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Gosh, they've remembered the T in LGBT. I suppose this is a good thing as they have lots of experience and expertise in campaigning for equality. At the same time, I've never been happy with including the T with the others, as I see my previous transsexualism (now cured via surgery and Gender Recognition Act) as relating to my gender identity not sexual orientation - precisely the matter which kept Stonewall and transgender apart previously.
Much of this relates to the seeming spectrum or continuum of the term Trans, which I loathe but which I accept might also put me in a minority. Then in my delusions I see myself as female having had a transsexual path to womanhood. Perhaps it's my age, but having lived as female for nearly thirty years and been active on the scene since I was eighteen, forty four years ago, I find it irksome to have some newly arrived twenty something all frills and lip gloss, telling me how to do things or what is needed. They forget it was my generation who got them this far. I know I sound like some granny telling her newly pregnant granddaughter that she felt the same forty years earlier and her foremothers before her, but it's how I feel.
Society is a constantly evolving organism, and like evolution it occasionally hits dead ends, I just hope that the religious right don't take over again because then we as a minority group could end up as one of the extinct experiments of history, just like some of the more bizarre fossils we see in museum collections.
The link to the Guardian article: http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/feb/16/stonewall-sta...
Comments
Stonewall, the bar and "riot"
according to my friend Boris who was sitting in the park across the street from it when it happened, the Stonewall pub was a TRANS bar, and the "riot" was the trans peaceful protest to police brutality towards them.
so the LGB part of it stole the movement from the trans community.
Stupidity is a capital offense. A summary not indictable.
Exactly
You wrote: "I've never been happy with including the T with the others, as I see my previous transsexualism (now cured via surgery and Gender Recognition Act) as relating to my gender identity not sexual orientation"
My thoughts exactly. It's like one of those kids picture games that show four items, say a baseball, a basketball, a soccer ball and piano and asks, which one doesn't belong. That and the fact that in all the negotiations about laws and ordinances and such, it seems that T gets thrown under the bus in order to advance the LGB portion.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
No activist at all
I've not been pleased with the exhibitionistic way many of the GBL folk confront life, and though I would like to, I've never felt connected to them in any way.
When I first came out, I did all the makeup and lippy, did the fancy wigs and heels with stockings. Somehow I'm in the size range and my voice is high enough that learning the inflections and nuances of the female voice seemed to be enough.
I'll be 68 in a couple weeks, so to blend in with my other female counterparts, means abandoning most makeup, heels (no loss there) and life is far less complicated. Men my age have lost any though of the persuit so I am safe, not that I wanted that. :(
In the relatively short time I've been out, 10 years, I've seen conditions improve a lot for T folk in gentle Portland. No thanks to the GBL folk, I think that much of it has come from compassionate members of the psych community and from certain members of the Media. The non-religious can stop reading here.
I was helping with funeral services on Saturday, and one of the members, of the church who knows my story,the Relief Society President, said there are changes coming in the Mormon church and much to my astonishment, she says that I have been a big part of driving that. I know many Mormon T folk who have not been accepted, and that may be changing, but likely at a snails pace.
I Agree That Sexual Minority People
Are not the same as the gender identity minority, but we do have some things in common, especially when school aged. We are all minorities and often our behaviors break the conventions of the past. For this reason, people who are not open minded and who strongly hold to archaic morality are apt to be upset by some of our behavior. If there are programs to stop bullying and stop groups trying to enforce their morality on individuals harming none, this is all to our benefit.
It seems logical, at least, that banding together with other groups that are discriminated against, should give us more strength. If these others did not help us much in the past, at least they are changing their behavior. Lesbians, gays and bisexuals out number TG people and are probably richer and have larger advocacy organizations. It's easier for them to be in the closet, but those who are out and/or supportive of groups defending our rights, means we should have more social, communications, and political support in the future.
Hugs and Bright Blessings,
Renee
that is the theory Renee,
but in practice, they get our support but we get little in return. remember some of the loudest detractors are gay people, the women who are part of the TERF movement, and male gays who think that MtF are just men afraid to "be gay" so say we are trans. then add in the religious far right, and we will get "tossed under the bus" quicker than the ink can dry. remember ENDA, we got dropped to get coverage for the LGB parts, but we werent good enough to fight for then. now that the current crop of republicans are in control, I doubt that the new ENDA that DOES include us will ever be voted on, much less passed.
yes many groups are better, but its the one with the attention who have let us down, those with the best contact with politicians, etc. my life is NOT a political compromise to me.
Teresa L.
Teresa L.
To me the biggest problem
To me the biggest problem with the T and LGB association lies in the confusion it engenders in a whole lot of people, perpetuating it. There are lots of troubled and seeking people that -still- not wholly understand the difference between orientation and identity, and this association isn't helping imho.
It is a pet peeve, I guess, but too easily it causes a mix-up of the two, and most often the G ( or L ) card is pulled for a conclusion.
Then again, I realize that just as often, people with T-questions will reach the LGB-associated information first, because of the larger number, and here they might find the proper answers to their 'peculiarities' .
So it is a question of how the LGB-community will handle and inform the lot of us. Them. All.
Jo-Anne
Don't forget a lot of T folk belong to both
We also identify as LGB also. So sometimes I get annoyed at both sides of the divide as there are LGB phobic trans as well as T phobic LGB.
Some of us....
are gladly lesbian in Bayonne..... GLIB?
Love, Andrea Lena
One problem
Stonewall is a very 'out and proud' group, and very much into monitoring. That, of course, is anathema to many; as Angharad says, she's just a woman who arrived at her position by a slightly different route to others.
I have no alternative to being 'out' as it is in the nature of my job, As for LGB people, some of them are indeed ferociously transphobic. Consider 'Pridegate', where at a London Pride event, trans women were barred from using the ladies' toilets "For their own protection". Bollocks, of course; it was the usual TERF and transphobe idea that all of us are rapists in skirts. The result of this 'safety' measure was a number of very violent assaults, including, if my memory serves me right, a rape.