Gosh, I'm glad she told me. Had I ONLY lied all along about being gay I wouldn't have lost those jobs. Sorry lady , that may be the unfortunate case with business types, but not regular human beings. Also it seems significant that she was in a company that tolerated her change and that she was well set enough that she could have gone elsewhere or retired, which is not the case with everyone. Not dishing the difficuties of what she did but I don't think she's a Joan of Ark compared to us humble foot soliers who are just gay.
Also I question her comparing the complex dealing with human beings as simplistic as playing chess, except in the respect that she took a few preliminary moves with the HR department and her boss to make sure sjhe would be OK and could have pulled out if it looked rough. That's a lot different than announcing that you are gay or lesbian. Her situation is far distanced from the situation of the many ordinary trans. who doesn't have the security and stability and proven history with a company at her back. I've known many tansexuals who go through hell and can't even get jobs at burger king.

Congratations, but don't pat your self too hard on the back.

people don't have to out themselves if they don't want to

I can say bullshit that makes me sound like a douchebag, too.

People don't have to transition if they don't want to.

See how that works, Meghan?

Oh, another self important idiot blah blah blahing. It's clueless and homophobic…and that's why it's here! Make it work! Take this bitch down!

Sigh, older male-to-female transsexuals can be a very umm…problematic group. They have soaked up so much WASPy (usually) male privilege over time that they really don't know what it is to be on the outside of a patriarchal Christian culture looking in. The more successful they are, the more arrogant and selfish I find them. Many are homophobic as you see evidence of here.

Many if not most are married with children which really, really upsets me (I mean once you have kids they come before self-actualization – hello!). They are always the ones who end up in the attention-seeking feature stories on the news, where they are shown applying makeup or some other cosmetic/beauty procedure as if that was the end all and be all of being a woman.

I write this as a transsexual myself who started living as a woman over a decade ago at age 21. I honestly feel I have almost nothing in common with people like Stabler.

I can appreciate Meghan's sentiment, it's similar to the sentiment expressed sometimes by other peoples who are discriminated against based on an outwardly identifiable characteristic.

However, the phrasing of her sentiment does inspire me to want to give her a swift kick in the vag. There is a certain implication there that there is a heavier weight of discrimination in transitioning. Oh sure, because coming out never has the dire consequences of "loss of my family, my home, my friends and fear of losing my career and my job." No, huh-uh, not ever.

Statements that beg a comparison on who suffers the most are doomed to fail every time.

As someone who is has come out as queer and trans, I've got to say it is different. She comes off as bit arrogant but I think that's more of her trying to explain a complex thing in a soundbite, but it isn't homophobic to say this kind of thing.

One thing I point out right off the bat is that unless someone has been living in a cave for the last forty years, they at least have some idea of what being Lesbian/gay/bi is about, with trans they usually no idea what it's about. Usually they don't see it as not having to with gender but with being a fetish or ultra super gay*. In my case, coming out as harder was harder than coming out as bi by an order of magnitude. But your mileage may very, some gay people have a terrible time and sometimes a trans person might have a storybook transition, it's all contextual.

And tank, quite playing oppression olympics, it's childish.

*Nothing bad about fetishes or being super gay, but that's not what it's about.

Opps… I meant to say "coming out as trans was harder than coming out as bi by an order of magnitude.

@Kropotkin: I also wouldn't call it homophobia, but ignorance.

So now ignorance can't be homophobic…Um, no. Just as the clueless racist is still a racist.

And that's ironic…considering this quote is playing the oppression "special" olympics. That's the whole thrust of the comment.

In a perfect world, every gay person would come out at work regardless of where they work. In a realistic world, many gay people don't come out because of the fear that they wouldn't be able to keep their job if they did. For instance, people that teach in Ohio can be the best damn teacher in the country but still be fired for simply being gay. Those people don't really get a choice but to be in the closet. However, transgendered people can chose not to transition as well if it is a problem for where they work.

@Bri: Stupid remarks made to gay people because of ignorance fits my definition of homophobia pretty freaking closely.

@galefan2004: Saying "you don't have to be out" does not seem homophobic to me. Dumb and holier-than-thou, yes, but homophobic? She would have had to say something with a bit more malice for me to use that term.

@Bri: I disagree. Why don't you just tell the black man he can bleach his skin. Its the same thing. You are telling a minority they don't have to be who they are. That is complete crap. Gays and lesbians have the right to live their life how they chose and to be out without getting any judgment on them what-so-ever. Anyone that doesn't support that view is being homophobic.

@galefan2004: Mmhm, I can see where you're coming from. I just think it stopped short of being completely hateful. Now if she would have continued…

@Bri: You are confused if you think homophobia is supposed to be hate for gays and lesbians. Its supposed to be fear of gay and lesbians but definition, but it encompasses everything from desire not to understand homosexuality to pure hatred against homosexuals.

@galefan2004: I think you are confused about your stance on homophobia. I've seen you on this site defending Obama and saying he is not homophobic, right? What makes him less homophobic than this woman? He pals around with anti-gay bullies, he's against marriage equality – this woman says one thing: "people don't have to out themselves if they don't want to" and you think she's more homophobic than Obama?

I don't think either are particularly homophobic, for the record, but your position puzzles me.

Because it's only homophobia when someone dies…very nuanced and true.

@TANK: I don't believe that.

Riiiiiiight.

@TANK: I would say I've experienced homophobia. And I'm alive, I assure you.

okay, so attempt murder's in your conception, too.

@TANK: Wow. Actually, I'm referring to typical bullshit from bible thumpers, allegations of incest/bestiality, etc. The usual.

@Bri:

It's logically vague, then–even what your arbitrary conception quantifies. This was homophobic–ignorance is no excuse, and never has been given that it's the responsibility of someone to correct their ignorance inthis context.

@Bri:

I assume what you meant by your original statement is that it was said out of ignorance, and not meant maliciously, right?

I worked with a trans fellow who did not out himself to everyone in our workplace, which was a gay organization where almost all the co-workers were gay and bi (or as it turned out, trans). I actually did not find out myself until someone else told me.

Not being trans myself I certainly don't speak from experience, but I can see why some people might not feel the need to out themselves to everyone. It may not be so much a matter of coming out as making a clear transition.

I think what she's saying is that gay people can (and do) have an easier time "passing", but trans folks have a harder time as passing as "normal". A closeted gay man appears to be no different (on the surface) than a heterosexual man. A transgendered person generally looks like a man/woman who's cross-dressing. Also, I've noticed that trans people are victims of hate crimes waaaay more often than gays and are more likely to be treated by police and society as "the freak was asking for it". They get prejudice from the straight community…and the LGB community too. Remember, they got dumped from ENDA and plenty of queers were okay with them not getting equal treatment.

Seems like a good argument for encouraging young people to be true to themselves from an early age. Had she transitioned early in life, it would have been a lot easier on both her career and (not knowing what she looks like) probably would have gotten a better aesthetic result also.

I can appreciate that trans people suffer a lot more in some quarters, and that there's a lot more ignorance still to overcome. However, playing "my oppression is more oppressive than your oppression" isn't going to help anyone – as the comments have shown, it just causes arguments and hostility. Instead of focusing on who has the most woes, we can just say together that we all have woes and focus on banding together to support each other and challenge these problems. In an ideal world…

No. 26 · Phoenix (Rider of the Purple Sage): There's not much of a problem understanding what she means by saying that it's easier for gay people to "pass" if they lie.
Then why is DADT a problem, why was it a problem from the onset, if everyone can just unproblematically just lie all the time. Not everyone finds it as simple as you seem to think to lie about who you are (very basically) on the inside.
To me it's dispicable that I should need to lie about who I am; And I am a person who even gay people don't generally recognize as being gay.
As Bri said: 'people don't have to transition." That doesn't necesarily involve lying at all.

Phoenix:

"A transgendered person generally looks like a man/woman who's cross-dressing. Also, I've noticed that trans people are victims of hate crimes waaaay more often than gays and are more likely to be treated by police and society as "the freak was asking for it". They get prejudice from the straight community…and the LGB community too. Remember, they got dumped from ENDA and plenty of queers were okay with them not getting equal treatment."

Umm…no. There are trans people who pass and those who don't pass, but to you the trans people "generally looks like a man/woman who's cross-dressing." are just the ones you notice, since the rest are passing and you never identify them as trans. So let's not fuel the stereotype that "all trans women look like corssdressers" stereotype, please.

But in other terms you're right and that's probably the source of the misunderstanding here. The quote is heterosexist, but I think it's extreme to call it homophobia.

Why?

Because Stabler was trying to describe what Pheonix said above, that if a person has to, they can go back into the closet if it is needed (I've done it myself, it sucks, you know the drill) if you get a job where you can't be out, etc.. But if a trans person doesn't pass or is in the middle of transitioning, then they are an open target all of the time. Even if a trans person passes, if their diver's license or identification paper don't have the right gender on it (remember, you legally need a expensive surgery for that, one that not every trans person wants) then you can still be open to discrimination when getting hired or when you get carded at club or stopped by police, etc.

That's pretty much what she was trying to get across, though in a very clumsy and idiotic manner.

strumpetwindsock:

"but I can see why some people might not feel the need to out themselves to everyone. It may not be so much a matter of coming out as making a clear transition."

And that's pretty much a big point of misunderstanding between the trans and LGB community. Most transitioning people have a goal as living as the gender they identify as and do not want to be "out". Because if you are out as a trans person, people will generally not treat you as your true self, but as an "it", "tranny" or your birth gender, which pretty much defeats the point of transitioning.

It's usually pretty hard for queer people to get this, since in queer culture out equals good. Not so much to many trans people. Now if you're trans and gay, that's a different story. Personally I'm very out as bisexual, but I'm very careful about who I tell about my gender history.

Are we reluctant to call her homophobic because she' s also a sexual minority?

I don't get why's she's homophobic. Was there something else in the article? I don't find anything in the quote that's not true.

Looks like coming out of the closet in the office is in the news…

http://online.wsj.com/article/.....62319.html

Maybe Stabler was right