How modern transphobia recycles old homophobia

[Bramblethorn]

Interesting thread here with a roundup of old newspaper articles, showing how the anti-trans discourse of 2019 is recycled from the homophobia of a couple of decades back. Virtually all the same issues that are now used to attack trans people were once used against gay/bi people.

https://twitter.com/ImplausibleGrrl/status/1100719714387484672

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

I dunno, buddy.

I'm looking at this link you posted and I can't help but think that what this is really all about is a wide social disparity in ideals and dispositions to 'beauty.'

Today's loud clamoring is coming from self-involved arrogant people who have just plain disregarded (or maybe don't even know) that Grace Jones existed (still exists!) and was already in a Bond movie long before LGBTQ anything, or that Errol Brown was an acknowledged superstar by EVERYONE including White Pommie Bastards who are supposed to all be racist, and that Marlene Dietrich wore men's tuxedos and white hetero MEN approved... ...because, BECAUSE 1. Grace Jones had talent and was authentically INNOVATIVE, 2. Errol Brown was a thorough and classy gentleman AND a good singer and musician, and 3. Dietrich never in the first place broke tuxedo code, because she was knowledgeable AND intelligent and knew what it was AND dressed superbly.

It's all about style my friend, not blush. It's about substance, not froth.

Like, what, we didn't already have The Lady Chablis kill it in 'Midnight In The Garden Of Good And Evil?'

Ru Paul is incredibly talented. And so is Anne Carlisle. The HARD RIGHT WINGER Clint Eastwood stuck Paul in that movie. Or do you forget?

There are people trying to jump onto a band-wagon that gives trans stories some carriage at present and for a short while - but really, none of them have the art, talent, or substance that would allow them 'stardom' or authentic celebrity status and until we get such qualities the whole thing will look like just so much temporary ego-driven noisy silliness.

It's not about 'phobia'-anything. It's about no talent.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I dunno, buddy.

I'm looking at this link you posted

Are you, though? Because your response doesn't deal with any of the issues raised in that thread.

I may be misreading you - I often do misread people - but sometimes your posts give the impression that there are two topics you really, REALLY love talking about, one of those two being Hollywood, and that every time you enter a discussion it's with the goal of diverting it into a long tangent about one of those two topics.

Being autistic, I can relate to that very well. I have certain special interests that I love talking about at length, and I often feel the urge to steer conversation into that comfortable territory where I can appear knowledgeable. But I've come to understand that it's not always Bramble's German Metal And Graph Theory Hour, and trying to make it so just comes across as obnoxious, so I keep that in check.

In this thread, I posted a link to examples of how people used to argue for excluding gay folk from jobs, domestic violence services, ... on a whole bunch of spurious arguments, with the point being that these are virtually identical to the arguments now being used against transgender people.

None of what you wrote touches on that. To the best of my knowledge, none of the names you invoked are even transgender. (Ru Paul very very arguably, depending on how broadly one draws the lines, but I don't think he considers himself to be trans.) Cross-dressing, whether in a trouser role or for personal enjoyment, is not the same thing as transgender.

It's not about 'phobia'-anything. It's about no talent.

Really?

How talented should a gay or trans person be before they're allowed to access a domestic violence shelter? How stylish does one have to be in order to be allowed to serve in the military? How many Oscars does a gay/trans person need to win in order to establish that they're not a predator taking advantage of confused youth?

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

Look discrimination is a crystal clear-cut thing. It's when people 'select and permit' because of pre-existing biases and prejudices and not because they are considering something on its objective merits.

To that extent nothing you are saying is particularly. let me say 'out of the ordinary;' people have been biased and prejudiced against all kinds of things since absolutely forever.

What I'm saying - and I'll be honest here, because I certainly have been in circles which consist of all kinds of lifestyles and in certain situations definitely INCLUDING transgender people - I am struggling to see that there really is a huge big problem of trans bias...

I think SOME, not all, SOME transgender people are overly-sensitive about their own issues (and that could be understandable too, after all, it's about THEIR experience). I don't think this immediately nor clearly translates to 'there is some kind of wider community or social/society problem' and that there is a huge mass of anti-transgender people. I don't see that. My point about popular culture examples is that very fact that they were POPULAR. Which means accepted, and NOT 'anti' or having obvious widespread negative bias.

No. I don't see it.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

'The Lady Chablis' (Chablis Deveau) was most definitely a transgender identity, and a well-known performer in transgender clubs as well as in mainstream theater and film.

'Midnight In The Garden Of Good And Evil' was not even a fictional story although it is told that way.

There is no possible way to say that Clint Eastwood is anything other than a staunch Republican and a Right Wing identity in politics, and he's never had a bad word to say about Chablis or the movie - which was an excellent film.

It's a stretch to argue that there really is a WIDE anti-trans sentiment around. I don't see it. There are a lot of self-promoters using tendentious arguments because the media loves it. And such arguments also tend to want to swipe a broad brush that takes extraneous things into the direct case (EG 'it wasn't trans it was x-dressing') because they can't make the direct case. That's about all there is to it.

All developed countries have laws about domestic violence shelters which are supervised by government agencies and they have laws about violence, be it domestic or otherwise. Anything that goes outside of those written codes and regulations isn't legally classed as 'anti-trans bias' it's called bias and not operating within the written rules. Those people you say are lobbying against transgendered people are going to need to lobby to change a lot of laws. And I'm 100% sure there ARE some strongly anti-trans people around. That's just common sense and what you'd expect people to be like - namely, some believe this and some believe that and some believe some other thing altogether. Like...so what?! As Chablis said: 'two tears in a bucket -, fuck it.'

The 'anti trans lobby' is not a thing. Certainly not a thing that will ever get any traction in the majority view. So whether they/it adopts old homophobic arguments is moot.

 

[Bramblethorn]

'The Lady Chablis' (Chablis Deveau) was most definitely a transgender identity, and a well-known performer in transgender clubs as well as in mainstream theater and film.

'Midnight In The Garden Of Good And Evil' was not even a fictional story although it is told that way.

There is no possible way to say that Clint Eastwood is anything other than a staunch Republican and a Right Wing identity in politics, and he's never had a bad word to say about Chablis or the movie - which was an excellent film.

Not wanting to get into a lengthy Hollywood-related tangent here, since it doesn't really have much bearing on the topic of this thread, but I'm not sure that "director declines to trash his own film & its cast" should be taken to indicate any more than that he hopes to keep working in the industry.

All developed countries have laws about domestic violence shelters which are supervised by government agencies and they have laws about violence, be it domestic or otherwise. Anything that goes outside of those written codes and regulations isn't legally classed as 'anti-trans bias' it's called bias and not operating within the written rules. Those people you say are lobbying against transgendered people are going to need to lobby to change a lot of laws.

https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc...could-place-homeless-trans-women-men-n1009346

Just a day after Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson faced grilling on Capitol Hill over the Equal Access Rule of 2012, which permitted transgender people to be housed according to their gender identity in single-sex shelters, the department published a proposed rule change that would allow men’s and women’s shelters to segregate transgender people “consistent with state and local law.”

[read: requiring trans women to use men's shelters]

...

The Equal Access rule was promulgated by the Obama administration in 2012 in order to ensure that women’s shelters and other single-sex facilities did not segregate transgender and cisgender (non-transgender) people.

In 2016, when the final rule was published, HUD released a statement saying the rule was “to make certain that housing assisted or insured by HUD is open to all eligible individuals and families without regard to actual or perceived sexual orientation, gender identity or marital status.”

“Transgender women in particular reported that they are excluded from women's shelters,” the statement continued, “forcing them to live on the streets or to seek shelter in male-only facilities where they're forced to disguise their gender identity or face abuse or violence.”

In 2016, HUD also cited a report from the Center for American Progress and the Equal Rights Center that found only 30 percent of shelters the organizations contacted said they were willing to house transgender women with other women.

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/01/22/politics/scotus-transgender-ban/index.html

The Supreme Court allowed President Donald Trump's transgender military ban to go into effect on Tuesday, dealing a blow to LGBT activists who call the ban cruel and irrational.
In an unsigned 5-4 order, the justices took no stance on the legality of the ban, first proposed in a surprise tweet by Trump in 2017, but Tuesday's action clears the way for it to take effect while lower courts hear additional arguments.
The four liberal justices objected to allowing the administration's policy banning most transgender people from serving in the military to go into effect.

...and plenty more where that came from, not to mention in other countries.

 

[stickygirl]

Nice link Brambles but jeez, reading it is tough. Good for her and she's so right. The parallels are obvious and well documented.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

What is 100% the case and can be demonstrated over and over, is that there is a strong political lobby coming from commercialized religious quarters in the USA, and these are overwhelmingly labelled (self-labelling? 'labelled AS?' ...whatever) 'Christian,' typically 'Evangelical Christian.' And this lobby is pretty loud against almost anything and everything (which certainly includes transgender matters).

Is this 'modern transphobia?' Well, probably exactly as the OP suggested, it is the SAME 'phobia' - the same style of phobia and arguments the same people/same kinds of people ran with decades ago over different things they didn't like.

My issue about it all, for right or for wrong, is that I think it 'gives legs' to these people by 'raising' them into some broader, 'modern' majority that is going to or likely to make a real issue of the subject.

I could be wrong, but I think transgender is going to disappear as a much talked over issue in the public discussion space. It's kind of, 'flavor of the millisecond.'

Let's see in a year.

I mean they're not 'modern; for one thing; they're reactionary.

And I just DO NOT believe the majority of the public is either homophobic or transphobic. I DO believe there are lot of naiive people susceptible to exploitation by commercialized religious groups who leap onto sex-related anything. And I know that political campaigns give air to these exploiting groupings because they need them to win elections. I know that because I am part of it. As in, have been part of marketing companies employed by political campaigns.

It's a very tricky business because I feel, if you want to help those who are being badly served by what is going on, providing the obvious 'opposition' to the 'exploit position' is almost like feeding it.

IE The 'exploit position' is not the actual position: the actual position is some human beings are being put in danger when they are being blocked from help, or from safe dwellings. So the real solution is to render the safety provisions to those people. Transgender people are people; full stop.

I would like to hear if any of you have a strong view (I am not well-enough informed about it to have a particular view) on if transgender people would object to having ENTIRELY THEIR OWN shelters...? Why is this about what the definitions of 'male' v 'female'/'man' v 'woman' are when it is basically about safety first and foremost? ...Actually I am not clear on the whole thing, have not heard, do not understand yet, all the arguments one way or the other.

 

[stickygirl]

snip~

I would like to hear if any of you have a strong view (I am not well-enough informed about it to have a particular view) on if transgender people would object to having ENTIRELY THEIR OWN shelters...? Why is this about what the definitions of 'male' v 'female'/'man' v 'woman' are when it is basically about safety first and foremost? ...Actually I am not clear on the whole thing, have not heard, do not understand yet, all the arguments one way or the other.

Transgender people are people, but frequently are not treated as such by the law, never mind bigoted individuals. I'll borrow and expression and say Sunshine is the best disinfectant and by raising the problems, raising the case means slowly people, even politicians, are informed ... but hang on, isn't this exactly what the gays had to do? Kids are committing suicide because their state legislation forbids them from being a full part of society - and yes, rest rooms included.

I don't really see what your beef is, because you surely know that if you say nothing and meekly pray that law makers will be kind to you, you just get ignored and shat on. You know this.

We don't want our own shelters because we're not some weird third sex. If you passed me in the street you'd think 'cute chick' because I'm lucky enough to pass. I'm a woman ( and a trans woman ) but in that order, so I want equality, not to be treated as a potential child molesting or 'trap'. When we're banned from an appropriate shelter or restroom, we're being told you are less, you are untrustworthy and that is not equality.

So we keep pushing back and whilst I doubt it'll be a year as you suppose, we will, eventually find acceptance. We trans people are not attention whores, quite the reverse. I've transitioned and my country (UK) is largely open-minded and forward looking in its legislation, so I could disappear into the background and no one except my bff would be any the wiser. I see it as my duty to keep fighting, to be noticed and to challenge laws if necessary and counter suspicion with fact and first person experience.

You're welcome

 

[Bramblethorn]

We don't want our own shelters because we're not some weird third sex. If you passed me in the street you'd think 'cute chick' because I'm lucky enough to pass. I'm a woman ( and a trans woman ) but in that order, so I want equality, not to be treated as a potential child molesting or 'trap'. When we're banned from an appropriate shelter or restroom, we're being told you are less, you are untrustworthy and that is not equality.

Also: it's just not practical economically or politically to set up and maintain separate shelters, toilets, prisons, ... for trans people. If you have say 20 cis women and 5 trans women in town who need shelter services, it's far cheaper to build and run one 25-woman shelter than two separate ones.

(Please assume lengthy digression here about queuing theory; the short version is that over-specialisation of services becomes very inefficient.)

Also also, specialist transgender shelters etc. provide a very convenient place for violent -phobes to look for targets.

DMMW may well be right that most people are quite happy to live and let live where trans people are concerned - I certainly hope that's correct. But the hateful minority can still be quite harmful, especially when the indifferent majority has other things occupying their attention.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

I am over sixty and I once worked for a top secret government department, firstly in the legal division and ultimately at a Central Bank in a 'research' position (lol).

I've met transgender people probably a lot earlier - IE longer ago than some here were even born.

The courts - depending on who was sitting - were the most difficult, the most problematic as far as recognizing the particular individual in a decent, legitimate way; the actual government official position, believe it or not, was far more advanced, and frankly, I would suggest even 'personable' and friendly and respectful.

Back in those days it cost quite a lot to go through the entire profile of recommended procedures, inclusive of psychological counseling as well as surgical and bio-chemical programs. And I will not go into how these things were funded...

In every case I had anything to do with, there were major issues of physical violence received or threatened - I'm not really sure what was happening with people let's say, not from politically-connected backgrounds (by political I really mean to include banking and police/other enforcement/sensitive agency/serving military upper rank families).

From my own personal life experience in central banking money/funding is just plain not any kind of issue at all - the reason it is claimed to be so, is due to politicians using the public's sentiments about 'saving money' and/or not wasting it.

I suppose an 'interesting' thing (don't even know why this should have been the case/was true back then in terms of my own experience) was that I never met, not even one single time, a transgender person (and I only myself personally met females; were given those case files) who wasn't quite astonishingly good-looking - and they were all in their mid-twenties. It was only relatively recently that I have personally met MUCH more mature people (fifty year old's and +), and some who were by no means 'model material.'

On one occasion a very important senior police detective was dating a transgender from a prominent family but who now had a different identity, and our job was to 'background research' so that we could determine if there was any untoward thing going on in terms of underworld or other attempts to blackmail the cop. Turned out there was absolutely zero going on in that avenue whatsoever. Up until I left the case the cop had no idea the girl was originally someone with a boy's birth name.

I mean if I go into what I know about 'certain well-known celebrities' I'm gonna get stiffed with this 'always focuses on Hollywood' (well, it's where I worked - not Hollywood, but Chicago in the artists and entertainment legal contracts area in a mid-tier global bank) - but frankly it's because I have this impression that the really REALLY good-looking people get treated differently to the ordinary people, that I 'fear' this whole matter is misdirected in today's media, and sometimes it is being deliberately misdirected once again by big political interests.

Yes there needs to be pushback against malice, and the way is education of the public.

My own view... ...seemingly blunt or hostile reactions to the anti sex/gender variation crowd is playing into the hands of those very lobbies the OP was mentioning; it's what they want. Their whole strategy and set of tactics revolves around arousing people's emotions and playing on their ignorance and creating 'sides.'

Yeah, but I would be the very last to say anyone will ever adopt anything I might have to say as a potential 'solution!'

...which is one reason I feel this is going to take a while and there are other reasons I believe it will soon fade into the background. There are other HUGE social issues about to dawn onto the world stage.

But... you do NOT need to believe me. I am not selling anything.

To explain myself re my initial reaction to the OP, it was about the phrase the 'anti trans discourse of 2019...' This anti trans discourse is about two sides tango-ing with their blood up; it's not about what the general public thinks or believes. The public could not care less, frankly, and the whole thing is being deliberately turned into 'a political beat-up.'

But like I say, this is just my opinion based on what I have seen in various places through the course of many decades of adult life swanning around in quite diverse places!

 

[stickygirl]

There are plenty of parallels for hostile reactions - today's US political situation being a good example where facts are dismissed as fake, but that doesn't mean you sit back and wait for it to go away ... although, in that instance...

Ok, I hear ya, but a good ally is one that speaks up when it's needed and I'd guess you one of them. I don't support petrol bombs nor those who turn a blind eye to injustice.

 

[ericandshannon]

.........

 

[AlexBailey]

Unfortunately it only takes a few phobes to cause great harm. What is it, fear? What are they afraid of losing that makes them so bitter and ready to marginalize or harm others?

Why would someone care what someone else does within themselves if it does not force others to do something they are uncomfortable with? Is it that that they want the "freedom" to avoid other culture besides their own? Do they need the "freedom" to discriminate?

I've read some interesting message boards where Trans people were offended with terminology used by non-binary, saying things like how a non-binary person cannot be a t-girl, or how some people can get insistent that a trans female that is attracted to other females is not a lesbian. These discussions can get heated even within the LGBTQ community, showing that there is some us vs. them tension even within a community that strives for inclusivity.

When someone has their beliefs tied into a religious dogma that discourages tolerance they can believe they are doing the Lord's work by oppressing those they do not want to tolerate. Once the rhetoric begins to define a social clash as a 'religious war' they can justify almost any means to their desired ends, truth is no longer a priority.

As far as the link to the news stories provided by the OP, I think the same rhetoric is being used because it is a similar social dynamic; someone is offended by other peoples' personal choices.

"God save me from your followers."

 

[Bramblethorn]

As far as the link to the news stories provided by the OP, I think the same rhetoric is being used because it is a similar social dynamic; someone is offended by other peoples' personal choices.

Similar social dynamic, but also because it's literally coming from a lot of the same people and organisations.