Yeah, actually, you do. You have the privilege of being a woman in a culture other than one that results in violence for getting behind the wheel. You know the other comment about living in the western world results in a certain degree of privilege - the one you took exception to? This is what that means.
I don’t know. At times this thread has seemed like the Argument Clinic.
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No, it hasn’t.
I have not had these experiences. I wonder if is because i am taller than you. (Just guessing, i don’t know your height.) I look like a woman, but I have always “presented” as a butch woman, and I’ve generally been accepted by the guys in discussions about fixing things, etc.
Maybe, maybe not. Back when dress codes were more rigid, I worked with a recruiter who urged me to wear makeup, but I interviewed without makeup, and wore low-heeled ladies pumps, and was hired. I did wear a (pants) suit and nylons, until the industry went business casual.
Maybe I would be more successful if I wore makeup. Hard to know. But I’ve never felt I had to.
It’s pretty clear that your quarrel isn’t with the fact that you were born and sexually identify as female. A few times now, you’ve expressed that the public perceives you as female, without having to jump through any special gender hoops. That’s a favorable circumstance for you, but it’s an added layer trans people must contend with.
Answered above.
It doesn’t mean that all aspects of what it is to be a woman in society are positive, but as you’ve already stated, you generally don’t have to try and convince anyone else that you’re a woman, in the first place. You don’t have to hope that others are open-minded enough to respect your chosen identity. You have those bases covered.
Where you now take issue is with how gender stereotypes are applied, as well as the treatment of women, in general. In a different discussion, I think both are valid. However, they don’t need to be in direct conflict with the experiences of trans people, in this discussion. As I said before, and in reading through this thread, I’m sure any trans person would love to eradicate gender roles, just as much as you do. But given the social landscape still isn’t as welcoming to them, they have to survive in the moment, meaning, they must conform in many ways. The unfortunate side of progress in our society, is that you have to play the game a bit, in order to beat the game.
I’m aware of male privileges, they also exist. Most any group of people has some degree of privilege. No argument, here.
However, I do believe that trans people are more marginalized in our society, and so I can understand their concerns, without trying to override them with mine.
Again, different discussion. So far as sexual identity is concerned, you’re covered.
What with all our privileges, we logically ought to be happier. Otherwise why complain when one person has a privilege and another does not? If your “advantages” don’t add up to putting you in an advantageous position, then what difference do the make?
Sorry I am not agreeable enough–it’s just one of my many unfeminine qualities.
That is not a privilege. It is my right as a human being to engage in human activities, like driving, the same as a male human. If someone prevents me from exercising that right and assaults me, that is an act of violence against me. We are not “privileged” if we manage to get through a day without being beaten. That’s like saying normal status is to be a victim and any time you aren’t victimized, you are "privileged.
“Privilege” is a terrible word to use in these circumstances, and I wish there was a better one (see also “white privilege”). “Privilege” implies that positive things are being given to you, when what it really means in these circumstances is that, while you may have plenty of shit to deal with, you’re spared some of the extra shit that people who don’t share your “privileged” characteristic have to deal with. It’s not so much “privilege” as “being excused from additional grief”.
For example, lots of white people have shitty lives, but lots of black people have to deal with the same shit PLUS the extra extra-large helping of shit due to their skin color. “White privilege” doesn’t make your life better; it just helps keep it from being even worse.
Could be your height and butch appearance, sure. I am accepted in discussion by guys who also know about the topic, although I have to earn that acceptance by proving I know what I’m talking about when a male might be assumed to know until he proved he didn’t. People–male or female–who have no idea about the topic themselves however, are generally much harder to convince and keep asking questions like “how do YOU know how to do THAT?” while I try to help them fix something. I’m talking about people even doubting that we can assemble a piece of IKEA furniture together and thinking they’d better get a man over to help.
I could not possibly wear any kind of pumps, low or high, or pantyhose and get any work done. The physical sensations of itching and squeezing would be too distracting for me and I’d be counting down the minutes before I could run to my car and remove the offending articles. My feet look like feet, similar in shape to a child’s foot or a man’s foot, because I have not modified their structure by keeping them crammed into shoes of a different shape, so when I do try to put them into pumps, they are very painful. I wore flip flops to my own mother’s funeral.
There is no point in quarreling about the fact that I was born female, as who would I quarrel with? I was raised in an era when being female was basically considered a mild handicap that could only be surmounted with extra effort. This was never directly stated, of course, but messages like “girls can do anything boys can do” and the idea that a woman who does not put her career first cannot succeed, the idea that she must put off reproduction as long as possible lest her kids pull her into the domestic realm, and the idea that playing with traditional “girl” toys like baby dolls and kitchen sets was for weak sissies who aspired only to be mommies/houseslaves prevailed.
Now I was never one to accept propaganda or even sensible ideas unquestioningly, but unfortunately, the evidence that being female is something that puts us behind the eight-ball does hold up to further inspection. Societal expectations for women remain very different (and unequal) to those for men in nearly every culture, but even ignoring the cultural expectations for women, we are also at biological disadvantage.
So hell yeah, I’d much rather have been born male. As a man, I could have children painlessly and if I spent any time with them I’d be considered a hero, I’d probably have greater upper body strength, and maybe I’d even be smarter (because why else would we have women’s chess?).
We can’t do anything about the biological disadvantages (I know some people may say that they are advantages, but for me, they are not) and most of us do not WANT to do anything about the cultural disadvantages. Yes, people complain, but the majority of American women do wear makeup, obsess over their appearances, take primary responsibility for childcare, take primary responsibility for cleaning, etc.
Being perceived as female is NOT a favorable circumstance for me, but I am female and am stuck with all of its disadvantages, unless some can be ameliorated by the idea of traditional gender roles being discarded. When a trans woman puts on a dress and make up, she reinforces the roles, just like a non-trans woman does. In a way it’s worse, because she surely has given the idea of “being a woman” some thought and this is what she came up with, whereas maybe a non-trans woman has never even considered that there are options and could potentially arrive at a different conclusion should she have occasion to consider the question.
Not being questioned about which gender I am is not a privilege, because I don’t care whether people ask me that or some other rude prying question. As a woman, of course I am expected to explain myself to anyone who asks.
If someone doubted that I was a woman in person, I’d be delighted to encourage them to think I’m not. What fun to be treated like a man for the day! And I wouldn’t worry about anyone harrassing me for being an overly-feminine man, because I would exude male confidence and power.
I’m not in conflict with anyone’s experiences. I’m not even sure what that means.
Each of us have arrived at wherever we are via our biology and our experiences. If someone has come to the conclusion that in spite of having traditionally male genitalia, she is actually a woman and feels the need to dress and comport herself accordingly, deciding that the best thing for her to do is buy into and participate in the two-gender system and all of the assumptions and expectations built into it, I am not here to convince her otherwise. I believe she truly should do whatever she chooses for herself, without particular regard for her actions’ effect on others.
Similarly, I believe that some other people’s experiences and biology have lead them to a different place, one where they believe themselves to be male, but choose to put on dresses and make up and sing and dance on a stage. I understand why a trans woman might not be happy about people doing this, and I’m not all that happy to see this reinforcement of gender stereotypes and caricaturing of “womanness,” but that’s not up to us and it shouldn’t be.
The relevance to this discussion is this: just as drag-queens’ and transvestites’ existence may contribute to making things worse for trans women, trans women wearing heels, make up, and dresses, contributes to making things worse for women in general. Sorry trans women, but growing up with male privilege may have left you thinking you should get to control what other groups do or whether they exist. We women are expected to accommodate and in this case, that’s actually the better choice and the one that could lead to a society that does not force us into boxes.
Some would like that, but no, not all or even close. A trans person is trying to fit into a different gender role than the one they were originally assigned or whatever, not trying to eliminate the roles entirely. Some people don’t participate in the roles, wear whatever they want, don’t feel the need for surgery, and just live their lives as themselves. We could all do that, and each additional person that chooses this makes it easier for more people to. If most people are grousing about “having” to conform, who is making us conform? The tiny fraction of a percentage of people that will impose their will upon the rest of us via violence? We out number these bullies, by a lot, let’s not do their work for them and buy into the idea that they are really in charge. They are only in charge because we act like they are.
No, the only way to beat the game is not to play!
This is the sort of dangerous overgeneralization you’ve been harping on others about. It’s to a larger extent age-dependent and sexuality-dependent. There are sharp lines drawn between those over age 30-35, and those under, in terms of tendency. Some of that has nothing to do with being transgender. Some of it has to do with ethnic heritage as well.
No, as has been explained several times, the expectations of employers, physicians, schools, and our peers. We live in a gender-binary world (at least I do) and while one can be and express being agender, genderqueer, non-gender-binary transgender, androgynous, etc., it makes life even harder. I work with college students who are facing this problem now - transgender women and men who are having to “binary” themselves in order to score better at interviews and such.
Keep on arguing what you think the world should be; the rest of us have to deal with what it is right now.
I was expecting that…or maybe I wasn’t. 
It literally means certain advantages are available to certain groups (given or otherwise), providing a sum benefit over others. Your definition is merely a rewording of the same concept, but in a way which minimizes others (trans) issues, for some reason.
You can -and will- still have shit to deal with, that’s just called life. But if you’re spared some of that shit by no effort on your part, that’s still an advantageous and privileged position. Anaman is comfortable with the fact that nobody ever questions her sexual identity. That experience is so normal for her, that she can spend energy attacking gender roles, with confidence that she won’t have to defend her sexual identity in the process. Some people want that, but currently, cannot have it.
Exactly.
Is that how it works for trans people? Upon having their identity challenged, they just brush it off and exude some confidence and power over the situation?
That’s great, but seems to deviate from what you stated earlier:
It is not a generalization to say “no, not all people in that group think that way”–that’s the opposite of generalizing.
“Trans” indicates a change of state. The term “transgender” is a bit misleading, as the person typically says they are NOT changing gender, but changing the gender they “present” as to their real gender, right?
So to be transgender is to acknowledge that there is a “female” way to present and a “male” way and they are going to switch over to the one they weren’t using before. Recognizing that there are commonly two accepted genders is not approval of this situation, to be sure, but compliance sure isn’t a vote against it. A person could instead think “I have what most people call male physical characteristics, but I like to do things that are typically associated with females and when females describe their mental and emotional states I feel like they match up with mine better than when most males do. I guess I am someone with a penis and such who likes the activities I like and thinks the way I think, so the world will just have to deal with that and maybe other people will see that I exist and that they are free to exist however they are as well.”
Women didn’t get to vote by obeying the expectations of others. Revolution isn’t something we can all just sit back and wait to have happen while we obey and comply. Putting on make up, heels, and dresses after living your life in a conventionally “male” way is hardly the easy way out, and aren’t we to believe that living “inauthentically” is the hardest thing of all? Fighting for women’s suffrage made a lot of people’s lives harder; fighting against slavery made people’s lives harder; fighting for civil rights makes life harder for the fighters, and I am grateful for and inspired by their sacrifices and willingness to take on that burden.
We all have to deal with the world as it is right now, but that’s not a good reason not to try to change it.
You have no idea what I am “comfortable” with. Ideally, people would question my gender, find no answer and be left with a big question mark. I’d be super comfortable with that situation.
Some people want bananas, and I have a big bunch of them sitting on my counter right now. I hate bananas, and I will not be eating any of them unless there is nothing else to eat. Do I have Banana Privilege? If I put them in the garbage, will that even things up?
For some, probably. How could I know?
Confidence in the face of a challenge is usually more successful than running away crying, so I recommend it to everyone.
I don’t see how these statements are in conflict. If you elaborate, I’d be happy to address this.
This would be me.
I agree that “transgender” isn’t a very useful term for people like me, although the current operant definition of it does include us.
There are hordes of people who have some kind of social-political concern or issue with gender, and there’s a perpetual tension between wanting to bond together to make common cause and wanting to be understood by the others without tucking away our individual differences so as to all be on the same page and reading from the same script, as it were.
ETA: I’d just like to reiterate that the reason it’s an Issue is that the surrounding world made an issue of my difference often enough, emphatically enough, and over a large enough rage of years for a strong sense of Difference (and associated alienation and adversarial posture towards those doing so) to develop. i.e., I didn’t start this shit.
I read this as “Trans women are using a definition of ‘female’ which I don’t agree with and doesn’t apply to me, and I’m not okay with that.”
Which is fine.
Whereas I read this as “If trans women want to define ‘female’ as all that stuff, that’s fine.”
So either you’re okay with it, or you aren’t. However, “Separate but equal” is generally not considered to be awesome.
Trans women who wear make up, dresses, and heels are perpetuating a definition of “female” which I am not on board with and which I feel causes harm to women.
If trans women want to live this way though, I support their right to do so, even though I feel that for them to perpetuate the stereotype causes me harm. They don’t redefine “female” by wearing certain clothes and it is no more their responsibility to upset gender roles than anyone else’s. Wear gold stilettos, lipstick, a tiara and a tutu, if that pleases you, but don’t expect me to join you in the bathroom so we can share mascara. I will grudgingly accompany you to make sure no attackers are lurking, but there will be no slumber party later so we can talk about hotties and paint each other’s nails.
Have you ever been threatened with arrest for using a public toilet marked “Ladies”? Yes or no. Many, if not most, transwomen have.
Are you at all aware of the rate of assault, rape, and murder that transwomen are subjected to, sometimes triggered by being taken for a man in a dress? Oh, yes, a great deal of fun to be treated so. :rolleyes:
Um… you do realize that not ALL transwomen wear dresses, heels, etc.? I’ve run into quite a few in shirt and pants.
Some transwomen choose to wear more stereotypical feminine clothes. If we want someone to support our right to dress “butch” then we must likewise support their right to dress “fem”.
Again - are you at all aware that until recently it was required of transwomen that they be extremely traditionally feminine to get therapy at all? Much less surgery. Or being able to change their legal status on their ID. The medical and legal system were forcing this on transwomen, and probably still do.
Have you ever been a subject of violence? Suffered a beating? Shot at? It sounds like you haven’t.
It’s easy for you to proclaim this, because you won’t be the one in the line of fire.
It’s a lot easier to say that when you have a roof over your head, employment, and your family hasn’t disowned you.
No, they can be changing from the gender they’ve lived and been acclimated to to none of the above, or fluid, or both. This is right in line with what you’ve been advocating, I think.
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We all have to deal with the world as it is right now, but that’s not a good reason not to try to change it.
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I’m really not sure you are seeing how terrible it is for many in the transgender community. I’m dealing with people with no jobs, no medical care, no permanent housing… At the time women fought for the vote they had an ability to work, be cared for by physicians, etc. They started on a much better footing at that time.
If your assertion is that women’s lives pre-1920 were akin to those of transgender persons today, I believe that is incorrect.