Transphobia, Cissexism, and Misogyny

[jaquiregina.livejournal.com]

I had come across the book Whipping Girl in a few ads and in a recommendation on Amazon when I bought other things. For some reason, I bought it but put it aside and read a few other books in my many piles of books to be read. I have to say that the book blew me away, I believe that it is the most powerful book I have ever read about the trans experience.

In the introduction she says:

"I have called this book Whipping Girl to highlight the ways in which people who are feminine, whether they be female, male, and/or transgender, are almost universally demeaned compared with their masculine counterparts."

This reminded me of stories I had read in books on the lesbian butch/femme culture wherein they talked of how the femmes were always suspect, especially in the politically correct period of the twentieth century when feminism was first starting and androgyny was valued higher then either butch or femme identity, but femme was more suspect because it was seen as complying with the expectations of the oppressing, dominating male culture. For myself, while I spent most of my life hiding any feminine aspect of my being, I often experienced how men dismissed feminine women as merely there for their pleasure and verbally attacked women who appeared strong and intelligent, calling them dykes or ball breakers. Damned if you do and damned if you don't.

In the chapter Trans woman Manifesto she says some powerful things:

"Trans women are so ridiculed and despised because we are uniquely positioned at the intersection of multiple binary gender based forms of prejudice: transphobia, cissexism, and misogyny."
"cissexuals, i.e., people who are not transsexual and who have only ever experienced their subconscious and physical sexes as being aligned."
"While often different in practice, cissexism, transphobia, and homophobia are all rooted in oppositional sexism, which is the belief that male and female are rigid, mutually exclusive categories, each possessing a unique and nonoverlapping set of attributes, aptitudes, abilities, and desires."

I find these concepts quite powerful and empowering to me. I spent most of my life avoiding any hint of femininity, now that I have been living as myself I find I feel much more comfortable in a dress or skirt. While I am skeptical of my own motives and realize that at least part of the urge comes from the fear of being "read", I know that is not all that is going on because it is even true in social situations where I am an out transsexual. I feel better about myself when I can feel more completely feminine. While I am still surprised at times by how typically feminine I have become, I don't see it as a performance or as an attempt to live up to anyone else's expectations.

The other day I was watching a video of a talk by one of my new favorite authors, S Bear Bergman, and sie made a similar observation to one that I had just read in Whipping Girl:

Media depictions of trans women, whether they take the form of fictional characters or actual people, usually fall under one of two main archetypes: the "deceptive transsexual" or the "pathetic transsexual." .... Because the "deceivers" successfully pass as women, they generally act as unexpected plot twists, or play the role of sexual predators who fool innocent straight guys into falling for other "men." ... In contrast to the "deceivers" who wield their feminine wiles with success, the "pathetic transsexual" characters aren't deluding anyone. ... Unlike the "deceivers" whose ability to "pass" is a serious threat to our culture's ideas about gender and sexuality, "pathetic transsexuals" ---who barely resemble women at all--- are generally considered harmless. ... Ultimately, both "deceptive" and "pathetic" transsexual characters are designed to validate the popular assumption that trans women are really men"

Now I understand why even sympathetic characterizations of transsexuals always made me uneasy. Both sorts of stories deny who I am, a woman, and both try to marginalize or erase me. Ideas are quite powerful.