What’s The “T”?

My satirical blog post yesterday (that many people, including my mother, thought was real) was about Bradley Manning and his sentencing and how President Obama is still allowed to roam these streets as a free man, unlike 98% of black men in this country. Or something as infuriating. Read all about it. Today, I’m asking what’s the T? T = transgender(ed).

Bradley Manning read a statement on the Today show on NBC asking that Americans refer to him as Chelsea Manning now that he is coming out as a transsexual woman. Chelsea has not taken any hormone replacement therapy (HRT) and will not receive any at Ft. Leavenworth military prison, where Chelsea will be imprisoned as Bradley. I have a lot of questions about this. Apparently, Chelsea’s transsexual situation came out in court, and her attorney’s tried to get it into the trial as an insanity thing (against Chelsea’s wishes), but it didn’t work. Then there was nothing much more about it. I saw stuff about Bradley Manning being a gay man more than a trans woman.

If there’s one place on the Internet where you can learn and ask questions, it’s Twitter. I learned a lot today. I was going to do my video on the “T” in the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgendered) movement because there is much I don’t get or understand, and I want to have an understanding of it. I have my issues with the “B” in LGBT because if we’re talking about equal rights, it bothers me that I’ve seen so many “B”s jump ship to full-on H (heterosexual) when it was convenient when the pressure from family or society got too hot…only to have a side lover of the same sex. If you’re going to be B and stick it out for rights, then you’ll more than likely classify as “G” or “L” as far as that’s concerned. (I know that you can be “G” or “L” and live a lie, but sexually speaking, you like both when you’re “B” so it’s sexually easier…am I making sense? Relatedly, I’ve only met a few [honestly, just a few] genuine bisexuals, but I’ve met many who were basically experimenting. I think LGBT has a lot to do with emotional connection over simple sexual preference too.)

So, on Twitter I learned today was cis is – people who feel they are in their right gender. I learned that people can ask questions to stop their ignorance of something and people get “offended” and attack them for asking said questions (happened to my friend @ReignofApril). Twitter makes you love and hate it at the same time. Thanks to those who sought to educate others today.

I’ll readily admit that I don’t get the T. I don’t get what it would be like to feel uncomfortable in your born gender enough to want to radically alter your body and life to become the opposite gender. I know that trans people have it harder in society than gay people. I know that the T was adopted into the LGBT movement, otherwise trans people would have had a much harder time finding advocates. I know that some trans people switch genders and become homosexual instead of heterosexual, adding to the discrimination. I know that “tranny” is a slur that I’ll stop using. I know that draq queens like RuPaul do it for the money and are happy being men outside of their time getting paid, and that draq queens are not transgendered or transsexual (for the most part).

I also know that I worked with a trans woman and thought it was kind of cool that no big fuss was raised about it. She was professional and nice, if a bit flustered trying to wrangle a rowdy group into doing what they needed to do in order to get work done. I also know a trans woman but never saw her after her reassignment surgery. She dated my friend as a gay man, though, and we were all shocked when she went to Mexico to have the surgery.

So, I have a lot to learn. As for Manning, what she identifies as today doesn’t change the fact, for me, that she committed traitorous acts against the United States of America. It remains to be seen if today’s revelation will get her reassigned to a civilian prison where she could get HRT and even reassignment surgery.

 

Also, if you’re not watching Orange Is the New Black on Netflix, you need to watch. There is a trans character named Sophie, who is played by transsexual woman Laverne Cox, who has been a woman since the late 90s.

She’s one of my favorite characters and my heart breaks looking at her past in flashbacks on the show. The show highlights the plight of women in prison and now of a transsexual woman in prison and it’s worth seeing how things unfold.

 

Tags: Bradley Manning, Chelsea Manning, featured, Gay, Laverne Cox, Orange Is The New Black, Politics, Transgendered, Transsexual

Category: Gay, News, Politics