Quite a few columns ago I wrote a piece outlining what I understand to be the six priorities of trans-community activism. In the column, Transgender activism goals, these priorities, in no particular order, were listed as:
• Employment
• Housing
• Public accommodation
• Full access to education
• Full access to healthcare services
• Legal recognition of appropriate gender
There are two other priorities that could be significant goals of transgender activism. Those are marriage equality, and open service in the armed forces. The question becomes one of where to expend our community’s scarce activism resources. Should marriage equality or open service for trans servicemembers be on the short list of issues upon which the trans community expends its limited resources?
Marriage equality
In my opinion, marriage equality shouldn’t be in the top six or eight of trans-specific activism priorities. That’s because the issue is already a top goal of the broader LGBT community. There are already a significant number of LGBT nonprofits focused on marriage equality – some examples include the Human Rights Campaign, Americans For Equal Rights and Marriage Equality USA.
That doesn’t mean trans people shouldn’t care about marriage equality. But we don’t need a separate, trans-specific, state or national organization to work on marriage equality. Certainly, we can work with the broader LGBT community coalition to achieve marriage equality for all, us included.
Open service for trans servicemembers
Arguments for making this issue a top priority for the trans “sub-community” of the LGBT community are similar to arguments for allowing lesbian, gay and bisexual people to serve openly. This is an ordinary equality issue allowing those who wish to potentially put themselves in harm’s way to defend their country to serve openly. This is assuming they don’t have any physical or mental defects that prevent them from accomplishing their assigned missions.
The case of Staff Sgt. Rebecca Grant highlights this as a fairness issue. From the WFPL News article Fairness Campaign Spotlights Discharge of Transgender Soldier, Sept. 27:
“Staff Sgt. Rebecca Grant was discharged from the Army National Guard after serving for over a decade. She did tours of duty overseas, including Bosnia and Iraq.
“In 2009, a fellow soldier revealed that Grant is transgender, and she was officially kicked out of the military two weeks before the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell this month.”
“With education this could change; people being informed on the different issues; not being closed-minded; not being ultra-conservative. Allowing us to have the rights that we should have had as a United States citizen; we need change,” [Grant] says.
Being trans didn’t affect Staff Sgt. Grant’s physical and mental ability to do her job, but it was sufficient reason to discharge her from the Army National Guard.
Barriers against open service by trans servicemembers include 1.) Accommodation issues for those trans servicemembers just beginning the transition process, 2.) The Diagnostic & Statistical Manual (DSM-IV-TR) still lists “gender identity disorder” as a mental disorder, and 3.) The Department of Defense instruction 6130.03; the instruction that “Establishes medical standards, which, if not met, are grounds for rejection for military service,” indicates “transsexualism,” “transvestism” and “change of sex” are grounds for rejection.
It will take resources to achieve open service for trans servicemembers. And, much as the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell took 18 years and a great deal of resources to achieve, the trans subcommunity of the LGBT community should expect as hard a push for trans open service. Expect at least as much pushback toward open trans service, as there was for open service for lesbian, gay and bisexual servicemembers.
Perhaps, in a perfect world, we would have enough community resources to achieve all of the LGBT community’s equality and civil rights goals. But we don’t live in a perfect world. Resources are limited. Speaking specifically of the aggregate of resources available to the LGBT community, only a small portion thereof are allocated to trans issues.
Is the issue of open service for trans servicemembers important enough at this point in our struggle for equality to warrant expending those very limited resources, even if doing so would significantly diminish work on the other six or more overriding challenges we face?
The trans community hasn’t asked ourselves that question yet. It’s probably time we do.
While there were no valid arguments against gays or lesbians serving openly in the military there are none in favor of transgender people doing the same. The two situations are not remotely comparable. The military has a single purpose, to defend the United States. Transgender people serving openly is completely incompatible with this. While I can see no valid reason for a person who is full transitioned (i.e. full sex reassignment surgery, not someone who becomes an eunuch and then tries to claim to be fully female) serving as their appropriate sex (i.e, not “out, loud, and proud) the idea of someone serving openly as transgender is outrageous. Such behavior would be disruptive, and destroy unit cohesion. A male transgender person claiming to be a “woman” would certainly not fit into a male unit, and it would be worse to place him in a female unit. The same would be true for a female transgender person. No amount of “training” would overcome the obvious problems. While such might be accepted in other countries, the U.S. military simply cannot risk such.
This simply shows the outrageousness of the extremes of the transgender movement.
The real question the “transgender community” should be asking is, “Why do we have insane people as our leaders, and why do we let them push for things that are totally absurd?”
I am transsexual. I also served in the US Army.
I know at least 100 transgender/transsexual people who served in the armed forces. One of them one of the best hot shot fighter pilots we ever churned out.
Being trans doe not interfere with military compitancy.
It also is NOT disruptive. I was in the Army. I know what happens when a soldier has issues with anouther soldier. He is told to STFU and soldier on.
What is in my panties has no impact on my mission.
Did you serve openly? Did you try to transition on duty? Did you demand the right to dress as a female? Did you demand to be housed with female troops, even though you have a penis? Do you understand that these are the issues? We are not talking about someone enlisting without revealing they are transsexual or transgender. We are talking about people being “out, loud, and proud.” I don’t think STFU would take care of the issue.
^ You’re totally right, how dare the trans community want EQUALITY in America…next the blacks, and gays and women will want to be treated like equal human beings.
ROTFL! Are you really trying to compare an inherent condition, like race or sex, or even sexual orientation, with a CHOSEN behavior like being “transgender.” As I said, I see no reason a fully post-op transsexual could not serve (provided they did not make an issue of their history) but people who choose to be openly transgender have no more right to serve in the military than anyone else with a behavior that interferes with military discipline.
This is not remotely an equality issue.
Jennifer, you need to educate yourself on trans* issues before you make statements like this. Gender identity isn’t any more of a choice than is sexual orientation, race, physical sex, hair color, etc. Not everyone has the PRIVILEGE to be born cisgender.
As far as your requirement for SRS. . .
A) Gender is not defined by genitalia, someone can be a woman and have a penis, someone can be a man and have a vagina because our physical body has NOTHING to do with our mental identity. If you take a cisman and force him into SRS it’s not going to make him a woman. If I drugged you and performed SRS on you, would you then believe that you were a different gender? No! Because that’s not who you are, (Assuming you are currently a ciswoman) you’d be a woman who was the victim of a terrible crime, not a man. SRS is not right for every single person who is trans* and having this surgery should not be required in order for you be treated with the same respect given to every other person: the right to present yourself as you are without shame.
B) Do you have any idea how much SRS costs?? Not everyone can afford to do this even if they want to! Now. . . if you want to introduce a policy where the military will OFFER to pay for SRS for service men and women, maybe we could talk, but this still neglects my far more important prior point.
How is a penis going to disrupt a squad of women who ALL behave, interact and identify as female? The only disruption would be caused by the prevalent transphobia in our culture so well demonstrated in your statements.
First off, gender identity has NOTHING to do with being “transgender.” If one has a gender identity that is at odd with one’s birth sex, then one is transsexual. Gender identity is not a choice, but the transgender crowd thinks it is. They think they can “change gender.”
Actually, like it or not, gender and sex are quite tightly related. There is a big difference between someone who has a true female gender identity who was born male, and who wants to be “correct” and some man who likes the fantasy of being a “woman with a penis,” like ,oh say, Sandeen.
I agree with you, it is the old “two sides of the same coin.” True, if you take a cisgender man, and give him SRS, he will not be a woman, even if he is “transgender” and likes to play dress up. He will still be a man. I can point to several cases where, while no one forced the person, they did have surgery and are still a man.
If you have a penis, claim to be a woman, and want to keep your penis, you are delusional. Period. I don’t care how much you play dress up, you are still a man. Politically correct? No, but reality rarely is.
I agree, SRS is not right for those who are “trans.” It is right for those who are transsexual. That is why there is a difference. People who should have SRS are relatively rare. But playing dress up does no make one a woman. A man who, oh let’s say, who lived a long period with no indication of actually being a woman, who was quite successful in a male dominated field (like serving as a male in the Navy) for, say 20 years, who was perhaps a cross dresser (which does not make one a woman at all) and who then, suddenly declares that they are “really” a woman, is a bad joke, not a woman.
Yes, I am very aware of the cost of SRS. But i disagree. You see, motivation plays a big part. If SRS is a not really wanted, and being a “woman with penis” is what is really desired, then cost makes a nice excuse. I have seen people who could not remotely “afford” SRS put every bit of their energy into raising the money for a trip to Thailand, or some years ago, Canada or Belgium, which were the Thailand of that time. I have also seen people who were handed SRS on a platter, having it covered by insurance, and they still turned it down. It would have cost them almost nothing, and they didn’t take advantage. Prior to the insurance actually becoming available, they were saying how they couldn’t wait. When it was in force, they had new excuses. So please, don’t give me the silliness about cost.
And thank you, your last remark is perfect. It shows the male thinking that is “transgender.” You are clearly not a woman, and you show it without question. I mean really, you actually said that? That is too much. It has nothing to do with “transphobia.” Believe it, or not, men and women really are different.
Ok, sorry for wasting your time; didn’t realize I was delusional.
That’s okay…I’m used to it.
That was immature of me. I really am sorry about that and I’m sorry about being harsh in my earlier response; I got offended and I was rude.
I do hate the way I am and I wish I weren’t this way. I understand that the way I feel makes other people uncomfortable when I express it, but the anxiety I develop when I try to cover it all up and fit in as a man in the work place, in day-to-day interaction with acquaintances, with close friends and in intimate relationships grinds me down until I completely break down and cannot function. I don’t want to feel this way, but I do. The only way I’ve found around it is to live as a woman. That obviously brings up new struggles – being ostracized by my family, losing many friends and being treated like shit in general by people I don’t even know but who just see me in public. Not to mention that I have a master’s degree in computer engineering and was fired for coming out and since have met heaps of discrimination in interviews when trying to find a new job.
I don’t want to deal with any of that either, but it is better than having to hate myself and the way I’m behaving. My body doesn’t bother me as much as having to disguise my reactions, impulses and feelings. Sure, I feel really ugly and gross. I always have and while I’ll go to some lengths to alter that so that I can occasionally feel like I’m pretty and someone might actually care for me and find me attractive, there are some things I don’t want to do. Ya, I think my penis is pretty gross, but I’ve come to terms with it and I don’t feel that it determines who I am.
Maybe I really am just some kind of crazy person, but that’s not what the professionals I’ve gone to have told me and that’s not what most of my research into psychology and physiology has told me. I’ve met a lot of people who have very similar stories to me and they seem very much like sane, compassionate and valuable people to me. We don’t want a whole lot; we just want people to stop telling us that they know more about who we are than we do when they haven’t even heard our story. We want people to stop denying our experiences and our histories. We want people to give us a chance to show them that even though we seem like freaks, we’re really just human beings born into a position that is a bit different than most. I’m not trying to make this a pity party, I just want you to see that I go through a lot of shit and it’s not because I have some crazy fantasy, it’s because I feel like I’m dying when I deny myself.
I can understand how you feel. I was quite miserable for all the years that I tried to deny who I really was. But I am a woman, not a man who likes to play dress up. There is a difference. It is not so much that I have a problem with men cross dressing, as I have a problem with them wanting to claim to be women with penises. If you are a male, and you want to keep your penis, then I cannot, and will not, accept that you are “really a woman.” Sorry, but it doesn’t work that way.
And what makes it all so funny is how all these people talk about being open and honest, and yet they ultimately lie, to themselves, and others, about what they really are. They are ashamed to be what they really are, and try to claim status as transsexuals.
I actually have never claimed to be a great beauty. I accept that I am a relatively plain looking woman. I am certainly never going to be a super=model, nor do I really want to be. Shoot, I know of drag queens who are quite attractive, but they are clearly men. I would rather be an ugly woman, than a gorgeous man. If you want to be a woman, then be a woman. If you want to be transgender, then be transgender. But be aware, you will encounter prejudice. You are transgressing social norms, and like it, or not, people do have a right to be bothered by that.
But don’t you think that there is a difference between someone who cross-dresses on the weekends but keeps their male persona in order to reap the privileges and someone who lives 100% of the time as a woman (including, for many, during intimacy)?
I understand why many people out there would bother you; people who treat the whole thing as a game make it a lot harder for society as a whole to take us seriously. But I feel that you are over-simplifying and are lumping everyone together into this big group and calling them all posers. You say you don’t have a problem with cross-dressing but you keep demeaning it as though it were just a game; not every person who cross-dresses is just “playing dress up.” Even for many of those who only do it occasionally, it is far more than a game and is a deeply personal form of self expression. I wish you would quit speaking of them with such low regard. A lot of people in fragile positions very similar to where you probably once were are likely to be reading this page.
The only differences I see between a weekend warrior, and a full time crossdresser, is a matter of degree. If they both have no real desire to change their sex, then they are really not that different. Sorry, but if you have a penis, and you want to keep it, then please, don’t tell me you are “really” a woman.
Simply put, I don’t take such people seriously. Call it playing a game, or call it choosing a lifestyle, but don’t tell me they are “non-op transsexuals.” That term is an oxymoron. Don’t give me whiny silliness about money, or medical problems.
Crossdressing, is a chosen behavior. It deserves no more protection than any other chosen behavior. I believe what people do on their own time, is their business, but I do not believe they should have the right to force it on their employer. If they want to own up to it being a mental illness, then they can use that approach, but if they want to claim it as an inherent right, then I have a problem. Self-expression is certainly a person’s right, but that right has significant limitations. For example, your employer has quite a bit of leeway in restricting it. Again, if you want to express something that large portions of society find, at best somewhat silly, and at worst, downright wrong, then you need to be prepared to face whatever happens. One person’s right to self-expression is no greater than another’s. A person may have the right to wear a purple and green mohawk, pierce their body with safety pins, and dress up in a Nazi uniform, but others, I fear, have a right to look at him in absolute disgust, and an employer has the right to tell him, you come to work dressed like that, and you are fired. It is really no different for a crossdresser.
Jennifer Usher (aka Just Jennifer) lives in a Tenderloin Housing Clinic shelter room and is not recognized by any trans organization ,mailing list or blog as being anything other than a royal pain in the behind.
Usher appears to be jealous of other transwomen successes and spends all her time, which is considerable since she is jobless and living in a city sponsored shelter room, putting down successful transwomen. Usher believes that transsexuality and transgenderism is a disease and thus anyone not disabled by it is a threat to her worldview. Usher is currently collecting San Francisco funds because she claims her transge deism is a disabling condition.
Usher is not “stealth” as she claims as anyone can see in her public pictures ( https://picasaweb.google.com/jenniferrusherr/AllAboutMe ).
Jennifer volunteers as a newsletter at a local Church that claims to be “inclusive” ? Would her pastor at Church of the Advent of Christ the King approve of her stalking transgendered people? She lets everyone know that you are the newsletter editor there ( http://www.advent-sf.org/staff/jennifer-usher.htm ) . Would her pastor be happy that one if his staff spends her time harassing transgendered people on-line?
Joanne, thank you so much for bringing this to light. The comments she had posted and the subsequent discussion had me in tears on multiple occasions. This is the internet and I shouldn’t be so sensitive, but I can’t help but try to reach out even to those who appear to need it the most. Though, from her reputation I can see that this is a lost cause and move on. I have several friends in the hacker community; I’ll see if I can convince them to help me do something about this apparent menace. From a few simple searches I can tell that she has been rather careless with her personal information and web interaction (not to mention garnering a well-documented awful reputation); I’d recommend that she be careful what she says from here on out because she’s made herself a very easy target. Looks like my 7 years of education in computer science are going to pay off after all.
This person, calling himself Joanne, is probably not. My guess is that it is a rather nasty cyberstalker named “Diane Lask,” a non-op who has pretended to be a post-op for years. I actually tried to help Lask some years ago, but now he has a vendetta against me.
Let’s just say that most of what he says is not entirely true at best, and much of it is outright lies. Let me say this, I have never met a “successful transgwoman.” I have met quite a few women with a history of transsexualism, but I would consider “transwoman” to be an oxymoron. You are either “trans” or you are a woman. A “transwoman” is generally someone who cannot move on from being a man. They are not identified as woman, but as something “different”
Mr. Lask spends a lot of time attempting to coerce other people into doing his stalking for him. All that has resulted in is people being laughed at by those they have contacted.
Now, if you want to make threats, go ahead. I don’t care for cowards who cyberstalk. I have not been careless with my person information. I was outed by someone who was using a blog system that I was unaware provided information about people commenting. Mr. Lask spends his time (he is unemployed and homeless) researching people he has a grudge against. Whether “Joanne” is Lask, or not, he is the source of the information being used here.
Am I “politically incorrect?” Yes, you bet I am. Do I step on the toes of the “transgender extremists?” With a vengeance.
I would have apologized for making you cry, but no. I see you are one of those men who cannot abide disagreement. This is typical of the transgender extremists. They think nothing of violating the law to silence those who speak the truth. Think about it. My words were not bother you so much, if they were not true.
I get a laugh out of the efforts of some to silence me. Oh well, do your worst. But be warned, I don’t roll over.