A transgender person is someone who is sure of and comfortable in their birth gender, but for many reasons, does things that are considered the province of the opposite gender. For example, a man who wears dresses and makeup. The crucial thing is, he is still a man in a dress. Therefore, uses the mens’ bathroom. That doesn’t need to change, ever.
The APA does not agree with your definition.
http://www.apa.org/topics/sexuality/transgender.aspx
ETA:
http://www.apa.org/topics/sexuality/transgender.aspx#
By APA definitions, transsexual people are transgender, but not all transgender people are transsexual.
I can’t speak for anyone else, but for me clothing is a defense against sexual assault. If I’m clothed, someone who wants to stick his fingers in me would have to get his hand down my pants first, and a rapist would have to get my pants off, which gives me more time to fight, call for help, escape, and flee. Trying to hold me down, while I’m fighting, AND get my clothes off is quite a bit harder than holding me down and sticking it in.
I’m a bit surprised that never occurred to you, actually. Clothing is a physical barrier. Why wouldn’t it make me feel safer?
Then there’s the social convention that locker rooms are considered single-sex spaces – while spaces that have signs designating them as co-ed are very clearly not – so someone flouting that convention is more likely to be doing so for some nefarious purpose.
Yes, but in this thread, we’ve been discussing transsexuality in gender segregated areas. Unless anyone has been talking about crossdressers and the likes, in which case we’ve been talking at cross purposes.
SOME transsexuals consider themselves to fall under the transgender umbrella, but some don’t. Personally having what I am conflated with transgender is the most horrifically offensive thing imaginable to me.
I understand it’s an emotional, not logical reaction, but the thought that a pair of cotton shorts with an elastic waistband would present an effective barrier against a rapist is, frankly, ridiculous.
Think what the first reaction of women is to an unexpected man in the room…generally, it’s to cover their breasts and vulva with their arms, even before running away.
Most adult women wouldn’t go skinny dipping with their best male friends, brothers and cousins - people they don’t fear attack from. That’s the fear that can’t be resolved with papers - not the fear of attack, but the fear of being *seen *by the socially wrong person.
But it’s probably not an either/or. There’s probably both the fear of being seen *and *the fear of attack at work, sure.
Nobody was talking about crossdressers until you brought them into the discussion. Nobody in the thread conflates transgender with crossdressing until you offered that definition. When most people use the term “transgender” and “transsexual” interchangeably, they’re not conflating “someone who is sure of and comfortable in their birth gender” (itself a loaded proposition–perhaps you meant “birth genitals”?) with someone who experiences gender dysphoria.
So the offense you’re taking appears to be manufactured. Before you take offense at the term “transgendered,” I think you need to pay attention to what the word actually means, instead of cleaving to an idiosyncratic definition of the word.
I agree that the term transgender may be too inclusive to be terribly useful. But my transsexual daughter certainly considers herself to be transgender, as do all of the transsexual people that I know. Most are adolescents so perhaps there are generational differences if you’re older? Your objection seems unusual.
We often hear (and use) the term gender variant as well to include cross dressers, non-binary folks, gender benders, etc.
Yes, this one part of nudity is not that complicated or conspiracy against transwhatever the correct word is.
Plenty of women prefer not to be seen nude by men. And a fair number of men by women for that matter.
You don’t need to bring up fear of rape or whatever to explain it.
And, IMO folks here who think that mindset is silly are the ones going way over the line here.
Response to Whynots last post.
Not entirely. He has to get the shorts out of the way, and that takes time. The longer he takes before he succeeds, the greater chance I have of getting my thumb in his eye or my knee in his groin. Unless he has large hands, it’s going to be hard for him to hold both my wrists in one hand so he can have a hand free to pull the shorts down. I get one hand free, I can break his nose, box his ear, gouge his face. Even if I can’t get him off me myself, it can delay him long enough that someone else has time to intervene (especially since we’re talking about this happening in a room full of other people, including other men who may be as strong or stronger than he is, or greater numbers). When we’re talking about something like this, seconds matter.
Onto terminology: For clarification, I’ve been talking about people who identify as women, to the point where using the women’s locker room is the most comfortable and safe choice for them, without regard to the extent of medical intervention that has happened or may happen in the future. This would include transsexuals and likely a few people who fall outside that strict definition, since there are any number of reasons why someone might identify as a woman but not opt to transition medically. The circles I (have) run in hew pretty closely to the APA definitions, when trans/intersex issues are the topic of discussion.
I doubt a man in a dress would want to use the ladies locker room, anyway.
And how the hell is a person not well versed in all these differences – as are are most – supposed to know the difference? I mean could I walk into a spa and just say that I am a woman* (at least in my head), and bang! into the ladies locker room?
*Though I am Napoleon. No, seriously, I am.
For my own part, I don’t understand the concern about the wrong people seeing your bits. As a straight, cis-sexual man, I’ve used full-nude, no-exceptions spas for years in China, and if I showed up at a slow time, I’d fairly often see cleaning ladies wandering around, mopping behind me as I nudely sashayed across the room and making rude or leering jokes about me to each other. For my part, I think of it this way:
- Is there any serious likelihood that, in the 21st century, an adult has not seen naked people of both sexes?
- Is there any reasonable variation between mine own naked body and the one they’ve probably seen?
So if you want to hop in the locker room with me and quietly go about your lockering business, feel free. As long as there’s no serious eye contact and no chit-chat - and believe you me I will not be supplying either of those, to anyone - then all are welcome. Why would you feel otherwise?
I’m 21. My objection is based on the fact transsexuals have nothing in common with anyone who comes under the transgender umbrella. We don’t belong in the same category as crossdressers, autogynephiles or transvestic fetishists.
Further, the word “trans-gender” implies changing gender. My gender is female and always has been; it’s my sex that some perceive as male and my sex I change, hence trans-sexual and not trans-gender.
– bolding mine.
As a point of fact, what does that mean? 
I confess my almost total ignorance on this topic but I get terribly confused when reading this threads – I hardly ever participate in them since the infamous “female sperm” one – but it seems like bizarre definitions come out left and right…leaving me only more confused.
“cis” means, at the risk of REALLY pissing people off, what Joe on the Street considers “normal” - their gender matches their sex. A cis-male is a man, who was born with and still has a penis, who identifies as male, who dresses in clothes that society expects men to dress in and enjoys activities society says is okay for men. “Straight” means he likes having sexual and/or romantic relationships with women, but you probably knew that part.
Cis basically means not transsexual. Cis people can be crossdressers/have supposedly female interests.
Okay, I get the objection to changing gender. But your understanding of the terms isn’t the generally-accepted understanding of the terms. And quite frankly there’s enough ignorance to fight out there–barking at people for using terms in the generally-accepted way doesn’t help matters much.
“Cis,” to not only run the risk of pissing everyone off but to most assuredly do it, means that I’m one of the normals, the majority, the folks who already got theirs. More specifically, as was already said, it means that I feel no major sort of dsymorphia; the way I identify myself is the way people overwhelmingly identify me.
It means ‘on this side’ in Latin, hence: cisalpine and transalpine Gaul.
Lots of generally accepted things are wrong. And personally, I’d rather have to deal with ignorance (in the literal sense of lack of knowledge) than being associated with transgenders.
Thanks – but then why not just say that? I’m a dude/guy/man. End of. I love five dollar words as much as anyone here, but again, in threads like these they only make matters more confusing.
Well, it’s easier to have a word to call not-transsexuals that isn’t as cumbersome as “not transsexual”. And in this day and age it’s easier than ever to look up a word.