A Small or a Capital "T"?

Lately it seems the topic "du jour" with me lately has been transgender discrimination within the trans community. So, in the spirit of a very emotional subject, I found this post by Cate O'Malley and decided to pass it along to you "Condo-ites":


"Are you more ‘T’ than me? Let me ask it this way. Are you more of a trans* person than I am? What started this question was a phone call I had with another transwoman who had completed her SRS ten years ago. She is well known in the local community as a resource, guide and a tireless defender of trans* people. It was recommended that I speak with her by a mutual acquaintance.

During our chat, she asked, “What are you?” I was unclear, then she asked, “How far are you going? Are you going to have sexual reassignment surgery?” I replied that I did not anticipate having the surgery, just live full-time. She shot back, “I don’t work with you people. If you aren’t going all the way, then I don’t want to be bothered. I only want to help people who are committed. I don’t do makeup and hair and all that stuff. You’ll need to find someone else.” I was shocked at first. We continued to talk and found much common ground between us.

The conversation was lively, poignant, brutally honest, funny and ultimately a huge help. I came away with a lot of insight and much to ponder and a tremendous amount of respect for her and her work in our community, but also a realization that discrimination exists in the trans* community. My naiveté originally made me think all of us trans* people were kindred spirits and we were all sisters and brothers. Alas, not so."

I used to have the same naive outlook as Cate did until I began to "get out in the transgender world and met more than my share of a few of very mean people. Now I am a believer there could be just too many layers of us to categorize.  You know of course we are the ones who fought so hard against being categorized in a binary gender but then still want too in the transgender culture. The rest of the post is good too and you can see it here.

Of course you know I have more thoughts on the subject but this time I'm going to move on and ignore the drama!