24) People can’t use my birth sex against me as a weapon to keep me from getting justice. I can tell anyone I want what sex I was born and it won’t cause a scandal because they already know what sex I was born.

My closest friends, people I’ve known for years, people I wanted to never have to deal with the prying or personal questions when someone knows are the people who also know me best. That bit of privacy has now been taken away from me. And am I ever pissed.

I am reminded of Alexis Arquette from the Surreal Life. On VH1 they did a show about the worst Reality TV Show fights/rivalries, and she appeared to talk about an experience where she was being trans-bashed–verbally, thank goodness, not physically. It was a collection of all those privileges about–saying things like, ‘She has a penis’ and asking horribly offensive, hateful things that they had no right to know or answer–not just because she was transgender, but also because she was a woman.

So what did she do, folks? Pick up an umbrella and charge them.

Now I don’t necessarily condone violence, but I do think this was an actions-speak-louder-than-words situation. She was pissed. Who can blame her? If it was me, I’d want to do something even worse than she did. But you had to LOVE their reaction to it all. They were fucking SHOCKED. They did not expect this trans person to fight for her right not to be harassed. And Alexis is a big girl, she could have given them a run for their money, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they were a little afraid too. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, as they say. Over all? Most gratifying thing I’d seen on TV in a long time, and VH1 was right to call out those sexist, transphobic assholes on their behavior.

Even more right of VH1 (though perhaps I am giving them too much credit), was to treat Alexis as a hero. She was. She was so very brave, and I want that to be a reminder to all trans people facing the same discrimination–that you should never be ashamed, that you shouldn’t be afraid to fight back because there is a whole big community of people like us that will give you the veneration you deserve and the support you need.

Lori, indeed I am dependent on billions of people who produce all that I consume. I could not live alone on a desert island, mostly because I could not bear that amount of solitude, even if I learned to find and prepare enough food. Perhaps it is that we are talking past each other. I understood “validity” in the list to mean worth. I remain worthy of respect however many people disrespect me.

If anyone does not realise that she is worthy of respect, and depends on respect from others to maintain self-respect, she is vulnerable to the withdrawal of such respect. So someone says, “It’s a bloke!” and she is distraught. Me, I do not care how many people think I am male, they are simply wrong.

I will survive despite a billion people calling me male, I will survive because of my own inner resources. I am female.

But you wouldn’t be able to type those words if you hadn’t been validated as a human being: first by your mother (even while you were a fetus), and, at some level, by the social system into which you were born.

I don’t know you, and I may be wrong, but, given that you have advanced literacy skills and are able to communicate over the internet, chances are very good that you were sustained by the body of your mother before you were born. Chances are very good that you were born into a (possibly hideously messed up but still functioning) medical system that weighed, examined you for illness and provided some sort of pre- & post-natal care for you. Chances are very good that you were born or adopted into a family that provided you (with the help of many other people) with language (& the whole process of learning depends entirely on external validation), food, shelter, clothing, advanced literacy, medical care, etc.

If you really are not validated as a human from birth you will die.

Human beings are first and foremost tribal; we cannot survive without the massive efforts of many people. We in the West are deluded into a false sense of our our grandeur and independence because of wealth and the ideology of individualism. This delusion of our own individual powers allows us to erase the labor it takes to sustain our very expensive lives. It is not a coincidence that much of this nurturing labor has historically been done by people identified as women and by the poor.

When women, trans- people, nonwhites, poor people, people with disabilities, demand external validation, they are simply demanding the tools they need to survive. Because being dehumanized is deadly.

That “privilege” doesn’t mean any of us need that external validation, only that others can’t use it against them. For example, despite being “female”, for some post-operative male-to-female transsexual value of “female”, under the laws of some parts of the state where I live, I am still “male”. Because I’m very “passable”, I’m very widely regarded as “female”, whereas transsexual women who have a more typically male build are more often regarded as “male” or “queer”.

A genetical natural, of whatever sex, isn’t going to be legally considered “male” just because she (in this example) has broad shoulders, big hands, and a deep voice. She might be the brunt of jokes, but if she’s a XX-female-type, she’s female-female-female. While a transsexual woman with the same body habitus, etc. is “male” and everyone around her will be told “she’s really a man”.

2) My validity as a man/woman/human is not based upon how much surgery I’ve had or how well I “pass” as a non-Trans person.

No-one but me can validate myself as a person. The need for external validation is slavery.

If you need external validation you will always be vulnerable and beholden. Yes, it’s nice, but Everybody has to be able to live without it or they are open to great suffering.

My validity as a human being is based upon My opinion of it, which is improving. It has been a struggle, but I now feel I am pretty valid as a human being. Unconditional negative regard hurts anyone, particularly the small children who people want to “make a man of”, but we can recover from that.

I wish you weren’t a squid because if you were a person I’d immediately propose marriage :)

Please excuse me while I swoon.

::thunk!::

I was amazed by how many of the people writing from the unprivileged side in the Male Privilege threads reversed positions (down to phrasing and inability to hear or parse the unprivileged side) when taking part in the White Privilege thread. Stunned that those who wrote so eloquently while explaining the privileging and the dynamics of language in one thread then used those same phrasings/were unable to see the dynamics of language when they were in the position of power.

What I learned from that is how easy it is to see your disadvantages and how difficult it is to see your own privileges.

I’d like to propose another “Non-Trans Privilege” — “I get to claim I’m not privileged because everyone thinks you’re crazy, a pawn of patriarchy, or generally suck”.

I just wanted to say how much I enjoy your posts, and how much I want this on a t-shirt.

I’d like to propose another “Non-Trans Privilege” — “I get to claim I’m not privileged because everyone thinks you’re crazy, a pawn of patriarchy, or generally suck”.

That should be listed first, because that’s the privilege that used most when these discussions come up. It can even be used for the “Male Privilege Checklist” — “I get to claim that I really am better than you because everyone knows women just want to have babies and get fat eatting bon-bons at men’s expense.” They both have the same validity.

Western society tries to categorize people into easy to understand ways. Women like me have to adapt greatly to survive. in an often hostile world. I didn’t choose to be born intersexed. It’s not a great deal of fun since I have NEVER had the pleasure of dating, companionship, romantic love or intimacy. I can never have a family. It’s tough at times, however I’m much stronger for it!

I cannot visit places like I would like such as swimming pools, gyms, beaches and other places because I consider the sensitivities of others. I do not want to make anyone uncomfortable. Bottom line, I respect other people.

I say to those who seek to go out of their way to make things difficult for women like me, I say bring it on! The harder people make it for me, the stronger I become. I overcome adversity and ultimately win.

I work from the premise that I treat all people like I want to be treated myself with compassion, dignity and respect. All I ask is that others do so in return

Like number 12… why mention political action? Huh? If you get arrested for any reason you get be put in the wrong prison and it’s basically a death sentence for a lot of people if it gets to that point and they don’t put you in solitary. And if you survive you are so messed up. I had a friend who survived five years in a male prison as an out transwomen and is permanently disabled.

Q Grrrl, you have no idea what people are saying. For example, EVERY person I come into contact with who find out I’m trans, eventually asks me if I’m pre-op or post-op. That includes my BOSS, my LANDLORD, the GOVERNMENT, etc. You have NO IDEA what that is like. Some piggy men ask you about your genitals is NOT the same thing. If I don’t tell them my situation, piggy men ask me similar crap to what they ask you. It’s very very different thing.

I agree the list could be better written to deal with the things trans people face as trans people and the things those of us who are trans women face as women. We face both. (Except that, like many nontrans women who cannot, or choose not to, procreate, we don’t directly deal with issues of reproductive freedom… we just deal with hostility and people saying we’re not real because we can’t).

But definitely, some things just need to be spelled out more since it’s clear some people actually don’t even understand what some things in the list are talking about, and the extent of them, and how they happen in addition to what we face as women. So, yeah, it is badly written.

[Moderation note: Edited by Amp a bit to remove some flame-bait.]

My chances of being murdered are 8.5% (liftetime)

Do you have a cite for that?

in post #55 you said:
ignoring the very real oppression that happens when women are classed alongside men as the weaker sex/fucked class. To the class of men in patriarchy, transgender is = to woman (a class to be fucked), leaving intact the primacy of the male “gender.”

Being “fucked” as you phrase it does not disallow you from oppression! Twisting it to supplant trans oppression with woman’s oppression is itself oppression, and you are not qualified to dismiss trans anything, IMHO. Certainly any more than a nontarget group member would be competent to dismiss target group concerns.
I believe the folowing is excellent advice:

Thinking girl wrote:
perhaps we are all used to finding fault with arguments, poking holes in them, sensitive to our own oppression, when what we should be doing is listening.

I agree that you are oppressed. I agree that you share many oppressions with trans folk. Isn’t that cause enough to work together? We are powerful together. We share much in common. Let’s start acting like it. We deserve it.

Thinking girl, My respect for you is immense. Thank you for bringing some light to this discussion.