Ask a MtF TG a question

[Bramblethorn]

Evidence suggests that the prevalence has increased over the last decades to up to 5–14 male-to-female transgender (MtF) individuals per 1000 adult males and 2–3 female-to-male transgender (FtM) individuals per 1000 adult females2.

I'd take those numbers with a grain of salt. With this kind of thing you can often get hugely different estimates depending on how you measure it. I think that figure is based on clinical diagnoses, which means it would only include people who sought out diagnosis and were able to fit into a clinician's ideas of what "transgender" looks like. In which case, it could just be that FtM people are less likely to go through diagnosis than MtF for one reason or another.

 

[2tallpaul]

Stickygirl, I do appreciate you running this forum, Having limited experience in this topic, I play in a group. Originally being introduced to two middle aged businessmen, I thought nothing of it. In a group meeting, two hot women by the pool who I didn't recognize ended up being the two men that I met before. Transitioning, publicly they had not come out. Hormones had them on small breasts causing other areas to shrink. they were both pleased that I didn't recognize them as men from before. It put into prospective what it's like in the Midwest as accepting people.

Having to hide who they are for most of the day would be more than tough. Seeing who they are was so natural in a non-judgmental environment was a natural. How do people normally respond? Frankly, I was checking out the perky tits and ass to begin with.

 

[stickygirl]

How do they respond? That all depends. If in their eyes you 'pass' as a woman then you later run a risk of being accused of deception. If you don't pass you can be immediately ridiculed, called any number of names and treated like less than a human being... being called 'it' or 'thing' is often where they end up after they've run out of ready insults.

I pass - I didn't always and many transgender women never will in the eyes of the gender police. They're the same people that attack anyone or anything outside their perception of normal: you might be in a wheelchair, be facially disfigured, speak differently or generally 'not be from round here are ya?'

But there always have, always will be assholes - it's when they end up in power, in the Supreme court that you have real problems. People are apt to feel powerless and think 'what will my vote achieve against all this hatred?' That's exactly what the bullies want you to think. Vote, protest, support local campaigns - they want you to be complacent. Don't be.

That way maybe in a few years time everyone will have the same attitude as you. Children are taught how to hate.

 

[timreh]

Slight change of topic, but please add your observations.

It's an old transphobic adage that you can tell a cis gender woman from a trans from the width of her shoulders - that a cis woman's shoulders are narrower than her hips. I heard it years ago, so on the street I've always checked out that ratio. My findings are that the younger generation of women quite often have shoulders wider and I assume the more athletic and sporty they are, the more likely their shoulders are wider.

I found myself following a cis woman the other day with wider shoulders and I smiled all over: not just for disproving the false claim but also that she was in a short dress and looked super cute.

I have multiple cis-het female friends who get clocked as male on a regular / ongoing basis. One is a great grandmother who has gorgeous hair down past her waist. Having been on active duty in the military for 30+ years she's quite comfortable in jump boots and fatigues. One might be considered broad shouldered, but mostly I think it's her attitude as a 55-year-old roller derby skater that skews people's perspective.

With each of them, as well as with the others I know, they tend to be people who live outside the societal norm of how a 1950's female dresses or behaves.

 

[timreh]

There's a trans lady on Twitter who responds to "we can always tell a trans person" tweets by posting photos and asking if they really think the photos look transgender. And they explain that the photos have a Distinctively Trans Jawline or whatever the "tell" is supposed to be that day.

Only, the photos she posts aren't of her. They're of famous cis women like Geena Davis and Sigourney Weaver, who look just enough like her profile picture that they won't immediately realise it's not the same person. And the transphobes reliably explain how these not-actually-trans women are Obviously Trans.

Two stories.

First story.

I was visiting my sister in another state. At one point we were discussing gaydar and transdar. A nurse walked into the room to give our mother her meds. Nurse was pleasant and we chatted a bit and she left the room. I looked at my sister and said, "Did you really think I wouldn't spot her?"

My sister was flabbergasted as for over a year that nurse had been part of our mother's care team, my sister had seen her multiple times per week, and she'd had no idea the nurse was trans, until a few weeks earlier when the nurse told her she was.

Second story.

I worked in a hospital as part of the OSHA Safety Team. As a result, I met people all over the campus while doing inspections. I transitioned while in that job, so pretty much everyone knew I was trans. One day a nurse I casually knew told me one of her kids was trans. She showed me a picture of several of her kids ... and asked if I could pick out the right kid. With a quick glance I pointed ... and she asked how I knew so quickly. I couldn't explain it to her, or to myself, and it's not like the kid didn't fully pass.

I'm sure I meet trans folks who I don't recognize as being trans, just as I'm sure I meet gay and lesbian people I don't recognize as being gay or lesbian.

There are also people who I know are gay, lesbian, trans ... and it almost never occurs to me that they are gay, lesbian, or trans.

 

[stickygirl]

It would be nice to be in a world where ***dars were irrelevant.

I saw an exchange online recently: someone asked why, in the 24th century Star Trek's Jean-Luc Picard had no hair and 'hadn't baldness been cured by then'. He replied 'In the 24th century it doesn't matter.'

 

[AlexBailey]

My wife who is a case worker in homeless services just told me about a woman who is a client of hers who was recently arrested on drug charges. My wife has always know her as a woman, but when she went to visit her in jail she was being held in the male population.

Yep. She is trans and the jail puts her in with the men. The woman has been in jail before and told my wife that she detransitions and lets her sparse facial hair grow in order to not stand out so much and to try to avoid abuse.

When my wife asked if she’s been abused in prison she looked away and said something to the effect of “snitches get stitches” and that she was just going to do her time and get out ASAP.

Since my wife didn’t know she was trans I’m assuming that all her identification says she’s female.

What a fucking nightmare - and this is California.

Do you know if any prison systems recognize trans identity? How dangerous is it for trans folks to travel? There must be some places you’d never want to take the risk.

 

[timreh]

My wife who is a case worker in homeless services just told me about a woman who is a client of hers who was recently arrested on drug charges. My wife has always know her as a woman, but when she went to visit her in jail she was being held in the male population.

Yep. She is trans and the jail puts her in with the men. The woman has been in jail before and told my wife that she detransitions and lets her sparse facial hair grow in order to not stand out so much and to try to avoid abuse.

When my wife asked if she’s been abused in prison she looked away and said something to the effect of “snitches get stitches” and that she was just going to do her time and get out ASAP.

Since my wife didn’t know she was trans I’m assuming that all her identification says she’s female.

What a fucking nightmare - and this is California.

Do you know if any prison systems recognize trans identity? How dangerous is it for trans folks to travel? There must be some places you’d never want to take the risk.

Depending on the exact circumstances, it can cost hundreds of dollars to get all of one's IDs corrected for name and gender. I got off cheaply, did almost all of it on my own, and still the total was well over $600. Not everyone has that sort of spare money kicking around.

Depending on the state, and what the ID shows, someone living as trans in their public life may not have the documentation to be placed in the correct prison population.

Despite numerous lawsuits that they have lost, TSA still routinely treats trans people poorly during security screenings. I will no longer fly anywhere specifically because of how TSA treats trans folks.

 

[stickygirl]

Depending on the exact circumstances, it can cost hundreds of dollars to get all of one's IDs corrected for name and gender. I got off cheaply, did almost all of it on my own, and still the total was well over $600. Not everyone has that sort of spare money kicking around.

The UK is good by comparison: official documentation is not seen as a way to make the govt profit. If you already have birth cert then the registration is £140 or less.

Depending on the state, and what the ID shows, someone living as trans in their public life may not have the documentation to be placed in the correct prison population.

I don't have any first hand information except what is reported in the media. In the UK people's rights are respected in prison, including your choice of gender unless of course you decide to compete in sport in which case you're barred...

Despite numerous lawsuits that they have lost, TSA still routinely treats trans people poorly during security screenings. I will no longer fly anywhere specifically because of how TSA treats trans folks.

I flew to Moscow ten years ago, before everything turned sour, and I felt quite safe. I wouldn't visit the USA because I have no desire to**, nor would I feel safe and the TSA is part of that, though screening wouldn't be an issue for me.

** apart from Montana, the grand canyon, NASA, Martha's vineyard, Half dome

 

[comegently]

As far as ID is concerned, I have not bothered changing my birth certificate or passport.
For nearly all practical purposes, it doesn't matter. I do not respect a civil servant's opinion of my gender - I know what it is.
I work under a female (known-as) name by agreement with HR.
I present in a feminine manner nearly all the time.
I have feminine pronouns and am addressed as tradition dictates one should address females.
I don't pay with old-fashioned cards any more - I use mobile payment methods and loyalty cards and they all work perfectly legally under my female name.

I don't experience misgendering or abuse in public as a rule but I'm a bit careful where I go.
In instances in the past where that happened in, say, a department store, I have come back at them right away and spoken to their supervisor.

Bigots know how hurtful misgendering is. Some older people and those from where the buses don't run may genuinely misunderstand the importance, but we should not have to tell them twice. Getting it right costs nothing but a minor challenge to their legacy mindset.

 

[timreh]

The UK is good by comparison: official documentation is not seen as a way to make the govt profit. If you already have birth cert then the registration is £140 or less.

I don't have any first hand information except what is reported in the media. In the UK people's rights are respected in prison, including your choice of gender unless of course you decide to compete in sport in which case you're barred...

I flew to Moscow ten years ago, before everything turned sour, and I felt quite safe. I wouldn't visit the USA because I have no desire to**, nor would I feel safe and the TSA is part of that, though screening wouldn't be an issue for me.

** apart from Montana, the grand canyon, NASA, Martha's vineyard, Half dome

I got my passport gender marker corrected as soon as Trump won the 2016 election. Until then I hadn't worried about it. Then I had to do the passport again with the name change. With the cost of photos and such each passport is about $150. Birth cert corrections, with a certified true copy as a spare added some cost. Getting the name change took a Judge's order from Probate Court. Because of Covid the courts went to all Zoom hearings. I hired a lawyer for that portion. Because my background check was spotless, the whole process became a formality, and the Judge just signed it at the monthly name change session. I didn't have to testify or even show up for the Zoom meeting. The certified true copies of the court decree added nearly $100 to the cost beyond the lawyer's fee and standard court fees.

Changing my SS and VA documentations didn't cost a penny.

(I'll be at 4 of your 5 destinations within the next few months as I wander about in my van. I'll skip Martha's Vineyard, but it's less than a day's travel from my cabin.)

 

[stickygirl]

(I'll be at 4 of your 5 destinations within the next few months as I wander about in my van. I'll skip Martha's Vineyard, but it's less than a day's travel from my cabin.)

You'd be a perfect travel companion in that case: girls road trip. How am I not surprised Timreh?

 

[timreh]

You'd be a perfect travel companion in that case: girls road trip. How am I not surprised Timreh?

Lol ... I figure I'll hit the road in late August, and then stay wandering until next Summer. I have a few friends scattered about the western USA that let me show up, do laundry, any maintenance chores, swap a few tales, and then I wander off again. Plus, I'll have a legal motorcycle on the rear carrier so I can park off in the boonies and still be able to make a dash to town for pizza / supplies.

There's BLM & National Forest lands out there where one can camp for up to 14 days at no charge, then one has to relocate to another area. Makes for cheap wandering.

Sunday they released info on the state of the GTTS highway in Montana, near Glacier NP. They still haven't cleared all the snow from last Winter off the road yet, but they are getting close to being done.

Not sure if you saw the news but Yellowstone NP in Wyoming took major damage from the heavy rains / flooding a couple of weeks ago.

 

[timreh]

Several years ago we were traveling through Montana along with Alberta and Saskatchewan. It was July and it still hadn’t opened. I read that now you have to make a reservation to travel the road!

I believe that started during the pandemic, or as a result of the tourist surge of the pandemic, when vastly more people than usual were visiting the NP system.

Various NPs in the lower 48 have had to institute daily quotas of cars / visitors. The NPs in Utah have been especially hard hit and now have implemented restrictions on how many folks can visit.

I rolled through those parks in 2010 on a motorcycle trip, and there were no restrictions at all.

 

[Jeph77]

Be still my heart.

 

[stickygirl]

Final thought for Pride month 2022
https://64.media.tumblr.com/cfc8836c1394b78cefb8b015a849e9d8/8cd403a886d38326-87/s640x960/3341b835bc058744216fd4a3da059451cf4b9fba.jpg
A final thought for Pride Month 2022. This is Alan Turing who ended his own life on 7th June 1954. He laced an apple with cyanide and ate a bite from it. He did this because the British government chemically castrated, humiliated, and prosecuted him for being gay. Ok, so what did he do? He invented computer science and using his first designs he decrypted the Enigma code - the machine base encryption that the Nazis and the German military used to communicate secret commands to each other in world war 2 - and hence he both saved millions of lives and brought us into the modern age of computing.


https://i.imgur.com/zC8nkoj.jpeg

You'd think we might have moved forward but the crazies never give up

 

[CountryGuy2]

When I was in college, we learned about Turing but there was no mention of him being gay. Only about his contributions to computing. That was in the 1980's

 

[stickygirl]

When I was in college, we learned about Turing but there was no mention of him being gay. Only about his contributions to computing. That was in the 1980's

In today's world, why should they? Back then it would still have a been a taboo subject I expect. My mother has remarked on how many celebrities back then were clearly gay once you had your gay-glasses on, but again it was never mentioned.

 

[stickygirl]

Interesting article about JKR in Politico that was published at the end of June. It's a balanced piece and as I read it I admired how the author Sarah Wheaton managed to remained impartial, citing both sides without resorting to melodrama: a chance for the reader to draw breath and reappraise both sides of the debate.

Yes, there are two sides but JKR is disingenuous to both, cherry picking sound bites and quotes she knows will appeal to those with a penchant for anger and bile. I agree with her that woman's rights are still under threat but to claim trans rights are the cause is untrue, unhelpful and ridiculous. Instead she has stumbled on a way to garner support from the very people she should be fighting - the conservative right, who have just cancelled abortion rights and plan to upturn the right to vote. I wonder if she's tweeted about that yet? Has she donated a million to Planned Parenthood or maybe she's happy for obstetricians to avoid litigation by waiting until the victim of an ectopic pregnancy is close to death?

JKR is not a spokesperson for women's rights - she's a spokesperson for her own vanity. She does seem to love playing the victim, latching onto niche topics like trans rights or that Dumbledore was gay, then clutching her numerous pearls when she's challenged "...but I give so much to charity". Even Putin was moved to offer her support, comparing his monstrous acts to her 'cancellation'.

There is much more to say and too much has already been written on the subject. I hope the distractions of hissy fits and menstruation can be avoided to focus on real issues like human rights, democracy, health care, global warming and poverty, which affect us all, trans or otherwise.

 

[AlexBailey]

It’s interesting that JKRs Potter books have gay characters (are there any lesbians?) and that the only gender transformations (temporary) were from F to M.

 

[stickygirl]

Julia Serano's new book - Sexed Up, 2022

This is the third book JS has published and I downloaded a copy straight away. Her previous publications were Whipping Girl and Excluded, but she's written numerous essays on a variety of gender related topics.

If you're familiar with those earlier works, then don't expect to find her breaking new ground, but she instead offers more depth on issues that affect all parts of society, not purely transgender ones. She takes a long look at contradictory values engrained in our western/white/christian society and looks beyond simple hypocrisies such as virgin/slut . Predator/Prey is a topic she refers back to a good deal - how we accept without question that men and tall, strong, aggressive against that woman's smaller, weaker and submissive roles among numerous other norms we are taught to accept.

In listing these opposing traits she points out how, when we acknowledge someone's gender on the street we automatically ascribe the matching values.

She uses her own life experiences of having been able to walk the streets unremarked and unnoticed as apparently a young man to facing catcalls, remarks and judgement after she transitioned. Predator/Prey. The men judging her felt so privileged by the authority vested in them by our culture, that they could see no harm in making 'cheer up love' comments. It simply doesn't occur to them, because they 'own' the street.

I'm making her arguments sound simplistic and cliched but you'd have to read her fuller discussion to appreciate the nuances and subtle 'othering' implicit towards women, people of colour, less-abled and LGBTQI+ divides. So - read the book! Her date stamp has unfortunately coincided with Roe v Wade but I know we can look forward to her thoughts on that in future.

 

[stickygirl]

Tavistock GID centre to be replaced by two separate centres.
The 30yr old Tavistock centre gender identity clinic in London is to be closed from 2023 with two new centres being opened in its place. The centre had been legally held to account by an action brought by a young person who later reversed their transition but who had been prescribed puberty blockers. The case was unique but played into the hands of anti-trans campaigners, while ignoring the amazing work and help they had given to hundreds of young people over the years.

Perhaps the centre and its maligned name was due an overhaul - it was certainly overburden with a two year waiting list. Watch this space... it needn't be a bad thing and will help the service shrug off controversy.

 

[stickygirl]

Puberty blockers and passing
I see more and more trans women online who surely must have started puberty blockers early and so have none of the typical male characteristics. 'Passing' is a hot-potato word that we're told we shouldn't use ( we shouldn't ) because it means adopting a set of arbitrary physical attributes designated male or female to judge people with a tick-list 'which of those do you have?'

All the same I look - we look, because we can't help looking, but we have to unlearn judging people who don't have long legs, or 36C breasts or any other approved features pushed at us by the fashion and cosmetics industry.

I have an inkling that the anti-trans groups who wilfully ignore the benefits of blockers have another agenda: they want to be able to identify trans people with those tick-lists. By picking 'them' out in a crowd they can police us and crow about 'born-male predators' invading their single sex spaces. Transphobes push a baseless lie that women risk being attacked or affronted by trans women in their changing rooms. Women aren't actually afraid of that - they're afraid of men, men have penises so the rationale is that anyone with a penis should be feared. I get that - I'm afraid of men too, but it should be women, both cis and trans, who should be pushing back at the reasons for our fear. It isn't trans women that hurl abuse at cis-women in the street or talk over them in meetings or take offence if they get turned down at a bar. It isn't trans women that rape or flash themselves from the bushes or abuse kids.

Meddling politicians encourage cis women to pit themselves against trans women, when instead all women should be joining together to make society less sexist - that's the elephant. If 50% of the population control the other half with the fear of violence, then how does the 1.2% trans population even figure? Women are making headway, laws are in place to ensure equality, but the marking out of people based on how they look is going to take longer. You can legislate for equal pay but not for being told to 'cheer up love' in the street or having your idea stolen, then presented by a man as their own.

 

[stickygirl]

Just when I thought I'd read it all, I had a kind Litster point me toward Janine Booth, a self-styled hipster anarchist, marxist, feminist, trans-rights advocate and awesome person. She's got a whole website of rwooaarrr stuff to read if you need inspiration.

 

[stickygirl]

There a legal case being brought in the UK against a harmful group, the LGB Alliance, who have gained charitable status. A status that confers much more than tax benefits - it implies legitimacy. This status is being challenged in court by a transgender charity, Mermaids.

The legal process is necessarily bringing into focus the way that being transgender is defined and described and how the language has evolved in the relatively short time that being transgender has been recognised by the medical world.

One such phrase is 'born into the wrong body'. Whenever I have heard the expression, I have winced because it never felt right to me. It felt like a throw-away media-style trope and a linguistic band-aid - a temporary fix until something better could be found.

I'm going to quote from one of Mermaid's publications
"Model, campaigner and Mermaids patron, Munroe Bergdorf used to say she was born in the wrong body but then decided it wasn’t right for her: ‘I’ve come to understand why the phrase ‘born in the wrong body’ is unhelpful to me. I know why I used to use it; because other people struggled to understand, but looking back I know it did me harm. Saying you have the wrong body feels like a kind of self-abuse, and it’s not the same as saying ‘I need to adjust my body to be my true self’. That’s a different thing. We only get one body and it’s really important, especially for younger people to know they are unique and beautiful. I would say to younger people that transitioning is hard so you need to look after your body, love it and respect it.’"

I feel that ^^ but not every trans person has the same view. Some still feel a sense of disconnect with their body, despite transitioning and surgery so it's important that the phrase isn't condemned. Both are valid. It is not for anyone to dictate how a person describes their own body and more importantly, shouldn't be picked up as a stick with which to beat us or see its use as divisive and suggest it is evidence of confusion, deception or division.

Some people describe themselves as black, some coloured, some the phrase people of colour and I feel I walk on eggs when I find myself in a situation where I need to use one of those terms for fear of getting it wrong. It's the same with trans folk - if you're not sure, ask them. Never ask "Does he take sugar?" when you can put the question directly.