GLBT: Why the T?

Great Debates
1

I am a part of a small group of Gays and Lesbians starting a local chapter of the Stonewall Democrats in our little berg of Texarkana. Naturally we modeled our mission statement on the national organization’s (no sense reinventing the wheel).

At the end of the meeting Tuesday where we formally approved the By Laws and Mission Statement, someone wondered aloud about why Transgendered Folk are explicitly a part of the group. I say explicitly because, of course, the group is open to anyone - gay or straight - who supports our mission. But realistically, we know that Gays and Lesbians will make up the bulk of the membership, especially locally.

The question about Transgendered people arose because of the experience of a couple of guys with friends of theirs who’ve had the surgery. These guys, one of them the Queen of the Local Drag Shows, insists that their friends who have completed the surgery now identify as straight women and do not want to be known as Transgendered. While they support Gay rights, they aren’t gay, they’re straight; so they really don’t want to be a part of the GLBT movement.

From my perspective, we all share the common element of being despised by certain groups because of our sexuality or gender identities, which aren’t the same thing. But to the cretins who hate us, sexuality and gender identity are functional equivalents. They don’t discriminate between us. It seems to me that we are natural allies.

Nationally this same debate is being played out surrounding the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA). The ENDA prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, but does not include protection of Transgendered people.

The Human Rights Campaign, a gay and lesbian political organization, supports the bill as it stands. A Planet Out story on the ENDA quotes David Smith of the HRC:

It seems the HRC views Transgendered people as a different community than Gay and Lesbian; but that we can work together on issues that concern us both.

Are Smith and the HRC abandoning principals for the practical dream of the ENDA? Should Gay and Lesbian rights be linked with Transgendered rights? Is the practical method of incrementally extending non-disdcrimination protection to groups the only way of eventually obtaining rights for everyone? Would adding Transgender protection to the current ENDA kill the bill and, thereby, hurt the Gay and Lesbian community which has a chance of getting this passed?

And how is the debate affected by the differences between Pre-Op and Post-Op Transgendered Folk, or people who may never be able to afford the operation and just live their lives as their natural gender in spite of the physcial body that doesn’t match?

2

This isin’t really a big issue that I have noticed. The whole “no longer transgendered” thing is more an issue with the word. The point of transition is to be viewed as a woman, not a transgendered woman. To imply that they are transgendered now implies that they weren’t before they transitioned.

Even then the actual label transgendered includes more than people who are transitioning. It also includes cross dressers, intersexed people, and people who claim to be “third gendered”.

3

As I grasp it (poorly), the relationship between LGB and T is this:

“Normal” male sexuality says, “I’m obviously a man and as such desire a woman,” and the reverse for a woman. G has the problem that it needs to overcome this view and say, “It’s perfectly OK that I’m obviously a man but what I desire is another man” and similarly with “woman” substituted for “man” for L. B says “I’m obviously a man[/woman] whose desires include both men and women.”

T, of course, says, “Never mind what’s ‘obvious’ about my body – inside I’m a woman[man].”

In each case what’s “obvious” to the unthoughful straight person is variable for the LGBT person, and gender identity, like sexual orientation, is not as “obvious” as might be first thought.

Eve? Kelly? Is that close to on target, in terms of analysis of how transgendered people feel? Gays of the board, does it incorporate the sense that “they’re like us” that I gather LGB people feel towards T’s, to have included them in those for whom one advocates?

4

Nobody has mentioned the gay transgendered population. There are a great many who, for instance, were male at birth, had the surgery to become female, and prefer females sexually. They should, in my opinion, be included in your group.

5

This has been a problem every since the start of the gay rights movement. Why are transgender people lumped into this group? In the early days conventional wisdom found little difference between being gay (sexual orientation) and transgender (which deals not with sexual orientation, but rather gender identity) Most people saw “the guy in a dress” and did not distinguish her from those in the gay community. And those who were openly transgendered were discriminated just the same. However, the transgender community was less organized and very few were out of the closet. Thus, it was natural that the trans community would gravitate to the gay/lesbian movement.

Today, the gay and lesbian movement has grown rapidly and as more people understand the issue of sexual orientation and the transgender movement has grown and become more organized, I believe that the trans community has outgrown the gay/lesbian movement and needs to move out on its own. The rift between gay groups and trans groups has grown and are often at odds with each other.

Transgender has everything to do about gender, and nothing to do about sexual orientation (that said, some trans identify as being gay/lesbian) In many ways lumping trans with lgb holds the trans movement back. . .

6

That is probably why transgendered as a group are seperating from gay people. Gay and transgendered people are becoming accepted at different rates, and as people learn to discriminate between the two what is in common will dissapear. This doesen’t even include people who have transitioned. For them what they are is what is obvious.

Also to adress the OP.
Too often GLBT groups are somewhat like in this article http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/26/magazine/26BOYGIRL.html

The T in GBLT in their group is there, but not because they actually expect transgendered people to be a part of the group. If the T is meant to say everyone is invited it should probably be an E.

7

I think that a lot of transgendered folks have had some sort of affiliation with LGB community since gender-bending is a fairly acceptable practice. There are some separate issues involved (for example, restroom equity is not as much of an issue for the non-transgender gay community).

It’s true that transgender issues get pushed aside in the flow of the gay community; however, I have mixed opinions on pushing for 100% trans-inclusion in legislation related to gay rights. Given the choice of a small step for anti-discrimination versus no action at all, I’m all for the small step.

Eventually, I think the trans movement will emerge as quite separate from the LGB movement. I’m curious to see whether people who are intersexual (hermaphrodites) will put themselves in with transgendered folks or will start their own separate movement.

8

Seems to me, a hetero male, that they are often lumped together due to perceptions of their sex/sexuality. Sexuality, in the case of GLB’s, in the sense of who they are attracted to, and sex, in the case of T’s, in the sense of what gender they are.

In both cases, certain people would have an “ewww” factor about GLBT’s. It could be an “ewww, he has sex with other men” or an “ewwww, she used to be a man.”

There is a struggle to make people see that gay men are just as manly as other men, and lesbians are just as womanly as other women. With the transgendered, a woman would, in many circumstances, be considered less womanly, because she was born with the male accessory kit.

I truly don’t know about the chances of the bill without including the transgendered.

9

When I first took up gay activism at 17, I was quite prejudiced against the transgendered community. I lived in a small town outside a small city, and it was already an uphill battle just for gay and lesbian rights. When I thought about transgendered rights at all, I thought of them as yet another burden, more than we could handle.

One of the first members of our fledgeling GLB (no T, back then) Youth Group was 16-year-old MTF transexual, who was too scared to talk about it for the longest time. When we finally did become friends, she helped educate me out of my prejudices. I realize that if things were lonely for me out there, they must have been a lot worse for her.

furnishesq, it’s all well and good to say that the two movements can split, that they’ve outgrown each other, if, say, you live in New York or San francisco, London or Paris or Montreal. But when you grow up in Esquimalt or Sooke, British Columbia, surrounded by loggers and dockworkers, in the buckle of the west-coast Canadian Bible Belt, that’s not a reality. The small handful of openly-gay GLBT have to band together, if only for safety.

This is part of a larger problem. Fragmentation of minority movements. I don’t just believe in that GLBT people should all work together – why stop there? I think we should have as broad a movement as possible for a more tolerant society, include heterosexual feminists, racial and religious minorities, and, yes, even the liberal-minded straight white Christian males. The project of building a more tolerant society must be inclusive rather than exclusive. Prejudice is prejudice. We should be prepared to stand up for one another.

One of my closest friends in the world is FTM. This year, he came out to his mother as a gay man, an experience we share. He hs to deal with discrimination against his right to be a gay man, as I have. Most of his friends are gay men. He’s one of us, and I for one would be the first to defend Ian’s right to be a part of our movement. Nor would I bar the gates of our community to him until he has his surgery in about two years.

We’re all fighting the same battle – the same struggle against pointless discrimination based on rigid gender roles. And these battles are easier to fight together than apart.

10

Not to be picky but: I think transgendered people identify as another sex or least don’t identify completely with their biological sex, however they don’t want the surgery/hormones.
Transexuals have the surgery.
At least that’s how my lesbian friends explained it.
This could change the debate/discussion slightly. As a transgendered person has more motivation to hang out with the gay and lesbian community.

11

Transgenderist is usually the word used to describe what you are talking about perspective. Transgendered is a more broad term. For example at theThe Transgender boards a poll was done and the most popular definitions were:

The need to be identified by people as the opposite of your birth sex either full time or part time

and

The experience of gender identity dysphoria, 24/7, now or in your past

12

Wow, transgenderist, I’ve learned something new. :slight_smile:
While transgender seems to be up for debate, transexual has a very well established and specific definition and the two shouldn’t be confused.

I poked around a bit on the web, as far as I can tell transexuals can be transgendered, but you don’t have to get surgery to be transgender.
Here’s a quote from this link

13

Hmmm. My understanding of the terms:

Transvestite is a person who chooses to wear clothing of the opposite sex, whether from compulsion, for pleasure, or for professional reasons. Need not be and often is not gay, but sometimes is; may or may not be transgendered. (I have had two friends who are quite normal straight men but who find that wearing women’s panties under their clothes gives them an erotic kick.)

Transsexual (2 s’s preferred) is someone who has had gender reassignment surgery.

Transgendered is someone who identifies him/herself as a member of the sex other than the one apparently present at birth. (This includes the small related group of citizens of the Dominican Republic who are born phenotypically female, but the XY-bearing members of the clan develop functional male genitalia at puberty, along with those who do have gender reassignment surgery, those who want to, and those who choose not to but who live as the opposite sex, while retaining their “factory issued” genitalia. Example of the last group would be the Lady Chablis.)

14

I tend to see the issue much as Hamish does. It’s a matter of joining together for as broad of a movement as possible. However, I’d like to hear more about the booklover’s POV that “the trans movement will emerge as quite separate from the LGB movement.” I’d especially like to hear the first person opinions from any transgendered people. Anyone have a rapport with Eve and can get her into this thread?

15

The group at my campus is LGBTA, including “allies” as a category, so it is truely open membership. Over the course of my time at this university I’ve had many friends in the group who were officers and such, and they’ve never even had a T in the group. This is the University of Missouri, a major college with over 20000 students, in the most liberal city between St. Louis and the Rockies. If there are transgendered people here, they are not taking advantage of the groups and resources the university offers. There was a drag queen at one time, but he wasn’t transgendered, just an entertainer.

It would be an advantage, I would think, for transgendered people to associate with gay and lesbian groups. Homosexuality is becoming publicly accepted at an astonishing rate, but cross-dressing and that family of activity is still treated like a sideshow for white trash alcoholics to hoot at on Springer. For the gay and lesbian community to divorce themselves from transgendered people for political efficiency would seem to be a bit of a dirty trick.

Any political effort to protect people of all sexual orientations should also strive to include protections for people of all sexual identities. They’re different issues, but public perception has made them related. It’s similiar to “race” issues. Widely differing geographic origins and genetic makeups have made the term “black” or “African-American” essentially useless…the only respect in which people are part of that group is public perception and treatment. So that group fights as a group, even though someone with Sudanese ancestors has as much in common with someone with Kenyan ancestors as an Irishman does with an Serbian. Public perception defines groups in irrational ways, but it still defines the battlefield.

16

Im transgendered and I think that the idea that the two movements were ever together is a myth. I looked around and the LGBT sites at most seemed to just provide links to transgendered sites.

What groups and resources would the university offer a transgendered person? I mean really why would a T join your group?

17

Thank you, Sterra, for you input. I’m sorry I didn’t know your identity when I asked for first-hand opinions.

If, as you assert, the two movements are seperate, should they remain so? I understand your position that GBLT organization seldom provide more than lip-service support for Transgendered individuals. Perhaps that’s because we really don’t know what you need from us.

I think ENDA is evidence of your position that the movements are seperate. The question is, should we (Gays and Lesbians) risk losing the bill by insisting that it also include Transgender protection? Or is it acceptable that we take what we can get now and work for Transgendered protection in the future?

18

While there could be one movement I think that the individual members of that movement will remain seperate. We can work towards the same goals, but there is no real reason to just have one group.

I think that “in the future” means never. I also think that the gay people who are really in danger of losing their jobs are the ones not protected with the ENDA because it only protects orientation. If someone “acts gay” they could still be fired.

19

I would hesitate a long time before contradicting Sterra, who speaks from personal experience, but I gather from reading that her view is not the unanimous one of all in the transgendered community. Though as a sympathetic straight man I cannot speak on these topics with any authority but what I’ve encountered in reading and sometimes in personal encounters, I felt it appropriate to post in this related thread my understanding of why the transgendered community and the gay/Lesbian/bisexual community have made common cause:

20

I don’t see where you dissagree with me Polycarp. I do agree that the two communities have common cause, and that is why the T is in GBLTA. I am just saying that the transgender community is generally not represented by such organizations.