Back down the rabbit hole we go.

You know, before the whole incident with Ron Gold’s post on Bilerico I was actually considering shutting this blog down. It’s not so much that I don’t enjoy writing about gender from a transsexual/queer/theoretical perspective—I do enjoy it quite a lot, and moreover intellectualizing is one of my mean of coping with the insanity of the world. However, the particular absurdity of life as a transsexual woman has been getting to me a lot lately. Let me see if I can articulate this properly, and to do this I must first distinguish between the intellectual side of my brain and the emotional—the irrational—side. Intellectually, I know damn well that being transsexual does not in any way invalidate a person’s gender (i.e. trans men are men 100% just as trans women are women 100%). The emotional side, however, feels the very real impact of trans representations in the media that illustrate, quite effectively, that trans men and trans women are distinctly different from men and women respectively (though to the media’s (possible) credit (?) it also says they’re different from women and men respectively). This representation persists even in those depictions meant to be supportive of trans people—the constant use of stereotypes and clichés makes the audience acutely aware that the girl they are watching is not really a girl—she’s a trans girl. What class. The intellectual side of me says that any representation of a trans person in the media that also focuses on that person’s gender is probably disrespectful in some way, as their transsexuality really ought to be fairly irrelevant to most plots (However, the intellectual side of me also says that if that is the case, we end up treading the line of erasing trans existence from media which, well, is pretty much what we have now).

Like most complex scenarios, I’m aware that there’s a pretty cool dialectic at play here: transsexual women are simultaneously transsexual and women (no duh!). That’s the intellectual side of me. The emotional side...er, well, the emotional side of me feels things that I’m pretty damn ashamed to say. The emotional side of me sits here and asks questions like, “When will I stop being trans and start being a girl?” The emotional side of me looks at my gender in black and white terms that suggest I can only be one or the other: I’m either a trans girl or a girl. And, most unpleasant of all, the emotional side of my gets sick of feeling like my girl side is devalued by the trans side—the emotional brain tells me I’d rather be a girl than a trans girl.

Last week I was talking to my friend Dan; the man’s an asshole at times, but he’s also probably the most intelligent person I’ve ever met, he’s progressive, and he’s very accepting of all people (with the exception of idiots). We were having a discussion about gender when I came to a point that I felt like I needed to disclose my transsexuality in order to add extra significance to my argument. So I told Dan, “You probably figured this already, but I’m trans gender...” and he nodded, saying, “Yeah.” Those kinds of exchanges kill me. They tell my emotional brain two things: 1) being trans will always be something that negatively qualifies my gender and 2) my transsexuality is obvious and noticeable to others and something that sets me apart from girls.

And this is where I was, emotionally, when I first read Ron Gold’s first and only post on Bilerico. I admit, my emotional state or already feeling devalued by my transsexuality made me much more sensitive to Ron’s disgusting essay; however, reading Ron’s article, the comments associated with it, and witnessing the massive explosion of opposition from the trans community and their allies, I felt that maybe I had some obligation to keep writing—keep telling this trans narrative to whoever may well come across this blog. The thing is, my transsexuality has become...well, a significantly less integral part of my existence. I often ask myself (on a purely personal level), “What the hell does being transsexual matter? If it doesn’t matter to me, why not drop it and just be a girl? Just be Sonia—the musician, the artist, the biologist, the queer spunky ambitious girl, etc.?” But Ron’s post has reminded me that transsexuality does matter, and is in fact more significant than I really wanted to acknowledge.

It’s not a pleasant thought, and I don’t much like the intellectual rabbit hole it down which it leads.