Fractured Transland: The Transgender Community Today

Now here's a conversation for you: your girlfriend calls you over and asks, "Honey, does this skirt make my butt look big?" to which you reply, "Absolutely, darling." At this, she beams, gives you a peck on the cheek, says "Great! Thanks, hon!" and twirls around to head back to the bedroom to finish dressing for the evening.

Such are the benefits of dating a skinny transsexual who wishes she had more curvature at the hips.

In the transgender world, all the presuppositions go out the window. There is diversity, sometimes irreconcilably so, and all of the gender rules are open to interpretation. Unfortunately, this can lead to a lot of division.

Even the way in which we define ourselves can be the source of immense infighting. To some, "crossdresser" is anyone who wears clothes that belong to other than our biological sex. To others, a crossdresser is someone who wears clothes of the other sex for pleasure, and has no interest in gender change or living as a woman. To some, a "transsexual" is someone who has gone through the entire process and has already had sexual reassignment surgery (SRS) -- to these, they were considered "transgendered" before the surgery. To others, "transsexual" is the transition phase instead, and after SRS, the person becomes their chosen gender. Some people use "transsexual" to cover the entire range of gender-ambiguous behaviour, and others use the word "transgender." Other times, "transgender" is just a specific phase. It gets confusing. I've seen the terms defined a myriad of ways, and each time, the person defining them is adamant that their definition is proper. Whatever.

So you can start to see why the trans community is always so divided and hard to unite. The divisions are only the first reason for this.

For the record (and hopefully a bit of clarification; I try to use these words they way I most often hear them myself), I define "transsexual" as someone on hormones and in that state between physical genders, before final surgery (which is where I am), "transgender" as the general blanket term, "drag queen" (or king) as someone who dresses (or sometimes overdresses) for exhibitionistic shock value or performance (often with no interest in transition, although there are drag perfomers who do it to pay for their transition), "genderqueer" as people who like to screw with gender definitions and want to live somewhere in the middle (usually without any bodily changes; sometimes sexual orientation comes in here), "intersexed" as having been born with some combination of primary and secondary sexual characteristics of both genders, "crossdresser" as someone who dresses recreationally, "transvestite" is a more specific crossdresser who enjoys a sexual fetish of it rather than truly identifying as the other sex, "two-spirited" as people who've come to acknowledge both male and female identities and have chosen to express both in various ways, "androgynous" as being gender-ambiguous (sometimes unintentionally and sometimes in ways that border on genderqueer). Even in these categories, there can be divisions -- for example, some transsexuals choose never to have the SRS (perhaps orchidectomy in MTFs) -- in transmen, it can be because of the limitations of the surgery; in transwomen, it can be because of a partner's preference, or because their own gender identity still includes their birth genitalia.

Added to this is the fact that transitioning from male to female can be very a different experience at times from that of transitioning female to male. Transmen are lucky at first, in that testosterone masculinizes them very quickly, and they can often "pass" as male easily, early in their transition -- for transwomen, this can take years, or they might never "pass" completely at all (a possibility that I've had to accept). Transmen's voices deepen fairly well and fairly quickly, while a transwoman's will never change without vocal training (and god forbid that they try voice surgery, which usually causes far more damage than it solves). However, in the later stages of transition, transmen really have the poor part of the bargain: they have three to four surgeries instead of one (mastectomy, hysterectomy and phallo- or metaplasty), the result of SRS rarely looks real enough for them, can be problematic in function, can be prone to infection... their surgery is just not developed as well. Worse, the transman's entire circle of friendships tends to change -- most start out in the lesbian community, but upon transition they're almost immediately ostracized as being "traitors," as though they're betraying the female gender in order to obtain male privilege. There are also strong differences in the ways in which we were socialized as male or female, things that we have to overcome during transition and get used to. For example, there is the experience of FTMs who discover that in girl days they could speak freely and comfortably with people -- but after transition, women view them as dangerous and predatory, and the men they can now associate with become uncomfortable if conversation strays too far from the realm of the superficial. This is all based on how people are taught to be, and this particular experience is unique to transmen alone.

Troubles arise when transfolk look at their own paths taken, and come to the conclusion that the entire transgender experience always follows the same linear path that they have -- i.e. that everyone starts out crossdressing, then becomes two-spirited while trying to define themselves, then androgynous, then transsexual, or whatever. And the fact of the matter is that no set of rules apply to all -- no experience of trans is the "right" one, that is for everyone to decide for themselves.

Another point of contention arises from the issue of blending in. Older generations feel that this is the ultimate objective, to eventually "pass" perfectly, and to slip into society with no one ever having to know where we came from. Unfortunately, this has made the trans community very transitory, with people tending to move on after transition, and not being there as much for those starting the process (to be fair, much of this also has to do with the fact that the trans community is currently very much about the process, and once a person is past it, continuing to dwell on the process seems pointless). Younger generations, on the other hand, feel that it's imperative to be visible, proud of being trans, and to never hide where we've come from. There is some virtue to that, since our community has so few spokespeople, so few role models, and so few people visible in the community to reassure the public that we are not the perverted and mentally ill people that they're envisioning. For role models, who do we have? Jaye Davidson, a member of Toto and a Wachkowski? No offense to them, but that sometimes doesn't feel like much. When she comes out of hiding, Renee Richards is often very negative and discouraging about the process (probably largely because of the publicity she received in her time), so it's hard to look at her example for guidance.

But this is always a choice, dependent on each person's comfort level. Not every person can blend in. Not everyone wants to completely abandon the masculinity or femininity that they're leaving behind. Not everyone wants to be in plain sight, with everyone constantly reminding them of their transition. The choice is always different. I am transitioning publically right now, but I have no idea if six years from now I might want to drop out of sight and find a normal, boring life. This decision cannot be dictated, and can't be foreseen until that day happens.

In Edmonton, there has been a definite need for some kind of unified support. There have been many attempts, and a lot of divisions, sometimes as much over personalities as definitions. The FTMs have had more success at gathering, but because the FTM experience is so different, transwomen have sometimes felt unintentionally alienated, and are even more dispersed. I don't know what the solution is.

But what I do know comes from the lessons of history. We’ve seen it happen in the lesbian community, where "butch / femme" lesbians were bold enough to stand up for their community, and were later jettisoned for being politically incorrect stereotypes. These were the people who had fostered the movement so much in the early days, and then their own movement betrayed them. Closer to home, it was drag queens like Sylvia Rivera who threw the first bottles and stones at the Stonewall riot that touched off the Gay Pride movement. But by 1973, gay advocacy groups decided that transpeople were a political liability. Suddenly, transgendered people were being consciously left off the proposed legislation that eventually earned gays and lesbians the rights they won.

"I've been working in this movement for thirty years and I'm still begging for what you've got" -- Sylvia Rivera, 2001

This is where I see the division as killing us. Sometimes I hear transsexuals talking about drag queens as being an embarassment, and creating bad stereotypes. But when there was no information on transsexualism, drag performers spread some awareness of our existence. When it didn’t seem like there was anywhere that a transsexual belonged, the drag community provided glimmers of hope. Most transsexuals choose to slip into society in “stealth” after SRS. And when they do, the drag community will still be there, teaching new generations of transsexuals how to tuck or how to choose clothes to fit and flatter their atypical bodies. As embarrassed as anyone may ever feel because of drag artists, we always have to remember that their support, their courage and their moxie has done at least as much positive as negative. We cannot forget our roots.

These are the bridges we must build.