Comments for 0 at http://empowerment4women.com , comment 1 to 16 out of 16 comments http://empowerment4women.com Thu, 20 Nov 2008 03:17:38 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.2 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-33 Great Article -- very insightful. Thanks. I too get sick of the stares. I'm originally from New York City and usually when I'm there no one bugs me -- but here in the DC area people think it's their duty to make fun of or stare or mock me. I usually give as good as I get -- how dare they!!!!!??? - Ace Wed, 22 Aug 2007 05:12:11 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-28 Dawn, as someone who is attracted to gender variant people and is still struggling with questions regarding her own sexuality, I appreciate your article. Keep speaking out! - LC Mon, 09 Jul 2007 10:44:40 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-27 What an enlightening article! As a future nurse, wanting to specialize in women's health, these are issues I will be sure to educate my peers on. Wonderfull! - Tiffany Fri, 06 Jul 2007 10:46:57 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-25 Well, I highly recommend talking to trans groups about how to find culturally sensitive doctors. You can start at Whitman-Walker in DC, DCATS, and T*Families. I wrote an article recently here -- www.rhrealitycheck.org/blog/2007/06/07/reproductive-health-of-the-transgendered-one-mans-story -- where I list resources at the end. Hopefully this helps you and others out. As for acceptance within the lesbian community, I hope that we can all come to see that we're in this together, and that nobody's struggles should be used to further divide any marginalized community. - Ev Thu, 05 Jul 2007 08:14:52 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-24 [b]Hey you! Thanks for stopping by![/b] - Jae Wed, 04 Jul 2007 07:23:03 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-23 Hi Jae and Dawn. Stopping by to support you guys. The article was very well written. - bikergal Wed, 04 Jul 2007 07:02:37 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-22 Thanks for clarifying your previous post. As far as the location of restroom and doctors office issues, those incidents have occured while in VA, where there are no laws to protect us. Lastly, to clarify my comment. "If you are confronted with a situation such as this where you do not know how a person chooses to be addressed why not simply make the exception and just use the person's name - no pronouns until you get to have the opportunity to know them and "who" the are." I was refering to my encounter at the doctors office and how I felt things should have been handled and in general... Dawn wanted to inform people and to start a dialogue on this topic. Thanks for your input. - Jae Wed, 04 Jul 2007 05:53:52 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-13 Hi, Jae-- Since you replied to my comment, I'll respond to you here. I didn't say anything about the difference between FTMs who physically transition (by whatever means they take up), and male-identified butches, female-identified butches, or transgender people who choose never to physically transition when I wrote about taking the "brunt" of oppression. My comment at that point was about not creating a hierarchy of oppression, because 1.) it's quite impossible and unproductive to say that one person's abuse is worse than another's; and 2.) it very often limits any conversation about the complexity of ideology's ability to marginalize people by focusing on its effects instead of on its sources of power. Also, I'm a transman who IDs AS a transman and not simply as a man. Sometimes I pass and sometimes I don't, but I'm not for a minute going to say that I have, in the past as a butch, or in the present as a transsexual, have it worse or better or anything compared to anyone else. I do think that people who identify or present in the middle of the gender spectrum face abuse based on their gender non-conformity, but I can't see the value or foundation of argument in saying that a transwoman's death is "better" than the death of someone who lived life androgynously. And given the dearth of statistics on hate crimes in gender non-conforming communities in this country, there is no basis for saying that anyone "takes the brunt" of anything. So that was my rationale for those statements. I think you should know that if you are in Washington, DC, in the past two years we have passed an amendment to the Human Rights Act and some followup regulations to help enforce that amendment, that protect transgender and gender variant people who live and work (or visit) the city. You are legally entitled to use the public restroom that concurs with your gender identity or expression, you cannot be fired from your job or refused entry to a homeless shelter, or refused housing by any landlord in the city. For more on your rights under the Act, take a look at www.dctranscoalition.org. While the world may be rough, in my experience (as I said in my last comment -- I'm talking about MY experience), there are strategies for getting through sticky situations, and I can probably not say enough that using the restroom is a right, not a privilege, and it should be about YOUR comfort level, not the comfort level of strangers. And yes, I've been chased out of a women's room before. And going back to the regulations in DC again, all single-stalled restrooms in the city are now legally considered gender neutral. If that doctor's office incident happened in DC, you can report them to the Human Rights Commission in DC. As I've said in many other spaces, I believe it's not so much the gender identity of the person as it is how that person is perceived by others. So on that level I believe that butches, FTMs, transmen, genderqueer people, MTFs, and gender nonconformists all have something in common. That is not to say that they are the same, or that male-identified people should be in women's only spaces. MTFs should, yes, regardless of their surgical status or anything else. But if you ID as male, I think that means that it is not appropriate to be in their exclusive space. It's been a hard shift for me to make personally, as I was tied to the dyke community for so long, but I've found new ways to be an ally to the women and feminists in my life. I think if you're male-identified, then yes, it makes sense to occupy male space, trans space, ally space, etc. It's not about me "allowing" or not allowing you, since I wouldn't restrict anyone per se, and since I can't speak for women and any space they would deem women-only. But again, there are a number of resources for people on the male spectrum in DC, including DCATS (and there's a new group starting up for female-identified partners of male-identified people), that are good places to talk about these issues. They're also really good places to get information on trans-sensitive health providers, for your future medical needs. "If you are confronted with a situation such as this where you do not know how a person chooses to be addressed why not simply make the exception and just use the person's name - no pronouns until you get to have the opportunity to know them and "who" the are." Jae, I don't see where this has anything to do with my comment, so maybe you were referring to another comment here. Ev - Ev Mon, 02 Jul 2007 19:33:12 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-12 In response to Ev's comment...while your experience is valid and important, it is not the only one. Here is my response. She stated FTM's and Male Identified Butches taking the brunt. Not all FTM's have or will have any surgery (Top or Bottom) or take hormones. Some do have it all, some choose to just take testostorone and claim FTM as their Identity. Usually a FTM who is taking hormones ("T") would never be out as anything other then a male. He would only be out if he chose to reveal himself. I am a male identified Butch, meaning for myself that I am "in the middle", taking the brunt of what society has to offer on it's most ignorant level. I am one of those that gets stared at relentlessly, "patted on the back" like a young man by some and stared at by others, and I face the countless other obstacles that we all at one point or another being a part of the GLBTQ community have or will face. Here are some examples for those of you who are not aware of what it is like to just live life. Going to the restroom can be a scary challenge for a Male Identifed Transgendered Butch or someone that doesn't quite fit into either box (male or female). For me, if there is not a unisex restroom out in public, I have to make a choice. Which do I use in order to avoid the most attention and not put myself in danger? I look like a guy typically. Yet, there are those that see me as a female. What restroom do I use that will make everyone be at ease if I were to be noticed once inside? What if I go into a "Womens" restroom and scare someone thinking I'm a man or what if security gets a call that a man entered the womens restroom? There are all sorts of humilating/dangerous scenerios on a daily basis. Especially for someone like myself that is fairly small statured. Or, what about being at a "professional" doctors office? Just today I had the entire staff laugh at me because of the way I look. What do you do when the staff is going on "looks" only and behaves in an unprofessional manner, not bothering to read the new patients paperwork? People do not think twice when dealing with someone who is not like themselves or what is labeled as "normal". After being laughed at because of someone else's ignorance while sitting in a small waiting room full of other patients,. you become belittled and a funny joke to them. Is "IT" a male or a female? My question is this, as very simple as it might seem: If you are confronted with a situation such as this where you do not know how a person chooses to be addressed why not simply make the exception and just use the person's name - no pronouns until you get to have the opportunity to know them and "who" the are. On that last note, I would like to offer another question. Where would you suggest us "male identified Butches" be allowed? I am not FTM or a bio-male, so therefore I cannot fit into the constrictive gender binary place of either "male only space nor womens space only". To me that is what ties both ( I didn't know they were seperate entities) the butch-femme and trans community together. Equality is the tie that we all share. So by stating that I should be denied access to a certain "space" means that i am not welcome based upon "who" I am. No matter how anyone identifies, what it all boils down to is very simple. No matter what we are all human and each of us deserve respect and dignity for being an individual with the right to live our life as we choose, free from harm, ignorance and prejudice. Women-only feminist spaces claim to be working towards equality, but are they really? We shouldn't be defending what "womens" groups we are not allowed into for whatever reason that may be. That only serves to being further destructive to our cause as an unified (GLBTQ) community. Thanks. - Jae Mon, 02 Jul 2007 13:35:59 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-11 Thank you to everyone for their thoughts, words of encouragement, thought-provoking additions, etc. More than anything, I wrote this to honor my partner, address a specific concern within the feminist community and start a dialogue! I guess it's working! :) - Dawn Mon, 02 Jul 2007 13:18:40 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-10 In my experience, the butch-femme and transgender communities are different communities. And the hatred I used to experience as a masculine woman was much worse than the supportive back pats I get as a passing man. It doesn't seem to be my FTM status that's at issue when I'm in public -- it's how close I appear to one gender or the other, and this would go against your argument that FTMs experience more oppression (the "brunt") than lesbians. It's the folks in the middle who seem to have it the worst, for bucking the system. Nobody has to know my transgender status unless I tell them, or unless they ask why I have a rainbow sticker on the back of my car. As for women's spaces, perhaps male-identified people shouldn't seek to enter them. - Ev Mon, 02 Jul 2007 09:19:57 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-9 [b][i]I am honored to be yours. I love you more and more each day we spend together. You have such a beautiful, warm, loving, peaceful soul. Thank you for letting me be me, holding nothing back and learning what it means to love life and laugh once again.[/b][/i] - Jae Mon, 02 Jul 2007 09:11:20 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-8 As a fellow queer femme and partner of a transgendered individual, I could relate to so much of what you wrote in your article. The butch-femme community at large is a great and welcoming place for us as a couple, but there are even those within that group who are not of the belief that the community should be inclusive to those who identify as male, as my partner does. Like you, I wish for a society that is all-inclusive so that those from every walk of life and every gender identity could find a place in which they feel comfortable and accepted. Thank you for presenting your thoughts and appealing for such a space in your article. - Sandy Mon, 02 Jul 2007 08:58:44 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-6 What a touching and honest look inside a beautiful relationship. Being involved in a loving relationship, I cannot imagine what it would be like to have to "shield" my love for another person. I won't say I'm lucky that I'm in love with a man-- I think we're all lucky to find love and companionship on our life's journey,and who you love should not be an issue-- it's how you love. - Jen Kay-Williams Mon, 02 Jul 2007 04:41:01 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-5 This article means so much to me. It is beautifully written, I feel honored in every sense. Thank you for being so strong, so loving, open minded and for caring to bring change for the better. I am very lucky and grateful. I hope that you continue to write and share more. - Jae B. Mon, 02 Jul 2007 04:17:51 +0100 http://empowerment4women.com/culture/the_feminist_experience/my_transgendered_lover/#comment-4 That's an incredible article! Very touching! Amazing! Loved it! - Jo Adamcik Sun, 01 Jul 2007 21:16:30 +0100