Transgender: The Toxic Conversation
We are still, as a society, unable to see a human being different to ourselves as being important. We see this with the small boats saga generated by the current Conservative government. Gary Lineker was spot on when he said about the narrative being not too dissimilar to that used in Germany during the 1930s. I’m glad he stood his ground.
Below is a letter to Kemi Badenoch to which the fate of trans people are in the hands of. I await the completion of the changes to the Equalities Act to see how far we are further pushed to the dark corners of society, a greatly misunderstood people who simply want to live our lives without being the focus of comments bordering on hate.
The letter is long but needs it. The Twitter sphere is no place to hold such a nuanced discussion. There simply isn’t enough words in a tweet or post that carries enough knowledge for someone to reach an understanding of the situation. I hope the letter makes sense. It took long enough to write.
Do we really want a repeat of life during the 1930s in Germany? Perhaps there are those who do. Are we, as a society, evolved enough to grow out of conflict and towards compassion and kindness? I suspect we have a long way to go. Answers on a postcard please!
Rt Hon Kemi Badenoch MP
As Minister for Women and Equalities
Re: Transgender issues and the EHRC redefinition of ‘sex’
Dear Rt Hon Kemi Badenoch MP,
I apologise for the length of this letter. It’s a subject that requires nuance and understanding and thus cannot be held in the Twitter sphere, as within that sphere lies confusion, upheaval, and deliberate misdirection.
The universe expresses itself through infinite diversity in infinite combinations. So, if something exists, it exists. And, no matter how anyone wishes otherwise, trans people exist.
I am a trans woman nudging 70, and have been deeply traumatised by experiences of bullying and rejection for over 40 of those 70 years. And for simply trying to express my true self.
I want nothing more than to be accepted for who I am, and not denigrated by those who are unwilling to discover more about a minority of a minority of a minority.
Right now, trans people are being described only by our genitalia and very little else. Being a trans woman describes 10% of me. The other 90% is so much more interesting.
Right now, the question ‘What is a woman?’ is simply reducing a woman to her genitalia and very little else. Even asking that question denigrates women and leaves them confused and angry. Women have been considered second class citizens for millennia. Even the Vatican dared to ask the question ‘do women have souls?’
Right now, it’s very interesting that the media never asks ‘What is a man?’ Perhaps this is because it doesn’t fit the narrative they are trying to present.
Before you deny a person’s existence from information you’ve received from someone else, it behoves upon you to listen intently to that person, to understand them, and to understand their experiences. Listening with empathy is kindness and compassion in action.
To reject a person for who they are, does almost irreparable damage to a person’s soul and identity. That trauma leaves deep scars that weep continuously unless acknowledged by both the person and the antagonist.
If you constantly see another as less than you, it opens you up to the possibility of being inhumane. From there, it becomes a short walk towards the same narrative used in 1930s Germany. And we are seeing the genesis of this narrative forming in the UK and the US, as well as many other countries around the globe. There is still time to stop.
As trans people, when we dare to live our lives just being ourselves, this terrifies society. It is powerful being able to express our true being, our compassion, our authenticity, and our honesty. And for this, we are hunted and persecuted.
It takes courage to travel our inner landscape, ridding ourselves of the trauma of decades of demonisation. I for one, having been willing to travel the inner darkness alone, and discovered the beauty in my soul, I can now give others an example of what is possible. Osmosis is such a wonderful teacher.
Society abhors difference as they are fearful of looking at the reality of who they’ve become. And that is ignorance at best, hatefulness at worst. But mostly, indifference to those unlike themselves. A darkness carried in the heart cannot be cured by moving the body from one place to another.
The GRC (Gender Recognition Certificate) is a degrading and humiliating process for asking permission from another person to be myself. I do not need permission to be myself. I ask only for respect and kindness. As do us all. I am a human being with human feelings. To be rejected by so many in society, and around the world, is hurtful beyond measure and leaves deep scars that rarely heal unless a great deal of inner work is done.
For me, I had very little help from the NHS, and I had to wait for over two years before my first appointment with the Gender Identity Clinic. A two year wait for an adult is bad enough, but for a child nearing puberty, this is a living hell.
When you create rules and limits of what should or should not be, due to the infinite nature of nature, there will always be someone who doesn’t fit in the box marked ‘normal’.
What would the computing world look like today had society not hounded Alan Turing into an early grave? An unanswerable question. Those who are different, live differently, and its usually those who create the biggest changes due to their ‘out of the box’ thinking.
The Impact of Unintended Consequences
When you treat young children with total disrespect and prevent them getting the affirming care they so deserve, what signals are you sending them? Those signals are that parents, teachers, and society, and even the government itself, simply doesn’t care about them. What legacy are you leaving them when they suffer from decades of trauma inflicted by the very people who are supposed to be guiding them to be the very best they can be.
Due to the trauma I experienced, my list of options became shorter and shorter with suicide almost reaching the top. I hid secrets from myself as I couldn’t deal with the pain of people’s opinions and judgement. I knew at a young age that I was different to the boys in my peer group, but was unable to find the words to describe my feelings until my mid 20s when I saw a television programme about a trans woman.
Please do not inflict children with the dogma and belief that they are incapable of making choices for themselves. Children are much more aware than you give them credit for. You just need to find the compassion and kindness to support them make those choices. Forcing them down a particular path in life because you are unable to deal with your feelings about their trans-ness is not their responsibility; it’s yours.
The Thatcher government presided over the greatest crime yet against the gay and lesbian community which was Section 28. Please DO NOT create yet another law which demonises a tiny group of people whose only goal is to live authentically and express the gifts they have been given. And we all have gifts in our uniqueness.
Question: You have two people heading for a door marked women in a pub. One person is dressed in a flowing skirt, shoulder length hair, high-heels, and makeup. The other wears bovver boots, has tattoos over their arms, a buzz cut hair style, and cropped off jeans with braces holding the jeans up.
How would you determine which person should be able to enter the toilets? One, both, or neither? Would you have someone guarding the door checking? How would they check? On what criteria do you make your decision? Identity card? Birth certificate? Genital inspection?
I believe if you go down the route of defining limits of what it is to be female and what a woman looks like, you take away the opportunity for women to wear what they like, dress how they choose, what style of hair, you will create an appalling situation where many women will be ejected from toilets simply because they don’t look feminine enough. In the US already, women have been forcibly removed from restrooms by police officers just because they didn’t look feminine enough. You see, there are many more women than there are trans women.
Women have been suppressed for millennia, by men, and are still expected to fit in with society’s rules. Women have only had the vote for 100 years. Let’s not limit them further by shoehorning them into looking a particular way. You will also limit men as they must also follow the stereotypical masculine. And there are many men who look feminine.
During my transition, I was stopped from going into the toilets. And that was the men’s toilet. I was dressed in an androgynous outfit with stubble over my chin due to my needing electrolysis at that time. So, I must look sufficiently feminine enough to be stopped.
I have also seen that notices in many toilets say that male and female cleaners will be entering to clean the cubicles and sinks. What will happen about these people?
How would you cater for intersex people? What would you do with people who have genetic syndromes? There are chromosomal differences: XYY, XXY, XXX, fragile X, and androgen insensitivity syndrome where an XY person will grow into a female looking individual. And what about women who have polycystic ovaries with the potential of facial hair. And there are some women who choose to have full beards with PCOS.
As you can see, it’s not possible to differentiate accurately using XX and XY alone. This is a very simplistic view of the world. Once you create rules, laws and definitions people must adhere to, there will always be someone who will fall outside the definition of those rules. And here’s the rub: it’s those outside the tight definition who are pushed to the edges of a society not able to encompass difference.
People in the media keep using the term Trans Agenda or Trans Ideology. The media make it sound such a bad thing. Ideology is just another word for belief. Everyone has a belief about something. There are those in society who would deliberately use transgender people as cannon fodder for creating separation in the general population instead of cooperation.
It’s very interesting that trans men are rarely mentioned in the media so I can only surmise that trans men don’t fit the media narrative. It’s penises that seem to cause the fear. As I am going through the transition, I must take oestrogen and injections that reduce my testosterone to female levels. This means erectile function vanishes, my libido vanishes. I am essentially chemically castrated. As was Alan Turing, just for being gay.
My only interest in life is in being myself in all aspects. So far, since I was not allowed to enter a men’s toilet, my concern may become a reality where I could be attacked by men if forced to use the space designated for male use only. This is a possibility now if you, as the MP for Women & Equalities, do not act responsibility to craft law that supports all people.
It’s very good that the Equalities Act is updated to include gender and sex as separate descriptions. Far too many people conflate the two, and some still refuse to understand the difference. Sex and gender do not mean the same thing. Words change meaning over time. It’s the nature of language. Not conflating sex and gender provides a useful differentiation to help understanding for all concerned.
For me, gender is what’s between your ears. Gender is how I feel about myself. It is a fundamental sense of self. Trans people do not change sex, we embrace our perceived gender. The journey I’m taking is to balance my inner sense of self and my body. It reduces my mental health struggles significantly. And my mental health struggles are a direct result of my experiences of bullying and rejection.
Yes, please define things under the law. But many people will not understand the law, nor will they be aware of it on a day-to-day basis. It behoves upon you and your parliamentary colleagues to use compassionate language which brings people together instead of creating more conflict. Unless conflict is your direct aim.
There are those who consider themselves to be non-binary. They are also human beings so should be afforded the same rights under the law.
The rights of me as a trans woman should not impact the rights of women. Women and trans women, men and trans men, should be equal under the law. One person’s human rights cannot be allowed to subsume another person’s human rights.
Woman is defined as ‘adult human female’ in the dictionary. You are a woman, as are many of your colleagues. Are you not so much more than that? Are you happy to be reduced to three simple words?
There are three very important words: communication, understanding, freedom. Please remember these as they may change your life. Once you start the process of listening, and I mean truly listening, you will begin to shift your understanding. From there, once you understand, you will feel greater freedom as you realise that you have nothing to fear.
As a final comment, I went to see my MP about this subject several years ago. I have written an article about that experience. Transgender: Into the Lion’s Den.