I havn’t been completely following the thread since i just discovered it, so i am not sure if my questions have been covered before. Apoloiges if so. (someone point the link and i’ll be off on my way) Anyway…
A couple o’ questions pop to mind:
What happened in the past? When surgery/operations were not available and technology did not allow trans-gender ops? [erm…think Roman times]
Does this mean that ones who thought that they were trapped in the body of the opposite sex…
(a) did not exist?
(b) were the absolute minority?
The more interesting question is whether this social phenomenon was created by the advance of science & tech, or whether it ‘existed previously’.
What i mean is that now that changing one’s gender has become an option, does this induce more people to ‘believe’ that they are trapped in the body of the opposite sex, since they can now ‘right’ the ‘wrong’, instead of going about with their lives normaly?
Now i realise that this presents the possbility of a chicken and egg issue a la did man create God or did God create man blah blah. But my take on this is that science has undoubtedly influenced the numbers of transexuals. Whether it has opened new doors to the previously trapped, or whether it has introduced new notions to people that would otherwise not be bothered and lead a normal life is debatable, but I would go with the latter.
I do apologise if my phrasing comes across as harsh; I am not biased against nor toward transgendered people.
Most people are not biased, just not informed. People have posted earlier in this thread examples of transgendered people who lived before our times. In rural areas today there are openly transgendered people who are accepted by their tribes. In the book “Islamic Homosexualities” there is a study by an anthropologist of transgendered people openly living in an Arabic Country. (Unfortunately, I returned the book to the library and I can not remember the author. I did a search on google, but Stephen O Murray’s name was the only one that came up. The transgendered individuals are also mentioned in his book, but the one that I recently read was a more detailed study.)
Any, the number of transgendered people was estimated by the anthropologist as 2-3 in 600. It described how the people dressed (in a combination of male and female clothes), wore their hair (combination of male and female styles). And other things about their lifestyle. Most made their living as entertainers.
What was interesting to me is that they were considered “gay” although a number of them were clearly interested in women. Still, by all accounts, they were talked of as female and refered to as female. They were allowed to hang out with women behind closed doors, something normally not allowed by men in Islamic countries.
I’ve read many more cases, in modern day and historic India (hijras they are called) and all other the world. As I mentioned earlier, I don’t think that there are more transgendered people now than there were before, just more that are open about it and able to “correct” it.
One thing I had to learn was that people are always more uncomfortable than me when they know I am trans.
It’s useful to learn since I tend to think that, being ftm and attracted to men, people see me as basically harmless.
And on a related note, it always amazes me to see people virtually walking on eggshells, particularly my family, saying me stuff like “you chose to do that, it’s okay with me” or “Do you feel well, you okay?”, and I have to remind me that it’s new for them, three years for my parents, one for my bro, when it’s been close to ten years that I know myself.
So these attitudes are clashing with the awsome and happy mood accompagning my physical transition.
I feel awfully good and people are acting like if transsexuality is that horrible illness and “poor, poor transsexual…”.
Because yeah, as Susanann pointed to earlier, it could be worse, I could have been born heavily disabled, but I’m in top health.
Funny thing is that knowing KellyM was transsexual made me more comfortable around her, not less. We knew each other online in 1993 or so, because we played a game via email with around a dozen others. Who you are did not matter in the game, just as long as you only played as one person. Although she said she was a woman, there was some evidence that she was also a guy. Nothing in her conduct made me think she was male; this was thing outside the game that associated her with a name that was obviously male. The net was a much smaller place ten years ago. This made me uncomfortable. I did not have a problem with someone pretending to be of the opposite gender for a game, but that is not what she was doing. She insisted she was a woman, yet there was lots of stuff that associated her with this other person.
Later she owned up to that name, and I did not like her very much at all. I do not like liars. I do not like being lied to. A few years later, she came out as a transsexual to the group who played the game. It was quite an epiphany for me. I finally understood how she could be telling the truth about being a woman, and yet was that person with the terribly male name. I began to talk to her outside of the context of the game and eventually we met in person.
Before she came out, I would not have been comfortable meeting her. If she lied about basic identity, what else would she lie about? It really drove home how two things can be true even when they seem to be mutually exclusive, because life allows more choice than any nice neat math problem. Sometimes there are possibilities you just would never expect.
ok, so is this guy considered to be a “woman”, even though he himself does not consider himself to be a woman?
The transexuals I know actually consider themselves to be the other sex, this guy never did consider himself a woman.
Is he a “transexual” even though he had the operation but just “prefers” to live as a woman?
He is more than a transvestite.
What do you call a man who thinks he is a man, who knows he is a man, but wants/prefers to live as a woman, or a woman who knows she is a woman but wants/prefers to live as a man?
I am asking for a “techical” response here. (I would treat anybody as a woman who presents herself as a woman, and I would treat someone as a man if he presents himself as a man)
The general term in sucah a case is usually “transgender” or “transgendered”. In general, it means someone who wishes to live as the opposite gender, but not (necessarily) to effect corrective surgery. However, as a desctiptive term, it is often so broadly used as to be nearly meaningless. It should be noted that a person describing themselves as transgendered may or may not feel they have much in common with transsexuals (and vice versa); it should also be noted that “transgender” is sometimes broadly used as an umbrella term for all sorts of nontraditional gender expression.
Please note that the preceding summary is mostly my third-hand understanding, courtesy of an ex-girlfriend who describes herself as transgendered (and definitely not transsexual). It’s quite possible that I have misrepresented some part of the above through ignorance of specific details, but it should be general enough for there not to be a problem.
Just for the record, the following paragraph, which I intended to post here, somehow appended itself to a post I made in the “Lazy Religion” thread:
Just for the record, applying the conditions of the Baptismal Covenant to how I and CJHoworth are expected to look at a transgendered person, I’d have to say that we owe them the respect and compassion to regard them as people who know themselves, in their inner spirits, to be something that their bodies do not express, and that we’re therefore called by our own beliefs to treat them as they wish to be treated, F2Ms as men and M2Fs as women, regardless of whether they’ve begun or completed a course of treatment. That’s not merely courtesy but a direct command of Christ applied to our call to follow Him and to their situation.
And of course, in copying it, I lost the link to the Baptismal Covenant – it continues on the following page, which is the operative part for the question under consideration.
I hope those responsible are punished severely. And everyone else understands that this sort of behaviour is completely unacceptable. Geez, they should already know. I hope the police involved lose their jobs at the minimum. Shit like this should equate with instant dismissal, IMO.
That’s about all I will say, since we aren’t in the Pit.
I heard about that from one of the people who was arrested with her – they’re seriously considering getting a lawsuit together. We’re nudging him every time we see him to encourage.
I’m . . . actually glad to see that it’s getting reported outside a circle of vague acquaintances. (I don’t know the guy who was there, but he’s a friend of a friend. I also don’t know how well he knows the woman who was abused.) Broader base of outrage makes for a broader chance for change and all.
For the past few days, I’ve been wondering why a post in GD turned up in any vanity searches I did. (I don’t lurk here very often, and post here even less; this is maybe my second post to this forum in thirteen months) Now I know.
KellyM, I’d just like to state that I don’t believe I have PCOS. I know where you may have got that notion from, but truthfully, it was only suggested as a possibility. Since it was only for one month that I “missed,” and things have been normal from then on… I’m not sure it is an indication of such. I don’t look on having PCOS as a stigma of any sort, by the way… just attempting to clairfy stuff.
As for my opinion of what it means to be a woman. I don’t think it should be predicated solely on hormones. (although I am vaguely aware that transsexuals must take hormones in some form regularly) If you’re a female at birth, and grow up to be a woman… in my opinion, you’re a woman. Unless you desire very strongly to be a man, and are in fact a F2M trans or are in the process of becoming one. (though I admit that trans people have always confused me… not necessarily over their gender, but over other things… like the washroom issue and such)
