Antonio wrote: "When I have a lesbian activist actively undermining my ability to even meet with a local legislator, I get the hint, and shift my focus accordingly."

Correct me if I'm wrong but my impression is you see lesbian (and by extension other gay) activists as bigoted towards trans people. I have a different take on this. Which I'll show by an example. Find just about any "name" trans activist and try to meet with a local legislator where you are expecting to get a word in edgewise. Most likely you'll find the same result. I.E. they'll actively undermine your ability to effectively participate. I found this out from experience in Atlanta a few months ago with some of our famous in their own minds trans activists.

Activists of all sorts are typically Ego Driven Personalities. As such the last thing they wish is to share the spotlight with anyone else. Particularly, as in your case, someone elegant enough in presentation to make them get less of an ego boost from the meeting.

Sue,
I'm quite sure you believe most of the stuff in your comment. But my reality as a trans woman has been quite different than that. I never thought of myself as "deluded" and once I had my surgery I never considered myself a "mutilated". None of the other trans women I've met felt that way either. You might want to factor that into your viewpoint. I may have been shrill at times but hormone induced neo-puberty can do that. That's another part of the process some trans people don't seem to handle too well. Just like some non-trans teenagers don't. Gold isn't a pathogen, he's a symptom of a pathogenic response to a different form of experience than he's used to.

Unfortunately, rich people like Renee Richards tend to skip some essential steps in the transition process like RLT and Gender Therapy because they have the money to buy the fast track path through the system. This fast tracking can and often does result in some post operative regret and that can be used by our detractors to pose worst case scenarios that they then apply to the whole population of trans people to create their bogus horror stories. Trans women, especially those over 40, grew up in a time when separation from others like them were the norm. So they only had their own experiences and sense of self to rely on. Is it any wonder why so many of them failed to survive? It's only when you can see you are not alone and that there is a commonality of experience that you begin to realize that perhaps you aren't exactly a freak after all. That's when the idea that they don't have to live the lie of false social masculinity and maleness begins to take shape. That's when we begin to see there are other options. Other paths. Trans kids have a dual burden. They aren't socially emancipated so they can't act on their own behalf and they're also financially dependent on those who would likely enforce social heteronormativity. Project that onto a trans kid growing up in the 60's and 70's and you see the results of that in some of the grownups of today.

I never hoped I could live as somekind of man somehow. Nights beyond number I cried myself to sleep because I wasn't born female. Nights beyond number I prayed to a god who never answered that he would magically transform me so that in the morning I would be outwardly as I knew myself to be inwardly. And mornings without number I woke to the harsh reality that today wasn't that day. I eventually got my transformation. But it wasn't easy, it was a bittersweet victory, and it wasn't as early in my life as I would have liked. But it was a glorious day and I've never regretted it.

But then, this is just part of my story. I don't believe I'm alone in this tho.

Valerie

Sue,

I'm a transsexual woman over 40.

I *never* hoped to live as a man. Not once. If, at any time in my life, I were offered that metaphorical pill, I would have refused.

I hated it that much.

Secondly, in the spectrum of male born trans people, most of them haven't an issue with such a question.

Sue, I get what you mean. I came out as trans in in the mid-1980s in the EU (which was like late 1970s in the US). My environment was dominated by progressive people that thought like Mr Gold. I grew up to think the same way, and had a very hard time coming to terms with my gender/sexuality. I constantly wished that I might find a way to somehow live as a "masculine woman" or "androgyne", because that's what I was promised- that the progressive subculture of the time would be a place where I could be myself. But being really myself was more than that, and that was unacceptable for that subculture.

So I guess what you say is true for people who lived within that subculture, as I did (I'm trans *and* gay and come from a leftist household). But from what the others have said, it seems not true for those who did their own thing.

I agree that the real bigots are both a waste of time and not generally worth trying to reach.

Your comment:

I'm a bit irritated by the fact that we still need to *explain* transgender or transsexuality. The same holds true for the obsession of wanting to "explain" homosexuality btw. That is the one point where I agree with Mr Gold- I believe that even trying to explain is a defeat.

is what I want to address, however.

You, personally, do not *need* to keep explaining.

Someone does, however.

In the end, trying to gain forward progress without explaining why it is necessary simply isn't going to happen.

Privilege stops that, quite effectively, in part because of the very things you talked about.

So, now, once again, since we combating not merely a *person* or even a small group of people, but institutional forces that derive their power from those individuals in collective.

And the only way to do that is to use the power of information. To explain until a majority has heard and understands with a good foundation the stuff *we* already know.

Which, bluntly, would be a lot easier if those in power at the main political orgs would pull their heads out of their hind ends on trans stuff.

THen again, I advocate a different approach that rarely brings much support: *we* need to run for office. Constantly, in large numbers, at every single chance we get.

Because until we do, all we're doing is begging at the table.

So convinced of this am I, I'm going to do it.

And win or lose, I will make a difference.

Hey Antonia,
I think you got me a little wrong. Zoe's post is mostly about the assumed medical causes of TS, and I find it problematic to go that path, for the reasons I have stated.
I didn't mean that we should stop explaining to people why they should respect trans (or gay) folk. But the reason why they should do that is not that we have some sort of biological defect- the reason is because we are human beings, what we are harms no one, and it is a part of human nature all over the world.

I understand though, that with people who have a veiled bias against trans people, like Mr Gold's, that seems to be difficult. By veiled I mean- he believes himself to be politically progressive and tolerant. He is all for gender variance, as long as the lines of "biology" (or "reality", in his mind) are not overstepped. This boils down to the assumption that those who indeed overstep that boundary must be mentally unstable.
Zoe counters this psychological argument by changing the context to a biological one. The same thing has been done in the past by homosexuals who have argued that "animals do it too, you know" when confronted with the accusation of immorality. While this line of argument often works, it comes with its own set of problems.

We also should not forget that these are all political *strategies*.
But often they become the straw that we cling to when we get attacked by people who doubt our sanity and worth as human beings, which can naturally lead to self doubt. In the long term it is better to just insist on our human rights and focus on that instead of using a defensive strategy and playing by their rules (or being played).

Thanks for the wonderful Christmas present!

There's some documents there I wasn't aware of.. Yummy URLs! Good stuff too... Sex differences in brain and behavior: hormones versus genes by Bockland and Vilain Adv Genet. 2007;59:245-66. for example.

You know, if the phrase "Geek Girl" hadn't already been invented, they'd have to make it to describe me. My niece is the same, we look like older and younger sisters.

Thanks for the kind things you've said about me too. That was thoughtful.

I've met so many wonderful people as the result of my transition, it's that rather than the whole biological m-to-f bit that I find most miraculous.

Thank you - for the URLs, for the support, and for being yourself.

Hey Zoe,
I think this might be a reply to what I wrote?
Ok, I get it, you're just a curious nerd girl ;-) and you happen to have some info that could make Mr Gold think twice.
Than I just adress my thoughts at those of us who are involved in politics.

As a het person, this morning.

To someone who asked if I was gay.

Hi Sara,

You can read much of it here via PDF:

http://www.pamshouseblend.com/diary/14451/was-that-peter-labarbera-or-ronald-gold-posting-that-antitrans-sentiment-on-bilerico

as well as at several other locations around the web. Google is a good tool you might consider using.

I will note that your term left out the intersexed -- and that Zoe herself (the subject of the article) is intersex.

Lastly, I'd like to know why you say that Ron Gold's comments being so common is cause for hope.

Someone as sensitive to issue of race and sexism as yourself surely should be able to explain that while avoiding the complexities of supporting the sexism he espoused in so stating.

*giggle*

Well, I will hesitatingly say that I doubt Zoe expects others to do that, and I will say that I don't expect it.

WHich is why in my stuff I don't get into the nitty gritty details of all the research, I just spend the time explaining the concepts that are revealed to us in that research.

I daresay that Both Zoe and myself consider ourselves extraordinarily privileged and very lucky given our respective situations to still be able to do the work we love.

But part of what I'm somewhat sure we both strive to do is, first and foremost, make it accesible, and allow people who question us, and doubt us, to do the work for themselves.

Some people will, some people won't -- we generally don't think most people will, and hope that our often highly simplified and colloquial explanations will suffice.

In my case, its because I've written some of the most incredibly boring, ultra dry papers on the nature of 2nd century religious ritual and social magic in the occidental/oriental crossroads that I wouldn't wish on a living soul if I could help it -- the stuff is so dry and boring and has value to so few people that I'd rather have folks use sandpaper on their eyes.

Probably doesn't help I was trying really hard to be a guy at the time.

I am *sooo* glad that's over!