Transgender people are definitely from Pluto
Conor Ryan found a wonderful response piece by our favorite LGBT historian Susan Stryker to the fairly obnoxious argument about how transgender people are piggy-backing on the gay and lesbian community. Actually John Aravosis goes even further in his article, “How did the T get in LGBT?” He suggests we are not even part of the LGB community.
It is simply not p.c. in the gay community to question how and why the T got added on to the LGB, let alone ask what I as a gay man have in common with a man who wants to cut off his penis, surgically construct a vagina, and become a woman.
Well, as Kelly Dugan quipped, “I am not part of the LGB community either, and who taught him how to spell anyway?”
Why the T in LGBT is here to stay
Transgender people are not beggars at the civil rights table set by gay and lesbian activists. They are integral to the struggle for gender freedom for all.
By Susan Stryker
Oct. 11, 2007 | Pity poor John Aravosis, the gay rights crusader from AmericaBlog whose “How Did the T Get in LGBT?” essay, in reference to the controversy over gender identity protections in the pending Employment Non-Discrimination Act, was published on Salon a few days ago.
To hear Aravosis tell it, he and multitudes of like-minded gay souls have been sitting at the civil rights table for more than 30 years, waiting to be served. Now, after many years of blood, sweat, toil and tears, a feast in the form of federal protection against sexual orientation discrimination in the workplace has finally been prepared. Lips are being licked, chops smacked, saliva salivated, when — WTF!?! — a gaunt figure lurches through the door.
It is a transgender person, cupped hands extended, begging for food. Seems somebody on the guest list — maybe a lot of somebodies — let this stranger in off the streets without consulting everyone else beforehand, claiming he-she-it-or-whatever was a relative of some sort. Suddenly, what was supposed to be a fabulous dinner party starts surreally morphing into one of those OxFam fundraisers dramatizing third-world hunger whose sole function is to make the “haves” feel guilty for the plight of the “have-nots.”
Maitre d’ Barney Frank offers an elegant pretext for throwing the bum out. The establishment’s new management, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, is caught off-guard by the awkward turn of events, but deftly shuffles the hubbub into the wings and starts working the room, all smiles, to reassure the assembled guests that a somber and long-sought civil rights victory will be celebrated in short order.
Aravosis and those who share his me-first perspective are not so sure. Seeing half a loaf of civil rights protection on the table before them, and sensing that the soirée might come to a premature and unexpected denouement, they make a grab, elbows akimbo, for said truncated loaf. This is, after all, their party.
October 11th, 2007 at 3:21 pm
The last time I checked my dictionary, homosexuality had something to with people of one gender tending to fall in love with people of the same gender.
I think Susan has been marking up her dictionary to change the definition of words to meet the needs of her argument of the moment.
Homosexuality is when people of the same sex, not gender, have sex with one another.
Merriam-Webster:
One entry found for homosexuality.
Main Entry: ho·mo·sex·u·al·i·ty
Pronunciation: “hO-m&-”sek-sh&-’wa-l&-tE
Function: noun
1 : the quality or state of being homosexual
2 : erotic activity with another of the same sex
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
ho·mo·sex·u·al·i·ty /ˌhoʊməˌsɛkʃuˈælɪti, or, especially Brit., -ˌsɛksyu-/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[hoh-muh-sek-shoo-al-i-tee, or, especially Brit., -seks-yoo-] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun
sexual desire or behavior directed toward a person or persons of one’s own sex.
[Origin: 1890–95; homo- + sexuality]
American Heritage Dictionary
ho·mo·sex·u·al·i·ty (hō’mə-sěk’shōō-āl’ĭ-tē, -mō-) Pronunciation Key
n.
1. Sexual orientation to persons of the same sex.
2. Sexual activity with another of the same sex.
American Heritage New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
homosexuality
A sexual attraction between persons of the same sex. (See gay and lesbian; compare heterosexuality.)
American Heritage Stedman’s Medical Dictionary
ho·mo·sex·u·al·i·ty (hm-sksh-l-t, -m-)
n.
1. Sexual orientation to persons of the same sex.
2. Sexual activity with another of the same sex.
Merriam-Webster’s Medical Dictionary
Main Entry: ho·mo·sex·u·al·i·ty
Pronunciation: “hO-m&-”sek-sh&-’wal-&t-E
Function: noun
Inflected Form: plural -ties
1 : the quality or state of being homosexual
2 : erotic activity with another of the same sex
Merriam-Webster’s Medical Dictionary, © 2002 Merriam-Webster, Inc.
Sometimes it involves love, sometimes there might be gender differences. But often it involves neither love nor gender differences–see Larry Craig, MSM.
Gender is orthogonal to sex and is not a major driver of homophobia as the gender normative lesbians and gays are still fired and evicted for merely being homo.
Patriarchy is a much more useful conception of what drives sexism, homophobia and transphobia, not violating gender norms, as it unifies all of patriarchy’s oppressions under one theory which explains subsidiary theories like gender oppression.
For het women, the oppression of patriarchy is apparent and well documented. For lesbians and gays, our sexuality is not controlled by the phallus of the patriarch and is thus untamable, women as nature which refuses to submit to culture, men as “always on” sex run wild.
For trans folks, violating gender norms is a more pronounced source of oppression, but the cringe factor of surgery threatens the entire notion of patriarchy because it reassigns who gets a phallus, or, in the ultimate violation, represents the willful abnegation of the phallus.
That is the capital crime in patriarchy and perceptions that all trans folks want to either resect their penises or get phalloplasty is what makes our tasks so different, the trans case more challenging. Even homos have a difficult time overcoming this misapprehension. Combine this with not playing the game your sex-designated gender and you have a double whammy of oppression and a much more difficult case to make politically.
The exceptions to the gender thesis of oppression demonstrates that it is not a thesis that can explain several observed cases. Metrosexuals, men who groom, wear jewlery, earings and nail polish are not oppressed for violating gender norms, see David Beckham.
Lesbians and gays who are gender agonstic or adhere to gender roles are also oppressed. Many have lived in liberal LGBT-friendly coastal enclaves and seem to have forgotten this.
Trans folks don’t get to impose their thesis of their oppression on others whose oppression demonstrates clearly distinct etiologies, especially when that thesis fails to adequately explain observed phenomenon.
Aravosis and those who share his me-first perspective are not so sure. Seeing half a loaf of civil rights protection on the table before them, and sensing that the soirée might come to a premature and unexpected denouement, they make a grab, elbows akimbo, for said truncated loaf. This is, after all, their party.
This is not a party. It is a queue where people fighting to get in line get to move forward as soon as they get a majority. Either you have your majority and you get to go, or you have to wait until you can reach a majority. The HRC acceded to including trans folks in the bill, but the homework was not done to see if the numbers were there and they ended up not.
BTW, John, like myself, lives in a place where we enjoy protections offered by ENDA. It is disingenuous for trans folks to play the “me first” card when we are fighting you all for the rights of homos who live in places that are not safe.
Then we get to the attack part:
John Aravosis is in the nosebleed section of the social hierarchy; if he gets any higher up the food chain he should be issued an oxygen mask.
Here, Susan Stryker trots out the cherished canard, that gay men don’t need protections because we are all double income no kids buffed Chelsea gym clone investment bankers with fat bank accounts. This creates an artificial hierarchy of oppression that squeezes lesbians and gays between our allies and opponents.
This, from our “allies” who expect for us to work with them to achieve mutual liberation? What political planet are you all living on?
The history of trans activism is an amazing narrative that has made substantive advances against tremendous odds. But all that counts now is completed activism oriented towards a civil rights bill as measured in votes. For trans folks, that represents less than a decade of work which has not succeeded to the point where it has convinced enough members of congress to support ENDA+trans.
Much solidarity work done over the past 10 years is being undone when trans folks accuse homos of “throwing them under the bus” because their struggle lags behind ours now.
Trans folks just recently found out that a bus is running, are still home in their bedclothes and are scrambling to gather bus fare and get dressed. Homos have been waiting at the bus stop for decades, bus fare in hand, and there have been several missed runs. The 93-Gays in the Military passed us by. The 02-Same Sex Marriage never showed up. Now the 07-Employment Discrimination Protection is trundling down the street but is being delayed, apparently they need to change out a motor before it can make it this way. Wait, what is that, the new engine is in worse shape than the old engine. It will never get us over the hill. The trans folks just called us on our cell, asking us to wait a bit longer for the bus with the new engine so that they might ride as well. They are a few hours away from the bus stop, and the engineers are considering replacing the original engine, not perfect but able to complete the run.
We’re wanting to take this bus, and trans folks can catch up later, when you’re ready.
If you all can rustle up the votes, then let’s have at it and we’ll all have job protections. If not, and you all continue to organize to block the original ENDA, the one that has had decades of work put into building support for it and is on the cusp of passage, then be prepared to accept the consequences of tens of millions of angry homos who will think twice about helping trans folks in the future.
This has nothing to do with the merits of the trans struggle for civil rights and everything to do with getting what you can while you can get it, before the window closes.
-marc
October 11th, 2007 at 7:20 pm
Gay & Lesbian Review: You’ve often contended that “homosexuality” is not a noun but instead a verb, an act—so one can only be a homosexualist or same-sexualist.
Gore Vidal: Only a country like this one could have thought up [the idea] that sexual tastes, whatever they may be, dictate identity. Only a bunch of morons would have come to that conclusion.
G&LR: Yet, despite Kinsey’s findings, we continue with that mindset.
October 11th, 2007 at 9:33 pm
When your employer fires you because having a man in your life violates the expected gender norms, maybe then you will understand why Senator Frank has missed the boat and why you incorrect assertions about Gays leading this historical effort don’t really matter. Throwing Trans people overboard not only hurts them, it hurts you, too - legally and practically.