Rant | Calpernia Addams Diary

Transsexuals Who Are Ashamed of Transsexuals (TWAATs)

July 21st, 2008

16 comments

Oops!

I’ve received emails from a very small handful of transsexual women over the years, dispatched from the deep closeted secrecy of whatever their version of stealth is, telling me that it would be better for “all of us” if I would just “keep quiet”. This isn’t the very widespread and debatable feeling of embarrassment over people identifying themselves as trans who relish being spectacles of trash television and outrageousness. With me, it’s usually more of a “sister to sister” chiding, like one old conservative church lady telling another one that she “really should reconsider that gaudy lawn ornament of the lady bending over and showing her bloomers… what will the other parishioners think?!” You know… kind of polite and sweet, yet still sticking their nose in where it doesn’t belong?

But I don’t think we’re in need of being shushed like Anne Frank about to play a game of Jenga while the Nazi’s are downstairs anymore. And I’m not even talking about being “loud and proud” in a gay pride parade. It’s the quieter daily-life things that a basically assimilated trans woman encounters all the time. For example, I refuse to make up lies about my first Sunday dress and my years as a Girl Scout when a stranger asks me about my past in order to spare them any discomfort with the facts of my history. I hate the fact that I had to transition, and would rather have been born with a female body. I don’t plan to bring it up as a conversational topic with every stranger I meet. But I will not be pressured to make up stories and lies by the Shush Brigade. I personally and internally claim my full history, including the torturous years of growing up forced into the male social role and having to transition my body to match my soul. And I still claim unqualified womanhood. How’s that for a brain twister? Trust me, in twenty years it won’t cause anyone to bat an eye.

I wrote a very short essay containing my feelings toward the Shush Brigade, which I’ve edited a little and posted below. I know that everyone will have their own feelings on this topic. Just remember, this is a response to being told how to live. I’m not telling you how to live. I’m telling you how I try to live. There’s a difference.

To Transsexuals Who Are Ashamed of Transsexuals

Living in stealth can be comfortable, and I can’t deny that I would have tried if I hadn’t been outed so publicly in 1999. But ultimately the facts still exist that most trans women were assigned the male gender at birth, grew up being pushed toward the male social role, and had to undertake a colossally difficult transition to align their bodies and social roles with their hearts. You, Andrea, I and every other trans woman has been through some version of that process.

(Click READ MORE to read the rest of the essay… it’s not too long!)

Christian Siriano - Transphobic Bigot

July 15th, 2008

21 comments

http://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/view/42353/She-males-gunning-for-Posh/

I’ve been unhappy about the “hot tranny mess” catchphrase popularized by fashion designer Christian Siriano ever since I first heard it, and then heard it repeated amidst squeals of delight by hetero and gay people who felt entitled because “a gay person said it.” I can take a joke, and I make quite a few myself. But if I’m going to risk walking politically incorrect thin ice, I try to do it firmly within the context of comedy. Just out-and-out promulgation on a television show of the idea that “tranny” goes perfectly with “hot mess” to describe anyone who is some sort of trainwreck or other, without even acknowledging that it could be negative, is ignorant and hurtful.

I know that in cases where the slur doesn’t personally affect the person using it, and where the person is of a certain character, there is no hope of convincing them that they are being hurtful because the idea is so far beyond and outside their thinking. It doesn’t hurt them, and it just seems “right” according to their worldview so they don’t question it. The idea that “trannies” are anything other than a “hot mess” is probably as ridiculous to Siriano as the idea that the Earth is flat. But I suspect that I know quite a few more transsexuals than Siriano, and even probably more transgendered people of all stripes. It’s a very difficult, misunderstood life. And now, along with being compared to Southpark’s pedophiliac detransitioner “Ms. Garrison” (a fictional character that has been brought up to me as an example of how “sick” transsexuals are in countless emails and replies), we can expect to be labeled a “hot tranny mess” by press and people on the street eager to repeat the latest screamingly funny catch phrase from their favorite show.

Is this what my generation suffered through the 1980’s GLBT civil rights battles for? To give a 21 year old gay man the comfort of being able to slam part of the community without any sense of the tradition of cruelty and ignorance he is perpetuating? I predict this will be the next big generational conflict, when GLBT kids who grew up with “Will & Grace” on television and Ellen Degeneres/Rosie O’Donnell hosting chat shows take all that hard won progress for granted.

As I say, one reality show contest winner’s prejudice and bigotry isn’t the end of the world, but since his negativity falls within my bailiwick, I thought I’d mention it. Especially after this:

http://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/view/42353/She-males-gunning-for-Posh/

Openly gay Christian, 21, was forced to apologise to “he-she” groups for using the term “hot tranny mess” on TV to describe frocks he doesn’t like.

He further upset the “snip-tuck” brigade by saying in a magazine interview: “If you think of heterosexuals, they have white trash women and trailer parks and we have drag queens and trannies.”

If the supremely ignorant Siriano ever chooses to enlighten himself on the subject of transsexuals before the next time he slanders us to the readership of another magazine, he might check out something like Lynn Conways TS Successes page. True, it even features “white trash” like me, but I think that this only proves that (flaws and all) a White Trash “tranny” can rise above mere “hot mess” status toward a hopefully useful life.

The article referenced is from The Daily Star, and following Siriano’s lead it refers to transsexuals as “the snip tuck brigade”, “he-shes”, “shemales”, “gender benders” and the tame-by-comparison “bizarre”. Being gay isn’t a free pass for bigotry against other people in the GLBT community. I hope people continue to call Siriano on his hurtful championing of derogatory and negative phrases and stereotypes. Designing for K-Mart can be just a season or two away from even many of the lucky ones in the fashion industry, and in any case you won’t catch me squeezing my 30-something curves into one of Siriano’s “hot tranny mess”-free, “white trash”-free garments even if it was given to me. Perhaps it would make a nice dust cloth to clean up the “mess”.

PS: He did apologize in a general sense, but whenever these things follow a “backlash” and come via press release that sounds like someone’s publicity folks wrote it, I have a hard time buying it. The damage is done.

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Calpernia’s Response to “Bad Questions” Responses

March 10th, 2008

9 comments

The “Bad Questions” video is a humorous portrayal of a heightened version of me… an exaggerated expression of the fatigue and hurt I feel when asked these questions in real life. I am performing in this video as a comedian, and in comedy we often express truths through exaggeration. Being an activist and an artist leaves me walking a fine line between selflessness and creative expression, and sometimes I lean more one way than the other. In real life, I have always treated questioners with kindness, even when they hurt my feelings to the very core, like kittens who dig their needle claws into you without knowing what they’re doing. You only wince and try to dislodge them with minimum damage, you never hurt them back.

But there is a nugget of truth in what I say in this video. Regardless of how curious and genuine the questioner may be, regardless of how much they feel like they need to understand my situation, that still doesn’t make these questions less hurtful when asked. That is an essential, very important point that I should type twice, it’s so important. Regardless of how good the intentions of the questioner, these questions still hurt many trans people who are asked them.

I’ve had many people respond to this video by saying things like, “I just want to know! Isn’t that a good thing?” and “Aren’t questions a good thing?” Well, yes, it’s a good thing that people want to understand, and yes, having questions is a good thing. But (1) Most of these questions can be answered on the internet and (2) this video lays out questions asked in a specific hurtful way; it doesn’t say any and all questions are “bad”. If one listens to the video, they will see right away exactly *why* I feel like the questions mentioned are “bad”. I explain why in great detail for almost each one.

It boils down to appropriateness in most cases. These are deeply personal questions, and I am often asked them by complete strangers who are obviously suppressing a shudder of thrilled revulsion even as they ask. I believe that most everyone could make a list like this… Police officers, wheelchair users, scuba divers, people with Mohawks. Most everyone gets asked “dumb” questions about something or other on a fairly regular basis, but as trans people our proportion of this goes through the stratosphere.

As I say, it’s a comedic exaggeration of my feelings, but if you listen to what I’m saying, it really does explain why I might feel the way I do for each one. In real life, as you can see in my response video, I am the soul of kindness and understanding. But I wanted to lay a little honest anger out there, too. I feel like, after a decade of these questions, I deserve that bit of release.

Calpernia

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