according to enough non-sense, i’m a so called activist. my mother would be proud.

so i encountered this post on the syracuse.com blog site entitled “sex change hospital” by karla scoon reid. you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. to wit:

But, it’s the touching patients’ stories, not the medical techniques, which will draw viewers into Trinidad. In the premier episode, Vicki Estrada, a 56-year-old male-to-female transsexual, was supported throughout his genital reassignment surgery by his loving father. His father’s unconditional love was profoundly moving.

emphasis mine.

of course, in the next paragraph, regarding an f2m:

Another woman was having a hysterectomy to further complete her transformation to becoming a man. Jim Howley, a female-to-male transsexual, had tried to commit suicide seven times. His mother was distraught, believing she’d lost her daughter in this surgery. Later, however, the mother realized that it’s better to have a son who is alive, than a dead daughter.

holy mixed pronouns, batman!

pretty confusing considering the opening paragraph states:

“Sex Change Hospital” easily could have exploited people in the guise of informing or entertaining television viewers.

right, no “exploitation”, just blatant disregard for and erasure of people’s self identification.

oh right, and in the first quote, there’s that “unconditional love” bit. because when it comes to trans people, regular love just doesn’t cut it. we’re so horrible and monstrous that it takes “unconditional love” to show any kind of support.

stassa writes about transsexual pride.

I am proud to be transsexual and I do not suffer from a medical condition.

yeah, what she said.

i attended the phoenix pink pistols saturday shoot today, and i wore my smith & wesson “yeah, i shoot like a girl” tank top. the range was pretty busy, though there were only 5 of us there. i tried out my .38 jacketed hollow points which performed flawlessly. made by hornady, i expected nothing less, especially considering what i paid for them (more than twice the price of standard .38 ammo). i’ll say that hornady ammo has lived up to its high end reputation.

(the bullet on the left is the hornady .38 jacketed hollow point)

i also found out that one of the other women, who i’ve known for several months now and have shot with several times, is trans.

i had no clue.

we all met at copper star coffee after the shoot and were sipping coffee talking about this and that, and she mentions that she’s going in for surgery, probably by the end of the year. thinking that she had some kind of ailment, or perhaps she was going in for a hysterectomy or something, i gently probed for a little more information. she looked at me and said, “you know, *the* surgery”. i had a blank look on my face, as i had no idea to what she might be referring. i started thinking that maybe there was some kind of girl thing about which i hadn’t yet received the memo. then she said “srs”.

at first i thought she might be making fun of me.

but no, it turned out she’s trans, and pre op. i remember thinking to myself “but i thought you were a real girl!”. and i caught myself and realized how bad i was for my poor use of language, even in my own head. i also caught myself shifting my perception, and had to remind myself that this bit of news really changes nothing, other than finding myself offering to help with her recovery, since i’ve been through it myself.

just…wow.

oh, and here’s a pic from the handgun basics class a few weeks ago of me trying on an AK-47 for size. they’re ugly rifles, aren’t they.

it seems that calling a trans person “it”, is the new “that’s so gay”. in the comments of a celebrity gossip column about christian slater, reported by tmz.com, two commenters suggest christian’s new girlfriend must be trans.
first, r.zimmerman says:

Is the girlfriend a transsexual? It looks like a man trying to be woman.

(emphasis mine)
then, jumbo loan account says:

17. that girl does look like a trans

so, “it” looks like “a trans”.

this reminds me of a post secret entry that was posted this week:

yes, society treats us like monsters, or just kills us.

so the discussion on real transbigotry over at pam’s house blend turned into a shouting match, and was shut down, with all comments deleted. i can totally understand why that decision was made. i read pam’s every day, and the mud slinging and back stabbing that occurred from both sides in that thread was totally out of line. it’s just amazing to me how certain groups of grown women can’t hold a civil discussion.

i do wish they’d have kept the comments though. it was a perfect example of how not to have a discussion, and who the perps were. well, based on the heat, i imagine that this type of thing will rear it’s ugly head before too long.

you’ve no doubt heard of godwin’s law, which states:

“As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one.”.

i propose a new law which states:

“As a trans-related online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving men in dresses approaches one.”

i call it “nexy’s law”, and i will promptly exit said online discussion immediately, according to the first corollary of nexy’s law, which states:

“once such a comparison is made, the thread is finished and whoever mentioned the men in dresses has automatically “lost” whatever debate was in progress.”

i’ll add that as both a jew and a transwoman, i am uniquely qualified to coin nexy’s law.

i have a news feed on bloglines which gathers articles based on two google searches; transgender and transsexual. it helps me stay current with all things trans. i came across this story the other day, regarding a local trans woman in mesa, arizona, a few miles from my location.

in the first story from ktar.com, the headline from the feed reads “transsexual mesa man arrested for exposure” (emphasis mine). though the article itself is headlined “mesa transsexual arrested for exposure”. i guess ktar had to get in their digs. and the comments reflect the worst of humanity, referring to the trans woman with male pronouns, as a “freak”, confused, mentally ill, and one commenter considering themselves “fortunate to not have witnessed this news story”.

the second story from kpho channel 5 has the feed headline and article headline the same “transsexual charged with indecent exposure”.

az central.com reports the story as well, in the most objective and non-judgmental fashion.

the story itself is heartbreaking, on a few levels. i’ve encountered kendra on a message board a while back, and she’s complained about her neighbors on several occasions. the typical reports from transwomen that we’ve heard so many times in the past - childish and homophobic taunting and harassment, mostly from men who can’t seem to deal with people different from themselves. you know, the “family christian values” that members of lgbt community are accused of lacking.

not knowing the whole story, i can’t honestly make any kind of accurate assessment of the respective behaviors of each party. i can say that exposing ones self is never appropriate in our society except in a mutually consensual intimate context. and brandishing a gun, bb or otherwise, is far beyond inappropriate - guns are not toys, and even a bb gun can be deadly. but then again, we don’t really know to what level her tormentors drove her. she’s not the only person i know of to reportedly expose herself in public, nor is she the first person to recklessly brandish a weapon.

and having encountered these types of situations myself, i can understand what constant harassment of ones personhood and humanity can do to a person. and though i’d like to believe i’d never behave that way, it’s not like i’ve never surprised myself when i’m angry and upset.

julia serano, of whipping girl fame, is calling for transsexual narratives on her site, and on the trans group blog, in an effort to “challenge[s] psychologist Ray Blanchard’s causal theory of ‘autogynephilia’ “. further details are available on either linked site.

she plans on submitting her research to a peer-reviewed psychology journal. i believe this to be a worthy effort. no name or contact information of the people who submit their narratives will be shared or published.

i came across this article that covers a relationship between a trans woman and her female partner, in the context of national coming out day. it wasn’t the article itself that caught my eye, but rather the first three comments.

Posted by stevevs on October 12, 2007 at 10:06 a.m.
So did that one person go from being a guy to a lesbian woman?

Posted by olokun on October 12, 2007 at 10:52 a.m.
That’s what it sounds like, stevevs. I wonder how frequent that is. I also wonder how often the violence against “trans women” my [sic] straight men was precipitated by pre-op trans women secuding [sic] straight men then popping a surprise on them. I don’t condone violence, but that seems like serious provocation to me.

Posted by JustSayin on October 12, 2007 at 11:36 a.m.
“She described feeling “ripped apart” while still a biological male. “I had a desire for women, but I couldn’t really express it, and I didn’t know why.”"

So you have yourself surgically mutilated so you can become a lesbian? No ‘hate’ coming from me here, just absolute amazement.

olokun - there is no provocation worth violence - ya just gotta walk away.

this covers several issues - loaded language with “surgically mutilated”; “provocation” in being unfortunate enough to being attractive to some male, and failing to engage in the “big reveal” of ones medical history before he takes off your clothes, causing “popping a surprise”; among others.

i wonder about the reverse. imagine a scenario in which i am “provoked” to violence toward a man who failed to “reveal” he’d been “surgically mutilated” by circumcision, thereby “popping a surprise” on me. perhaps we ought to require everyone to carry “disclaimers”, clearly outlining any “mutilations” or other medical or social conditions, with a place for signatures by the “disclaimee”.

or, if one is offended by anyone or any body part that doesn’t exactly fit into ones idea of what a man or a woman is, you know, just ask, before you get into bed.