Rating Katie?

Last night National Geographic's presentation of the Gender Revolution aired in this part of the world at least with host Katie Couric.

Dr. Marci Bowers

Some on social media called it boring or at the best a Transgender 101 primer. For those of us who have lived a trans experience, indeed some of the show seemed a little tedious to me. Except for the exchange between trans pioneer Renee Richards, and Hari Nef a self described "gender fluid" 20 something.  I for one have never really liked Richards persona although obviously I don't know her. She is like someone's mean grandmother. The gender fluid girl talked of a time when gender wouldn't matter and Richards huffed "Utopia" before the interview came to a rather uncomfortable end.

Hari Nef

Renee Richards

Other parts of the two hour show contained an interview with famed SRS surgeon Marci Bowers, and later a look at the El Pollo Loco franchise in California owned by a transgender woman. She makes a good habit of hiring other trans women.

The link above should take you to a Global News site which gives a more in depth look at the show, Here is an excerpt:

“It was an effort to educate the public about transgender individuals, and ironically, what people didn’t realize is that it was a taped show, and I could have taken that part out,” said Couric. “But I tried to use it as a teachable moment, and to show people there are appropriate and inappropriate ways to have these conversations. But I think, obviously, I had a lot to learn then, and I still … I’m not the world’s expert on gender issues. I certainly know a lot more having done this documentary.”

A teachable moment indeed if the word on this show which included the rest room battle in North Carolina, a transgender kids summer camp and a senior citizen transitioner and her wife reaches the right people.

Quite a bit of ground to cover in two hours when you consider the first half hour focused on intersex people. I have provided another link to National Geographic itself where you maybe able to catch the show.

Drafted to the Losing Team?

Here is a topic we haven't delved into in a long time here in Cyrsti's Condo- male privilege. Truthfully, I ran back across the subject from an unexpected source: MarieClaire.com. In fact the site is running a whole transgender series called "Trans(form)". There is quite a bit of wonderful information in the post so I will pass along some of the highlights.  Including a book which hits home on the subject with the obvious and then goes farther, much farther:

Julia Serano

"A lot of trans women are aware that there is male privilege before we transition–that women are not treated with as much respect as men," says Julia Serano, author of Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity. "But there's a big difference between knowing privilege exists and the literal experience of losing it."  For Serano, the sexism hit her all at once. "All of a sudden, the world is, to a certain degree, a lot more dangerous or precarious," she says of discovering her new reality. 

The transgender women we (the author) spoke with cited a litany of new challenges on the other side of their transition, which will be painfully familiar to the cisgender women reading it: getting talked down to, getting talked over, getting catcalled in the street, getting dismissed in the workplace, and so on. "I would be talking about a patient, and a male medical student would be kind of glazed over, staring at my breasts," says Dr. Marci Bowers, the first transgender surgeon to ever perform a gender-reassignment procedure."

Dr Bowers though went on to say: "With their unique perspective of gender relations, some in the trans community actually find themselves sympathizing with men. "I think there's a lot of what I'd call female privilege, too," Dr. Bowers adds. "A man is never trusted like a woman is trusted: by strangers, children. When men deal with each other, there's a certain distance they keep. There's a sisterhood and a safety among women, and it's a very helpful feeling."

I always felt being admitted to the "girl's sandbox" was far from a "given" but once I was trusted and admitted, I did feel the strength of the"circle" as I had never did with men during my life.  I think I was drafted to the winning team!

Don't forget to follow your links for more!

Stealth and the "Pink" Pickett Fence?

For those of you of age, you grew up watching the iconic mothers of the 50's and early 60's like June Cleaver.  Mom's were the stay home types who kept the household running and had the dinner ready when hubby came home.  My Mom wasn't like that (school teacher) but almost all my friends mothers were. So the feminine stereotype so aptly pictured by our unnamed cross dresser below was alive and well.

Then Dr. Stanley Biber burst upon the scene as one of the primary sexual reassignment surgeons in the U.S. Biber performed his first sex change operation in 1969 after a transsexual woman asked him if he would be willing and able to do so.  Biber retired in 2003, at age 80, because his malpractice insurance premiums had risen to levels which he could not afford, probably because of his advanced age. Marci Bowers, a gynecologist and transsexual woman herself, took over his SRS practice. Biber was hospitalized in January 2006 with complications from pneumonia, to which he succumbed on January 16 while hospitalized. Biber was 82 at the time of his death.

Deserved or not, one of the basics of going through SRS from the Dr. Biber's era of thinkers was the newly "minted" woman should go forth into the world, find a man, have sex with him and disappear. (stealth) For God Sakes as Ophra used to say "why would you want to buy a new car (vagina) and not drive it?" (At the risk of getting too "X" rated, my lesbian friends tell me they could drive my "new car" better than any man." )  

But the question of even needing a "new car" doesn't define who I am or my life.  I know I can't meet the budgetary constraints of a store bought vagina or want to think of the health considerations at my age.With or without the new car, I have been shown a path to a wonderful life I never dreamed I could have.

So now, do I just walk away and go stealth or is there another road for me? I believe there is and it's in the example I mentioned in an earlier blog post about how I'm beginning to market my Etsy shoppes.

In the beginning of course, I did use my name and my male name only came into play when legally I had to use it behind the scenes because I had not changed my gender markers. (It all made for some interesting calls to Ebay, who were cool.)

Now, as I said, I'm seeking a broader social marketing base and it could be said I am in some sort of stealth mode because I don't say "Hey! this shop is a TRANSGENDER owned business."  But, I don't hide the fact it is either.  My hope is, that again the world sees me as just another person trying to make a go of it.

Maybe I'm naive enough to think how I identify would not make or break the sale of a vintage vase or comic book.  If it did, the person could go to hell, but overall I think of it as my one small Laverne Cox style statement:  Think of me first as a person you respect and oh yeah-I happen to be transgender.

Sex and the Transgender Girl

Wouldn't that subject make one heck of a reality television show?  More exciting than Mountain Men? Who knows, but one does touch quite a few nerves when you talk about it.  Then again, it's a highly personal subject.

Back when Dr. Stanley Biber was performing all the SRS changes in Trinidad, Colorado (prior to Marci Bowers joining his staff in 2003) all the rage was to have the operation, find a man, go stealth and live happily ever after. How about a plot like this- transsexual woman goes through the change, begins ideal life with the man of her dreams- until the woman of her dreams comes along?

Regardless of your feelings about all of that, times "are a changin'" (could Bob Dylan have been a closeted cross dresser?)

Most of us were shocked when Facebook went from two binary gender choices to 50-most of which we didn't understand-unless we were living them.  I for one, thought the process was a huge step forward, as much so as a growing number of individuals who rebel at any sort of sticker label being applied to them.  All of the sudden, genitalia aren't the basis for gender feelings and aren't the basis for being comfortable as a chosen gender in life.

Then, as you take sexuality and mix it in with this potent brew-the whole picture becomes even more confusing to some and exotic to others.  At my recent visit to the Equality Ohio meeting, the organizers went around the room and asked us to give our name, pronoun preference - plus how we identified.  I gave it all-to a point.  For some reason I said I identified as a transgender woman- not a transgender lesbian woman and transgender veteran (which I brought up later to them)  I just figured it was too much information for them.

Some times, it is too much information for me.  This Cyrsti's Condo comment sent in by Caroline, may say it best:

I was about four and a half and had know that there was something wrong for a couple of years already then I twigged that as bad as I thought it was, girls liking girls was a real no no...

I really thought way back in the fifties that I was truly doomed, they think I am a boy is bad enough but to not want to be a typical girl who likes boys, what the heck!?

I was even thinking only a few years ago that such a fact would make sure I never got any help but I did.

Who on earth can find guys attractive anyway?

Thanks Caroline, fortunately my Mom found my Dad attractive enough so I could be here babbling :). But of course I know what you are writing about. I believe the longer I do this, the more I feel there are more people like us Caroline.  I'm so glad you got help!

To those of you who are still coming out and unsure of your sexuality, I would say yes, the lesbians are a tough crowd to be accepted into.  But, if you follow certain parameters, I'm proof it's not impossible. (Coming up in a future post.) To explain the process even better, I'm still trying to get my lesbian partner to write a post or two here-maybe she could explain what the trans scenery looks like from the "other side of the street." 

She's a tough sell!!!

Hey! There's More!

I watched a totally wonderful talk show this morning which hit all the right transsexual "buttons". The first couple had stayed together through SRS and wife even has a job now counseling other transgender couples and kids. The second group was a family of four who raised a transgender son the correct way...with respect and support. The third person was the famous SRS surgeon Dr. Marci Bowers (right) who is a trans woman herself. Don't get me wrong, the show left me with all the proper "warm and fuzzies". The more mainstream shows who present the transgender story in a positive light...the better off we are.

But wait! I read this post from the Bilerico Project and realized show I watched this morning had nearly become routine to me and so much was missing. Here's an excerpt from the article by Drew Cordes:


"Don't get me wrong: Part of me is thrilled that trans* people are becoming more visible and gaining social acceptance. But the picture cis people and cis media paint of us is simplistic to say the least, and my concern is that it should not be only those trans people that our empathy, and thus, our resources, are going toward. We don't want to hear about the messy cases. We're not as familiar with the stories of inner-city trans* women of color who grow up disadvantaged, below the poverty line, poorly educated, disowned by family, and turn to sex work or living on the streets to survive. We don't hear those stories over and over, but they happen over and over. And usually those stories do not conclude on a hopeful note. Anyone who's ever attended a Trans* Day of Remembrance ceremony and heard the stories of all those murdered in the past year will solemnly corroborate this fact. We don't hear about the huge chunk of the trans* population that rebels against going from one sex all the way to the other, against our notions of what male and female are in the first place. We don't hear about those for whom gender is expressed in myriad incarnations besides just the familiar two. Where are the mainstream narratives for the femme faggy trans* men, masculine stone butch trans* dykes, intersex people who don't identify as male or female, genderqueer folks who favor a slinky cocktail dress Friday night and a three-piece suit on Saturday? Many of my friends are somewhere in that short list. I'm in that list. We're out there in sizable numbers, but culturally, we are not yet allowed to exist. It would be too confusing or off-putting to readers, viewers, listeners, students, employees, audiences, etc."

None of this is ever easy for sure. I just had one of many strange ideas buzz through my noggin...are these mainstream transgender shows  the new stealth in our community?
Yeah, we know your story already and have a great life but what about all the other of us?

Read all of Drew's post here.
Also here is a link to the Jeff Probst Show I saw.

Move Over Thailand!

Perhaps I don't get out much. I just made the comment that 70 grand was an extreme amount of money for SRS etc. 
Of course then I read a post about Serbia being a new hotbed of SRS surgery for several reasons- one of which of course was cost.

According to the New York Times

Nearly 100 foreigners and Serbs have undergone sex reassignment surgery in the past year, and the numbers are growing, according to theBelgrade Center for Genital Reconstructive Surgery, with candidates coming from France, Russia and Iran, and from as far away as the United States, South Africa, Singapore and Australia.

Dr. Marci Bowers, (right) a gynecologist in San Mateo, Calif., who has performed 1,100 sex reassignment operations over the past 10 years and is herself transgender, noted that in the United States, a global center for sex changes, only about five surgeons were performing the operation regularly. She said that social conservatism and a lack of surgical skills in many countries, combined with surgeons’ fears of potentially catastrophic complications, were promoting the growth of transgender tourism.
Here's my point on the cost:
Foreign patients say they are attracted to Serbia by the price tag of about $10,000 — compared with $50,000 or more at some clinics in the United States for the more expensive female-to-male procedure. So when you add other procedures I'm sure 70 grand is out of the question.
Finally, you may be asking "Why Serbia?"

Sociologists say the more accepting attitude toward transgender people in Serbia signals the first glimmers of a shift in a country where conservative currents still run deep.

“We are the children of two parents: one is the Orthodox Church, the other is communism,” said Dr. Dusan Stanojevic, a pioneer of sex reassignment surgery here.

He said transsexuality was so taboo in the former Yugoslavia that it was not even mentioned in medical textbooks. But a surgeon, Dr. Sava Perovic, began performing the operations in 1989 after being approached by a man suffering from gender identity disorder.

Follow the NY Times link above for more!