What The Hell Happened to Us in the 60's and 70's?
Pat recently brought it up in another comment here in Cyrsti's Condo, the tumultuous years of mid to late 1960's into the mid 1970's potentially could have been a time for change in the transgender culture too.
It simply wasn't and I have ideas why (of course I do!).
Two words: Vietnam and ignorance. First of all, allow me to define my definition of the word ignorance. I'm not equating it with stupidity or lack of intelligence. I'm simply saying ignorance is not having access to information. During that time (and after) gender dysphoria was considered a mental illness issue. No pun intended, but real information about words such as transgender and transsexual was beginning to finally come out of the closet.
In those days though, it was a tough world to come out to. Beginning with JFK in the early 1960's, a tragic hot mess of a war in Vietnam and then the losses of JFK, Martin Luther King Jr, Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin-gender dysphoria all of a sudden wasn't so important. Except for those of us who suffered with it.
The sad part to me is, so many who didn't live through it have such a cavalier view towards it. I talk to anyone who will listen of my deep problem with being the only gender drafted. I am not saying genetic women should not have been in combat (that is another discussion), I am saying everyone should have been drafted. Find something for everyone to do.
So, those are the reasons I believe when we look back on an era of extreme change, really it wasn't for us.
It simply wasn't and I have ideas why (of course I do!).
Two words: Vietnam and ignorance. First of all, allow me to define my definition of the word ignorance. I'm not equating it with stupidity or lack of intelligence. I'm simply saying ignorance is not having access to information. During that time (and after) gender dysphoria was considered a mental illness issue. No pun intended, but real information about words such as transgender and transsexual was beginning to finally come out of the closet.
In those days though, it was a tough world to come out to. Beginning with JFK in the early 1960's, a tragic hot mess of a war in Vietnam and then the losses of JFK, Martin Luther King Jr, Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin-gender dysphoria all of a sudden wasn't so important. Except for those of us who suffered with it.
The sad part to me is, so many who didn't live through it have such a cavalier view towards it. I talk to anyone who will listen of my deep problem with being the only gender drafted. I am not saying genetic women should not have been in combat (that is another discussion), I am saying everyone should have been drafted. Find something for everyone to do.
So, those are the reasons I believe when we look back on an era of extreme change, really it wasn't for us.
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