I’ve been successful this past week in having a post every day, and even working ahead to have posts ready and in the pipeline a few days out. I’m really going to try and keep this up, because I love the amount of interaction and response that comes when I’m more consistent with my postings.
To that end, here’s a thought for this Saturday:
Google News archives have just over 70,000 results for a search of ‘transgender’:
They also let you see a graph of news results over the last 20 years:
And a timeline for all the results in their archives, since 1960:
An interesting pattern, no?
Continue reading 'Patterns of “Transgender” in Google News archives'»
I was talking with some coworkers this week, B who has been there almost a year and K, the woman I’m training to be my replacement. We were joking about a number of things, and B made a self-deprecating joke about being gay. I followed up with a self-deprecating joke about being trans, and turned to K, saying, “You know I’m trans, right?”
That’s been my general coming out tactic lately, and I think I’ve mentioned it once or twice before on this blog. Today, K paused (awkwardly, I felt) and said, “Oh, yeah.”
Continue reading '“You know I’m trans, right?”'»
Just when you thought it was over, there are a few more questions to answer!
- Did you dress like a girl before you considered yourself transgender? (Dress in drag, I guess?)
Occasionally, but not a lot. And that’s due in large part because of that language: it felt like dressing in drag. And the last thing I wanted, the last thing I ever wanted, was to feel like a boy in a dress. So while I did experiment every so often with sneaking something from my mom’s wardrobe, it was never that satisfying. (I denied taking her clothing the one or two times she confronted me about it. Maybe, in retrospect, if I’d come clean – and talked about my desires to not be a boy – my life might have turned out very differently.
Once I was able to put a name on my discomfort – I was trans, not a crossdresser – I was able to start experimenting with ways of feeling more feminine. Things like growing my hair out, shaving my legs, and so on. That eventually turned into buying women’s clothing, but by that point I’d say I was actually transitioning and not just experimenting.
Continue reading 'Questions on being trans, from highschoolers (pt 6)'»
Baruch atah adonai eloheinu melech ha’olam asher kidshanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu al ha-milah. Baruch atah adonai eloheinu melech ha’olam asher kidshanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu lihach-neeso bivreito shel Avraham aveenu.
Blessed are You, O Lord Our God, Ruler of the universe, who has sanctified us with Your commandments, and has given us the command concerning circumcision. Blessed are You, O Lord Our God, Ruler of the universe, who has sanctified us with Your commandments, and hast commanded us to make our sons enter the covenant of Abraham our father. (Source)
Eight days after birth, Jewish boys are supposed to be circumcised as part of the covenant between God and Abraham (in Genesis), as specified in Leviticus. In this way, Jewish boys are supposed to continue the line of the Children of Israel, fulfilling the obligations and duties laid out for them in the Torah.
There are no required rituals or ceremonies to mark the birth of a girl.
Snip snip!
Continue reading 'Circumcision'»
While driving to work this morning, someone pulled up along side me at a stoplight and motioned for me to roll down my window. He was gesturing to the back of my car and saying something, and I worried that I had a light out, my trunk was open, or (worst of all) I hadn’t noticed a flat tire.
I rolled down my window and he started talking across the gap between our cars. I couldn’t really hear him over the rain, complicated by his soft voice and foreign accent. I finally understood that he was complimenting me on my bumper stickers. This happens every so often, and I always get a kick out of it. I have a couple dozen bumper stickers on the back of my car, ranging from the political – about Obama or women’s rights – to the silly (“No, I will not fix your computer”). I thanked him, and started to roll my window back up, when he yelled something I heard very clearly:
“Wanna meet up some place?
I rolled up my window, turned back to the light (green, by this time), and sped away.
Continue reading 'The male gaze can jump in a lake'»
I wish I remember who recommended Transgender Voices: Beyond Women and Men to me. It may have been through this blog, but…oh well! The book is written by Lori Girshick, a “sociologist and social justice activist,” and is an exploration of 150 interviews she conducted with individuals who responded to a survey looking for “gender transgressors.” Much of the book directly quotes these interviews, with Girshick interjecting her summarized opinions and conclusions throughout.
The book is divided into 6 chapters, with multiple sub-headings in each chapter. The chapters are:
- The Social Construction of Biological Fact
- Self-Definition: Birth through Adolescence
- Constructing the Self: Options and Challenges
- Coming Out to Community, Family, and Work
- Gender Policing
- Inner Turmoil and Moving Toward Acceptance
There is also an epilogue, “Gender Liberation,” and an appendix with the survey-advertising flier and the survey itself.
As you may be able to guess from the book’s subtitle, “Beyond Women and Men,” and even more so from the chapter titles, I generally agree with the politics of Transgender Voices. Girshick does a solid job of representing a very wide spectrum of people, and (for the most part) she interjects her own thoughts only to provide context or summarize how aggregate groups felt, rather than impose a specific definition of identity or gender.
However, in the introduction, “Identity Boxes,” Girshick lays the groundwork for a view I’m not 100% comfortable with:
My own bias in this book is to advocate for liberation from the binary gender system, which for many people artificially restricts the fullest expression of self. At the same time, though, I deeply respect those who wish to identify with “male” or “female,” “man” or “woman,” and are willing to undergo expensive and painful medical treatments to achieve physical correspondence with who they feel themselves to be given the current gender system.” (Pg 11, Emphasis in original)
Continue reading 'Review: Transgender Voices'»
It’s been a while, I know, but I figured it was time to finish off some of these questions. Lets go!
- Do you want to have “bottom” surgery?
“Bottom” surgery usually means sex reassignment surgery (SRS) and I think “want’ is a tricky word to use here. If the Vagina Fairy came through my window (no, not that one) to wave her wand and give me a pussy, I’d say “Yes!” in a heartbeat. I’d also say that I do want to have had SRS, in the same way I want to have learned a foreign language: I want the results, but don’t want to go through the pain and suffering to get there. But do I want to have surgery at some point in the future?
I’m not sure.
Continue reading 'Questions on being trans, from highschoolers (pt 5)'»
This post was prompted by an article in Yoga Journal, given to me by my mom, called “Forgiveness Heals.” There will be a companion post, a writing exercise about forgiving myself, sometime soon.
I’m sorry.
I’m sorry I stayed silent too long, spoke too softly to be heard, gave in too quickly.
My kindergarten classroom stretched along an endless hallway. There was a finger-painting station, a corner with cardboard building blocks, a book nook, a playhouse with a kitchen. Trim along the ceiling had numbers, one for each day of the school year, and we would hold a little classroom celebration every time we hit a number ending in zero. We sang, and drew, and played tag at recess. Once a week, I would leave the class and go down the hall to talk with the school psychologist. Even then, my parents knew something was wrong.
I’m sorry I didn’t tell her – in her office with reassuring colors and a calm far removed from the kindergarten class – that there had been some mistake, that my bowl-cut should have been reserved for a boy, could I trade in my button-down shirts for pigtails, please?
Continue reading 'Apologizing to myself'»
One of the questions I’m sometimes asked is whether or not there’s anything I regret about transitioning. Generally I either say “Nope!” or comment on how I missed the testosterone-fueled muscles I had pre-hormones, but not much else.
As summer approaches – and Chicago experiences an unseasonable streak of 70+ degree weather in early April – it made me realize I do miss one other thing: going topless.
Continue reading 'Topless while trans'»
Comments (2) 
They also let you see a graph of news results over the last 20 years:
And a timeline for all the results in their archives, since 1960:
An interesting pattern, no?
Themocracy