Comments (15)

By Rebecca, July 31, 2009 4:36 pm

A recent comment from (amusingly enough) “Your Personal Troll” to On the Edge of Trolling, Pt 5 was written in such a way to make me want to respond, if only to get my own thoughts in order.

For the sake of disclaimers: I’m going to assume the commenter has the best of intentions. However, I have no obligation to respond to (let alone allow in the first place) any comments on this blog, particularly ones who say I my resources “could be spent better” on something other than “the wild goose chase” of transitioning. Likewise, it is not my obligation to educate you. Google, Wikipedia, your local library – all places that can and do provide informative resources for your further education. Lastly, unless otherwise noted, I speak for no one but myself. I make no claim for my experience to be representative of anyone’s but my own.

All that said, lets get to the comment. I’ll selectively quoting here, so check out the original if you want the full text.

Continue reading 'An ‘Edge of Trolling’ Detour'»

Comments (2)

By Rebecca, July 30, 2009 1:38 am

I know I haven’t posted for a few days, so I figured I’d send out a few minor updates.

First, this past Monday, I performed in The Homo Show, a variety show put on by About Face Theatre. It was tons of fun and, although I was really nervous, it went well. I performed a piece based off this post, although with a more positive ending. I got lots of positive feedback (and apparently made one woman cry, which is a first for me…) so it charged me up as I work toward my December performance.

On a separate note, I’m typing this on a shiny new (old) Power Mac G5 – one of the more advanced pre-Intel Mac desktops. I’m still getting used to it and all its quirks… For example, I know “different” and “stupid” aren’t the same thing, but some of the Mac keyboard shortcuts are just flat out stupid. As far as I can see, there’s no rhyme or reason to why some shortcuts use Ctrl, some use Apple, and some use Option.

If anyone knows of any logic behind Apple’s shortcut choices, I’d love to hear about it…

Continue reading 'Some quick updates'»

Comments (17)

By Rebecca, July 27, 2009 12:46 am

(A note: These have sort of moved from “this might be trolling” to “this is obviously trolling,” but I like the title too much to change it. So “On the Edge of Trolling” it remains.)

Yet another comment to Misogyny and the Male Gaze, which is apparently where baby trolls go to learn how to fly:

No amount of blogging, self denial, surgery, or hormone pills is ever gong to change this fact:

Born a man, always a man. Born a woman, always a woman.

This is straight, clear cut science. It cannot be argued against. It’s as solid as 1+1=2.

Mmm. Smell that? Some lovely proof by assertion, with a hint of You’re arguing with opinions not fact, vintage 2009.

I think the only appropriate course of action is to respond in kind:

No amount of trolling, assertion, rejection, or dismissal is ever going to change this fact:

Gender is more complicated than what’s between your legs, or what you were assigned at birth.

This is straight, clear cut science. It cannot be argued against. It’s as solid as 1+1=2.

See? I can make assertions without backing them up, too! I could back them up, referencing some of the various different ways that gender is more complicated than “Born a man, always a man. Born a woman, always a woman.” (And that’s without even getting into trans issues!) But that would be silly.

Likewise, I could respond by stating that my own lived experience gives the lie to your assertions. That your argument boils down to how no true Scotsman would ever transition in the first place, and therefor I must not “really” be a woman. That stating “It’s as solid as 1+1=2″ does not magically make it so.

But since all of those arguments are hypothetical, and nothing I’d ever actually put forth as a response, I guess you win: My transition has been for naught, and I shall now attempt to rebuild the shambles of my gender-confused life.

Comments (3)

By Rebecca, July 25, 2009 9:50 pm

I’ve mentioned my status as ‘geek’ on more than one occasion. As it relates to computers, I have a laptop (which I’m using more and more as it’s nice to sit in the living room and write blog posts about how I’m able to sit in the living room blogging) and a desktop (which I use for media storage and playing games).

Unfortunately, it seems like the desktop is on the way out.

Continue reading 'Silly computer…'»

Comments (2)

By Rebecca, July 23, 2009 12:35 am

Enjoy!

• An Open Letter, from (trans)pose – a great open letter (obviously) to “Cissexual Queer/Gender Theorists, Feminists, and Trans Allies” because “some of y’all have been talking about me, and you’ve been talking so loudly that you haven’t been hearing what I’m saying. Some of you haven’t even noticed that I’m in the room.”
• The 6 Most Depressing Happy Endings in Movies from Cracked – I know, I know, another list? But it’s funny! There’s a Galactic Empire Official Defense Strategy flowchart!
• Disability Is…? at Feministe – My mom has worked with disabled students and kids for as long as I can remember, so I find discussions about the language surrounding disability – particularly in light of discussions surrounding cis – particularly interesting
• How Hard Is It To Transition In Your Hometown? from TransGriot – As someone transitioning in her hometown, I think this is worth reading. I would have commented on it, but anonymous comments are disabled and I don’t want a Blogspot account (To be clear, I’m not faulting people for ensuring they know who is posting to their blog, I just don’t want to have a login for every blog at which I’d like to comment occasionally…)
• Operation Beautiful from Feministe – I did this at work, and need to check to make sure it wasn’t taken down from the bathroom
• A bit of a blogular digression at Questioning Transphobia – A good review of why “But trans women can’t understand born-women’s experiences!” is a strawman argument

Comments (13)

By Rebecca, July 21, 2009 8:53 pm

(I tried for about five minutes, but couldn’t come up with a good pun using ‘name.’ Feel free to suggest better post titles in the comments…)

Yesterday I went back down to the Daley Center to finalize my name change, from what I was given at birth to what I’ve been using for the last seven months (at work), year and a half (with friends), or fifteen years (in my head). I suppose the timeline is all in how you look at it.

Continue reading 'Name change'»

Comments (4)

By Rebecca, July 21, 2009 10:23 am

Name change went well, and I’ll post a much expanded retelling later.

For now, I wanted to turn once again to comments that are barely questionable as trolling.  That is, comments that are almost certainly posted just to be obnoxious, but there’s the slimmest sliver of a chance the person honestly thinks that way and isn’t intending to be inflammatory. This latest comment was posted to in reference to Misogyny and the Male Gaze:

What I love about trans is this:  They were sensitive and easily hurt to begin with, but now they feel they have a reason.  The dude’s always bothered you because he doesn’t think like you, but now the way he thinks *directly* deals with you, or so you think.

Get over it.  Yes, you are “a pair of tits with a dick”, and lots of people are going to see it that way.  Is that cool and fair and right? No.  But how many minds are you changing by whining about it?  Whining implies that you have no balls.

I mean, cry all you want, but you had your chance, still have your chance to be the man you were born as, so I think the crying is a little weird, forced and irrelevant at this point.

How delightful!

Continue reading 'On the Edge of Trolling, pt 4'»

Comments (2)

By Rebecca, July 19, 2009 7:46 pm

I’m going back down to the Daley Center tomorrow to finalize my name change and I’m nervous! I go before a judge and basically need to convince her that I’m not attempting to commit fraud or escape debt by changing my name. (Obviously I’m doing neither.)

Legally, there should be no reason to say no to the name change, but there’s still the slim possibility I’ll magically end up with a major bigot for a judge. As I’ve said before, I have little doubt my white, middle-class, lawyer’s-daughter privilege would eventually let me get things back on track, but I have no desire to play “Convince a judge trans people have valid needs” tomorrow.

The only nice thing (which I’m glad I just checked online) is the central Chicago DMV is down the block from the Daley Center, so I won’t have to go out of my way to get my corrected license.

Assuming everything goes smoothly with the judge at 9AM, it’s possible I’ll have not only my name change paperwork but an actual new license by noon!

Comments (0)

By Rebecca, July 18, 2009 2:08 am

I’ve mentioned before that I live in the same city in which I grew up. (Well, the larger city imediately south of the city in which I grew up.) I’m living with friends from highschool, working with organizations where I was involved pre-transition, and so on. So it shouldn’t be a surprise to me at this point that A) I’m going to run into people at parties who I haven’t seen since highschool and B) most of my friends (and their friends) are not queer.

Continue reading 'Social Circles'»

Comments (0)

By Rebecca, July 13, 2009 9:53 pm

A few weeks ago I wrote I Want to be Empty. It was, shall we say, not my most optimistic or positive of posts. I’m still kind of in a slump, and having a tough time getting out of it, but I thought a followup post might be in order. A post that, if not exactly positive, was at least looking in a forward direction. So, without further ado…

I want to be full.

Full of pride. Pride in my appearance, in my voice, in my presentation, in myself. Pride in who I am, day after day, and who I can be.

Full of contentment. Contentment in the choices I have made, am making, and will make. Contentment at being surrounded by friends and family who accept me, who love me.

Full of joy. Joy of life, of love, of sex, of biking past the lake on the way to work and seeing the horizon. Joyful laughter pushing past my teeth and exploding out my lips.

Full of confidence. Confidence in my ability to get up, get dressed, put on makeup, do my hair, speak on the phone, walk down the street, look and feel and act the way I imagine myself able to do.

I want to feel these emotions bubbling up inside me, rising like the tide, fizzing and popping with carbonation. Strengthening bone and muscle and sinew as they pass, until I am filled with light and ready to fly away like a bird.

I want to take in the world through eyes able to focus outward, too see and be seen.