Presidential candidate Roseanne Barr isn’t known for holding her peace. But the actress-activist has upset members of the transgender community with some comments she posted on Twitter.
When one of her Twitter followers mentioned that Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein “is also in favour of letting men into spaces where little girls get changed.”—a presumed reference to Stein’s support for trans rights—Barr tweeted back, “if she has a penis she is not allowed in.”
When a Twitter user accused Barr of transphobia, she tweeted back, “Women do not want your penises forced in their faces or in our private bathrooms. Respect that FACT.”
Angry tweets came fast and furious, with many trans folks and their allies expressing dismay that someone like Barr was taking such a stance.
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One replied: “@TheRealRoseanne, I’m extremely disgusted in your transphobic behaviour. I HAD a lot of respect for you. You are no ally.”
More recently, Barr tweeted: “I remember when the LGBT community stopped supporting NAMBLA” and claimed “I was instrumental in forcing lgbts to dis include man boy love as part of their program.”
Okaaaay.
Ronny
So she’s ok with a transwomen getting the shit beat out of her in mens room?
Eric Auerbach
Trans women need to grow a pair and not take this kind of shit. They need to show they have the balls to stand up to the bigots.
Guillermo3
How can anyone take Roseanne,seriously?Trying to forget the
very serious shit she tried to pull off with her
“recovered memories” a few years ago[it was fashionable
psychobabble at the time], I think the best,and certainly
the funniest take on RB was the SNL sketch which showed
her undergoing Liposuction.
Noktomezo
She isn’t a candidate. Jill Stein is.
Cathy
Roseanne Barr is a hero. Shame on Queerty for writing lesbians out of this story.
http://bugbrennan.com/tag/roseanne-barr/
hex0
If you have a penis you shouldn’t be in the women’s toilets. This isn’t rocket science.
Wh1t
@Cathy:
Sure thing, radscum. Take your cissexist, bigoted rhetoric and get out.
Lexi
This Lesbian is disgusted by Roseanne’s comments! This is not the behavior of a hero, but a bigot!
stadacona
How exactly did T get added to LGB. I don’t really see the connection. T is not a sexual orientation. I also suspect most T don’t like gay men, but they sure do like our political success.
Guillermo3
@stadacona:Rather mean-spirited,resentful,
and possiblyignorant comment,stadcona.[From our last encounters in these pages,
I still think staidcoma describes your utterances very accurately.]
Too late in the evening[or early in the morning,really] to comment at length,
but are you aware that many transgendered people feel excluded
by gay men and lesbians?Try coming out of your coma and putting aside your bile.
Thedrdonna
@stadacona: Well, many many trans folk are LGB, at a far higher rate than the general population. In addition to that,very few are hetero both before and after transitioning. Also, “transgender” refers to all genderplay, not just people who transition, so that tends to include drag and all that. Oh, and to a bible-thumping bigot who’s looking to “stomp a mudhole” in some queer, the femme gay guy is just as likely a target as the trans woman. If you’re all for gay men being separatist, why aren’t you calling out lesbians and bi folk? It seems like you’ve got a personal vendetta against trans folk.
Guillermo3
@Wh1t: Seriously curious,Whlt:
What is radscum(I imagine not a radical’s ejaculate) and what
is the meaning of “cissexist”?
Guillermo3
@Thedrdonna: Thanks,Thedrdonna!!
Thedrdonna
@Guillermo3: There is a rather contentious debate between radical feminists and some of the more excitable trans activists on a variety of things, but the main thing is that these feminists do not consider trans women to be real women, and so they basically say that those trans women who are attracted to women are not “lesbians”, by their definition. Given that their lines of logic to support that are approximately as advanced as those put forward by most other anti-trans bigots, it’s gotten a lot of heat from the trans community. In the time-honored tradition of labeling one’s enemies with childish names (a la Lyin Ryin, or Libtards), these radical feminists have sometimes been called “radscum”, because that’s totally a good way to get other folks to your side. Oh, and cisgender is considered the opposite of transgender, in that transgender is being uncomfortable with your assigned-at-birth gender, and cisgender is being comfortable with it. Thus, cissexism is anti-trans animus.
Guillermo3
@Thedrdonna: Thanks for the information,
Thedrdonna[your name reminds me of Theadora,the slut wife of
the Emperor Justinian.I didn’t know any of that.
Rather sad,really.When are we ever going to realize ourselves as all
allies in difference and as human beings?
Thedrdonna
Heh, I’m glad to help! I feel like the best way to effect change is to give people information. My name is actually a reference to Dr Who, because I’m an irretrievable nerd.
Dumdum
Roseanne has always been a loud opinionated b**ch so no surprise there. I was going to vote for her as a personal protest to partisan politics. Guess I’m going with Jill. Looks like Romney is getting the popular vote. A sad comment on the stupidity of the American people. President Obama has got the electoral votes so far. But it is going to be a nail biter. I really wish that I could afford to move to Denmark or Holland. I am REALLY tired of narrow minded, knuckle dragging, gun toting, butt scratching, hate mongers. AND honey effing boo boo.
Shannon1981
I am soooo tired of supposed activists being completely ignorant. The thing is, Roseanne and others, GRS is expensive. Most trans women- you wouldn’t know if they had a penis or not. You wouldn’t know if they were trans. Further, you are much less likely to be assaulted by a trans woman in a bathroom than anyone else, but she sure as hell would be attacked in the men’s room. Genitals do not = gender.
Roseanne is absolutely transphobic, and I’ve lost all respect I had for her.
BradT
Brava Roseanne. Like your common sense approach!
krandall
Transphobia? I’m so confused. Is that transferring your phobia to someone or something else?
I’m not kidding. There are so many new terms I can’t keep up and it’s not in the dictionary. Can someone explain what Roseanne is being accused of? Thanks.
PRINCE OF SNARKNESS aka DIVKID
@Cathy:
i’m all for feminism. i’m all for radicalism. but a cursory glance at your blog demonstrates the kind of dehumanising hatred indistinguishable from the extreme right-wing. the “scum” in the appellation “radscum” is an apt characterisation your views. presumably you also see transmen as sick, and probably as traitors, too.
the unsubtle subtext to this is that pre-op/non-op mtf’s pose a sexual threat to girls and women. well, conceivably so too do lesbians. or rather it wouldn’t be hard to convince many heterosexuals this is the case, mandating the need for separate facilities for those scary butch lesbians… just to be safe, y’know for the children… but no hate intended, obviously.
@Shannon1981: welcome back shannon. we’ve missed your rationality round here.
Shannon1981
@PRINCE OF SNARKNESS aka DIVKID: I am in New York now! Taking a bit to settle in, but oh how I am loving being on the committees at the LGBTQ center and campaigning for Obama!
Sarai
Okay, so this doesn’t really have anything to do with the transgender part of this, but why in the world would Jill Stein debate Roseanne Barr? Jill Stein is a real candidate! Roseanne is some looney write in desperately trying to cling to whatever fame she had in the 90s.
Okay, transgender part…as for the person asking how this is transphobia…I think if that’s not obvious you may need to do some self examination! Transgender people should NOT only be accepted in the LGBT community!
What’s that slogan that’s been going around lately? I am an ally! (I think that’s it!)
Shannon1981
@BradT: Common sense? You mean by advocating pushing trans women into mens space where they will be beat up?
PRINCE OF SNARKNESS aka DIVKID
@Shannon1981: damn, girl! you will run new york. lol.
your point about not really knowing who’s got what plumbing is very salient. how would this be policed….airport-style patdowns for even somewhat masculine-looking cisgendered women….this is crazy.
Shannon1981
@PRINCE OF SNARKNESS aka DIVKID: LOL! I am upstate, about 90 miles from the city. The LGBTQ center for the Hudson Valley is great. I am doing Marriage Equality Phone Banking for those who do not have it in their states yet. You know me, always rallying for the cause!
And yes, this is silly. I am a masculine looking cis woman who gets questioned all the time. Its fucking NUTS to try to usher me into the men’s room….for what? Because
I don’t fit some pre conceived gender role norms? What Roseanne and others here are advocating for is frankly dangerous. Woe betide the person who grabs MY crotch to see what’s there before letting me into a women’s locker room or what have you.
Shannon1981
And I left a comment on Cathy’s blog, one I am sure will not make it out of moderation. I said:
Trans women are WOMEN. End of. Genitals do not = gender, you ignorant fuck.
Dumdum
@Shannon1981: Please forgive my ignorance but what is.masculine-looking cisgendered women. I do not know the definition of cis.
Shannon1981
cisgendered means you are born the gender you identify. For instance, I am assigned female at birth, and identify (somewhat) female.
Dumdum
@Shannon1981: Never mind. cis Latin for same sided. Translation- You are a real woman with woman plumbing. Not transgendered.
QueerTheorist
Wow! What a lot of heteronormative bs being posted here. If we truly embraced the queer agender and stopped pandering to heteronormatve gender identities we would not need to worry about whether T should be added to LGB or not …
Shannon1981
@Dumdum: Yeah, except, the term “real” implies that trans women are not real women; they indeed are. Think of their male plumbing as a birth defect.
Carolyn in Baltimore
The original story Roseanne responded to was about an adult male allowed in a womens college dressing room and sauna, and when teenage girls complained about a man in the sauna, the girls had to find another place to change for swim practice because this man’s fantasy trumped Title IX rights to equal accommodations for women.
It is not transphobic to ask for safety for girls, to ask that predators not get housed in womens prisons, to affirm that lesbians don’t need to sleep with be-penised people.
The amount of violence directed at Roseanne for affirming that a pervy dude with intact penis should not be in a sauna or dressing room with girls kind of proves the point. Rationality all out the window because gender-fantasy fetishism trumps all womens rights. So death and rape threats. So ‘womanly’. Not.
Shannon1981
@Carolyn in Baltimore: What is your definition of a man? IF it is anyone with a penis, you are dead wrong.
Dumdum
@Shannon1981: K. Thank you. An interesting point and well taken I might add. I choose to embrace a more androgynous state rather that identify with my masculine. A balance of yin and yang. I have always been accepting of the transgendered and believe they must be included in our community. I do not understand how some Gay people can think that they do not belong with us.
Thedrdonna
@Carolyn in Baltimore: Hey do you think you could post an actual link? That way we could read it too and all be on the same page. As it stands, though, you’ve got an awful lot of bigotry there in your comments, with the “gender fantasy fetishism” and all that tripe. I have trouble figuring out if you got that from the radical feminists or from the Illinois Family Institute.
mdoll
@stadacona:
The T got added when Trans folks started Pride, started the “gay movement”, by starting the riots at Stonewall. There wouldn’t be gay rights if it wasn’t for Trans* people. Show some respect!!!!!
Thedrdonna
@mdoll: I think it’s important to note that drag queens/kings are part of the trans umbrella. If you don’t do that, people might accuse you of trying to co-opt that part of history, when that’s not the case. Trans folk aren’t an infiltrator into the LGBT movement, we’ve been here all along!
pomosapien
You aren’t entitled to give your personal approval of everyone using the same bathroom as you (I mean you can give it or not, but no one has to acknowledge that or care.) Maybe you don’t like that they have certain genitals. Maybe you don’t like the fact that they dress and wear their hair a certain way. Maybe you don’t like their race, or their disability, or their body hair, or their hygienic state. Maybe you don’t like that they’re on their cell phone. Big. Freaking. Deal. You do not have a right never to be uncomfortable; if spending a few minutes in a bathroom with someone you’d prefer not be in the bathroom, who is not bothering or harassing you in any way, is the worst thing that happens to you in a given day, you are way ahead of most of the world. A stranger’s body is none of your damn business, no not even in the bathroom, unless they are threatening or assaulting you with it. You don’t have to like it to pee next to them. Real feminists are for the rights of ALL women; they don’t accuse some women of having bodies that do not warrant protection.
Aaron
I don’t really even read this as trans-phobia as much as going back to the age-old scare tactic that GLBTs are out to molest your children. If you run all the statistics, I’m guessing that a transwoman is about the LEAST likely person on this planet to be going after young girls.
The only way this story makes sense is if they are suggesting a pedophile is pretending to be trans in order to access the dressing areas of children. The rest is all complete and utter BS. There are plenty of male nurses, childcare providers, dads, therapists, etc. who assist female children with changing and bathroom. Should these men all be banned because they have a penis?
I’m sorry, but this is just a load of garbage and it’s just more scare tactics.
Stache99
Wow. Not getting involved in this cat fight. She said something that was insensitive yes but she has a right to her opinion too. Get over it.
MegaUberSissyPantywaist
Whenever I use a public restroom, I go into a stall, close and lock the door, eliminate waste and flush, wash hands then exit, NEVER ONCE SEEING ANYBODY’S PLUMBING. I must be naive because I have always thought that the above is standard procedure for everyone but based on many of the comments here it is quite clear that a great many people attempt to view the private parts of others! Check with your local law enforcement but as I understand it, anyone who attempts to look at anybody else’s plumbing is breaking the law and considered a sexual deviant. Hence, my question should be obvious:
How the hell can any person know what plumbing configuration another person has unless they have broken the law by ‘peeping’ and thereby rendering herself a sexual deviant? NONE OF US ARE SUPPOSED TO EVEN TRY TO LOOK AT THE PRIVATE PARTS OF ANOTHER, LET ALONE ACTUALLY DO IT! WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE!?
the other Greg
@MegaUberSissyPantywaist: Right, I wondered how long it would be before someone brought that up! It’s one thing in the men’s room with those urinals. But if someone goes into a stall in the ladies’ room, how does Roseanne magically know if they have a penis or not? Apparently in addition to all her other “talents,” Roseanne has X-ray vision?
April
I understand where people are upset with the way she responded…. However, her point if read between the lines can be understood. It stated men where LITTLE GIRLS get changed. Unfortunately the LGBT community is not fully accepted. Also, little girls don’t understand what transgender means… So, if they see a man, dressed as, looking as a woman, they still see A MAN… plain and simple. Roseanne supports the LGBT community. Her point is, until the transition is COMPLETE, there needs to be a seperation there.
erics
@Thedrdonna: I would say “some feminists” feel that way; many feminists, including trans feminists, very much welcome the freedom of everyone to identify their sex.
Dumdum
Since this is a hypothetical situation, why is everyone being so intense?
When one of her Twitter followers mentioned that Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein “is also in favour of letting men into spaces where LITTLE GIRLS get changed.??? This comment on twitter seems intentionally inflammatory.
Dumdum
@MegaUberSissyPantywaist: I am sure that you are aware of this but. Mega-Uber-Sissy-Pantywaist. Is totally redundant.
socalistudent
I don’t understand personally why trans are grouped with LGB in the first place. After all they are changing their gender and live as heterosexuals so they have nothing in common with us. The bisexual thing is getting old too, the only bisexuals I’ve ever met are guys on grindr looking to cheat on their unknowing wives. Call me bitter, but thats just the way it is.
Dumdum
@socalistudent: The Gay subculture is or at least should be a diverse group of human beings. Your comments echo the same narrow minded knuckle dragging values of the intolerant right wing breeders who continue to deny our civil rights. I am constantly amazed by the divided hateful factions within the Gay community. L vs G vs B vs T vs Q or any variation of. What we share with these people besides our humanity is non-acceptance with the mainstream. I hope this clarifies things for you. Student.
Lyssie
@socalistudent: “Nothing in common”? Many trans people are transitioning TO a gay orientation; i.e., a female-bodied male-identified person who is attracted to men, and transitions to male to be seen as the man he knows he is. Others have experienced life being perceived as gay before their transition, and will always be someone who had that experience even if they do transition to live as heterosexuals. Besides, gender play (drag, etc.) and uncertainty has always been an aspect of the gay life, it comes with the territory… not to mention, queers of all flavors are harmed and endangered by restrictive gender norms. That goes whether you’re a gay man born male or a straight man born female.
As for your comment about bisexuals… Hi. Now you’ve met one who isn’t a guy on grindr looking to cheat. I’m a 27-year-old woman and I’m attracted to both men and women. I call myself a lesbian for simplicity’s sake because I’m only *romantically* interested in women, but the sexual interest is there. We exist too, and just because we have the option of “camoflage” by potentially being happy in heterosexual relationships, does not mean we’re not queer.
socalistudent
@Lyssie: How can you be “romantically” into women if you are not sexually attracted to them in the first place? I could be “romantically” into a pine cone, but if I don’t have a serious fetish for evergreens its kinda pointless. I’m not trying to be rude here, but in my opinion 90% of bisexuals are really gay or lesbian and the other 10% are just saying it so they can kiss another girl at parties and get the attention of all the guys and are really straight. As for trans, I’m not hating on them I just think they have different issues then we do. After all gays and lesbians dont have problems figuring out which restroom is appropriate.
Lyssie
@socalistudent: I think you may have misread my comment? I was saying that I AM sexually interested in women as well as men, but I’m only interested in dating other women. I don’t think I’m “really” gay, because I appreciate the male form too much for that, and might have been equally romantically interested in men if I’d had different formative experiences. As it is, I’m sexually interested in both but only interested in dating one.
I buy into the Kinsey scale, myself – I think that the majority of people ARE actually bisexual to some degree, but that it’s not always an equal mix of homo/heterosexual attraction. There’s a lot of biphobia in the gay community, of which your comment is actually a pretty good example: apparently we don’t exist, and are just straight people pretending or gay people clinging to some bastion of “normalcy”. But we do exist and it’s a bit tiresome to have other LGBTs insisting that we don’t, or shouldn’t, or are just co-opting the cause, or whatever.
Trans issues may be different, but there is considerable overlap. You’re trying to separate trans people and gays, as if trans people exist in a sort of quantum sexuality state and then collapse the sexuality waveform to heterosexual as soon as they transition. That’s just not the case. A trans person is most often living as gay at some point in his or her life, either before their transition or after. So, in point of fact, some gay people DO have problems figuring out which restroom is appropriate. Different issues, but overlapping and related.
I reiterate my point, also, that trans people face just as much danger and trouble in their lives as cisgender gays do, and for a similar reason: they’re not performing the way they’re “supposed” to, according to gender roles. The distinction of whether it’s a matter of who they sleep with or what genitals they would prefer to have is, to my mind, an academic one, and trying to exclude trans folk from the LGBT umbrella is just unnecessarily being a jerk.
Thedrdonna
@socalistudent: Did you happen to read my response above to stadacona? I feel like it outlined several different ways in which the T fits into the greater LGBT thing. If you want to go for your own separatist thing, then I fully invite you to go off on your own. I love my gay brother, and he loves his trans sister, and I feel like there’s plenty of people who feel the same way, if not in microcosm.
@erics:You’re right, erics, and I misspoke. It’s not fair to paint all feminists with that brush, because most are wonderful and kind people, who are interested in righting a pretty major wrong in our society. I consider myself a feminist too. I was attempting to give a sort of capsule background on the debate that Roseanne waded into, and I didn’t really get it across that those feminists who think that way are a radical fringe with a very exclusionary idea of what it means to be feminist, lesbian, or a woman.
@April:April, there are many trans people who cannot afford the surgeries that would “complete” their transition. These are people who have been living in their identified gender for a while, sometimes for many years. They don’t just whip out their junk and wave it in people’s faces, either, because that would be wrong and criminal. I haven’t seen a single source that could provide documentation that actually showed that’s what happened. It seems like some of the more transphobic elements saw that a trans woman was asked to use a different locker room because she made other people uncomfortable, either because they too were transphobes, or just ignorant as to the realities of normal human variation. The radical feminists in question then started pushing the narrative that she was out waving her gizmo in people’s faces, when I have seen no real evidence of that. By being supportive of a story that has been structured to make it sound like the trans woman was the villain, instead of a victim, Roseanne is telling trans folk that she doesn’t understand, or care about, the unique challenges they face. She is not an ally, she’s a user.
Guillermo3
I have been following these comments,for many of them at somewhat of
a distance in time,have learned a few things[terminology,mostly],and
as often happens,find the discourse interesting and APPALLING.Writing
and grammar seem to be badly wounded,or Dead arts on this,and too many
other sites:Since when has “hating on” become correct usage?
Much more disturbing are the number of combative,tribal,and just
plain bitchy comments.I have doubted the existence of a true gay
community,and all of this infighting ,sadly,confirms my doubts.
Wouldn’t more unity in our difference be an asset?
Guillermo3
@Dumdum: I’m with you,Dumdum!
[sorry I haven’t found time to respond to your personal e-mail,BTW]
I just saw your comment now,after 3am,Sunday,even though you made it
a long time ago.I feel that what you’ve said and what I said in my
comment #54 are similar.
Hate to sound like an old-time union activist[even though I am one],
but United in Our Difference[s] seems more valuable than all this carping.
Lefty
@socalistudent: “After all gays and lesbians dont have problems figuring out which restroom is appropriate.”
Trans people don’t have any problems figuring out which restroom is appropriate, either. The problem is with people like you, it seems. I’m sure there are many people in the world who think gay people have problems figuring out the appropriate gender for their sexual partners, but we all know about people like that, don’t we?
It’s extraordinary to read transphobia or terms like “appropriate” or “normal” on gay blogs.
I’m never sure if it’s by people who are genuinely ignorant about how hetero-normative they are or if it’s oddly conservative gay people who are trying desperately to placate prejudice by throwing another minority under the train… or just trolls masquerading as family.
Also – as has already been pointed out – many trans folk are gay or bi, so your above quote is nonsensical on a number of levels.
I see standards at SoCal have dropped. 🙂
x
Lefty
@Thedrdonna: Well said x
Lefty
@Guillermo3: “Much more disturbing are the number of combative,tribal,and just
plain bitchy comments.I have doubted the existence of a true gay
community,and all of this infighting ,sadly,confirms my doubts.”
A lot of people post in such a way on the web, it’s just the way it is, unfortunately.
I wouldn’t take it as proof of anything.
x
(trans stories always get the crazy right wing gay contingent out, I’m afraid)
feminist
Here’s a website with stories about sex offenders using their “transgender” status to prey on girls and women in restrooms and elsewhere.
http://theysaythisneverhappens.wordpress.com/
Just as no one knows what kind of plumbing someone has if they’re in a stall, how do we know why that person is there? Is that person there to pee or to rape someone? We don’t know. So what’s more important, the gender identity of the person who has a penis, or the safety of actual girls and women in the restroom? Read that website to get a better understanding of why I and some other women don’t want penises in the women’s restroom.
Dumdum
@feminist: Very informative. It is nice to know that there are still plenty of feminists out there or just people in general promoting hate and fear over what is so obviously a fringe faction of society. over a 12 year period the number of incidents seem surprisingly low as compared to crimes committed by heterosexuals. You remind me of the story of Chicken Little and the acorn. SOME OTHER WOMEN??? Please allow me to share a true story. I went with my Lesbian friend to Guernville California, my long time friend Ron was dieing from AIDS. My Lesbian friend was working at the Women’s Music Festival there and had told me to meet her by her car when it was over. I was sitting peacefully under a tree not far from her vehicle near the parking area. I was accosted by two large scary Dykes in security uniforms who questioned my presence in a PUBLIC area, when I told them why I was there I was handcuffed and held by one while the other tracked down my friend to confirm my story. I stated several times that I was a Gay man in a PUBLIC AREA. I was treated with aggression and suspicion and totally ignored until my LESBIAN FRIEND confirmed that I was no threat to the other WOMEN. MY GENDER WAS MY ONLY OFFENSE. The day before THAT I was turned away from from an open air crafts fair even though I was in the company of three Lesbian friends. AGAIN my GENDER being the only restriction. Prejudice based on gender is still prejudice. It is obvious to me that the radical faction that has sprung up from the Transgender movement is in direct response to the hate and fear directed at the aforementioned Trans-Folk. Not only by the heterosexual community but by the Gay community as well. People make generalized assumptions all the time. I could easily assume that ALL Lesbians and feminists are by nature misandristic. Or through nurture or the lack of have become that way. There are VERY CREEPY PERVERTS in every walk of life. I for one believe that once caught these people should NEVER be allowed back into mainstream society. They are predators and should be treated as such. I understand that Molokai Hawaii has excellent penal and Leper colonies.
ScaryRussianHeather
@Dumdum:
Luckily you’re not in a hurry to move to Denmark since their housing waiting list is 20 or 30 years. Be back later, after I find housing here in America in 20 MINUTES.
PRINCE OF SNARKNESS aka DIVKID
@feminist:
re: linked blog — hmmm, not sure i can trust the neutrality of a source that puts quote-marks around the pronoun “him” referring to a transman. that kind of rude intolerance calls into question ones motivation and thus credibility. which is a shame because we shouldn’t be afraid to look cold hard facts in the face, but we can have no confidence that you’re not merely shaping or distorting the facts to fit your agenda, which is one of intolerance.
as for your argument it all sounds reminiscent of the “all men [and you get to define men] or rather all penises are potential rapists/only dead men don’t rape” school of radical feminism. oh, i forgot the underlying assumption “women are the passive victims of men, or penises.”
if the threat of penis is the issue why concentrate on trans or bathrooms? women’s ones are rarely empty, with notoriously long lines waiting to pee, hardly the most opportune place for a covert penis to strike…unlike those shady corners and corridors in workplaces. yes, why not ban mixed work places? those sly penises are everywhere there… or both genders sharing the streets? rapes are known to occur there. why not segregate every damn arena where men and/or penises have potential access to strike at unsuspecting women. separate taxis. separate stores — why not be more like more like saudi arabia?
face it, your just a gender separatist at your gender policing worst, with a social purity issues masquerading under a convenient “think of the children.” have fun with that.
out of interest where would you allow the [presumably more deserving of your concern] intersex or hermaphrodite individuals to pee?
ScaryRussianHeather
@April:
Right. But parents and their children are the LAST demographic that individuals on this site ever consider. Actual PARENTS stopped letting our children in restrooms decades ago unless we could accompany them, long before the ~life and death issue~ of trans people using the freaking BATHROOM became the cornerstone of ~civil rights. A complete alternate reality exists.
Dumdum
@ScaryRussianHeather: I was merely attempting to point out that there are places more tolerant and accepting of LGBT peoples. I only said that because Scandinavia and the Netherlands is where I have friends and relatives. I also have relatives in Ireland which might be a nice place to visit but I wouldn’t want to live there. Socialized medicine and education are top notch though the cost of living is much higher than in the U.S. I guess you get what you pay for.
Dumdum
@ScaryRussianHeather: But parents and their children are the LAST demographic that individuals on this site ever consider. Actual PARENTS stopped letting our children in restrooms decades ago unless we could accompany them,
I take this to mean that you yourself are a parent? Your use of the plural pro-nouns, our and we, would suggest as much. I agree that a Gay site would be the LAST place where children are discussed. I would be more apt to comment on my new puppy Oliver Queen who is by the way VERY CUTE.
socalistudent
@Lefty: No my standards have not dropped in the least, just ask anyone on grindr or adam4adam :)As for me being oblivious to my “hetero-normativity”, the fact is I’m quite aware of the differences between us and straight guys. I’m in the military and deal with hate all day long. Theres nothing worse than hearing your battle buddy, who you trust with your life suddenly blurt out something utterly hateful and homophobic. I simply feel trans are lumped together with us gay men and lesbians when in fact they would do better for themselves to fight for their own issues themselves.As for your problem with “normal”, I for one dream of a day when we as gay men are considered mainstream and seeing a gay wedding will be no big deal to straight people. I hope one day we too will be considered normal.
Dumdum
@socalistudent: Your claim of being in the military is highly suspect. As for your sex app status I have no doubt of that. Being normal is overrated and boring to say the least. If I am EVER perceived as NORMAL, then I will go cliff diving at the Grand Canyon.
Thedrdonna
@feminist: So that’s a pretty masterful work of propaganda you’ve got there. Did you make it yourself or contract out to whatever firm Bryan Fischer and his cronies use? In looking through that site, I notice you correlate crossdressers with transsexuals, which is really about as valid as comparing them with drag queens. In addition, you have relatively few actual things about trans women forcing their way into women’s only spaces, so it seems like you aren’t meeting the premise of your own URL. I’m actually a bit busy today, so I don’t have time to conclusively research those few actual trans women you’ve linked there, but given the way people are talking about the woman in the original story, there are probably distinct differences between what the site alleges and what news outlets reported. By the way, nobody’s been able to rebut my original statements about the locker room story, is this meant as a distraction from that?
Guillermo3
@Lefty: Thanks,Lefty,for your
explanation.Its rather patronizing tone was,I imagine
[and choose to believe]probably not intended.
As an older person,I DO take this digital snarkiness/cum
illiteracy as signs of our Brave New World,in the Huxleian,not,
the Shakesperian sense as where we are,or soon will be:What is
called Post-humanism by some.Facebook is the most obvious,prevalent,and
awful example of this.
Freud13
As a trans ally I have this to say.
1. Many trans individuals cannot obtain health insurance or if they do so then their trans issues are considered a pre-existing condition and does not cover any medications, surgeries, etc. So those trans persons cannot afford the cost of bottom surgery which can be upwards of $50,000 to $75,000. So you might have a trans woman who is a woman who just cannot afford to have her genitals corrected.
2. This story is not so much about genitals but about an adult exposing their self to a child. It certainly would not be okay for an adult woman to expose herself to young girls in a locker room either. Adults should not expose their genitals to children end of story. Children likewise should not be in locker rooms with strangers without a parent or guardian present.
3. This highlights an issues with trans persons period. Bathroom politics. Statistically trans people are not attacking or exposing their selves to others in restrooms. However, trans people are often beaten, raped, threatened, or ran out of multiple stall restrooms all the time. The trans people that I know do not want to use the restroom and get harassed. They would rather use safe single stall bathrooms.
As a member of the LGBT community we need to have safer bathrooms for not only trans persons but any gender non-conforming person. If you have short hair you should not get asked if you are female upon entering the bathroom.
Lefty
@Guillermo3: “Post Humanism”???
Dear God.
I think the opinions you’re quoting are rather patronising themselves and more than a little snobby, I have to say.
This kind of declinism is everywhere amongst a certain class and generation. “Look at the oiks on Facebook! How vulgar!!”
It’s a cynical view and there’s a wealth of evidence to the contrary.
And no I wasn’t trying to patronise you. Have you considered the fact that you may automatically take an irrationally negative view of things you read? Because that could be the case. 🙂
Sorry if I was too vague or somehow at fault myself. That wasn’t my intention.
Lefty
@socalistudent: “As for your problem with “normal”, I for one dream of a day when we as gay men are considered mainstream and seeing a gay wedding will be no big deal to straight people. I hope one day we too will be considered normal.”
You put far too much importance on what straight people think of you, in my view.
Far better to “dream” of a day when you have equal rights. Who cares what people think? The danger in placing too much importance on that is you easily throw other, more maligned minorities under the bus to get their approval.
Evji108
What’s with the anti-penis fixation? Is this a generalized war on penises by women? The fact that a penis is in the next stall of a restroom no matter the apparent gender or sexuality of the person, seems to be a major threat to certain women. Women who know better, know that gay men and trans are not a threat to them, in fact they are their allies, perhaps even their protectors in certain situations. Historically feminine men of whatever stripe have found their place living intimately with women in harems and in other all-female home situations, helping to raise children, sharing secrets, beds and clothing with women in a non-sexual way. All penises are not the same and it’s about time Rosanne Barr woke up to this fact and started behaving with more compassion.
Candice Marie Sweet
You ‘people’ that STILL think gender is between a persons legs need to come out of your own IGNORANCE closet!
Gender is a persons self awareness and it resides between the EARS not LEGS! Those that don’t have the conflict between your self awareness and that of our physical body seem to have a very difficult time wrapping your closed minds around to ISSUE that all ‘T’ people and Inter-sexed people (formerly known as Hermaphrodites) have lived their entire lives dealing with.
As for R. Barr… WOW, I have always suspected her intellect, but this confirms my doubts that I have held about her.
It is so sad when a supposed ‘Ally’ spews such Intolerance!
And simple fact of Public restrooms is (for Trans-Women) we use sit down, walled stalls (almost exclusively) and that ‘thing’ between our legs (that most wish was not there) is NEVER seen!
For Trans-Men (my understanding in actually talking to some whom I’m friends with…. side note, FKING ACTUALLY TALK TO TRANS-PEOPLE BEFORE YOU SPEW YOUR STUPIDITY ON THE WORLD!!!)
is that MOST wear ‘packers’ (fake penis) and it is almost undetectable when a Trans-Man is peeing at a stand-up urinal, and IF they are not wearing one, they HAVE to sit down IN A (generally) WALLED PRIVATE STALL! AGAIN NO-ONE WILL EVER ACTUALLY SEE ANY OF ‘OUR’ GENITALIA!
InscrutableTed
“women do not want your penises forced in their faces or in our private bathrooms” — Roseanne
The irony is that Roseanne herself is a giant dick, and yet she regularly enters the women’s bathroom.
paula aeryn sun
@Shannon1981: Indeed. We just want to go to the bathroom that matches what we are presenting as. Go the the bathroom and leave and get on with our lives.
BradT
@Carolyn in Baltimore: Well said. Couldn’t agree more
Thedrdonna
@BradT: Well said in that she misgendered a trans woman, called her a pervert, and implied she was a pedophile? Or the part where she said that the trans woman was a “man” with “fantasies”, implying that transsexuality is something that can be cured (perhaps via ex-trans therapy)? You guys maybe should get in talks with Focus on the Family and pool your hate-group resources.
Guillermo3
@Lefty: Well,Lefty[I’m sort of a lefty myself:
can’t wank with my right hand],
For some reason,I just got notice of your reply a minute ago,just as I
was,at 3am Monday,about to pack it in for the night.Therefor,I’ll keep
it brief,and add more later.Post Humanism,or just Post Human,refers to
a current concept[you can wiki it up,actually] regarding the removal of
direct physical,tangible experience in our virtual world,and the subsequent
robotization of our selves,and the difficulty of having authentic feelings.
Yes,I am a snob,one of my few positive personality traits(or,if you will:accomplishments along side having successfully evaded induction into the army during the
Viet Nam War,and having lived in Philadelphia for nearly 40 years and not
having acquired a Phildelphia accent).
More later.
defsteve
I can’t help but feel that this whole trans deal only serves to further hetero-normative gender roll bs.
“I just feel like a woman/man.” what does that even mean? How do you know that’s how you feel? Is there some agreed upon standard experience? The idea of it all is so alien to me.
I like wearing make-up, skirts, sexy boots, so does that mean I’m a trans-woman?
I guess I just don’t get what all the fuss about gender and sex is. It’s all seems so abstract and irrelevant…
Fitting into hard and fast gender roles is exactly what we need to not be doing… Gender is a social construct, one that has outlived its usefulness.
Bonnie
Roseanne’s fuckstick Johnny Argent and her son were both attacking anyone who had a dissenting opinion to that of Roseanne’s, going so far as to call me retarded and a loony for believing those who identify as female (regardless of their genitalia) should be allowed in the female restroom, citing that ANY man could claim to be a female to get into the restroom in order to molest and rape women. That’s their logic. It’s easy to say it shouldn’t matter what bathroom a trans person should be allowed into, that gender is a construct and so on. My girlfriend gets harassed in subway, SUBWAY for being trans. We’ve been asked to leave female clothing stores (even when it was me who was shopping for clothes, not her). She has to drive to another state to get medical and dental care because the medical professionals in Alabama refuse to treat her. Yay, gender is a social construct but guess what? Trans people still have to live in this fucking society.
ReaganS
I’m so sick and tired of the “bathroom issue” This is completely stupid! There is no way in hell I could ever used the men’s room again! It would cause so much more of a disturbance if I did. I in no way look like a man and there is no way I could ever pass as one. I could go outside in public in the most masculine attire and still not be able to be seen as a man. So I’m not going to no matter what this fool says. Rosanne is a fool and anybody that agrees with her is a fool. I have been using the woman’s restroom for sometime now and have no intention of stopping and I have never had a problem with anybody either. I have never showed my privet parts to anybody and I have never had anybody do it to me in the woman’s restroom. I just go in and Pee. Most of the time public restrooms are quite disgusting and I’m not in there long. I do want to add that her comments were very offensive and she should apologize. I doubt she will though.
Thedrdonna
@defsteve: Actually, while transgender applies to anyone who operates or feels outside their gender role, transsexual specifically refers to people who do not feel comfortable with their sex. That is a documented, well known dysphoria that has been pretty well studied, and most medical organizations agree that it requires medical intervention. As to you not understanding it, I’m glad that you don’t have to deal with that hurt in your life. That’s not a reason to decide it doesn’t exist though. If you were gay or straight, wouldn’t you not know what it feels like to be attracted to members of the opposite sex or same sex, respectively? But you wouldn’t use that as evidence that such sexual orientations don’t exist.
zzk2001
@hex0:
Really?
First off there are Born women Who can very much have a penis, And for the trans people who take pills etc to change into there rightful self, a very HIGH % of them CAN’T even use there penis anymore OR would they want to.
Come on people Transgender people just want to Pee and Poo ??? Is is so hard for you to understand that?
Carolyn in Baltimore
This is not about peeing or pooing in closed stalls. This was about a transwoman with no intention of surgery hanging out in a sauna used by HS swim team. The girls objected to a man in the sauna and dressing area. I am a pretty liberal lesbian, have done mountaineering and shared dorms with men with no privacy. this is different and I would want my girls protected from a middle-aged man in a sauna.
Some trans have true dysphoria. Some are really fetishists.
Thedrdonna
@Carolyn in Baltimore: You claim to be liberal, but at least in this specific case you’re repeating the same talking points as the social conservatives. This isn’t about saving the whales, or your stance on nuclear power, it’s about trans issues and you insist on misgendering a trans person and ignoring the well documented positions of most major medical and psychological organizations. How is it that you’re more qualified to judge the level and source of their dysphoria than the medical gatekeepers that every trans person has to work through in order to medically transition?
Thedrdonna
@Carolyn in Baltimore: Also, do you have a source for the part about her having no intention of surgery, or are you just making that up? I haven’t seen any news article or other reputable source that says that.
Meltin
@feminist:
Scare fluff, did you actually read that stuff, thing like: an actual census worker attempting to get actual census papers served(to a resident that was off their rocker, or the worker would not need to be there anyhow)… A real crime there!
I note a distinct lack of actual crimes in there. For the few that are, bravo on compiling the “huge” list that’s scare-fluff edgy as any. With a population of about 45,000, and precisely zero post-op crimes, and in that hit piece, TS women are a clear and present danger to society, only in delusional minds. The TG crimes in there are mostly crimes against TG people, such as impersonating TG people to further basic robberies etc. It’s about as applicable as saying skiers are at fault for robbers using ski masks.
Carolyn in Baltimore
http://gendertrender.wordpress.com/tag/colleen-francis/
http://twaaahnbulance.tumblr.com/post/33073867241/faeraven-colleen-francis-creepy-okcupid
An article and his OKCupid profile. He iis keeping his penis by choice. Since he likes his penis and likes to use it sexually with young women I don’t think he was misgendered except by himself. Like I said – I wouldn’t have my kids shower with him.
As for statistics – the fact that over 60% of transwomen still have their male genitals and brains and socialization. You can look it up.
And as for dysphoria – no I’m not medical. But from this persons own words I think he’s a fake – and a creepy pervy dude. I don’t know why trans would want to defend him.
Thedrdonna
@Carolyn in Baltimore: OK, #1, that site you listed said that she wanted to get her “plumbing remodeled”, in her own words. In fact, she says that she’s “not a genitally focused person”, ever. You should maybe try to find propaganda that better fits with the lies you’re trying to push on people, it would make your story work better. Again, you’re basically saying that you know better than her, her doctors, or really anyone who’s been involved in her transition. You’ve decided to hate her, and will not be discouraged.
That said, yes, she is a sex offender. As with every population, trans folk will also have members who are criminals, perverts, liars, abusers, drug addicts, and jerks. That does not mean that every person who identifies as trans automatically shares those traits. I could find plenty of examples, more even than you could possibly hope to find for trans women, of women who were pedophiles and rapists. I do not assume based on that that all women are like that, because that is a bigoted and, frankly, foolish idea.
Again, though, you’re missing the point that many trans people cannot afford the extraordinarily expensive surgeries that would confirm them in their identified gender. I think you are blinded by your bigotry and are unable to understand the position they are in. You also seem to think that having male genitals means they have male brains, and male socialization, which is, as far as can be shown, scientifically, sociologically, and laughably wrong. Did you look those arguments up on NOM’s website? I could see how it’s somewhat difficult to tell the difference between there and the radical feminist websites, at least based on the content.
All in all, you’ve really just been depressingly inept at this whole thing. You point us to obviously bigoted websites with blatantly misleading content, such that only the rarest moron might actually be convinced, and when called out on it you either redirect to some other canned argument, or you ignore the point entirely. I might almost suspect you of being a strawman created by a trans activist to show how ridiculous the radical feminists are, except I know for a fact that any attempt to do that would have much better execution.
Thedrdonna
@Carolyn in Baltimore: I would need to correct my previous statement: The woman in question is not a sex offender, a pervert, or a dude. Your disgusting and reprehensible mangling of the truth turned me around for a moment, and I had this woman confused with another trans woman who was, in fact, a sex offender. This woman is a former army vet, and has done nothing wrong besides try to live her own life, and for you to malign her is more proof than I could ever give that you’re so far away from reality that you can’t see it around the curvature of the universe. Please, for your own sake, learn some human decency and try to figure out what is broken in you, that you need to libel a member of a downtrodden and ill-served minority.
ThyrdSex
This thread has been increasingly interesting. When I first saw this article, I was dismayed to find out that Rosanne would make such insensitive obtuse statements. Honestly, I don’t mind the reality that cis women have a problem with trans bathroom inclusion, what bothers me is the approach to the ordeal. I absolutely understand why it may seem inappropriate for someone with a penis to use a women’s restroom facility. Cis Women have a well documented history of systemic subordination and oppression by m e n. If, too the observer, the person in question is demonstrably male – then questions about safety arise.
While this acknowledges the reality of women’s vulnerability and right to equal safe space, it continues to disregard the r e a l i t y of transgender people. To write this situation off as a “man” who calls “himself” “Colleen” is offensive, obviously, but lets look at why. The entire point of identifying trans is to assert through language an alternate foundation of self that vanquishes heteronormative binary culture in attempt to more accurately locate the *self*/*soul*/*mind* of the individual in this physical world. Due to the same opressive monolith that subordinates cis women, our bodies are interpreted as essential signifiers to social/personal identity. Thus the trans person is *trapped* in a body that by all worldly observation is bound to a social construct that bears no resmeblance to the soul locked inside it.
But that is not to suggest that sterile gender stereotypes are the defining characteristic of trans-identification. By all means, any person cis or trans would benefit from a liberated gender structure. How many cis women hardly relate to what this world mandates their identity be? This of course, combats the notion that to rid the world of gender principle would subsequently eradicate the existence of trans-identity. NO, obviously if the binary was destructed trans people would not go away. We would be happier and less violence would be perpetrated against us. Perhaps our language woud change, as the prefix trans structurally carries the binary with it, being defined as *across*. But our language has morphed through time and space for all of history. We are transsexual in this era of this world, but we are present in other cutures with other concepts of identification, but we share a common bond.
The point I make in elaborating on the reality of trans people and the importance of language and the role it serves us in this world is to make explicitly clear the fact that to *understand* us as Men masquerading in Your *real* world, is to completely disavow everything we stand for and finally have a voice to realize. The logic that we are essentially men because of our genitals suggests that identity is bound to the body, which seems so far from feminist logic. Our bodies have real social implications, of course, and the penis – no matter how I express my identity – remains a significant artifact of patriarchal oppression. But to go from there to the suggestion that thus trans women are actually men, is to reinforce the patriarchal formula for what makes a person real, and what role they ought to serve.
Personally, I have no interest in using *your* bathrooms. I identify as a transwoman, but woman is the descriptor to the primary identifer, trans. It has been suggested that I am co-opting womanhood, that I am claiming ownership over someone else’s identity and appropriating women’s language, space, and bodies. Heres the problem with that: I am not taking anything from you. I live in a world that is foundationally structured within a binary system an to suggest that because I am trans, that I need to single handedly function outside of a binary system in all manner is simply violent. I utilize the language of my world, and implement one of a growing future. If you must insist that I am not a woman, then so be it – I have no care to force your acceptance of me. But that does not mean you can make me a man. The logic that I was socialized male and therefore have male privelege is b r o k e n. That would make sense if I were a man, but I am TRANS. I am also gender non-conforming and always have been, so my inheritance of manhood was denied and distorted years ago. Of course I still received more pirvelege than cis women do, but under that logic we are still assuming I am a boy. What if what I say about my self is true? If I am trans then it doesn’t matter if the world saw me as a boy or not, no matter how they treated me – they never acknowledged my reality or allowed me to pursue it. I was squelched out of this space in silence and oppression and violence. So as I was being *priveledged* with being a man, what was actually happening was I was dying inside and trying to find a way to survive. Sure trans women need to acknowledge that we experience unique conditioning that is not identical or necessarily similar to cis women, but the reason we get upset is because cis people continue to suggest that we are ACTUALLY some version of THEIR truth and not our own. I may have experienced the socialization of a male, but I experienced it as a suffocating non-male being denied by every facet of my social world, and thus I experienced a socialization of a trans person.
To acknowledge the complexity of this upbringing is wise. By all means, lets examine how my socialization may influence me post-transition. But lets also acknowledge what I am, and the fact that guess what – I have rights too.
This particular case is interesting because this trans woman’s personal dating information has been called as evidence…Uh, let me be honest – she seems like a loser and freak to me. But guess what, if you read all the livejournals of the ciswomen using that locker room I bet some of them like to fuck all day too.
I can’t help myself, I do think it feels complicated to have those young girls in the same space as her. But not because I fear for their safety. I think we need to use this situation to ask the question – WHY is this happening? Why is no one considering providing the children with an education on trans people, so when they encounter one – They’re not like WTF NO. Even if you remain opposed to trans inclusion you still ought to accept that awareness is the best tool to remove the blockade of ignorance.
WHile I may have no strong hold on my identity as a woman, many of my sisters do. And they have a right to that. They have a right to assert themselves in a world that has been built around cutting us away, into obliteration. We may step on some toes while trying to sort out who we are and who you are and what this world is – but we’ve been stepped on so hard we hardly have feet to walk on.
When it comes down to it. I just want to use the bathroom. Look at me and ask yourself which one I should use, and only a psychopath would say the Mens room. Lets just get one thing straight, if I went into the mens restroom I would look insane and it would be a huge problem 100 percent of the time. That problem would very quickly escalate int violence, and I would be socially psychically and physically invalidated in the process of trying to take a dump. I am a feminine spirit with a feminine gender expression and body. I need a space to peform necessary human bodily functions. I don’t think the women’s room is ideal either, but only because so many women seem to be uncomfortable with it, and I don’t want to take a pee with a bunch of uncomfortable people. Actually – guess what, I have never had a problem in the restroom. Probably because I pass pretty well and people don’t notice, or perhaps because many women don’t mind. I don’t know.
I am sorry these girls feel unsafe, an I am sorry any of you feel unsafe. That could only be because you have been exposed to a violent climate of agression and you deserve to have a voice for that. But I also feel unsafe. And statistically, it is my population that is assaulted in restrooms. I am on a sojourn out of the death that is the cult of manhood, and feminists can choose to aid me in my travels or they can turn their back on me. (lord knows most feminists have embraced me) but that will not change the fact that I have left this supposed mascuinity behind, and nothing you say or do can ever truly reduce me to that class of Man ever again.
Just build me a Third Sex restroom and I’ll promise to lend you some TP if you run out.
Thedrdonna
@ThyrdSex: What a great analysis! I feel like you really cut to the quick in terms of both the problems trans women face and the reality of how they must fit into the real world.
vrmhugs1957
Transphobia is something the GLBT community and the straight community needs to overcome. It’s as bad as homophobia is. I’ve dated one preoperative M2F and have many friends in the trans community and am very much aware of the discrimination they go through. We who are gay, or lesbian, or like myself bisexual need to realize that our trans brothers and sisters deserve the same rights as we’re fighting for, and they also deserve to be treated with the same respect we want to be treated with.
A preoperative transgender woman has to live as a woman for at least a year before she can qualify for the operation to change her into a postoperative transgender woman. She is no more likely to bother other women in a public restroom than any other woman who’s not transgender. The ignorance and fear over the restroom issue isn’t going away soon, but we need to stand up for those in the transgender community to use the restroom that fits the gender they know they are ment to be.
LeahStrong
i’d just like to sing the praises of being gay to other gay people. to shout it again from the highest mountain and to as many people as i can reach. this letter is halfway stream-of-consciousness, it will get into murder and rape, not so much hannibalism, but i’m only trying to expand on who i am. you see, i thirst to try on new identities like some people thirst for knowledge, and i am always on a quest to broaden my identity, so i’d expect that the identities i’d like to try on would not be judged by the very people who supported chastity bono in her identity-crisis that led her to mutilate herself as if gender is a piece of clothing.
first of all, i love being gay. i’ve loved madonna since 1984. sometimes, i just want to write to gay organizations so that i can share my experiences. i love being gay. in fact, it was more than a few years ago when i declared the following to myself in realization of why “gay” is a synonym for “happy”…
1) i love going out because i love to be around other gay people
2) i love gay.com and my other “social networking” accounts because they get me social and they put me in contact with other gay people
3) i love sex
4) i don’t care that i’m not attracted to females
now, years later and as a 38 year-old man, i can honestly say that being gay is the best thing that’s happened to me, simply because straight men are nowhere near the type of person that they’re attracted to.. gay “men,” and i use that word loosely, are (at least) masculine and therefore have the potential to turn into the man of their dreams. now, after decades of being a total masculivoid and yearning for relations with the men who i saw as the “most ut,” as judy jetson used to say, i have become the utmost and i am all the man that i need…and therefore…
1) i’ve replaced going out with staying in because i am interesting enough to keep myself entertained – and being around my own masculine presence gives me the feeling of completion that i once would only be able to get from being around “real men”.
2) i love “social networking” and all of my facebook accounts because i can taunt gay “men” with the words “are you man enough to be your man,” much like i taunt the “anything a man can do” type of Strongwoman when, no matter what she says she can do, she still relies on gender-based sports teams and gender-based military requirements. something like “anything a man can do, as long as she’s not competing against a man”
3) i’ve replaced sex with masturbation because, although masturbation also puts naked men on pedestals (and reminds me of the fact that, in comparison, i am somewhat of a masculine slight), there is no poop on my penis once i ejaculate.
4) i still don’t care that i’m not attracted to females
i would always say that “being gay is the best thing that’s ever happened to me” when i was younger, kind of as a defense-mechanism for my hurt pride, but i really didn’t know anything else – being gay was not an option i explored alternatives to. being gay just happened to me after years of feeling somewhat less than masculine. eureka, what a total shocker, i felt like a masculivoid and so i searched for masculinity to make me feel complete. oh, i won’t bore myself by writing about my overprotective mother and my absent father, gay activists have made it as plain as day that the roles of my parents had nothing to do with my growing up to use men as a crutch in my quest for a sense of completion. they have made it as plain as day that my upbringing had nothing to do with the either the gender of the crutch or the reason i did not feel complete without one.
as i was saying – i used to say “being gay is the best thing that’s ever happened to me” all of the time. it was a stupid thing to say back then and it was not really justifiable with any knowledge of being straight, but the reason i can say it (and mean it) now is because i know that a desire for women would get me looking for the woman of my dreams every night. without one, without a woman, i’d be beat, incomplete – kind of like how madonna described herself in her 1984 release of her first #1 hit entitled “like a virgin”.
i am the man of my dreams, i’ve found the man of my dreams, there is no such thing as the woman of my dreams because i don’t think much of people who can’t exercise with a 100-pound barbell. seriously, though, a “real man” in my life is what fulfills me because the bruised esteem given to me by other boys on the schoolyard (“you throw like a girl,” and “you’re a little wimp,” etc) during my childhood had established my identity as that of a masculivoid. furthermore, i can say that i WAS beat, incomplete…but not that i AM beat, incomplete. i am the man of my dreams, and while there is a more perfect specimen of manhood around every corner…well, that’s just a matter of the masculine delusions i’ve had since childhood – the delusions regarding chest hair and muscle. the fact remains, though, that i do not need a crutch to get me through my semi-charmed kind of masculine existence. that’s because my masculine existence is not semi-charmed. i guess i got a tip from dr. frank-n-furter, who built the man of his dreams in a laboratory, but i built the man of my dreams in my room. er, i guess i “write the gay away” on the computer in my room, but it was in my greenhouse where i built the kind of muscles on myself that i would previously envy and worship on other men. in my greenhouse is where i “exercise the gay away,” enough to stop regarding strong men as “real men,” enough to stop classifying them as divine, untouchable or out of my league . i lift weights and i swim in my greenhouse…as well as sing and do water-aerobics with the 80s/90s music. now, prince sung “sometimes it snows in april,” and the greenhouse lets me swim all year long…but as for water-aerobics and madonna…well, sometimes i vogue in april.
anyway, being the man of my dreams and being attracted to men keeps me from wanting to have sex with anyone. you see, if i was attracted to females then i surely wouldn’t be woman enough to be my woman. i am therefore so thankful that my past life of not being my own masculine epitome has led me to function as a crooked “man” rather than as a straight man, because if i had a sexual appetite for anything but men…then being the only man for me wouldn’t save me from a life of wanting sex with other people.
i can hear it now, people taking issue with an unused homosexual attraction. hmn, now i’m thinking…madonna had a lyric…and it goes something like this: “there’s a certain satisfaction in a little bit of pain”. well, there’s a certain satisfaction i get when i fantasize of inflicting pain upon certain democrats i have spoken to.. i guess the rest of the gay community would tell me that christianity is bad because it keeps me from doing what i want to do. hmn…now i’m thinking…should i do more than tell people what i want, what i really-really want? oh, who am i kidding, i don’t really want to harm a democrat. i don’t really want to be (yet another) man to overpower a Strongwoman and rape her – these are just fantasies that i wouldn’t enjoy if i actually started doing them. “how do you know you won’t like it if you’ve never tried it,” i hear the community say. hmn…now i’m thinking…i’ve tried being in bed with men – this is true and it’s why i choose porn and masturbation. eureka, is my true identity that of a murdering rapist – will i never be sure unless i step inside the shoes of a murdering rapist? i wouldn’t know the first thing about killing people, but i’ve never tried it…so maybe i can’t say that i don’t like it. after all, some people get enjoyment from it. some people even get sexual enjoyment from murdering people, even if rape isn’t involved. gee, i really liked “the silence of the lambs”. hmn, now i’m thinking about my true identity. and why shouldn’t i be, why should the gay community take issue with my questioning my own identity – isn’t that what they encourage? (“you’ll never know that you don’t like it if you don’t try it,” stop whispering in my ear, mr. lecter, or i’ll snort more cocaine to drown your voice out) i’ve never done anything like george huguely did, so i guess i can’t really say with any knowledge that i wouldn’t like it. maybe it’s my true identity.
i apologize for that look inside my mind. i can’t keep snorting when i’m trying to write something…i get so unfocused. let me hold off on rape and get back to the previous topic of having sex with people. i don’t like putting people on pedestals, i don’t like putting body parts (naughty or otherwise) on pedestals, and if i am going to do it then i’d want to get it done as quickly as possible. enter masturbation, bed-humping, shampoo-lube in the shower, anything but sharing a bed. i know that michael jackson said “what’s wrong with sharing your bed,” and it’s fine as long as nobody’s naked…but naivete just slaps me in the face when i’ve got either my fist or my penis up someone’s ass. usually, naivete slaps me in the face when the aforementioned parts of my body exit the ass with a smelly, brown coating over parts of them.
i’ll maintain that i’m proud to be gay, but the pride lies in not being attracted to females. i’m proud that i am attracted to masculine images, that is gay, but i’m also proud that i don’t feel slight enough as a man to want to snuggle up to and have sex with the personifications of the masculine images that i am sexually attracted to. hmn, if i’m too proud to snuggle up to men like i’m some kind of bottom-feeding/ass-kissing masculine insufficiency, then i must not be proud to be gay…rather, i must be TOO proud to be gay. too proud a man to go for second-best. ha. whatever the case, i feel that i owe the gay community my gratitude…for if it wasn’t for the apparent gender-naivete of “men” who go gaga for masculinity (i’ve seen them in strip bars, cheering and screaming in praise of the naked, beefy and studly musclemen). then i might have had no reason to change myself so that i wasn’t like gay people. the truth is, i just couldn’t love or respect myself if i was as much of a blank genderivoid as the “men” in the strip clubs who see a discovery zone in other men and embrace it. i do see self-respect as respect of the actual reality of the gender that’s physically a part of the self that wants to be respected, i don’t see self-respect as respect of the impressionable reality of someone’s answer to the question “who do you think you are”. in other words, a man is a man and if a man would start to sing a song like “man! i feel like a woman,” instead of chuck berry’s penis-affirming “my ding-a-ling,” then the man has gender-identity issues (issues with who he is) and he would certainly not be respecting the man he is by becoming a woman. let me explain why…
gender is the reality that birth bestows upon someone gender-identity is the reality that doesn’t develop until one can form opinions about oneself in relation to the world (and genders) around him. “who do you think you are” is not a therapeutic question that should be asked by a therapist in an effort to determine if someone needs a sex-change operation. the truth is that anyone who wants a sex-change operation needs to see a therapist for help in accepting reality, because the acceptance of one’s reality is both the acceptance of self and the acceptance of one’s eye color and one’s shoe size..and one’s physical gender. self-acceptance will never tell a man to change his gender. self-acceptance will not allow impressions of the world around a man to lead him to believe that he was not “supposed to be” a man. if reality isn’t black and white, then it’s certainly red and green and blue…and one’s reality should not be tainted by any secondary colors produced by society mixing their many rainbows of diverse views in. this “rainbow of diversity” reminds me of a webpage i once made – a whistling wind is heard as these words appear on the screen: “your mind is so open, i can hear it from here”.
some people say that you can’t “pray the gay away,” even when some christians have “prayed the gay away”. some people say that it doesn’t snow in april, even if other people have seen “april showers” replaced by “april snowflakes”. now, madonna once sung a song called “justify my love,” and that’s what i do. i justify my lusts by reasoning with myself enough to “reason the gay away”. let me just say that i get very angry when it comes to limitations regarding the amount of money i can put into slot machines. likewise, i get very angry when it comes to limitations i’m thought to have by people who think sexual preferences are as unchangeable as the current time. it’s actually quite ridiculous for gay activists to accept and even embrace the ex-heterosexuals with the line “you’re realizing your true self,” while labeling the ex-gay crowd as either “self-loathing,” “brainwashed,” or “sexually confused” in an effort to shield their prides with the words “he wasn’t really gay”. well, these defenses of homosexuality can also be called “grasping at straws” or “seeing what sticks” – so, for the next few paragraphs and as an effort to paint the straw-grasping activists as incredulous, i would like to employ the same kind of “grasping” tactics to mock the gays who are apt to put limitations on me and on the sexuality of heterosexual wannabees.
some say that my unwillingness to relish in homosexuality labels me a “closeted homosexual,” but i’d ask the activists if a lack of genuine interest in gay sex would make or break that label. furthermore, if the reality of a homosexual attraction should relegate a man to a life of gay sex, mister activist, then why shouldn’t the reality of a masculine body relegate a man to a life of no sex-change operation? if i have a sexually open mind paired with lots of practice cultivating my erection through use of playgirl magazine, would that make me a non-practiced bisexual who didn’t practice with playboy magazine because the gay-affirming media told him not to? and should i not be relegated to a life of gay sex if i was only playing by the rules of a gay-affirming society when i would give myself “practice sex” only with gay porn? if i have a sexually open mind that’s disgusted by and strays from sweat, saliva, lunch-breath , gamy armpits, gamy asses and unfirm behinds…am i lying about the identity of the man i am by continuing the sex-act when i’m not attracted to my partner like i was before we undressed and got into bed? am i lying to myself and denying my true identity by continuing the sex-act when all i want to do is leave – even if i had no clothes and i had to hitchhike naked like madonna did in her 1992 book called SEX?
having watched many different news stories, i feel like i am correct to say that gay activists would call me “brainwashed” and have my psychiatrist fired if he scared the homosexual right out of me with “negative reinforcements” like electric shocks and horrible smells. well, where do gay activists stand with regards to gay porn? there is no such thing as “smellovision,” and therefore anyone who gets hooked on gay porn is only being subject to half of the gay sexperience. now, if gay activists would have a psychiatrist fired for “shocking” the gay lust out of somebody, would they sue a porn studio for presenting human bodies in a positive light without any reminders of dung or sweat? i ask this because i developed slowly and i had always looked with envy upon images of hairy, masculine armpits. they have been a favorite of mine since i was 10 years old, i’d seen them on tv and in movies and on my friends – and i’d never gotten close to one until recently. you see, i was actually looking up at a masculine, hairy armpit about two feet away from my face – and the realization of the sweat and grime had totally turned me off. all the porn movies that i’d seen would present armpits in a favorable light, leaving me anticipating the day i’d be able to put my face inside one and just realize my fantasy. let me ask a question: if i was turned off by the reality of armpits – if the fantasy of armpits was cultivated for years with non-offending pictures of clean and dry armpits – would gay activists sue porn studios for portraying armpits as something for gay “men” to relish in when the realization of the reality of armpits can be as competent a “negative reinforcement” as an electric shock is? would gay activists sue movie studios for contributing to the allure of manly and hairy armpits if the reality of manly and hairy armpits may produce an effect that is quite similar to that of the shock therapy that “shocks the gay away”? why should they ban gay-to-straight “conversion therapy” if it’s only given by a doctor? if they’re gonna ban doctors from changing my mind, from changing the way i think…then why don’t they ban movie studios from portraying gay sex as alluring, when gay sex in reality involves enough smelly assholes and poop-residue to get homosexuals to (in the classic words of michael jackson) “make that change”.
the preceding is an example of using bullshit to “grasp at straws” and reach a desired conclusion, much like how the ex-gay crowd is belittled by gay activists who use bullshit (assumptions) to label them as “confused” or “self-loathing”. i, too, can throw bullshit to see what sticks. keep calling me “brainwashed” and “sexually confused” with no real knowledge of anything, i will throw your straw-grasping back in your face with MY straw-grasping . as for now, well, it’s late. wow, i didn’t intend this letter to get as wordy as it has become. i must apologize.
“have i said too much? there’s nothing more i can think of to say to you” – madonna
dylan terreri, i
http://www.homosexualityiswrong.com
http://www.jaggedlittledyl.com/essays
Allie
@Eric Auerbach: Actually, a lot of trans women are more inclined to get rid of the pair we’ve got. And I wish people would stop using that analogy for *anything*, it’s clearly based on misogyny (with a sprinkling of cisnormativity) considering that testicles are actually one of the most vulnerable parts of a human body.
Allie
@stadacona: It’s a political coalition, because:
1) Trans people are much more commonly LGB (or maybe LGB trans people are much more commonly out) than our cis counterparts;
2) Ignorant cis straight people often assume trans people are just “extremely gay” or (and LGB people do this one too) [cis] “gay people in denial”, regardless of trans individuals’ actual orientations, so even straight trans people suffer from homophobia to a large enough extent that their straight privilege can only ever be said to be partial in practice;
3) Lots of “LGB issues” are also “trans issues” and vice versa – for example, marriage inequality effects straight trans people (unless their gender is legally recognised) in the same way that it does cis gay people, as well as resulting in a requirement for any existing marriage or civil partnership to be dissolved in order for a trans person of any orientation to get that legal recognition. Marriage inequality also has other more subtle direct effects on trans people (regardless of orientation) that I’ll go into if you’re interested.
The LGB liberation movement owes a lot of its victories in large part to trans people by the way, including its existence
http://www.glbtq.com/social-sciences/san_francisco,2.html
http://www.transadvocate.com/interview-with-an-actual-stonewall-riot-veteran-the-ciswashing-of-stonewall-must-end.htm
Allie
@socalistudent: See my reply to stadacona above for the why. As for the rest… Trans people are a diverse group just like cis people (ie, “not trans” to slightly oversimplify it). LGB people who are trans aren’t uncommon. In fact, for whatever reason recorded statistics show trans people as being far more commonly LGB than cis people. And binary (ie male or female, as opposed to third-gender, in between or non-gender) trans people tend to be quite clear on which restroom is appropriate, even if people like Roseanne Barr sometimes intimidate us into using the other one. Non-binary people are more likely to have difficulty deciding on an appropriate restroom, but that’s not a fault on their part, it’s the fault of binarist society which confronts them with 2 binary-gendered options and the only gender-neutral option (if there even is one) is usually only appropriate if they’re disabled.
@April: Actually, children don’t have any assumptions at all about what other people’s genitals might or might not mean until adults teach them to make those assumptions. And whether or not the children in question were old enough to have likely been taught about sexual anatomy (with or without the erroneous or negligent broad-stroke gendering of that anatomy), for this to be in the news and for Barr to be commenting on it they have to have first mentioned it to adults – and those adults then had a second opportunity to correct them that if a woman has a penis it doesn’t in fact make her a man. Also, I seem to remember reading somewhere that some of the girls weren’t bothered, but they were prevented from making their views public. And while I’d argue that all changing facilities should be private if possible so nobody has to be exposed to anyone else’s naked body, if they’re *going* to be communal and parents are *going* to take their kids in communal changing facilities then they shouldn’t take any different an approach to the presence of other women’s naked penises than to that of other women’s naked vaginas.
david dirdam
@Allie: @mdoll:
Trans people had nothing to do with Stonewall:
Stonewall historian David Carter wrote on the subject:
“…if we wish to name the group most responsible for the success of the riots, it is the young, homeless homosexuals, and, contrary to the usual characterizations of those on the rebellion’s front lines, most were Caucasian; few were Latino; almost none were transvestites or transsexuals…”
You guys have some galls stealing our history, then going around convincing everyone under the sun that it is the other way around, and that we should be grateful to you for doing that.