…may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.

we used to recite that verse when we were children, especially after someone else called us names. not because we believed it; in fact, we did, and still do believe that names can hurt us. but because we tried to convince ourselves and our oppressors that names couldn’t hurt us.

for trans people, certain names take on significant hurt. specifically our old names. many of us won’t mention them, and even when we see it, it hurts.

i come across my old name on occasion, on mail, on documents, in old photographs, when someone slips. and once in a while, when we have to deal with society, like government agencies or during job applications. when i applied for my current job, the application instructed me to list any former names. so i did. and just this past week, when i applied for an arizona ccw permit. so even now, 9 years after i legally changed it, it still rears its ugly head.

it doesn’t bother me as much as it used to. although i never liked my old name. even as a child, i thought to change it when i “grew up”. little did i know that it would follow me around for the rest of my life. but i guess that’s something that every person, trans or otherwise, has to deal with.

i think if you give a young child cars and an erector set to play with, they will develop spacial skills. navigating a car through the world, and building a 3-dimensional models tend to do that. if you give young child dolls and an easy-bake oven, they’ll develop verbal and reading skills. playing with toys that require the use of talking, and reading and following directions tend to do that.

i think that a child’s brain will develop the necessary pathways and circuits that enable those skills that you force upon it. and those pathways that are not required for those skills will atrophy. and that’s why the brains of men and women seem to differ, both in ability and scans.

i think we should start giving all children cars, dolls, erector sets, and easy-bake ovens.

apparently, deacon keith a fournier thinks me and my ilk are bullies simply for the want of moving through the world without harassment. i suppose he’d rather retain the right to shoot us on sight. perhaps that’s his idea of god’s plan.

i came across this post on towleroad, in which the comments perfectly exemplifies the “gay vs trans” argument.

mcnnyc points out:

When the movement first started it was just gay. The only reason lesbians got listed separately was because of feminism and, as Derrick noted, all the work they’ve done.

right mcnnyc, and then the trans people were listed separately because some gays don’t want to be associated with “those people”. because, well, gays are “more equal” than trans.

then ipodius perfectly expresses the issue:

I have listened to this debate until I just can’t stand it anymore. I’m also sorry to be politically incorrect here, but I don’t see what gender identity has to do with being gay. To wit: a male has sex reassignment and becomes female and has a male partner. She is straight. She goes through the process, is now legally a female and can marry her male partner. Now she gets all benefits as someone’s wife.

apparently, ipodius is unfamiliar with the littleton vs. prange case in which a trans woman was judged as “male”, dissolving her marriage. and this is only but one example in which a trans person’s gender was deemed legally invalid. and you know, people still seem to be confused when it comes to trans genders.

sorry, but “gender identity” has everything to do with sexual orientation – you can’t have one without the other. sexual orientation is defined in the context of gender identity, and gender identity is necessary in order to have a sexual orientation.

in many people’s minds, i am merely an effeminate gay man in an illegal marriage with another gay man.

and that’s why we are equal, despite your belief that you are more equal than me.

we all know the saying. they know the saying, and its underlying truth. and they use it well, against us. they use it, and its power, to their own agenda. they know they can gather themselves around their hate, and rise up against us. they will continue to allow us to survive, so we will always be there to use for their end, as a symbol of their hate, to keep themselves together. because that’s all they have – their hate, and their love and worship of their power; their only true god.

they divide us any way they can, and they use enda, just like they use all their other tools. because if we are fighting among ourselves, we cannot fight against them. they never had any intention of giving us any rights (pdf), instead, only to keep us from coming together. to divide us. to make us weak.

marti says it well:

But really, isn’t worrying about the Presidential veto is a bit premature? For the life of me, I can’t see how this would ever pass in the Senate. The Matthew Shepard Act passed by ONE VOTE, how could anyone in their right mind think that this bill has a snowball’s chance in hell of passage?

they know it will never get past the senate. and even if the snowball’s chance hits the lottery, it will never get past the presidential veto. it has and will continue to keep us divided though, just as they intended.

they don’t care about anything their bible says, unless they can use it to increase their power. adultery, false witness, murder – none of these commandments from their god have any meaning or use for them, and they ignore them at will. loving their god, and loving their neighbors, their god’s two most important commandments, have no meaning for them, and they ignore those too. but the few references to homosexuality are their commandments, for those are the only ones they can use to worship their gods. hatred and power. and so long as we are divided, they will reign.

i got an email this morning from joe solmonese of the hrc that says, in part:

Dear Nexy,

I need your help.

Over the past two weeks, HRC has stayed at the table and fought for an inclusive version of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act…

it struck me that this conflicts with this press release which says, in part:

“Therefore, we are not able to support, nor will we encourage Members of Congress to vote against, the newly introduced sexual orientation only bill.

so if you’re not encouraging members of congress to vote against the sexual orientation only bill, how are you staying at the table fighting for an inclusive version of the bill?

dear joe,
i need your help.

i came across an article on salon How did the T get in LGBT? and read through the usual unlikely bedfellows arguments. what particularly struck me was panther58′s comment in the letters.

I mean, you might be able to convince a married, straight conservative that a gay man can feel the same thing for another man that a straight feels for his wife. It’s a much harder sell, though, to convince a straight person that some guys will only feel whole after their penis has been lopped off.

here is a perfect showcase for misunderstanding. the stereotypical transgender narrative, created by patriarchal medicine, used to further push us into a corner. in the minds of “married, straight conservatives”, transgender people are simply men who will only feel whole after lopping off their penis.

never mind that transgender people include those assigned female at birth, as well as those assigned male at birth. never mind that a huge majority of transgender people never have their “penis lopped off”. never mind that most transgender people i know date members of the sex opposite to the one they were assigned at birth, rendering them gay after they transition.

don’t confuse them with the facts. it’s much easier to hate someone whose entire existence is defined by their need to cut off their penis.

i don’t believe panther58′s opinion is unique to the straight community. walt baby love, who posted on joe.my.god’s post about donna rose’s resignation from the hrc, says:

I always thought of transsexuals as gays who were so self loathing they were willing to mutilate themselves rather than be labeled gay.
Just being honest about what I think.

thanks for your honesty, walt. at least we know how horribly wrong the narrative forced upon us has manifested in the minds and souls of our fellow human beings. that same narrative trans people are forced to use (or were in some cases, in which therapists and other medical providers finally got a clue) to obtain medical care.

so what can we do? i guess continue the fight. continue the education. continue protesting harmful stereotypes. and wait until these dinosaurs die off.

via bint at my private casbah, i came across another one of those “are you male or female” tests. the results, of course, were not very surprising.

i was going to wait until i finished it, but i just can’t. this book is amazing. julia serano is insightful, intellegent, and cuts right to the root of the issues. i was amazed even after the introduction and the trans woman manifesto, which are even before part one, chapter one. she rocks. this is required reading for *everyone*. and it’s even available on amazon. buy it and read it. now.