Week 10: Trans Identities and Cis-Gender Privilege

Trans Identities
I didn't really understand the two groups of FPA mental states. Actually, reading further, I have no idea what this author is talking about (and I'm not even reading at night). It's so in such a passive voice. This "I want to go home" reference is too long and I'm pretty sure it's going to lead up to "choices" with trans people.
When guys do the whole “He tricked me! I didn’t know that was a really a man!” thing, I feel annoyed, as I'm sure a lot of us do. If a MTF has completed surgery too, they aren't a man! There's no deception there. There's nothing hiding physically, and the only argument they could possibly make is about something not physical. Like people for who they are. Even if they haven't completed their transition, a woman isn't seeking to trick anyone. It's just dumb.
"In my view, gender presentation literally signifies physical sex." This can be pretty true. I agree with it, with the exception of actual genitals present. If someone says they are a female/woman for gender, that's who they are by sex- I would treat them as that sex, but I'm just saying they may not have the "right genitals", but that doesn't disprove their gender/sex to me. The part where the author says " If it is true that transpeople who “misalign” gender presentation with sexed body are deceivers or pretenders, then those who “correctly” align presentation with  body tell the truth. Thus, there is a representational relation between gender presentation and sexed body" gave only one way that there exists a relationship between gender and sex. This one is proved  vaguely, but matches society, I suppose. I know people connect sex and gender, but why does everything have to be about right and wrong, correct or incorrect? People don't question other challenges in their life, they just accept it. If gender presentation symbolizes the "sex" of someone, then they're assigning a "genital status" to that individual, or at least with the claim that gender signifies sex.
Curiousity can be a bitch. Not only does it kills cats by the mass grave, but it hurts individuals in mroe way than one. Just asking “Have you had the surgery?” is a curiosity that can be so hurtful, but people want to know. It's an attempt to be polite to get to know, but asking nicely doesn't entitle you to know. Is it our business? Do we ask people who spent time with a guy get to ask "So, did you lose it?" in relation to the V-card? People do it, but it's not their business. Using surgery as a basis to represent someone as a man or woman shows how focused on gender our country is. You aren't "really" a man or woman until everything is complete. Then why do we still think after everything that they aren't "really a man or woman"? Or at least some people.
There's not really a way for the general population to know the culture, terminology, preferences, or lifestyle of those different from them- especially for transgender individuals. How would they know trans-friendly terminolgy and concepts? I myself have no freakign idea how to say things sometimes. I don't want to be offensive, but I want to be an ally. This class is helping, but it still follows the general population and our "extreme ignorance".
When I saw. " Yet rape is 'justified' in particular ways," I snapped with a huge "EXCUSE ME?" That's another topic on its own, and I don't know why the author brought it up if they hardly argued with or against it. Don't say something like that and so vaguely give information after. It doesn't let me know if I should give you brownie points or spite you.

Cis-Gender Privilege
I hung out with my two best friends over the weekend, and I tend to talk about this class. I also give my boyfriend, one of those best friends, crap jokingly about hos cisgendered and privileged he is, especially for being a middle class man. We all had serious talks about it along with other things during mini-golf, but it's incredible how much he has and doesn't realize it. We tried explaining things to him, and although I'm technically straights with a 2-2.5 on the kinsey, I felt I could add to the topic. I also remember the huge fights on tumblr last year about how "cis scum should die" and a few other violent implications made after one individual wrote about and posted a hateful text about cis gendered people. That post exploded with notes and there were fights all over the place. It's kind of dumb and counter-productive to actively hate cis-gender people. You can show them that they have more privilege, but you shouldn't tell them to all die.
But anyway, onto the reading.
When she was talking about masturbation, I remembered talking to those friends I mentioned earlier about how people even discover masturbation. Unless it's somehow taught, seen, or learned, people will in a young age probably have different ways of masturbating. (We're very TMI with each other). For example, laying on your hands and humping it if you're a guy, or a girl laying on her back and moving her leg a certain way. So, I think it would be easy for anyone to, cis or not, masturbate in a opposite gendered way.
As far as the author's problem with attraction at puberty, I wonder if it's at all ever the longing to be that sex that creates the attraction. A person only knows attraction by their own definition and feeling, so longing and sexual attraction may be different? I don't think this is really applicable to a lot of people, but it could be a common thing. I'm sure some doctors and therapists bank of this.
I really like the statement, "I now regularly experience what I consider to be the most important gender privilege of all: feeling at home in my own sexed body" and the discussion about 10 million dollars to transition. If it were cheaper and easily reversible, I think that she's right- more people would transition for a variety of reasons. People don't like change, though. That and the whole "body security" dilemma. I don't think it would be too hard for me to do that for that much money. My only problem really would be with the boyfriend. I already think androgyny is beautiful, and it would make me closer to that. But of course, all of this isn't on deep though and is possibly insulting. I just feel slightly more neutral about my gender, I guess.
I can see why Serano would dislike feeling a need to be a part of the trans community, but I don't see it as a bad thing that it exists. Sure, you don't feel that you should have to. I get that. That's okay. But you seem like it's a bad thing to have your own unique culture and lifestyle and she's focusing on why it exists in the first place instead- as if she's looking for the root of a problem rather than the budding flowers that may come with it?
I concept of "conditional cissexual privilege" to be interesting and believable.
I feel like going back and figuring out how to change my honors contract for you to include some word that could replace "biological" because now I can see as offensive or rude. Do I define "biological sex" in the paper? How would I define it? But my terms or what some online dictionary says? Is it important if we get the idea, but not specifics? The point but not the tangents? She makes a good point that I like about passing, where it has been made the minority's fault now. I don't like the concept, but it's a good point that it is "used to shift the blame away from the majority group's prejudice and toward the minority person's presumed motives and actions".
Serano's friend that has money hypersensitivity felt extremely similar to me right now. I've always been frugal and probably always will be. I was frugal before my mom lost her job and we had to cut on everything, and now it's even worse. I have extremely bad anxiety issues and panic attacks when dealing with money/costs in social settings, such as with friends splitting the check at dinner or my boyfriend treating me, because I can't just take it in myself. I can't control it, it just happens and I hate it about me. I feel guilty about spending it and it can make it physically feel sick at times. Where Serano is comfortable living in her body, I'm not quite comfortable with my end? We both seem to understand how easily something can be lost now though.

Week 9 Readings: Consuming the Living, Dis(re)membering the Dead in the Butch/FTM Borderlands; Transgender Butch; and Tracing a Ghostly Memory in my Throat

Consuming the Living, Dis(re)membering the Dead in the Butch/FTM Borderlands
I do not understand the religious quote at all. Cut the living son in two and give half the corpse to the dead guy? As for the next one, "Excuse me if this sounds harsh but, in my mind, they all deserved to die." REALLY? That's more than harsh and it doesn't give you the ability to say shit like that if you just say "sorry if this sounds hard, but ________."
I was upset hearing about this reading in class and now I get to be frustrated reading it. If people hate trans individuals so much and they're just the worst "scum of the earth" why would they rape them?? Rape isn't okay in the first place, but it makes even less sense here. The rape in Stone Butch Blues made me feel sick. The time in the football field and then the police? It's fucked up and I'm ashamed of this country a lot of the time. For Brandon to get called it after being raped is a shitty thing for the hospital staff to do. I'm glad that at least someone said something non offensive that was quoted in here. The random contributor to the TNT is absolutely right though. There's no way those rapists got what they should have in our shitty justice system and they should be ashamed to call themselves humans. I also love the emphasis on "He (not Her, not ever Her because We decided who We are) had the courage and the strength to live a life of his choice."
I don't know why Brandon was against lesbian sex. What was he doing that lesbian couples couldn't? Was it just the fact that it was two women or was he thinking of some vicious scissoring stuff? Even if he identifies as male, does he not see at all that he in strictly technical terms is slightly hypocritical?
I found the strap on topic interesting as well. I actually used to think of it more as a way to pleasure their femme more than pretending to have a penis. Whether a strap on, dildo, vibrator, ect. I feel stupid for not seeing that as the first result in my mind.Strap-ons it would make more sense with though. But I get what the J-Boy was saying. You don't need a dick to have a good time, use your hands and mind. There's lots of foreplay out there. Assuming that a butch needs a strap on is too stereotypical and offensive to have to remind them what they lack. That's such a sexist thing too. You don't need a dick to be a man or masculine role. Having a dick doesn't make you better at anything in general, except at getting wood.
I don't really tie butch to ftm automatically. Yes, generally I would think that if someone was FTM it was because they were previously butch before entering transition. But I wouldn't say that all butch women want to have a male body in its entirety. I like dressing and looking butch most of the time and I find butch women attractive, but I obviously don't want to be a man. It's just an assumption that probably always gets made.

Transgender Butch
I had a hard time staying focused the entire reading, not going to lie. Because I'm catching up on stuff that I was supposed to read, I feel like I've covered everything in class or in other journals already. Quite a bit of this stuff seemed like stuff I found while looking around for the paper too. I mean, at least on Tumblr and stuff I would wonder about when looking around. I know that there will never be a group of people that have the exact same idea, nor two people in general, so I guessed that the FTM and lesbian views of each other would vary. You would think that "outcasts" would stick together and find themselves equal, but I guess not since lesbians were calling FTM's traitors and FTMs saw lesbians (and lesbian feminism) as scum that ruined masculinity. Then there's the whole butch concern which took a large majority of the paper in general. I think that butch women don't have to want to transition to be butch. Some women just like that more masculine feel and appearance. I don't even think you have to be a lesbian to be butch, really, but in these readings we're assuming such.Why would people put pressure on butch women by saying that they're "too afraid" to transition- maybe that's not what they want with their body, and who are you to tell them what to do with it?
Oh, here's a reference to Stone Butch Blues. Several times. If I read this before writing my final to you I probably would have talked about this document a little.

I think I remember us doing something like this little chart thing in class. Wouldn't femme be at the very end of this spectrum, or is this strictly about butches? I guess that would make sense. But anyway, the only other issue I see with this is that you don't necessarily have to be extremely masculine to be FTM. Maybe an FTM would want to be a casual or feminine man. Perhaps an androgynous man, which probably borderlands in a reverse scale for trans women. 

Michael was the only FTM in the article to mention privilege and the change in social status experienced by transsexuals who pass because even before his transition, he faced these challenges and discrimination  If you're already from some poorly treated or underrepresented group, such as an individual of race or class, you probably know that transitioning won't help you much if not make things worse. Perhaps you would be used to the intolerance though. It builds up on you after time though. 

I like the complex nature of being "butch". You can have a variety of combinations of femininity or masculinity or sexual orientations. As the text said, you can have a “woman-loving butch” or “butch-loving butch.” You could have more than that really because not everyone fits into some mold and people defy themselves every day.

Tracing  Ghost in Memory in My Throat
I'm not sure if Catherine Millot's quote about wanting to be a man because men make the world was saying that she strictly believed that trans men just want to escape female inequality of power, but the point about men is true. Women don't make the world. Men technically don't either, but they run it. Oh, feminism.
Xavier Villaurrutia's poem(?) took me two reads to get an understanding for. I'm pretty sure it'll be explained as I read on, but I'm guessing that Xavier is a trans man or wanted to be a trans woman but feared losing their voice in the world. In that respect I guess it makes more sense that Xavier wanted to transition to female but felt not only that she would lose her voice, but that the transition itself would ruin their respect as a human being. I'm sorry if I am completely wrong, but I do think I know that they're talking about losing their ability to talk without being invisible and remembering the ability that they lost to do so.
In response to the quote that someone was going to "look 'forward eagerly to the day when there [will] be more genders from which to choose'” I immediately thought "Why not make your own?" Sure, other people may not really believe you unless you're a human rights activist on Tumblr or something, but you technically can be whoever you want to be or whatever you want to be. I don't see what's wrong with forming your own gender to your definition of gender. Not very many people are going to share the same idea of gender as another: it's a complex topic that we've spent the entire quarter talking about and still don't have a solid conclusion for.
The person that said "I claim a right to speak as one, assuredly not representative, ftm transsexual" seems be be a good person to me. They spoke and thought about it before they said it. If this was a statement made back further in time, like when the entire concept of transsexuality and such was becoming more public, it would have been even better- or at least if the media didn't selectively take that part out. It just stood out to me and I respect that small but important comment because they acknowledge that they are just one person and that they can't speak for an entire population and that they can't set some hard facts by their ideas.
When it came to the situations to read if you were non-transexual to see if you could see what was wrong with each picture, I was wondering if because of this class or some prior knowledge if I would be able to or not. I guess not. I don't see how the first "picture" example provided about vaginioplasty was a medical refusal to grant transsexual agency over their own body. It seemed like he was genuinely helping. is the problem that he's doing it to make sure it'll be long enough to be a "good" vagina? The rest I can see something kind of wrong with though. If people like their providers though, I don't see what's so terrible if they get the job done. Like with the nipples thing, they may know what they want for themselves, but the doctor may know better than the patient. Although it is an aesthetic choice, the doctor may know it would be better for the patient to pass or to be happy, and maybe it's so the provider can show his results. I honestly don't know.
As for the overall talk about men and feminism, I think that anyone can be a feminist. I was thinking about gay men or genuinely nice guys trying to respectfully and kindly, out of good character and honesty, wanting to help their female friends or something, when all of a sudden, some over extreme feminist comes and shuts them down. It's assholistic in my opinion because I'm not an extremist radically insane feminist, or anything for that matter. If someone wants to help you, let them. If you want to be a strong independent individual, that's fine too, but you can kindly tell someone to let you do your own thing. Those individuals are speaking for the entire female population by telling men or transmen that they can't be feminists or help them with their cause.

Week 7 Meyerowitz and Berdache Wars

The part in Fierce and Demanding that talked about MTFs and FTMs going through absolutely shitty medical never ending pits of intervention reminded me of a class I took last quarter. It was called Mental Illnesses in Movies and I took it as an honors seminar. In it, we saw and talked about almost every single thing mentioned by the people in the document. We talked for a short period of time about how homosexuality was considered a sickness or a disease and how shock therapy and mental institutions were common remedies. In One Who Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, I think we were talking about how one of the characters was gay and how they would have been put in an institution. I hated the end of the movie, if you've seen it and know what I mean. I don't even want to think about how many "queer" people unwillingly underwent lobotomies. It's just another fucked up day in the history of medicine.
I liked all the visuals that were in this one. I had to tilt my head a few times to read things, but I didn't mind at all. You definitely mentioned all of that stuff in class. The French night performer looks pretty sexy :) A lot of t was very interesting. I was surprised that Jorgenson didn't mind her film being a little more sexualized, though.
Go UCLA! It's pretty cool that we were involved in a positive way for the most part. Even if they were doing it just for the sake of research, which they may or may not have, I smiled at their work. I know why have an LGBT Resouces Center and office, but do we still have the gender clinic thing? That would be an interesting place to check out and work with. I doubt it though since most gender issues have enough information and attention, for the most part.
How did pre-transitioned men and women find out about transgender surgeries? How did they find doctors without the internet??? You can't exactly make phone calls, if you can even find numbers to offices, for various doctors and ask them bout something like that. Who do you even go to to find out information about this? Is it some underground information network? At that time in history, you had to have needed connections to find that type of stuff. Also, people who flew all the way to America, Europe, Mexico, or whatever country from whatever country that were refused to be given surgery for stupid reasons is a depressing read. They used all that money to go up there just to get to hear the doc is saying no? That fucking sucks.
Holy shit. That doctor tried to put out a fucking cigarette on her? What the hell???? Yeah he sure fucking did "have problems of his own". Trying to kiss her to see a reaction too was way out of bounds both in terms of personal space and professionalism. Great going, medical rules and regulations. Good job.
After reading about some of the failed surgeries, I got distracted while reading about other stuff in the article. I was and still am tempted to look up pictures of these types of things too, but I'll probably be eating again soon, so that may not be the best idea. The account of horrible the pain doesn't sound fun. I don't think that there is anything that I want so badly in my life that I would go through pain like that. I have no pain tolerance in the first place. Post-operative individuals are brave and strong individuals with an unwaiverable dedication and desire to make themselves happier in life, and that is something I can respect to an extreme extent.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I think one of the reasons that these scientists and homophobic people can't find evidence of "homosexuality" in the Native American cultures is because homosexuality is really a Christian based term. The entire "evil" connotation given to it was because of Christian religions that felt superiority and believed that they had a divine hand to say what they thought was the word of "god". I just feel like the entire idea of homosexuality wouldn't fucking existent if it wasn't for Christians and their Bible. I have so much more I could go on to rant about my distaste for that, but my point is that book and the stuck up people in this world that follow it (or other texts that are based on it and follow its example) are the only people who have a need to define homosexuality. The reason they didn't find it in Native American tribes termed as homosexuality or some form of the same was because they didn't have some concrete divine law that said marriage (once again a very and entirely religious concept in the details and roots) was between a man and a woman. Instead, it was seen as gender role. When I  took American Indian Studies in my fall quarter, we read about and learned about some tries and their view of what we call homosexuality. To the one tribe ( I can't remember the name of), love was love and it was a spiritual blessing. If a woman loved a woman, it was even more beautiful and blessed. In terms of what I'm reading, it seems to be "transsexuality", once again based on our terminology.
Also, holy shit. How does this guy have so much research on this stuff? I couldn't find anything when I was writing my papers for that American Indian Studies class. He has so much...
I was talking on Skype with my friend about joining a ranked team in League of Legends called "The Butthold Pirates" right when I got to the last paragraph on page 156 where it said "///rubber cocks or offering up their buttholes." Well then.
That entire paragraph actually feels completely different than the rest of this paper. When the hell did the tone and diction backflip out? It sounds like a movie trailer.
"Living... in an era... of safer sex *SOUND EFFECT* in which dildo or rubber-covered cocks are prescribed..." and so on. By rubber-covered cock, does he mean condoms or dildos? I don't think there is literally a dick inside a rubber dick. He sounds really passive aggressive about this part, or at least I feel like that. "Offering up their buttholes" sounds so weird. Wow. Everything after that seems kind of like gay misogynistic too. Maybe he's just sarcastic to mock other people?
Anyway, that was a tedious read when it came to having my level of an attention span.

Week 8 Readings: Eden Built By Eves, Open Letter, Skirt Chasers, Empire Strikes Back

I can't help myself from reading something with "Empire Strikes Back" in the title first. I freaking love Star Wars. So, without further adieu...
The Empire Strikes Back: A Posttranssexual Manifesto
Why was James Morris freaking out so much about becoming Jan Morris? He made it seem like a terrifying, scary, mortifying experience. The entire walk up to the room seemed like a march to his death. It was like he didn't want to become who she is now.
I had to double take and go back and reread the intro to the first paragraph of the medical clinics report on their "study". What the hell? I was honestly expecting something professional, but then it seemed to rapidly and immediately decline into insulting "results". It may be true that the participants had psychological diagnoses but saying that they were "immature, narcissistic, egocentric, and potentially explosive...demanding, manipulative, controlling, coercive, and paranoid" is a little bs. Maybe I'm reading it wrong and that part is talking about the researchers, because if it isn't, it should be.
Rape is not someone fitting into their bodies comfortably. There's no discomfort or violent action made. Them having their bodies transformed into what they know to be themselves is not an attack on women or a "rape". If tumblr saw this, they'd explode. It isn't even close to rape. If you don't like transsexual women, too bad.
I'm surprised that Jan enjoys the vulnerability of being a woman. Sure it means that she's successfully fitting into the demands of being a woman in a shitty society, but I wouldn't necessarily enjoy it. Just feeling it would ... I don't know. I don't really get why you would like it.
"Germ glands." Yep, this is second grade all right. His wiener and peepee got changed.
Um, wait a sec. Gender dysphoria clinics were refusing to perform surgeries and insult the idea of transexuals by calling them "sociopaths"? That's like a pediatrician refusing to work with kids because they're childish, immature, and young. I was surprised that nonacademic gdc's were performing surgery on demand, but I can understand why some would be careful due to legal reasons. Standford's acting like a charm school and assessing their patients wasn't the best thing either, but at least they were more open. I can see why they would want to only complete the most potentially successful transitions, and I find it interesting that they used ability to behave the gender as a measure. But it's nice that they offered the whole "charm school" thing. And now wait, did they have to jerk it as a test to see if they could become a woman or not? Hey, fap and if you get off on it, then you can't be a woman. Enjoy. That's not cool.
Reconstructing history is an expensive price for trans individuals, but if they truly want to live their new life, they have to make the sacrifice and it could be more than worth it to them. It can be a drastic tale or one just like the life you lived, just swapping the gender as a child. I guess I'm just thinking in terms of young transgenders. Since this paper focuses a little more on older (30's and 40's) people, I guess I should speak in more consideration of them. Yeah, in that case it's a lot more editing of the past. The older you are, the harder it is to transition depending on your life story, I suppose.
Anyway, that essay was definitely not what I was expecting, but hey, it works.


>Letter<
Damnnn. That's a very stern, well-written, and well-rounded letter. You don't see those much nowadays. It was very to the point and just overall impressed me. The people who wrote it made very good points and I liked the format. It mentioned that not having a standard procedure would be dangerous for all of the women attending the festival; was this for any reason other than the injustice of being excluded? I hope the letter went through and was read, because I honestly feel like no organization reads letters if they're critiques or complaints. I'm happy that the Lesbians for Justice were addressing the issue, because they aren't even the excluded group from the festival. They're standing up for someone other than themselves (that isn't meant to bash on them at all, I mean it in a positive light). If they weren't women writing, they probably would have been ignored, so it helps. Anyway, I really liked this particular reading quite a bit.


>Eden Built By Eves<
I'm pretty sure I read this in Professor Morris's class. The music festival sounded cooler before we learned about the exclusion stuff. When Jean Fineberg said "Imagine a city where women and children feel free to walk anywhere," I remembered that children under 5 were the only ones allowed to be free about. Otherwise they were thrown into some daycare up to the age of 12. Doesn't sound like children so much as toddlers to me. I initially thought when I read this last quarter that the idea sounded cool. The festival would be fun, but it's not something I would fanatically rush to and become a part of, inside and out. If I went, it would be to check it out as a tourist-type attraction rather than as an extreme feminist. We both know there's super over the top extreme feminists there as well as women who want to have the fun, unique experience. But anyway, I was more caught on seeing how well a society could function with just purely females. It was interesting to see how well they reported it to function. It isn't perfect, even though they treat it a bit that way. It's got to have downs, but it seems to do pretty good. This isn't some sexism talking so much as a belief that in a community, there will always be conflict, regardless of sex, but just because of human nature and such.
Excuse me about the age earlier, apparently it's 3. That's a little bs. I also only breezed over the transgendered restrictions when I read it the first time and hardly processed it. One little sentence there can spark so much discussion, just as in class. Saying that they're free from rape at Michigan is also stupid, because women can commit rape just as readily as a man can. Women of anything outside of the standard (white and older) would still feel societal pressures and not absolute freedom because they're still in a society where the higher-ups get the say; and those higher ups aren't the same as the other women. But anyway, it still sounds better than our current society at times.
I still remembered the part about everyone taking a shift. I don't see what's wrong with that and those ladies need to get over it; it's part of the experience of being in a non-male world. You have to be a strong independent woman who can hold her own :) I like volunteering, so I would be more than glad to work a shift, if not multiple. As for the boobies, why not? Throw some sunscreen on and show off if you're comfortable. Personally, I like the support of certain clothes, but I would try it out a little if I was there just for the hell of it. I'm sure there's still pressure as so if someone's boobs were big enough or or good looking enough to fit in, but at least there wasn't the fear of men judging you; just women (which can still be as bad).
It took me a double take and the read from Morris's class to notice the "Cuntree Store". Howdy, there. Wouldn't more women find this offensive than funny or empowering? Whatever floats your boat, but I was not expecting that. I found it slightly humorous, but it's not something I'd praise.
Since the entire piece seemed like a practical advertisement for the Womyn's Music Festival, I was surprised to see that it ended with, "'And so, really, Michigan is more like a benign dictatorship.'" It kind of is, but that's probably not the place to end, academically.

>Skirt Chasers<
I don't really watch TV or movies very often, so I don't really see transgender individuals in them. I've seen Ace Ventura, but I don't think I ever finished it. It does suck for transwomen who face physical limitations from appearing petitely feminine, and I'm not sure I should be liking the woman who punched out a guy for calling her a faggot. I kind of do, but I'm guessing it's really counterproductive and the exact point being made by this: poking fun at transgenders. We talked about this in class today- the whole "deception" and media thing. Challenging male masculinity definitely is a factor of why men feel so "deceived" and are so against dating a transwoman, despite their woman-ness. If you're demisexual, does it matter? It really shouldn't. Even if you're heterosexual, they're a woman and you shouldn't challenge it. Be open to a "whole new world". You might like it.
I feel like the author of this is over-analyzing Bree. From the description I read, I don't see a flashing Vegas sign blaring "fake" over her. It's more of a depiction of her life...?  Stumbling in heels and such could be taken that way, but applying makeup is an intro to a crap ton of movies with women. It's not too much different. Anne Hathaway movies like the Devil Wears Prada I believe start out this way; getting dressed, putting on makeup, and failing to be perfectly super feminine. Why? Because it doesn't exist. Everything that I would have to say was already stated: stereotypical femininity is forced by society as complete bullshit, and wanting to see transwomen apply femininity standards just like other women is a result of this sexist crap. I don't wear makeup. I dress nicely when I want to. I don't need to look nice for anyone other than myself and perhaps my boyfriend. I don't ask myself in the mirror, "What would society accept?", I ask myself, "What do I want to wear and does this match my own code of acceptance?". I'd rather not show off my cleavage and wear tight, revealing clothes. It should be the same for any woman. If a transwoman wants to doll up, they can. If they feel like it helps them pass more, then that's fine. But they shouldn't be called out on it.  The statement, both sadly true and persistent, " women have no worth beyond the extent to which they can be sexualized" hit me a little. I never thought of it that way.
I can't lie and say I haven't wondered about before and afters. I look through facebook pictures, cosplay photos, ect. A Youtuber I actively watched from 2005-2008, then came back to in 2010 was now Luke. I wasn't sure if I had the right channel or not, and I couldn't remember if Luke was Luke all along, but I remembered after looking at older videos. I don't really feel guilty for it, but I will admit that I do it. I don't ask people for pics though. If they're openly available and they don't mind sharing that aspect of their life, then that isn't so much of a problem, I think, because I still respect them as the man or woman that they are.

April 25th: Kennedy

I was surprised to see in the Kennedy reading that Dillon "endured  jeers and taunts because she could not present herself as either male or female; she had landed in what Radclyffe Hall named the 'no man’s land between the sexes,’ the loneliest place of all.Without a sex, she would not be treated as a human being.” Who is Radclyffe to be that exclusive? I don’t really understand how people can be exclusive in an exclusive group themselves. It’s like the rejects rejecting someone below them, like in middle school where you have “nerds” and then the “reject nerds” like me. It’s irritable. 

When we see Dillon questioning himself (I don't know what pronoun is supposed to come out of the machine at this point) with “what had gone wrong with her” and asking what would make her “seen as a person again,” I felt a little sadness. I want to hug her and say "nothing 'went wrong with you', it's okay.” The part where it says "even the military wouldn't have her” because she “was deemed too mannish” to sleep with the ladies in their dorms was a tick. Are you kidding? As long as you don’t have a penis, how would you be too mannish? Even then, trans women I can understand would probably be excluded, but that was unnecessary. What deems as too mannish for a born woman to be in the women's place. Regardless of if it was something Laura wanted to not, I find it rude to say "hey, you're too manly, so get away from the ladies. You don't belong." 

Anyway, so far from the reading, since I’m so far damn behind, I’m pretty sure that this was the reading about the person who would try testosterone no matter that the effects were because he wanted to live as a man so badly. (Now that I finished reading it and am just pasting this over, I know this is true.)

Now, onto that psychiatrist being a fucking asshole. How the hell did you get your medical credentials if you couldn't understand the basic "confidentiality" part? Maybe it wasn't an established part of medicine then and I'm just a spoiled child of this generation, but breaking codes about confidentiality shit is completely against my tolerance. It is not a code to break; how dare he. Fuck the medical profession back then. People like him are screwed up and I hope they lose their jobs, or lost them, when word of stuff like this got out. I'm not a huge justice-freak, but I do believe in the ethics and morality of mankind. It's a crappy time and place to have these standards, huh? Onto the next part...

>Magical monkey-ball surgery?Oh, man, load me up with some chimpanzee or goat balls. Sounds great.           Oh. Wait Infections. Right. How about no.<

I’m glad Michael could get things done happily out of the shop, but annoyed again at how people treated him like a laughing stock in it. It’s pointless in even explaining how stupid that is to me and to anyone on the negative end.

I’m glad that he was a good person though; rather than living an outcast, he would rather die a hero. I like that attitude to some extent (without the pessimistic attempt at optimism aspect). Even if he died a hero, it would only be until some controversy arose from what was under his pants- unless the body was that malformed. Good thing it was never a problem.

Gilbert was good for Michael and it was a pleasant read seeing their relationship. He was a good kid. I’m glad that he stood up for and cared for Michael in a way that no one else would. The tin hat part made me smile because they both had a reason to live, at least a little more, for someone else. It gave Michael a little bit of someone to live to protect perhaps. I was hoping it would turn out a little bit like a movie and Michael would find Gilbert after the war and they could be buddies, but this isn't Hollywood and I don't know what happens outside of the scanned pages.

When the document has a section talking about how surgery and hormones should be given if it makes someone happy, I thought of the promise for a "pursuit of happiness" in our American dream and how subjective it really is. I like the doctor's attitude for making the patient happy and I don't see it as catering to selfish wants and needs as much as the other doctors were. The charging anything he wanted was a little bit skewed, but that's what any doctor would do in the day, sadly. 

 I found the statement "Gillies made happiness a reason for surgery- which in turn upended the traditional relationship between doctor and patient. The doctor could no longer pretend to know what was best; he would have to listen to the patient to find out” to be something interesting in regards to the paper I'm writing for you. Make the patient happy if you can. They deserve their pursuit of happiness just as much, if not more (but really more) than the woman who's getting bigger boobies. They need it, rather than want it (which is debatable in society, but we know where I stand on that front.) The last chapter entirely actually, was interesting to me, considering my possible current plans for the future : plastic surgery.  

Overall, I enjoyed reading this and I wish I did it sooner. Normally readings that long are dreadful to read, but then again it's not 11-2am. 

April 23: Patrick Califia, Richard Docter, and Assorted Pictures

When I first saw the assorted pictures of Christine Jorgonson, I thought she was an older woman or something to explain any small facial features that she had. I figured she was some possibly famous old lady or star that wasn't all that attractive in my opinion. I didn't make the connection to how it kind of was that truth.I felt guilty for falling prey to what we covered in class; I began recognizing features that made sense. Thin, straight legs, the "elder" facial features, ad other minuscule details. What was important though, at least for her sake, was perhaps, that I didn't question anything before.


I felt happy when I was reading the part of Docter's paper about Christine's appearance on December 11th. She "did something no other transsexual had ever done before and few have ever done since" is a powerful statement, and it's one that she led very well. Having read this after looking at the pictures, it was interesting to see that the reporters thought she looked like "a glamorous young blonde who looked more like a movie scarlet than a transsexual woman who had just checked out of Royal Hospital." They had a great view on her, it seems, which I'm glad for. I didn't realize it was just after she had left the hospital, too. It's interesting that Chris made such fame and fortune without having revealed anything much about her treatment or medical history in her transformation. I wonder if the European doctors, in their distaste for such unprofessional approaches for displaying medical work, refused to work on other transgender patients afterward, or made them report in a medical journal instead.
It must be stressful beyond belief having to be absolutely perfect. It was her mission to establish the image of transgenders to the world, and she had to keep her act up. She had to make every sentence, facial expression, body gesture, and self image perfect. She said it was natural for her, but even as a girl myself, I can't imagine having to be so precise in every detail of my being for the world. It's nice that she got to have a get away for a while to recompose, relax, ect. She knew how to work the media though and she is one classy lady. She must have practiced, because she's more of a natural than women themselves.
As for the husky voice, some guys dig that in a lady ;) It's hard for a MtF to have a feminine voice if it was a post-puberty transition, so there's not much to expect. If that was the only indicator of remaining masculinity, then props. Some women just have low voices, but I guess the reporters wouldn't take that. When they attack her for not being a woman because she couldn't get pregnant, my first thought was "Not every freaking woman can get pregnant either, assholes. Ever heard of infertility? Hysterectomies?" If they were using this to call her a man instead, well, she was castrated and wouldn't get someone pregnant, so she was certainly not a man either. Attacking the exact technicality of whether she was a man or not doesn't mean anything as far as how she was a lovely trans woman. What's in her undies doesn't change who she is, and the letter from Hamburger was just a meaningless slap to the face.

I was a bit confused about where to start reading on the Califia reading. I found the part about masturbation and fetishes on page three to hit the head on the nail. So many baby boomers and other older people condemn masturbation as if it was a curse. It's stupid because you see it in nature and it's so common. It's accurate in saying that people see it as shameful and dangerous. As for fetishes, I think that literally everyone has fetishes. There are fetishes that cause harm to women, but there are some that harm men as well. Fetishes are fine to have and aren’t satanic. Some of us argue that sexuality is a fetish. Without fetishes, we wouldn’t be here today; no schmanging goin’ on.

I’m surprised I haven’t really heard about/don’t remember reading about Havelock Ellis in the two classes I’ve taken. It’s a surprise to see someone possibly from the same time as Hirschfeld(? Maybe not but it doesn’t say) to find cross-dressing not a threat.

It’s unfortunate but something I have thought about that historically, people haven’t been able to have GRA/SRA. How did they deal with it? Was it easier because people didn’t recognize the issue? Or was it worst that they had to live without being in the body that they wanted? It gets more complex with the more options open. If they were caught, it was worse than it is now as far as I can tell, but I think it would be harder to catch because it wasn’t a super-known subject that was a part of culture. People wouldn’t question something without knowing it exists.

A lot of this covers the Christine Jorgonson topic we covered ages ago (since I’m doing this so late, it probably is from the same week) and we’ve talked about her in class a lot. I found the last paragraph of her book that was quoted to be inspirational in a way. It’s great that she finds so much love in herself when I can’t even. And saying that feels like I’m discrediting her identity, but she found her way through more problems than the majority of the population gets. She believed in God, too, which was something I don’t normally expect people of criticism to do. It is unfortunate that she died of cancer, but she did change the world in a graceful way.

Morris’s comparison and debate about “true transsexual” and “untrue transsexual” kind of brought up a point I was curious about. I’ve heard “true transsexual” before. I thought about the honors paper research where someone felt “fake” or possibly not a “true transsexual” but in a different sense. It was more for this trans man considering if what they wanted was what he needed because he had no base comparison to know the difference between want and need. That seems like it would make more sense but is similar to the reason for transitioning being for “erotic” reasons. They argue a lot about the whole “true” and “untrue” transsexual. Sure, some people have the additional bonus of meeting some sexual desire in transitioning, but that doesn’t invalidate their transitioning desire. If they want to have sex after the sex change or if they enjoy it, does that make them untrue? Or is it only assigned before the transition? I think true/untrue titles to people in general and for any category is stupid; A person knows themselves more than anyone else and so who are we to tell them who/what we think they are? Who are we to call them fake?

Although it’s more of a tangent, when I read about Martino’s wife being pregnant and dying, I remembered the “pregnant man” a few years ago. I was more of a kid so I didn’t get it and I didn’t really care to judge. Later I learned that the man was a trans man without a complete surgical transition. How was he pregnant though? Isn’t it 100% completely and utterly a “no” to receiving testosterone if you’re pregnant? If you’re on T, you temporarily stop ovulating- right? That’s something I’m curious about; what doctor let the trans man do that?

At the end, the author makes a really good point that medical gatekeepers shaped how trans individuals shape themselves to be and see themselves as. It really, actually, kind of is. If trans people are seen medically as “wrong” or “sick” or up for selection and picked to be true/untrue, they’re going to view themselves in those opinions. Do we do this because the “doctor knows best”? Because they have a higher education and qualification? 

Tuesday, April 30th; (Joan/John), John Money, and Ray Blanchard

I want to say two things first.
1.  John Money was an abusive asshole. If any person did what he did to the children, they would not only be fired, but seen in court, and facing penalties ranging from pedophile or molester. Yelling may have been normal, but having them undress, breaking confidentiality with other persons in the room, ect is such a violation of the children's rights.
2. How the hell do you mess up that badly on a circumcision? How the fuck do you practically burn a baby's penis off? Did you sneeze and the laser went wild? Did the hot nurse come in? Did you have any clue? I can understand some accidents as accidents, but the way this sounded to me wasn't so much the case. You just ruined this boy's life. Good job.

Now, onto the actual other content. When I was reading this document,  I was in a skype call with my boyfriend and was talking about it a little, and he said it sounded familiar to him. I gave him a tldr/quick summary, and it was exactly what he was remembered. He's never taken an LGBT course, so I wondered how he knew about it. Apparently, it was a large topic that they reviewed in his Psychology courses. He didn't spoil anything for me, but I kind of guessed how this would go. I was more or less correct. I was assuming that John would have undergone the surgery to become a female sooner (I don't know how ealy they can be done, but I assumed childhood or perhaps even at a time that she wouldn't e able to remember), and would successfully have been taught to grow up as a girl, but then realize that she was possibly a lesbian or feel late gender dysphoria, and then receive a sex change again to become John, and later the parents possibly telling him the accident.
Money's philosophy was something I believed too, but more so in the sense of "everything you do and believe that characterizes your identity is a learned behavior." Maybe if John was raised as a single child, he would have successfully followed Money's formulate. Perhaps if it was more modern day as well, it would have been more successful (since we have cool toys for chicks and we don't all sew and crap). Some parts of the story seemed a little exaggerated (that or John was just a really tantrum child) such as having a breakdown when John's father wouldn't let him "shave". Maybe explaining that girls don't grow facial hair and so they don't need to shave would have been a better route rather than "girls don't shave". Maybe even tell your kid how much of a pain in the ass it is. You'd be shaving your legs and armpits down the road anyway. I can agree to growing up feeling a different gender, but this kid was a little over the top in asserting his point. I haven't heard of any other case so dramatic before.
I didn't catch it when I was reading, but I guess John committed suicide? If he was happy with his wife and kids, why would he? He was over the worst humps in his life, as far as I could tell.

John Money's paper really only served to show that transgenders can live non "psychotic" lifestyles post surgery and that they're "normal-ish" people. I would find this to be common sense, for the most part, but I guess it was needed to be proved to the others at the time. Sure, trans people can get into crime and live failed lives, but so can anyone else in the world. Sure, trans people work prostitution, but so do normal people. It's sad that not everyone can get a job, so it was good to see an increase in their employability.
Either way, his paper was short and to a point. It could have used more subjects so that picky scientists wouldn't criticize him, but sometimes it can't be helped. Overall, I don't have an opinion about the paper; I just have the comments aimed more to the people he's showing it to.

Blanchard's paper was a painstaking read. I definitely don't recommend it at midnight hours. Anyway...
I noticed that Blancahrd cited Money in his introduction. "Finally, all investigators concur that gender identity disturbance also occurs in males who are not homosexual but only rarely, if at all, in nonhomosexual females....(Money and Gaskin, 1970-1971)." Maybe I haven't been paying attention, but I don't know of anything Money may have said pertaining to the subject. Either way, I believe that Blanchard misused, abused, or manipulated his sources a little to match his opinion, or worse, only saw through his lens and justified it as such. As far as the quote, I don't really agree. We discussed in class how he doesn't consider women to be homosexual, and even if they are, they really aren't. (What a load of BS. He was being a sexist ass for just straight women, and then there's this). This guy doesn't make sense in my opinion, at least not logically. He defines "Automonosexuals" as people who pretty much get off by the idea or image
of themselves as the opposite sex, and the term "nonhomosexual" for heterosexuals,
bisexuals, asexuals, and automonosexual gender dysphorics. I would consider nonhomosexual to be heterosexual and asexual. While automonosexuals aren't necessarily interested in transgender pursuits, and are actually more fetish based, it's strange to just refer to them as nonhomosexuals; it's in the same category as a standard person. It would only make the argument more confusing. (Now, I think I just realized this isn't actually Blanchards work, but someone writing on him?)
The discussion on female gender dysphorics makes me wonder how many individuals may confuse themselves as gender dysphoric, rather than someone who likes homosexual things. Lots of women get off on gay men, as men get off on gay women. That's what the internet is for. Some women wish they could date a gay man and be their partner. Some women wish they could have been a man. What draws the line in understanding between a fetish and an identity?