The Silent Transsexual

Even as transsexual kids are being acknowledged and finding greater support in their communities, from their parents, and from more enlightened medical care givers, their voices are being shouted down by an ever growing chorus of people who are NOT transsexual.

Yes, non-transsexual “allies” are policing transsexual’s language and identity.

I speak of course to the unfortunate social circumstance of having been subsumed in a larger identity of “transgender”.

The term “transgender” was originally coined in the ’60s by Dr. “Virginia” Prince, a heterosexual married lifestyle crossdressing man, an autogynephile who neither desired nor sought medical interventions to change his body. He coined the term to describe himself, and to differentiate himself, from transsexuals. Yes, the term originally EXCLUDED transsexuals. He was infamous for berating transsexuals in both public and private, in print and in one’s face. He also coined the term to differentiate himself from secretive crossdressers, commonly called transvestites, autogynephiles who only occasionally crossdressed, often only partially in women’s lingerie, for sexual gratification and emotional comfort.

But, over the decades, the term was expanded, first to include transvestites, then in the early ’90s, it began to be used to cover “late onset” transsexuals, who had followed a transvestite, to transgenderist (the term used then), to transsexual, career arc. In a way, it made sense that such “late onset” transsexuals could and should be covered by such an umbrella term, given their histories. But sadly, because of the conflation of the two types, this also dragged “early onset” transsexuals under the umbrella, unwillingly and to their detriment, conflating and confusing them with heterosexual transvestites!

But sometime in the last ten to fifteen years, a new phenomena grew. People who were neither “early onset” nor “late onset”… indeed not even gender dysphoric, began to see that transsexuals were fighting for our social, legal, civil rights. We became, in some socially liberal circles, “cool”. And because we’re “cool”, many who felt like “outsiders” took on the superficial trappings and identity of being “trans”, even though they were in no sense gender dysphoric, nor even gender atypical.

But, among those who weren’t gender dysphoric nor gender atypical were large numbers of female bodied young people who wanted also to join the “cool kids club”. And as they did so, they diluted the voices of actual transsexual transmen. These transmen began to openly question why these non-transsexual, non-gender dysphoric, non-gender atypical, very often heterosexual girls, should claim to be like them. Thus began a war of words and of ugly epithets as actual transsexuals began to be pushed away from the ‘cool kids lunch table’ by self-identified ‘transgender’ and ‘non-binary’ people, vilified with such terms as “trans-medicalist” (“transmed”) and “truscum”, falsely accused of “believing that they are better than us”. If transsexuals dare to point out that we are very different from those who aren’t the least bit gender dysphoric nor gender atypical, and insist upon continued use of the most accurate label of available to us, “transsexual”, we are shouted down and derisively called, “the trans police”, “gatekeepers”, literally appropriating and flipping the original meaning of “gatekeeping” doctors denying medical transition services to transsexuals. They even accuse us of being “transphobic”. They even call gender dysphoria, the defining condition that demarks transsexuals, “Internalized Transphobia”. Think about this for moment. This is non-trans people calling actual transsexuals, “transphobic” for being transsexuals.

The viciousness and anger expressed by those who use these terms to decribe transsexuals, especially those transsexuals who point out that gender dysphoria is part and parcel to what defines them as transsexuals, is very telling.

But this wasn’t the end. Now we have entered a new phase where actual transsexual people are being silenced and marginalized by this ever expanding “transgender” community evidenced in the past couple years by the stunningly counter intuitive development in which they are now claiming that the very term that started it all, “transsexual” is “outdated” and even a pejoritive!

That term is NOT a pejoritive to actual transsexuals!!!!

The goal of those who are “transgender” who make this astounding claim is clear: To silence, to “erase” transsexuals.

Remember, very few people are transsexual, a tiny minority. But in recent surveys, 3% to 6% of teens and twenty-somethings are claiming to be “transgender” or more recently “non-binary”. That’s more than those who are actually gay or lesbian. Thus, the voices of actual transsexuals can be easily drowned out.

If our voices can be shouted down by claiming that there is no difference between those who merely self-proclaim their identity as “trans” and actual transsexuals, then they can lay claim to all the “coolness” and social acceptance that transsexuals have worked so hard over decades to earn.

Addendum 24 December 2020: Lest you think my complaint specious, last night, on twitter, I was “questioned” by one person and attacked by two others, for using the term “transsexual” to describe myself and those like me. The one who questioned me was a gay man who was under the impression that “transsexual” was indeed a pejoritive. The other two were also non-transsexual people, one a non-transwoman who also believed it was pejoritive, and the other was unclear. But that third person also jumped down my throat for using the term “transkid” without a space and the “-ed” suffix in “transgendered”. (How many will now be dinged for using the terms, “transwoman”, “transman”, “transboy”, “transgirl”) For decades, both terms were in use, but the last few years, language policing is being used to identify those who don’t use the “correct” forms; forms that shift with each season; forms which control how the various populations that are mistakenly pushed under the “transgender umbrella” are to be defined and made invisible or silenced. Again, defining that the term “transsexual” is verboten is the same as saying that recognition of transsexuals as a unique condition and especially the knowledge that there are two populations lumped under even that singular term, is also verboten. Ask yourself; who benefits from this language policing and how?

Addendum 9 February 2021: It’s getting worse. I continue to see, and to hear from other transsexuals, that we being told that we should not use the term “transsexual”. I’ve noticed a pattern. I’m more likely to get this insistence from a non-trans “ally”. This is amazing. Non-trans (or “cis-” if you like the term) folks telling transsexuals that the word is outdated and offensive!

Folks, I was a proud co-founding member of the ACLU TRANSSEXUAL Rights Committee in 1980. In the early to mid-90s I was the co-chair of the Ad Hoc Committee of TRANSSEXUALS to recognize Alan Hart (an activist group lobbying the Oregon State legislature while simultaneously dealing with a transphobic gay and lesbian political lobbying group that was falsely claiming that an historic transsexual was a self-hating lesbian who felt forced to live as a man due to homophobia, all the while this transphobic organization had been actively throwing transsexuals under the bus, politically). In my wardrobe is a “letter jacket” given to me by the TRANSSEXUAL Menace group in the mid ’90s. I wrote articles for the TRANSSEXUAL News Telegraph (TNT) magazine in the ’90s. I taught a class on TRANSSEXUAL & Transgender History at the Harvey Milk Institute in 1999-2001. I’ve been writing this blog on the science of TRANSSEXUALITY and transgenderism for past eleven years. Are we supposed to abandon our own personal and cultural history because a group of non-trans folk have recently gotten a bee in their bonnet that “transsexual” is a bad word? Its as though being an actual transsexual has somehow become a bad thing. Thus, we are called “truscum” when we insist upon being recognized for who and what we are. We will not be silent. We will not be erased.

Addendum 4 June 2021: I’ve noted a new pattern. If shown this essay many non-trans ‘allies’ then back off, but only to the extent of condescendingly saying “I support your right to identify as transsexual” as though I needed their permission. But recognizing my right to my natural “identity” makes the general silencing & erasure still OK? It doesn’t.

Addendum 11 April 2022: On a website produced earlier this month by Yale, they literally described the term “transsexual” as being both outmoded and insulting. A number of transsexuals wrote to the woman responsible to correct this misapprehension. But in a way, it’s not her fault. Non-transsexuals were lying to her, tell her it was. She corrected the website. — At the same time, someone on Wikipedia proposed to eliminate references and usage of the term “transsexual”. This looks to be a continued and concerted effort to erase transsexuals by eliminating and/or redefining the term as unacceptable, to the detriment of transsexual people, to privilege non-transsexuals as per my explication above.

Addendum 3 August 2022: I don’t know the exact date or where this presentation was made, but the Planned Parenthood of Illinois, who would call themselves our allies, made this PowerPoint slide in which they said that “MTF and FTM” are “outdated and offensive”, putting them into the same list as “she-male” and calling a transsexual “it”. So, the problem of mis-defining terms used by transsexuals to describe ourselves continues and has been expanded. This clueless presenter has no idea just how hurtful this is to the thousands of transmen who were members of the venerable FTM International organization that did so much good work. Once again, our proud history and culture are denigrated in an effort to erase transsexuals. I call on Planned Parenthood to publicly retract and apologize.

As a transsexual, I will NOT be silenced.

Further Reading:

Lost In The Crowd