All of these questions are asked from benign ignorance and no offense is intended. I have never known a transsexual or transgendered person to my knowledge and I am just curious about a few things. (All of the following questions are for people who live their lives as a gender opposite to the one on their birth certificate- not garden variety transvestites and or “drag queens”.)
I know that it is etiquette (if that’s the word) to refer to a post-operational m2f transsexual as she, but is it also considered proper to refer to a transgendered (i.e. pre-operational or ‘no intentions of an operation’) m2f as she?
In the literature I’ve read (and I’m talking about legitimate articles, not tabloid fodder) I’m always surprised at the number of m2f people who have had operations and become lesbians. Is this very common (in the sense that anything regarding transgendered people is common)?
Are transsexuals who break the law sentenced to male or female correctional facilities? Has there ever been a lawsuit on the subject? (I know that Ernest Hemingway’s son [who became, after several marriages and several children, Gloria Hemingway] died in a women’s cell where she had been taken after an arrest for vagrancy, but I believe this was due to the fact that the officers were unaware she had been born a man- they were probably also not aware that Gloria, who occasionally spent the night in homeless shelters, was a multimillionaire [and none of it was from money inherited from Ernest].)
Do transgendered people encounter much discrimination in the workplace (such as when they have to provide a birth certificate or driver’s license and the gender is opposite their appearance)? Are there any states with laws protecting them?
Any info appreciated. (I ask these things because I have a near mortal fear of offending innocent people.)
IANAT but my understanding of the etiquette is that you refer to a person as they present themselves. If she is presenting as a woman then she is a she and vice versa.
Inmates coming into the correctional system are sent to a reception facility where it is determined what facility they are best suited for. Part of this determination can be “what gender is this person?” (although in most cases it’s obvious). In cases where it’s not so clear, medical examinations are made and the inmate will be sent to a male or female facility depending on where they will best fit in. In at least one case I know of, an inmate who had been in the middle of a series of sex change operations when convicted required three seperate medical examinations before the doctors were willing to sign off on what gender the inmate currently was.
We also make this determination on a strictly biological basis. Transvestites or other people who live as the opposite gender in their street life will be classified as their original gender. “A woman trapped in a man’s body” will become “a woman trapped in a man’s body imprisoned in a male correctional facility”.
You should refer to a m2f transsexual as “she”, whether or not she is post-op; in general, you should refer to anyone as the gender he or she presents as, without regard to any knowledge you have of their genitals, past or present. If you’re not clear, ask (politely).
Although I’ve never seem solid studies on this, it seems to me that between 10% and 30% of m2f transsexuals turn out lesbian. Bisexuality seems to be far more common than in the general population.
Every American correctional institution that I’ve ever heard of incarcerates transsexuals based on their current physical sex. There have been lawsuits over medical care issues, with the general rule now being that the prison must maintain the individual’s current status but need not further the process (so that a pre-op who is on hormones must be allowed to continue them and be monitored appropriately, but the prison medical system need not provide reassignment surgery). Generally, individuals whose appearance is substantially at odds with their “equipment” will end up housed in protective solitary; the courts have sanctioned this practice.
Workplace discrimination against transsexuals is very common, ranging from refusing to allow the individual to use company bathrooms, forcing them to use the “wrong” bathroom, forcing the individual to adhere to the “wrong” dress code or to an arbitrary dress code established for that one individual, to general harassment and summary termination. To the best of my knowledge, California is the only state to prohibit discrimination on the basis of gender identity (although several other states have nondiscrimination law which might be capable of being interpreted to prohibit such discrimination). Many communities smaller than a state have local law prohibiting such discrimination; the largest is probably Cook County, Illinois. Longstanding precedent holds that federal sexual nondiscrimination law does not apply to transsexuals.