Category: trans

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Five Questions With… Kate Bornstein

Kate Bornstein is an author, playwright and performance artist. Her latest book, Hello, Cruel World: 101 Alternatives to Suicide for Teens, Freaks, and Other Outlaws, came out last month. Kate’s published works include the books Gender Outlaw: On Men, Women and the Rest of Us; My Gender Workbook; and the cyber-romance-action novel, Nearly Roadkill, written with co-author Caitlin Sullivan. Kate’s plays and performance pieces include Strangers in Paradox, Hidden: A Gender, The Opposite Sex Is Neither, Virtually Yours, and y2kate: gender virus 2000. It was both a pleasure and an honor to get to speak with her.

1. I love that you mention in Hello, Cruel World how trans folk are separating themselves into “male” and “female” by using terms like MTF and the like, because I’ve noticed that those of us who are hot for trans folk seem to like the transness, not the ‘target gender’ (or really even the ‘birth gender’) alone. It’s the chaser’s dirty secret. Do you think trans people will start to enjoy being trans, sexually or otherwise?

There are lots of un-named, unclaimed desires that are free from the male/female gender system. Desire for sex with oneself is a sexual orientation in itself, and you can be any gender or no gender in order to have that desire. My former partner felt the most important component for his desire was that his partner be the same gender as him. When he was a woman, he was with women; when he was gender-exploring he was with someone who was also gender-exploring; now that he’s a man he’s with men. I think what you’ve got is an as-yet-un-named sexual orientation: the desire for sex and romance with someone who’s neither male nor female.

Give your desire for transness a name. Then, speak your desire loudly, and proudly and seductively. I think if people hear that, that you’d like them the way they are, they’d be more encouraged to live that place of neither/nor.

As to using terms like MTF/FTM – yeah, I’ve been complaining about that for years. In this new book, I’m just a little less patient about it. It’s amusing and humiliating to admit it, but I still work hard to pass in public. I’m an old fart, and that’s still important to me. Out in the world, I pass to avoid the shame and the danger. But intimately with friends, community, or our lovers? The not-passing is the dance of love. No need for male or female, what luxury!

kate bornstein & betty crow1b. But I seem to upset some transsexual people when I recognize that Betty’s masculinity turns me on – even if it’s in addition to my being turned on by her femininity.

Upset them! When you go beyond either/or, people think you’re a radical, that you’re less safe because you’re less predictable. Speaking or writing down the truth of your desire unlocks the political and moral shackles of desire.

Continue reading “Five Questions With… Kate Bornstein”

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Speaking at Purdue

I’m excited to announce that I’m going to be speaking at Purdue University @ Calumet this coming October 27th. The talk will be about ‘Trans Identities and Cultural Politics’ and is part of an ongoing Diversity Advocacy series they’ve been doing. There’s more information on their website, but I do hope those of you who are anything close to Indiana will be able to make it! I’d love to see some familiar faces, of course.
I’m planning on traveling through Chicago, of course, so if there’s a group in/near the city that’d like to have me come speak, let me know.

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Ultimatums

I was reading Reid Vanderbergh’s soon-to-be-published book and he mentioned how the wives of MTFs are doing reasonably well when they “were able to wrap their minds around the transition sufficiently that they did not leave the relationship, or deliver an ultimatum (“move forward with this transition and it’s over.”).”
& I was thinking, what difference is there between his example of an ultimatum:

Quote:

move forward with this transition and it’s over

and what i’ve said to betty:

Quote:

i’m pretty sure i won’t be able to love a woman so transitioning may mean the end of our relationship.

Because I honestly don’t know. Obviously tone and concern and trying to deal, yes, but ultimately, is there any difference? I’m not so sure there is.

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Victor/Victoria

Tonight I finished my last revision of Chapter 7, and coincidentally Victor/Victoria was on PBS, and I happened to catch it right from the beginning. People will be surprised to hear that I’ve never seen it before. (Though no-one should be, I keep saying that I just don’t like movies, and I think I saw Chariots of Fire that year instead, because I really do see only a few a year.)
I can see how utterly shocking this movie must have seemed in 1982 when it was released. But I can’t see Julie Andrews passing at all; I mean she’s Julie Andrews! The hills are alive and all that.
But the romantic subplot (or is that the main plot?) with James Garner is – well, dumb. But at least it’s not one long homophobic joke… except it is. There’s also just something creepy about the way it’s all so ‘demimonde packaged for the suburbs’ too, which is beginning to tire me. The scenes of them trying to navigate public spaces as a gay couple are hurting my brain.
“I guess the problem is that we’re not really two guys.” UGH. My crazy bet is that she’s going to choose to drop the act and become properly gendered so they can be together. Am I right? (It’s not over yet, still on while I’m typing.)
And why a Polish count? Are Polish folks just considered genderqueer or something? I’m starting to think so. I have very little idea as to how this movie was received, and I’m sure most of you have seen it, and I’d love to hear your thoughts, initial reactions, etc.

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When the Media Gets It Wrong

I was researching some issues tonight concerning journalism and the proper use of pronouns and discovered that the NLGJA (National Lesbian & Gay Journalists’ Association) have a Rapid Response Task Force whose job it is to target any form of media that’s getting a story wrong about LGBT people.
From their site:

NLGJA’s members and staff work daily with our colleagues in the news industry to fulfill the organization’s mission of fair and accurate coverage. Sometimes, though, a more targeted response is required to promote greater understanding about how to fairly and accurately cover the LGBT community.
NLGJA’s answer to this is the Rapid Response Task Force. This panel of working journalists from mainstream and LGBT media answers complaints about reporting seen as unfair and/or inaccurate by readers, viewers, listeners and our peer journalists around the country. Since its inception, the Rapid Response Task Force has not only informed countless newsrooms about appropriate terminology and the appearance of bias, but has also used these contacts to spread awareness about issues facing the LGBT community.

And they encourage you to submit stories that you feel included unfair or inaccurate coverage. So you can do something besides gripe on the message boards!

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Passing for Couples

I was just now re-drafting one of my chapters, when out of the blue it occurred to me that one of the issues for a (female + mtf) couple making it through transition (social, medical or otherwise) is the ability to pass as a lesbian couple. I know about all the “like sisters” people; they’re all well and good and don’t have to pass as anything but friends (or sisters, obviously). But for those of us who still want a publicly visible, romantic and sexual relationship, what we’re effectively looking to do is pass as a lesbian, or bisexual, or queer couple. In order to do that, I think you have to know something about what lesbian, bisexual, and queer couples are like, no?

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Five Questions With… Jan B.

Jan B. is one of the people who started a trans group in Poughkeepsie called MHVTA. She’s been helping run the group since 2001, and I’ve known her for about that long. I used to call her “perpetual lurker Jan” on my very first yahoo support group, CDOD.
jan b.1) MHVTA is a nice group – how did you decide to start it? Do you have rules or guidelines, or are you making it up as you go?

Helen, thanks for the opportunity to answer these 5 questions. This is also a nice way to publicize our group so I want to start with a Shameless Plug:The Mid-Hudson Valley Transgender Association (MHVTA), a chapter of Renaissance, is a fairly new group. It was founded in May 2001 by Nikki and I. MHVTA serves the mid-Hudson Valley area of New York (the area north of New York City and south of Albany, from the Pennsylvania border on the west to Connecticut on the east). It’s an active group with regular monthly meetings near Poughkeepsie.

We were so frustrated that nothing was local. We had to travel forty to seventy miles to find a group, so someone said. “Well, just start it yourself (and they will come).” I had never been to a TG support group before but was pretty used to other types of support groups. We met in homes for four meetings and eventually found [an affordable] place to meet, with discreet off street parking.

It varies but there are around 20 dues-paying members who attend meetings. We have more than 100 members on our list server who are interested but don’t necessarily attend meetings. The membership requirements are that you are a TG interested to know more and we are open to the TG spectrum including family if they want to attend. We currently don’t invite admirers in but they sometimes sneak in when someone brings a friend. The members seem to appreciate the level of confidentiality and the one on one interviews pre visiting the group.

MHVTA’s principal mission is to provide outreach and support for our members, their families, their friends, and to be active in the Transgender Community and the greater community of the Mid-Hudson Valley, New York. MHVTA is a non-discriminatory group which is structured to allow participation by all those who support the transgender community. We respect and support the right of free and open expression and the right to be treated as equals by society. We focus on providing an understanding peer support network for anyone who would like to be a part of it and to assist others who wish to learn more about the Transgender community, acting as a Transgender advocate to other groups and institutions in the Mid-Hudson Valley area. We welcome new people with sensitivity towards their fears and concerns that accompany revealing themselves to others. MHVTA aims to accomplish this through: Regularly scheduled meetings, social events, and frequent and open communication. For more information, you can check MHVTA’s website.
You can also find an interview with some members of MHVTA at www.tgforum.com (but you can go directly to the article if you’re a subscriber).
Continue reading “Five Questions With… Jan B.”

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Jeff & Esther

I mentioned Esther Williams to a wife of a crossdresser not long ago and she looked at me blankly – silly me, assuming everyone knows the story of the million-dollar mermaid and her crossdressing movie star boyfriend.

“Jeff Chandler was standing in the middle of the bedroom in a red wig, a flowered chiffon dress, expensive high-heeled shoes and lots of makeup,”

she said about her near-husband, Jeff Chandler, Hollywood hunk.
Here’s a great review that talks about the genderedness of it all that originally appeared in Salon, and I find it interesting the way he ties in her LSD trip, the recognition of her own animus, and how her acid-induced knowledge of her male self makes a crossdressed husband especially horrifying.
I wonder if the acid is required, since otherwise I fall into the same category of being aware of my animus, except I didn’t scream. Not even once.

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Three More Ways

Three more ways you can help the larger trans community, according to NCTE:
#26: Make a Restroom More Accessible to Trans People
&
#27: Collaborate with another group on a community project or social event.
&
#28: Work to pass an anti-discrimination policy at your workplace
Eventually there will be 52 suggestions, one per week, listed at the NCTE website.

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On the Side

There are times when I think I have achieved the ideal form of monogamy: I spent the day with my husband for our anniversary, and now I’m about to go out to a lesbian club with my girlfriend. (And yes, I prefer thinking of Betty as my girlriend on the side, not as my wife. It’s sexier, no?)