, he killed himself. Jacob, who lived with his grandmother, left her with passwords to his phone and email accounts, so that she and investigators might understand why he chose to take his own life.
In the recently released film Bully, filmmaker Lee Hirsch reminds us just how much cruelty young people are capable of displaying toward one another. The documentary records the grief and the determination of the parents of Ty, a boy who committed suicide at the age of 11, as they fight to change the system that served their son so poorly. It follows Alex, who faces daily torment on the school bus. And it tells the story of Kelby, a one-time star athlete in Tuttle, Oklahoma, who comes out as a lesbian – only to be kicked out of the school sports team amid an outpouring of hate.
Thirteen million children are bullied every year, says Hirsch. According to the American Psychological Association, approximately "40% to 80% of school-age children experience bullying at some point during their school careers." Suicides like Jacob's take place somewhere in America every single month. According to a Yale University study, children who are bullied are two to nine times more likely to end their own lives. Kids are bullied for all sorts of reasons: for being fat, shy, poor, rich and for no reason at all, although everyone familiar with the phenomenon knows that sexual orientation is a common excuse.
Solutions to the problem of bullying aren't easy. They have to do more with changing the culture than changing the legal codes. Families bear the chief responsibility for teaching their children to respect others.
Schools can help, though, by educating students and teachers about the problem, setting up clear and effective policies for dealing with cases and establishing accountability, and fostering a safe and welcoming environment for all students.
State legislators in New Jersey, Michigan, and Illinois, among other places, have taken important steps in this direction with useful anti-bullying bills. The merits of specific policies, and the money and time they will consume, can be debated, but we can all agree that bullying is a bad thing and that we should be looking for solutions. Right?
Wrong. A number of groups that claim to represent the "Christian viewpoint" have come out in vigorous opposition to anti-bullying initiatives, and their opposition has to do with a fundamental question about exactly what we think bullying is.
In Arizona, for example, legislators had their anti-bullying bill teed up for passage in March. But then, Cathi Herrod, chief of a lobbying group associated with Focus on the Family, decided that the bill was really part of an effort to "force cultural acceptance and affirmation of homosexual lifestyles".
Although the bill doesn't refer specifically to any one victimized group, Herrod successfully pressured lawmakers into rejecting it. Senate minority leader David Schapira, a sponsor of his Senate Bill 1462, called her a "legislative terrorist". "Cathi Herrod, an unelected lobbyist, killed a bill that would protect all Arizona kids purely because of her intolerance of gay kids," he said.
In Michigan last year, the "anti-anti-bullying" lobby went on the offensive with some legislation of their own. In a bill dealing with the bullying issue, they inserted a provision that would have exempted bullies who acted out of "a sincerely held religious belief or moral conviction".
With an irony that seems more than usually cruel, the bill was named for a Michigan teen who had committed suicide after years of bullying.
A national outpouring of disgust at the Michigan legislature's attempt to legitimize faith-based bullying ultimately resulted in the removal of the provision from the bill.
But now the lawmakers of a Tennessee plan to make good on the loss. In what must count as an extraordinarily perverse way to mark the suicide of Jacob Rogers, they have introduced a bill that follows the trail blazed by the Michigan lawmakers, with some inconsequential changes in language, to open up a loophole for verbal bullying that is motivated by religious prejudices.
Given that the Tennessee legislature approved Bill 368, which is intended to bring "creationism" into the state's biology classrooms, on 26 March, the prospects for this anti-anti-bullying bill have to be considered good.
In Washington, Senator Al Franken and Representative Jared Polis have put forward the Student Non-Discrimination Act, which would add sexual orientation and gender identity to anti-discrimination law. The legislation recently won the signed backing of 70 civil rights and educational groups, ranging from the ACLU to the American Federation of Teachers.
But the Christian right is up in arms. According to rightwing pundits and bloggers, the nefarious purpose of Franken's and Polis's bill is the so-called "homosexualization" of students. Concerned Women for America says it aims at "promoting acceptance of LGBT behavior".
Many people will undoubtedly conclude that these efforts by the anti-anti-bully lobby are lacking in Christian charity or common sense. But their proponents do have a point that we should carefully consider.
To be sure, the notion that the anti-bullying initiatives are driven by "the homosexual agenda" – a phrase that conjures the vision of gay hordes aiming to seduce children into lives of abomination – is preposterous. But the sense that anti-bullying initiatives involve teaching children "acceptance" of LGBT peers, to use the word of the Concerned Women of America, is not.
If you want the school to tell students to stop harassing kids like Jacob Rogers because they are gay, you have to let them know, at some point, that the school thinks it's OK to be gay.
As Americans, we all like to believe that we can establish laws and policies that are neutral with respect to religious belief. But the truth is, we can't, and we don't. Sometimes, we have to make a choice.
We have already made such choices – obviously, the right ones – with respect to race or ethnicity. No state or school would or should entertain for a moment the notion that it is acceptable for students to tell those of another race or ethnicity that they are inferior and degenerate because their religion teaches them – as some religions in America did, until quite recently – that certain races are less worthy before God than others. Maybe, it's time to come clean about sexual preference.
We can spend long hours parsing the complexities of social and cultural influences on human sexual behavior, and we can devote still more hours to lamenting the reductive crudeness with which human sexuality is coralled in tidy categories. But the fact is that for most people, sexual orientation is no more a matter of choice than place of birth or color of skin.
And even if we were to suppose that, for some of the people, some of the time, it is a matter of choice, the fact remains that it is not the kind of choice that breaks anybody's leg or picks anybody's pocket.
It is OK to be gay. And it's time to let the bullies know that.
Katherine Stewart is the author of "The Good News Club: The Christian Right’s Stealth Assault on America’s Children" (PublicAffairs). Visit her Web site or follow her on Twitter @kathsstewart.
"Protect and Serve" WHO???
February 23rd, 2012 6:16 pm MST
Okay gentle readers, I know full well that Valentine's day is just recently "in the rear-view mirror" (HOORAY!), but I gotta tell ya, as a trans-gal AND a biker, this one REALLY is makin' me "see red" all over again!
I suppose that the reason for my two-level anger will be self-evident when you read the report that follows.
Admittedly the victim in this story was (presumably?) a natal woman, but the mind boggles as to what might have happened if she'd been trans.
And then there's that other "victim", the motorcyclist that T-boned her car, and although I have no facts to back this theory up, the content of the story leads me to believe that she probably carelessly pulled out in front of his moving bike as so damn many distracted drivers seem to do (voice of experience!) nowadays.
This rotten excuse for a cop was ready to "f*ck" HIM too, albeit in a slightly different fashion.
Either way, this delightful officer was making damn sure that somebody was gonna "get screwed"!
It does seem more than a little weird though, since I was just now speaking of the "great state of PA", as the home of that "frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the by-product of anal sex", the much-publicized "Ayatollah" Rick Santorum (go ahead and Google his name), and suddenly this rather alarming item comes up on my always-vigilant (the "price of freedom", right?) "trans-radar" screen.
Read on and discuss?
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"My Stomach Hit the Pavement": A Creepy Cop's Victim Tells Her Story
Last week, Pittsburgh police officer Adam Skweres was arrested for allegedly preying on vulnerable women and demanding sexual favors from them in exchange for various forms of legal help. Now one of his victims has come forward to talk about her experience — and how the Pittsburgh police department ignored it.
The woman, who has asked to remain anonymous, gave a complete account of what happened between her and Skweres in the summer of 2008. She said she was driving to work with a friend, when a motorcycle hit the driver's side of her car. Officer Skweres soon arrived at the scene, and the woman told him she had no insurance and was driving with a suspended license. Then he asked her to talk to him privately so he could "get my side of what had happened."
Here's what happened next:
“I went with him away from my friend and he then he explained to me that I was in alot of trouble and he could make it look like it was my fault or he could give the motor cycle drive a ticket for a failure to obey signs, which would make it his fault.
That I could go to jail for this and what he would do to me wasn't as bad as what would happen to me in jail.
He then said, "You don't know what a pretty young girl such as yourself could do for a guy like me?" I said, "'No sir,' like I was clueless but I knew what he had meant, my stomach hit the pavement, like if I run I'm resisting arrest, if I say yes that's a reason to arrest me, and if I say no he's going to handcuff me, put me in the back seat and rape me.
After about 45 minutes of him saying the same thing and how much trouble i was in I said I was late for work and had to go and my friend in the car with me was on break and was also very late. He told me to think about it, looked down at his gun and said,"If you say anything about this I'll make sure you never walk, talk, or breath again.
He then said that paper work could get lost or misplaced if i cooperated and wrote down on a piece of paper off his police notepad his cell phone number, house phone number, work phone number, extension number, and badge number and said if I didn't call him by 11pm that he knew what my answer was.
He said he canceled the ambulance saying the guy on the motorcycle refused medical attention to make it look better for me to make sure I call him.”
The woman says she immediately told her boss what had happened, and he advised her to report the intimidation to the police. She did so: "the next day I spoke to OMI [Office of Municipal Investigations, which handles complaints against officers] detective Paul Becker and a female officer. I was then asked to take a polygraph test that they said was inconclusive. I never heard anything besides my court papers in the mail."
She's angry with the police and OMI — she says if only they'd investigated her claims back in 2008, the other abuses Skweres is accused of "could have been prevented."
Neither the police department nor OMI has responded to repeated requests for comment, so there is currently no explanation for why they failed to do anything about a serious complaint for several years. But the department has had a lot of legal troubles recently.
In 2010, the city paid out almost $300,000 in legal damages to people who had been mistreated by police in various ways, including a woman who was physically "picked up, then dumped on the curb" by an off-duty officer. Another man sued the department in 2011, alleging that an officer had cut him off on the street, then pulled him over and beaten him up.
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported that civil rights concerns caused the US Justice Dept to monitor the Pittsburgh police department from 1997 to 2002 — but a lawyer told the paper that "the vigilance of police brass and the public has waned since then, creating conditions for more misconduct cases." The police certainly don't seem to have been vigilant in the Skweres case. Says his alleged victim, "it's a shame to know that you can't even trust or depend on the police, and how do I know that I'm going to be safe? That's the question that I can not get an answer to."
Chicago Police and Transfolks
February 22nd, 2012 8:52 pm MST
Hello folks. One of the news items recently posted on the URNA homepage deals with some proposed legislation concerning trans-people and the Chicago police. I was seriously involved with this issue several years ago, and a sensitivity training video for patrol officers was one of the results of that involvement.
See it here ~ http://youtu.be/58JMQmS-vno
Hey-hey, it's the Monkeys!
February 16th, 2012 7:39 pm MST
Sometimes my already busy inbox is absolutely flooded with urgent-looking URNA notices that "somebody has viewed your profile" (OMG!), and so I'll stop what I'm doing to go and log in, only to discover what essentially amounts to NOTHING.
No "guestbook" greeting (pro or con) from the unsolicited "visitor", no comments on my prolific, heartfelt, and carefully thought-out (usually?) journal entries, no type of human contact at all, simply a robotic spam-style e-mail alert that contributes to my substantial inbox clutter.
It's as though I were in some kind of cage where curiosity-seekers could just casually stroll by, peek thru the bars to check me out, and then without any interaction whatsoever keep on walking.
I realize full-well that a few so-called "admirers" slip in here, hoping to "hook-up" with some local tranny, or at least harvest some new "wanking" material, but in this age of internet anonymity, is there no such thing as "common courtesy" anymore between presumably like-minded members of the same group of trans-women, such as the thousands of "carefully screened" (?) people that this semi-private and well-produced website is supposedly made up of?
WTF?
Under most circumstances I believe myself to be a fairly calm and reasonable human being, but sometimes I wish that I could lose my temper the way that Charlton Heston did in the original 'Planet of the Apes,' you know, that scene where he stands up and says, 'Take your paws off me, you damn dirty apes!' And he did that AFTER they threw a net on him.
It's like, before then, everything was OK; but something about monkeys throwing a net on him makes him say 'That's it. That's it. NOW, I'm angry!'
Does anybody else out there get a little weary of these annoyingly voyeuristic profile "drive-bys", or is it just me?
OH, Canada?
February 16th, 2012 6:19 pm MST
“Segregation is the adultery of an illicit intercourse between injustice and immorality.”
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
While America has been slowly but surely striving towards racial equality, and more recently greater equality for gay men and lesbians as well, the sad reality is that gender-variant people are still at the bottom of the proverbial "food chain" in regards to basic human rights such as adequate employment, affordable housing, and competent healthcare.
These unacceptable inequities are a root cause for the alarmingly high rates of mortality for trans-folk at all stages of transition due to murder, and even worse, suicide.
With that said, I found the article which follows to be most interesting, not only because it clearly states the obvious in a public forum, but even more noteworthy is the fact that this public forum is a major Canadian newspaper, the Montreal Gazette.
It is my understanding that Canada has some arguably more enlightened attitudes concerning transgender issues in general, but the author seems to have some very serious points to make, and I thought her perspective was worth sharing here.
Read and discuss?
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Transgender Issues: Segregation vs. Unassailable Rights
Many moons ago (ie. the 1960s) in my high-school history class, the teacher asked the students to fill out a survey he had created. It was about discrimination against black people, and he asked questions like: “Would you be seen in public with a black person?”
It was the ’60s, remember, a time when discrimination against blacks still existed. It was also a time when the youth (including me) rebelled against the Establishment big time.
I was quite appalled by his survey, because I found it to be discriminatory in its very nature — in trying to gauge discrimination levels among his students, I felt he was inadvertently discriminating against blacks by even asking those questions, and discriminating against the rest of us by making us answer those questions. I felt humiliated: I would never have dreamed of discriminating against a black person or anyone else. And I didn’t want to fill out that survey.
So, I told him so, and I pointed out to him that we had a black person in our class, and how humiliating it must be for her to have people even questioning her right for an equal place in society . . . as if we had a right to even discuss such a thing. Equality was an unassailable right in my view, and there was simply no discussion to be had about it.
Well, my protestations didn’t go over well. The teacher was very upset that I would suggest his survey was discriminatory at all . . . but he did withdraw the survey. However, I failed history that year.
Flash-forward to the present . . . When I see columnists and commentators questioning and challenging the rights of trans-people to live in society as equals, I am reminded of that history class.
Yes, history is repeating itself.
When a columnist, for example, challenges the right of trans-people to use the washroom or to bear children or whatever, they are taking an elitist stand, as if they have some say in how trans-people should live, as if they can dictate whether we should be treated as equals or not.
It doesn’t matter to them that medical science is offering explanations for transsexualism, it doesn’t matter that we really are born this way, and that it is NOT a sickness.
They don’t care. We don’t fit neatly into their neat binary system, and they are repulsed by that . . . so they find subtle ways to discriminate against us, or not-so-subtle ways.
You can tart it up any way you want, and pretend it is an intellectual discussion, but it’s not. It’s discrimination plain and simple. Nobody should be questioning the rights of trans-people to live freely, to bear children, to do anything that everyone else is allowed to do.
Indeed, it is time to stop all attempts to segregate trans people.
With respect, Jillian
Send comments to jpage@montrealgazette.com
When is gay okay?
February 15th, 2012 6:31 pm MST
Hopefuly most URNA members (unlike those unenlightened Faux News-watching folks "outside the bubble") understand that clearly essential difference between the concepts of "gay" and "trans", yes?
If not ~ LOOK IT UP!
With that in mind, I offer the educational visual aid below. Enjoy...
Those 70's Clothes
February 15th, 2012 6:22 pm MST
Okay, I may be "dating" myself here, but isn't it strange how we can manage to hold on to the pieces of the past while we wait hopefully in anticipation of our futures?
Gender 'Difference': Alienation & Validation
February 15th, 2012 5:41 pm MST
When it rains, it truly does come down in metric bucketloads, doesn't it?
To that point, no sooner did I post Ms Eva's amazingly insightful essay about the juxtaposition between Valentine's Day and trans-people, and my attention was then diverted to what follows by an very lovely and articulate American trans-woman who offers some uniquely intellectual and deeply personal perspective.
Admittedly not everybody here at URNA will be interested in what Ms. Drew has to say, but for those "inquiring minds" that really don't align with their bodies (sound familiar?), her expressive writing should be most informative.
Read and discuss?
Gender 'Difference': Alienation & Validation
Filed By Drew Cordes | February 14, 2012
"All the world's a stage, / And all the men and women merely players; /
They have their exits and their entrances, / And one man in his time plays many parts ..."
-- Shakespeare, "As You Like It," II.vii.
Please forgive the following unholy union of the personal with the theoretical. I know this practice takes some of the oomph out of my hypotheses, but I'm doing it for two important reasons: 1. to give you, my dear reader, some insight and context into my deliberations on these things, and B. I have limited patience for theory that has no practical application (be it personal, artistic, etc.) in the living world. Grounding the theoretical in actual experience makes it more understandable (hopefully).
Now, foreplay aside - I'm a transgender woman, I pass when I want to (which is usually), and I had gender reassignment surgery a little less than a year ago. At this point, I am expected to feel validated and "complete" as a person in terms of my gender expression out in the social world and in terms of how I view myself, i.e. the elimination of "dysphoria" and correlation harmony of mind and body[1].
This is not the case.
I don't regret anything I've done; I'd do it all over again, as much as it sucked. I feel validated in my identity via gender to some degree, but I also can't ignore the alienating aspects of gender expression. Now, I didn't place all my psychic eggs in the basket of reassignment surgery and expect it to resolve all my issues with identity, love, etc. This is a common pitfall - one that all trans folks seeking the knife should be aware of - but it is not where my alienation originates. The nature of my felt dissonance is difficult to convey, as it's best explained by some rather dense philosophical theories, but let's give it a try.
A Crude Summation of Post-Structuralist Linguistic Philosophy
(stick with me, I swear it's relevant)
The word for the central concept at work here is "differance," which is described by its coiner, famed French thinker Jacques Derrida, as "neither a word nor a concept" -- so that should give you some idea of the abstraction to follow. In the post-structuralist[2] ethos, differance (a pun combining the words differ and defer) represents the inability of language to definitively convey ideas and reality, as well as our inability to perceive and grasp True meaning without the inaccurate intermediaries of language.
This principle expands further within the discipline of semiotics, which is the study of signs in all their varied forms. Reality itself, as perceived by humans, is one big system of arbitrary signs and subjective perceptions. This includes human behaviors - the wink from the stranger across the bar, a thumbs-up from a friend, an icy stare from an upset spouse - these are all signs, and all rely on our perception and ability to differentiate to parse their meaning. And as any married person will tell you, sometimes you're prone to misinterpret signs from even the most familiar source[3].
A contemporary of Derrida, Jean Baudrillard provides, I believe, the most expedient and poetic explanation of this phenomenon in his work "Simulation and Simulacra."
"If once we were able to view the Borges fable in which the cartographers of the Empire draw up a map so detailed that it ends up covering the territory exactly ... Today abstraction is no longer that of the map, the double, the mirror, or the concept. Simulation is no longer that of a territory, a referential being, or a substance. It is the generation by models of a real without origin or reality: a hyperreal. The territory no longer precedes the map, nor does it survive it. It is nevertheless the map that precedes the territory - precession of simulacra - that engenders the territory, and if one must return to the fable, today it is the territory whose shreds slowly rot across the extent of the map. It is the real, and not the map, whose vestiges persist here and there in the deserts that are no longer those of the Empire, but ours. The desert of the real itself."
Enter Gender
Queer theorist Judith Butler applies these semiotic principles to gender. What we think of as gender expression - the expression of varying degrees of "masculinity" or "femininity," or some mix of the two - is "an imitation for which there is no original." We are copying an ideal that in reality, has never existed. A copy of a copy of a copy ... ad infinitum[4]. The term Butler coins for this is performativity.
"The 'being' of the subject is no more self-identical than the 'being' of any gender; in fact, coherent gender, achieved through an apparent repetition of the same, produces as its effectthe illusion of a prior and volitional subject. In this sense, gender is not a performance that a prior subject elects to do, but gender is performative in the sense that it constitutes as an effect the very subject it appears to express. It is a compulsory performance in the sense that acting out of line with heterosexual norms brings with it ostracism, punishment, and violence, not to mention the transgressive pleasures produced by these very prohibitions." (Butler, "Imitation and Gender Insubordination")
Here's where I differ with Butler, and where alienation begins to manifest itself: She posits performativity as predominantly an unconscious phenomenon; and even if we're aware of our performative practices, we're still bound by its pervasiveness in our cultures - as Butler says, "It is a compulsory performance," and failure to play one's role brings consequences. She writes, "Although I have concentrated in the above on the reality-effects of gender practices, performances, repetitions, and mimes, I do not mean to suggest that drag is a 'role' that can be taken on or off at will. There is no volitional subject behind the mime who decides, as it were, which gender it will be today." (Ibid.)
I disagree. Butler's viewpoint here neglects the experience of the transgender, genderqueer, and gender-fluid populace. There are many people who, in fact, do adopt and discard genders at will. My own gender transition is a form of this. Granted, the initial casting off of masculinity was not the quick, capricious act that Butler's casual phrasing implies, but the end effect is the same. And now that I have completed the journey in one direction, I find myself pondering what's to stop me from turning around and walking the road again? I could pass as a man again, if I wanted. I can still talk in my old voice, my postures and gestures are malleable (I've already reformed them once, after all), my hair can be cut short, my breasts can be bound, jewelry and makeup obviously are easy to discard, etc.
We often are so focused on transition's final destination that we never notice that its path lies straight through Baudrillard's desert of the real. Is femininity any more representative of who I am than masculinity was? I am still copying a copy, after all - a sign without truth. I, and other trans and gender-nonconforming people, did consciously choose our current gender expression (or lack thereof), but is the choice of one artifice over the other a validation or a further delusion, a further alienation of self? This question is the essence of gender differance.
Gender Differance
The very act of transitioning requires the initial recognition that gender expression is not necessarily representative of self-identity. The first step each transitioning person takes is some form of the thought: "Being a man/woman really isn't me," and the seed of alienation is planted in this realization. How can one arrive at this conclusion and immediately turn tail to take refuge within the other end of the gender spectrum? If the concept and expression of gender itself is illusory, as Butler says, how can one gender expression reflect one's identity more than another? It can't. Regardless even of one consciously choosing to employ it, gender is, ultimately, artifice.
Some of us already realize this - I realize this. So why and how does gender expression maintain its importance? I endured great pain, both physical and psychological, to express a gender I know is false. Why? Where does the validation lie?
Validation lies within alienation itself. It lies in embracing the illusion. Validation is the joyful, purposeful manipulation of the falsehood. This is what Derrida calls, in his own linguistic context, "play" or "freeplay." He critiques his structuralist forerunners for searching language for a truth, presence, or center that does not exist - much in the same way that Butler explains that an original gender, a gender ideal, does not exist.
"... structure -- or rather the structurality of structure -- although it has always been at work, has always been neutralized or reduced, and this by a process of giving it a center or referring it to a point of presence, a fixed origin. The function of this center was not only to orient, balance, and organize the structure -- one cannot in fact conceive of an unorganized structure -- but above all to make sure that the organizing principle of the structure would limit what we might call the freeplay of the structure." (Derrida, "Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences")
Derrida describes freeplay as "the disruption of presence. ... Freeplay is always an interplay of absence and presence ..." (Ibid.) In other words, toying and experimenting with the unbridgeable gap between the object or idea (aka the signified), and the word or sign employed to convey it (aka the signifier). Derrida continues, saying there are two responses to freeplay, the alienating: "A turning toward the presence, lost or impossible, of the absent origin, this structuralist thematic of broken immediateness is thus the sad, negative, nostalgic, guilty, Rousseauist facet of the thinking of freeplay ...;" and the "Nietzschean affirmation -- the joyous affirmation of the freeplay of the world and without truth, without origin, offered to an active interpretation ... This affirmation then determines the non-center otherwise than as loss of the center. And it plays the game without security. For there is a sure freeplay: that which is limited to the substitution of given and existing, present, pieces." (Ibid.)
This "joyous affirmation" of freeplay is where we can find the validation of gender differance. Regardless of being aware of gender expression's inherent emptiness, one can still choose to find meaning in its freeplay manipulation. We can simultaneously realize its falsehood and disconnection to reality/identity, and still feel validated that the fully informed choice[5] to "play" is one of our own free will, and that the entire world of gender is offered to our own "active interpretation."
One can manipulate the signs consciously as one sees fit; or one can even, as Baudrillard often urges in his writings, figuratively set the signs ablaze. In "The Mirror of Production," he provides his most famous quote while examining capitalist economics through the lens of post-structuralism. Wonderfully poetic, Baudrillard merges his desire for the figurative burning of signs with literal fires set by revolting political protesters: "Something in all men profoundly rejoices in seeing a car burn."
With gender, once one is aware of (and gives consideration to) the performative system in place, the choice of expression (or lack of expression) one makes is infallible. An informed choice of where one finds meaning cannot be taken away from the chooser. Whether choosing, in one's freeplay, the extremes of masculinity or femininity, androgyny, gender neutrality, remaining fluid from day to day, or militating against the very notions that we must adopt the artifice of gender at all, one's choice has power. And it is validated when one sees its reflection in the world.
Epilogue
Personally, I've felt more alienated than validated with my gender expression lately. This feeling does not mean I regret my actions or retrospectively think I was naive in my decisions or feelings (as I said, I'd do it all over again). My feelings of alienation may be nothing more than one side of the constant pendulous action of gender differance - validation to alienation to validation ... and so on. What I do know is that I find the thought of Baudrillard's burning car more and more delightful. After enjoying so much Derridean freeplay with gender, I'm beginning to lust for the flames myself - to watch gender burn and cackle at its every pop and spark. ... Perhaps I should cut my hair.
[1] Relatively speaking. There's a bump on my nose I'd like gone, and a cup-sized boost for my chest would be nice, but these are not manifestations of dysphoria, just more all-too-common lamentations about being imperfect.
[2] Also referred to in various contexts as deconstruction or post-modernism.
[3] Next time you end up sleeping on the couch, blame semiotics.
[4] Perhaps not truly "ad infinitum," since our species and the life it evolved from wasn't always around. If you want to be super technical and nitpicky about things, you could theorize that our performative genders today are ultimately highly evolved, highly modernized imitations of our cro-magnon origins - the "traditionally" strong and dominant male role being merely a fine-tuned version of clubbing a woman over the head and dragging her back to a cave by her hair to rape. Though, men assaulting and raping women still happens today, millions of years after these origins ... not always as evolved as we think we are, are we?
[5] We could have another debate over what "fully informed" means and who is fully informed. I think most people believe they are fully informed. I believe that most of them are not. Do I believe I'm fully informed? About this subject, yes, of course I do. Regardless of knowing that my ego is not immune to the same self-assuredness that "most people" fall prey to, I do think I'm informed. Though, I also could very well receive an email from Judith Butler calling me a misguided ass.
Changing sex, a desire to love
February 15th, 2012 4:20 pm MST
Beauty and brains is always a great combination to stumble across.
There are a lot of really smart trans-folk out there. This fascinating essay, which just hit my inbox, reflects the perspective of a brilliant trans-woman from the UK concerning Valentine's Day, from it's pagan origins to the impact that it can have even in our modern secular world.
Read and discuss?
Changing sex, a desire to love
With Valentine's Day approaching, I have been thinking about the relationship between love and desire. When does desire become love? Can you have love without desire? Agnolo Bronzino's beautiful painting "Venus, Cupid, Folly, and Time" depicts the ambivalences between lust and love, with Venus and Cupid forbiddingly embracing. Cupid, the winged god of desire, is the son of Venus, goddess of love.
In Greek mythology, Venus emerged from fecund sea foam, and while married to Vulcan enjoyed the company of many lovers. According to Wikipedia, in one of her manifestations, Venus Erycina, she embodies impure love, and is the patron goddess of prostitutes. As Venus Castina, she has sympathy and understanding for feminine souls locked up in male bodies. Her divinity recognized and celebrated that inexplicable bodily drive to change. How can anyone ever describe in words such a deep desire (is desire even the right word) as changing sex?
The history of Valentine's Day is shrouded in mystery, but for many Americans it seems only a commercial success with billions of dollars spent on heart-shaped boxes of milk chocolates, awful greeting cards with sayings such as "I Loved You Yesterday, I Love You Still, I Always Have ... I Always Will" and plastic roses. But I have a confession: I adore Valentine's Day.
To dodge my friends' looks of horror, I tell them that I celebrate the pre-Christian, Roman festival of Lupercalia. And for good measure, I throw in a bit of trivia: "It is somewhat unclear if the holiday honored Lupercus—god Pan from Greek Mythology—but the focal point is the suckling of Romulus and Remus by a she-wolf."
Cross-species care, what better to celebrate? A feast with wolves, I tell my friends, and a yearly opportunity to reflect on our fantasies and libidinal appetites.
Lupercalia is full of bloodletting and sacrificingwolfish hedonism fueled by ritual. To celebrate the festivities I host a lusty dinner party. The room is decorated with anatomically correct heart cut-outs and crystals from a now-lost red chandelier hanging from the ceiling. I change all the light bulbs to pink. I serve rosé champagne and red-hued food: purple olives, red pepper bruschetta, borscht, raspberry chocolate torte and figs. My guests come dress-coded in red or pink, sometimes sparkly too. Any individual can act as a male, a female, or simultaneously as both. A love poem or a bit of smut from a recently read novel is shared aloud, but always the conversation turns to desire.
We tell each other salacious stories. Sexual cannibalism in black widow spiders—hungry after lovemaking, the female spider devours her mate—or a hermaphroditic sea slug called a "sea hare." At breeding time the sea hares form a chain of mating animals. The sea hare at the front of the line is female only. The ones that follow "her" are male to the animal in front of it and female to the one behind. The sea hare at the end of the line is male only. It is unclear if spiders and slugs have desire, but certainly their stories can inspire a decadent evening.
Desire is a constellation of wants and needs, hopes and dreams reaching toward someone or something. When I started dating my husband, it was all desire. The way he would sit with his thumbs in his pockets, as if a pose, looking directly at me. His gesture was jocular, but I was swept away nonetheless. With a shift of his lower jaw or a pushing out of his shoulders I dissolved. He was cocky—this young Oedipus—but, from our first encounter, I offered him my attention as his roost.
On our third date, accidentally, his finger touched mine; our knees, under the table, happened to brush against each other. I became absorbed in the significance of these subtle mishaps. I started to create meaning out of these brief zones of contact—each touch raises a question in need of an answer. As simply as that, I was falling in love.
The ache of desire can give way to love. If desire is projection, then love is about recognizing the emotional contours and experiences of the one you desire. Loving someone is the closest we can get to knowing what it is like to be another person. Love breaks through our serially surging selfishness.
Later in our relationship, I was sitting in the surgical waiting room of the hospital. He was having surgery, a necessary cut, part of his transition. For him, cutting his body was a way of healing, not hurting. By removing deep structures that fill his body with competing hormones, his testosterone would no longer need to fight for a place to stay, a home. It is his cut, his alone, and yet I feel him, feel the thick purple scars on his abdomen. For him, the surgery is a desire for change; for me, his cuts are about love, loving his scars as marks of his own desire. As it is for the patrons of Venus Castina, so too is it for my husband: Changing sex is a desire to love.
With Valentine's Day approaching, put aside those chocolate roses and stuffed winged bears holding heart-tipped arrows and sit down with your friends or your lover and talk about your desires. Dim the lights, listen to Wagner's "Tristan and Isolde," especially Isolde's last aria, and enjoy a decadent tipple and a scrumptious nibble.
Consider the importance of following your desires, for repressing them does you no good. Following your desire is a brave way of recognizing that something is happening to you, something remarkable. Perhaps it will break open your world, or perhaps it will simply open your heart. Things will change. But change is what must happen to desire for love to find a home.
NO
February 9th, 2012 7:54 pm MST
Irony can be an amazing thing, but sometimes it's difficult to distinguish from deliberate contradiction. For some reason, I seem to accumulate an amazingly large number of visitors to my profile, but hardly any of them have anything to say for themselves.
Because I am a lowly "free" member, I can only see the three most recent profile viewers. However, I do tend to "return the favor" and look at their profile out of curiosity. If it seems that the person inquestion has their head reasonably well "screwed on", I'll leave a quick "hello" on their guestbook, and if they seem REALLY cool, I'll add in a "friend" request.
Most times the person accepts, and perhaps we'll get acquainted as time goes by. Sometimes my invitation is simply ignored - no big deal.
However, a funny thing happened today that I thought I'd share.
A young gal from nearby peeked at my profile, and upon review, she seemed okay, as well as close to home. In addition, her profile clearly stated she was "looking for tg friends", so I sent her the "friend request".
Guess what?
For the very first time ever, my good-faith offer of friendship was REJECTED!
Not ignored mind you, not a note saying "thanks but no thanks," but in essence flat out told to go f#ck myself!
Fascinating, this "community" of ours.
The Genderbread Person!
February 2nd, 2012 5:57 pm MST
Gender is a tough subject to tackle. There are a lot of facets to consider, a lot of pressures at play, and we have all been conditioned in such a way that our first instinct is almost unanimously wrong. But we’re going to tackle it. No, we’re going to tackle the balls out of it.
Coming to our aid, I would like to proudly present to you wonderfully curious folks: The Genderbread Person! (see below)
As you’ll see above, we have four elements. I will break those down, but first I want to talk in generalities. First of all, if you noticed that the first three categories all pertain to gender, while the fourth pertains to sexuality, great job. Skip ahead to the next paragraph. For everyone else: if that doesn’t make sense to you, or you’re unsure of how all four interrelate, worry not. By the end of this post it’ll all make sense or you can have your money back. And if you never gave me money, give me money.
Whenever I talk to groups about gender, a common problem arises: people tend to assume that someone has to be on either the left half or the right half of all the continuums above, and when I explain that many people zig zag through the list, they give me blank stares. I’m about to say something that will likely freak you out, but be cool, because it’ll all make sense soon.
Gender identity, gender expression, biological sex, and sexual orientation are independent of one another (i.e., they are not connected). With that said (I’m going to say it again later), let’s move on.
Gender Identity: Who You Think You Are
On the left we have “woman” and on the right we have “man,” two terms you are likely already familiar with. In the middle, we have the term “genderqueer,” which, you guessed it, is used for an identity that is somewhere between woman and man. Another term for genderqueer that is accepted within the community is “genderfuck,” but that’s a bit racy for my taste.
Gender identity is all about how you, in your head, think about yourself. It’s about the chemistry that composes you–your chromosomal configuration and hormone levels–and how you interpret it. As you know it, do you think you fit better into the societal role of “woman,” or “man,” or do neither ring particularly true for you? That is, are you somewhere in-between the two? The answer is your gender identity.
Most of us aren’t out at the very extremes. I identify as a man, but there are many traits and dispositions I possess that slide me left on the scale. For example, I am sensitive, empathetic, and emotional, three traits that describe the traditional woman. But I still strongly identify as a man. Grrr!
It has been accepted that we form our gender identities around the age of three, and after that age it is incredibly difficult to change them. Formation of identity is affected by hormones and environment just as much as it is by biological sex. Oftentimes, problems arise when someone is assigned a gender based on their sex at birth that doesn’t align with how they come to identify. We’ll talk about that more later.
Gender Expression: How You Demonstrate Who You Are
On the left we have “feminine” and on the right we have “masculine,” the two expressive terms related to “woman” and “man.” In the middle, we have a new term “androgynous,” which describes an ambiguous or mixed form of expressing gender.
Gender expression is all about how you demonstrate your gender through the ways you act, dress, behave, and interact–whether that is intentional or unintended. Gender expression is interpreted by others perceiving your gender based on traditional gender roles (e.g., men wear pants, women wear dresses). Gender expression is something that often changes from day to day, outfit to outfit, event or setting to event or setting. It’s about how the way you express yourself aligns or doesn’t with traditional ways of gendered expression. And like gender identity, there is a lot of room for flexibility here. It is likely that you slide around on this continuum throughout the week without even thinking about it. How about an example?
You wake up and you’re wearing baggy grey sweatpants and a tshirt. As you walk into your kitchen to prepare breakfast, you’re expressing an adrogynous-to-slightly-masculine gender. However, you see your partner in the kitchen and you prowl in like Halle Berry from Catwoman, then you are expressing much more femininely, so now you’re back on the left half of the continuum. You pour a bowl of cereal, wrap your fist around a spoon like a viking, and start shoveling Fruit Loops into your face, and all-of-a-sudden you’re sliding back onto the right side of the continuum. After breakfast, you skip back into your bedroom and playfully place varying outfits in front of you, pleading your partner help you decide what to wear. You’re feminine again.
I assume this entire time you were imagining it was you, with your gender identity, acting out that example. Now go through the whole thing, but imagine someone with the a different gender identity from you going through the motions. Now you are starting to understand how these concepts interrelate, but don’t interconnect.
Biological Sex: The Equipment Under the Hood
On the left we have “female” and on the right we have “male,” the two biological sexes we all grew up knowing about. In the middle, we have a new term “intersex,” which describes someone whose sexual organs are not strictly male or female. The term “hermaphrodite,” which you’ve likely heard used to describe an intersex individual, is frowned upon as “hermaphrodite” is a stigmatizing word that means someone who is entirely male and female, a biological impossibility. P.S. How did you feel about me expressing my masculinity in the heading of this section?
Biological sex refers to the objectively measurable organs, hormones, and chromosomes you possess. Being female means having a vagina, ovaries, two X chromosomes, predominant estrogen, and you can grow a baby in your stomach area. Being male means having testes, a penis, an XY chromosome configuration, predominant testosterone, and you can put a baby in a female’s stomach area. Being intersex can be any combination of what I just described.
For example, someone can be born with the appearance of being male (penis, scrotum, etc.), but have a functional female reproductive system inside. There are many examples of how intersex can present itself, and below you can see some statistics from the Intersex Society of North America that describe the frequency of intersex births. (check out the stat I bolded, but be prepared to be shocked)
| Not XX and not XY | one in 1,666 births |
| Klinefelter (XXY) | one in 1,000 births |
| Androgen insensitivity syndrome | one in 13,000 births |
| Partial androgen insensitivity syndrome | one in 130,000 births |
| Classical congenital adrenal hyperplasia | one in 13,000 births |
| Late onset adrenal hyperplasia | one in 66 individuals |
| Vaginal agenesis | one in 6,000 births |
| Ovotestes | one in 83,000 births |
| Idiopathic (no discernable medical cause) | one in 110,000 births |
| Iatrogenic (caused by medical treatment, for instance progestin administered to pregnant mother) | no estimate |
| 5 alpha reductase deficiency | no estimate |
| Mixed gonadal dysgenesis | no estimate |
| Complete gonadal dysgenesis | one in 150,000 births |
| Hypospadias (urethral opening in perineum or along penile shaft) | one in 2,000 births |
| Hypospadias (urethral opening between corona and tip of glans penis) | one in 770 births |
| Total number of people whose bodies differ from standard male or female | one in 100 births |
| Total number of people receiving surgery to “normalize” genital appearance | one or two in 1,000 births |
Sexual Orientation: Who You Are Attracted To
On the left we have “heterosexual,” meaning attracted to people of the opposite sex, or being straight. On the right we have “homosexual,” meaning attracted to people of the same sex, or being gay or lesbian. And in the middle we have bisexual, meaning attracted to people of both sexes. Note: there is no place on the scale for “asexual”, which is the lack of sexual attraction to others, as it doesn’t fit into this continuum.
Sexual orientation is all about who you are physically, spiritually, and emotionally attracted to. If you are male and you’re attracted to females, you’re straight. If you’re a male who is attracted to males and females, you’re bisexual. And if you’re a male who is attracted to males, you’re gay. This is the one most of us know the most about. We hear the most about it, it’s salient in our lives, and we understand where we stand best. It’s pretty cut and dry, right? Maybe.
Interestingly enough, pioneering research conducted by Dr. Alfred Kinsey in the mid-20th century uncovered that most people aren’t absolutely straight or gay/lesbian. Instead of just asking “do you like dudes or chicks?” (very sciency, I know), he asked people to report their fantasies, dreams, thoughts, emotional investments in others, and frequency of sexual contact. Based on his findings, he broke sexuality down into a seven point scale (see below), and reported that most people who identify as straight are actually somewhere between 1 – 3 on the scale, and most people who identify as lesbian/gay are 3-5, meaning most of us are a little bi-.
0 – Exclusively Heterosexual
1 – Predominantly heterosexual, incidentally homosexual
2 – Predominantly heterosexual, but more than incidentally homosexual
3 – Equally heterosexual and homosexual
4 – Predominantly homosexual, incidentally heterosexual
5 – Predominantly homosexual, incidentally heterosexual
6 – Exclusively Homosexual
Putting it all together.
Wow, that was a lot of information all at once, can we agree? The crazy part: I held back. I plan to write individual write-ups on each of the sections above, because there is still so much to say. But you don’t need to worry about that right now. We need to make this all make sense–synthesize some knowledge up in your brain.
Interrelation versus Interconnection
Remember earlier when I said that thing, then I said I would say it again? It’s on the right, in case you forgot. This me saying that again: though the four things I presented above are certainly interrelated, they are not interconnected. What do I mean by that?
Gender identity, gender expression, biological sex, and sexual orientation are independent of one another (i.e., they are not connected).People’s sexual orientation doesn’t determine their gender expression. And their gender expression isn’t determined by their gender identity. And their gender identity isn’t determined by their biological sex. And also every other mismatch of A isn’t determined by B combination you can dream up from those inputs. Those things certainly affect one another (i.e., they are related to one another) but they do not determine one another.
If someone is born with male reproductive organs and genitalia, he is very likely to be raised as a boy, identify as a man, and express himself masculinely. We call this identity “cisgender” (when your biological sex aligns with how you identify) and it grants a lot of privilege (read some of them in this list of cisgender privileges). It’s something most of us who have it don’t appreciate nearly as much as we should.
Questions, Concerns, or Thoughts?
Take some time to mull all of this over, particularly if it’s the first time you’re learning about this super-complex, super-hard-to-swallow subject. There’s a lot of information to process, and most of it goes against a lot of what you might have been learned growin’ up.
Calling Bullsh*t on the Big Apple
February 2nd, 2012 5:31 pm MST
When one thinks of New York City, a lot of LGBT references come to mind. Not the least of which is the legendary Stonewall Inn, arguably the birthplace of the gay rights movement in Amerika. It is also common knowledge that local drag queens and other gender-variant individuals were reportedly the very first to stand-up to the corrupt police who came in on that fateful night in 1969 to either collect bribe money, or shut down the bar and harrass the patrons, should such pay-off money not be forthcoming.
Fast forward to a presumably "more enlightened" world. With that in mind, prepare to be seriously discouraged by the article which follows. Read and discuss?
*************************************************************************
In NYPD Custody, Trans People Get Chained to Fences and Poles
A trans woman says that when she was arrested for a minor subway violation, NYPD officers belittled her, called her names, asked about her genitals — and kept her chained to a fence for 28 hours. Now she's suing. And it turns out she's far from alone.
In her lawsuit, Temmie Breslauer says she was arrested on January 12 in a subway station for illegally using her dad's discount fare card (only seniors and people with disabilities can get these). She says the arresting officers — the suit names one, Officer Shah — laughed at her. When they took her to the station, a desk sergeant asked her "whether she had a penis or a vagina." Breslauer explained that she was in transition. Then, instead of putting her with female inmates or in her own room, the department allegedly chose this course of action:
[S]he was fingerprinted, seated on a bench, then painfully chained to a fence wherein, for no apparent reason, her arm was lifted over her head and attached to the fence to make it appear that she was raising her hand in the classroom. She sat there in that position for 28 hours.
She also says officers not only refused to call her "she," they instead referred to her as "He-She", "Faggot," and "Lady GaGa," and asked her "So you like to suck dick? Or what?" Meanwhile, people arrested for the same minor crime (misdemeanor "theft of services") she was were calmly processed and allowed to leave. Finally, she was able to go before a judge, who gave her two days of community service. She says the whole ordeal aggravated her existing PTSD and left her sleepless and suicidal.
Breslauer's suit names the City of New York, Officer Shah, and several other officers as defendants. It accuses them of assault, battery, false imprisonment, and violation of Breslauer's civil rights, and asks for compensatory and punitive damages. And this isn't the first time the NYPD has been accused of mocking and abusing a trans person. In October, Justin Adkins, director of the Multicultural Center at Williams College, was arrested for protesting on the Brooklyn Bridge as part of Occupy Wall Street. At The Bilerico Project, he reports almost exactly the same treatment that Breslauer got. When a male officer found out Adkins was trans, he asked Adkins what he "had down there." Then, at the the station, this happened:
They had me sit down in a chair next to the filthy toilet, and handcuffed my right wrist to a metal handrail.
Why was I segregated from all of the other protestors? Perhaps the answer lay in the fact that police officers were coming by to ogle me, and were laughing and giggling at me through a window. It was obvious that prisoners were rarely handcuffed to a railing in this manner, because a number of officers asked a female officer why I was handcuffed to the railing. She told them something, I couldn't hear what, but then, on each of these occasions, they would laugh and giggle while looking at me pointedly.
Adkins was chained up for eight hours, sometimes with his arm twisted painfully behind him, before he was finally released. When I reached Adkins by email, he told me, "I have been in touch with the Internal Affairs Department of the NYPD and they are investigating the officers I encountered on October 1st." However, "No one has apologized to me for the treatment I encountered." Adkins also mentioned that he was working on "encouraging the NYPD to adopt a protocol and start a full education program for its officers and staff on how to treat transgender detainees." The department currently has no official procedure for arresting or holding trans people. And Adkins isn't the first to ask for one. A list of demands issued to the NYPD in 2009 by a group of transgender advocates and lawyers includes this:
NYPD officers place detained transgender women in cells with men in dangerous situations against their will no matter the circumstances. Transgender men have been cuffed to rails outside of cells for hours on end.
The list also says that, "In 2004, a transgender woman filed a law suit against the NYPD alleging a pattern and practice of engaging in unconstitutional and overly invasive searches of transgender people. Since then, at least four other transgender women have sued the NYPD about violations of their civil rights." In one such lawsuit, provided to me by Breslauer's attorney Gregory Antollino and filed in June of last year, a trans woman named Ryhannah Combs said she was arrested outside a convenient store for "loitering for the purpose of prostitution" (she says she was simply doing errands). An NYPD officer allegedly told her, "I've seen girls like you come around here all the time. Just because you're dressed differently doesn't mean you're not a prostitute." She says other officers later lied to make her look like a prostitute, claiming she was carrying 9 condoms when she was actually carrying zero. And she says she "was cuffed to a wall near an elevator for an extended period of time." Eventually all criminal charges against her were dropped.
Sharon Stapel, Executive Director of the New York City Anti-Violence Project, told me that her organization was aware that the NYPD had a problem with its policies towards trans detainees, and that they were working with the department to make changes. She said the NYPD was willing to work on the issue, but that they weren't necessarily ready to agree to all of AVP's recommendations, which include amending patrol guidelines to make sure that trans detainees are treated with "basic respect and dignity." I also talked to M. Dru Levasseur, a transgender rights attorney for Lambda Legal, who told me that a group of lawyers were hoping to persuade the NYPD to adopt clear guidelines for detaining trans people, including a ban on strip-searching detainees purely to look at their genitals (a practice he says is distressingly common). He noted that a number of cities, including San Francisco and Portland, had adopted such guidelines, and said that "New York City thinks of itself as on the forefront of trans rights, but it's way behind on this issue."
Attorney Andrea Ritchie, one of the main attorneys working to get the NYPD to change its policy, confirmed Stapel's statement — she said the NYPD was willing to have "conversations" about the treatment of trans detainees, but haven't yet followed those up with actual change. She also confirmed that Breslauer, Adkins, and Combs (the last of whom she represents) were part of a pattern: NYPD officers frequently chain trans detainees up instead of putting them in cells. Also part of the pattern: unnecessary strip-searching, groping, and false arrests. Ritchie says these practices have been going on for years and the fact that the NYPD is addressing them at all is likely the result of multiple lawsuits (in addition to the ones I describe above, she named three others).
So far I haven't been able to get anyone from the NYPD to comment on this issue in any way. Emails to the Deputy Commissioner of Public Information have gone unanswered. When I contacted Timothy Duffy, the NYPD's LGBT liaison, he declined to comment and referred me right back to the DCPI. All the advocates I talked to expressed some hope that the NYPD would change. But I bet lots of people in the trans community would feel a lot more hopeful if the department would make a public commitment to treating them like people. Until then, all they have to go on are some vague assurances of reform — and a lot of lawsuits that show the exact opposite.
Home for trans-folk, at last?
January 31st, 2012 4:28 pm MST
With equal opportunities for employment, healthcare, and housing being such a critical problem for so many gender-variant individuals in America today, needless to say I was most encouraged to note this positive item right off the wires ~~~
