The Onion news parodies are so damned funny. Doesn't this "report" have the ring of truth to it? I can just see some dumb homophobic Senator making stupid allegations and telling outrageous lies like these... *sighs*
Conservatives Warn Quick Sex Change Only Barrier Between Gays, Marriage
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Where is that "gay bus" with the advertisements on it? I'm thinking it's hot pink on the outside with disco music and sweaty "gays" dancing inside. I want to ride it.
Oh boy...only the Onion could go there and not have it be terribly offensive. I'd like to ride on a gay bus though!
I winced when Alex gushed about that video a week ago, but now you're going back for more??
Y'all srsly need to check your cis privilege if you think that shit is funny.
Help us check that privilege.
When I posted it last time I was kinda squeamish but interpreted it ultimately as "not transphobic/homophobic but making fun of cis/hetero privilege."
In the comments people seems to generally agree with that interpretation. I'm not saying that that means that they were right, but it just means that if there was some education to happen here, it didn't happen.
So what do you think? Why is this satire offensive?
As for the repeat, which isn't, in and of itself, that big of a deal, that's me who dropped the ball. Bil emailed saying he was going to post this and I didn't follow the link until after it was up.
Hi Alex,
Since no one else replied to your very valid question, I will do so.
Let us first keep in mind the guiding principle of what is offensive and what is transsexual-phobic cannot be decided by those that are not. I am sure I will get a lot of replies to my comment that assure of the innocuous intent of the video, and I want to reassure them right back that the intention of those who created it has nothing to do with whether I am or whether I should be offended by the video clip.
First of all, the whole thrust of this satire had nothing to do with transsexuals, its about gays. As such it again (and again, and again) conflates our gender with gay sexuality. My transition and my surgery had NOTHING to do with either who I have slept with in the past or intend to sleep with in the future. It has nothing whatsoever to do with my sexuality in either intention or effect.
Secondly, it trivializes my whole intention for surgery through its flip assertion that anyone could run off and get genital surgery simply based on the desire to have the surgery because they are gay and want to beat the system. It accounts neither for the staggering cost of these surgeries, the years of real life test of living in gender, often giving up our jobs and careers, giving up our families, giving up all our friends, and often even giving up every material possession we have ever owned all for the right to be who we are based on a medical condition we were born with. People having this surgery have died on the table trying to be who they have known their whole life that they were. Its not common, but it is not trivial either. For those of us who have had the surgery, it is virtually always the most momentous decision we have made in our whole lives, often even overshadowing the decision to transition.
Finally, it again (and again, and again) reinforces that stereotype that we transition and that we have surgery in order to deceive the good God-fearing, straight cisgendered public. Whether it is to prey on children in bathrooms, trick straight men in bars, or now to thwart DOMA laws, I frankly am sick and tired of being told my whole life that the most honest thing(i.e. genital surgery) that I have ever done in that life was duplicitous and done with an intent to deceive.
THAT is why I find it derogatory and offensive.
All that being said, I have no intention of going after The Onion, nor have a replied on any other comment section devoted to this video. I said this to answer Alex's valid question. As to the makers of the video, I can only say idiots will be with us always. To spend your life at answering all of them is a waste of a lifetime.
I'm trans and I found the video hilarious.
But I'm not surprised that there are folks out there who are outraged. That's what good satire does.
I found it offensive simply because, while ostensibly having one target (the Religious Right) it was not missing any opportunity to mock another, innocent target (transfolk).
There is something deeply wrong here, some new permutation of the "men in dresses LOL" attitude, that I found shocking coming from the Onion. It underlines, once again, how mainstream media considers us an acceptable target -- even as side comedy beats in a joke not aimed at us.
Didn't Alex post this here a week ago?
Yeah, sure, to a point it's funny. However, why give the Reichers any ideas? I'm sure some Southern or Midwestern elected piece of GOP fundie trash is going to try to make it happen at some point. I wish the Onion had never published it.
Call me naive, but this Onion piece does more than stop people in their track - it makes them think. That's what good satire does.
And if anyone thinks for a nano-second that this will give the fundies any ideas about - "oohh, now we have to worry about this too" - then all the more power to The Onion for putting this up.
The fundies aren't that smart people, and I would love to see the right-wing nut jobs take this particular ball and run with it.
As for those thinking this is in any way transphobic or homophobic, I think you need to get outside a bit more. I only have so much room in my head for a headache, and this ain't even entering my air space.