are we there yet?

These thoughts just running through my head. It's hard to write them down clearly so I may not do them justice. This is about those in the gender binary though is not a denial of any others on the spectrum. I'm not a journalist, just writing what I feel....no editing or blue pencil so take it as read, if you can.

People that are trans, transgender...however you wish to say it are in a place that you could almost forget still existed in our nice clean civilised society in the 'west'.

For people that transition or have transitioned if you prefer you can be yourself. Life changed, ID changed, birth certificate changed....the picture on your passport, the gender marker on your medical records, the salutation used in official letters addressed to you. You may have no past any more, friends, family your history may no longer be there for you. People have lost wives husbands siblings children to be who they are. Others have been fortunate, understanding has prevailed, bigotry and intolerance has not gained a foothold and they have the thread of their past lives to where they are now. Money and privilege may have helped, giving financial and physical independence though not always a guarantee of an easier journey.

day by day though....

There is the talk of 'passing'. Do you 'pass'? Will people detect who you once were? This gets tied up in society's pressures of how a woman and a man look and behave....for a lot of people it's just a minor issue in comparison and usually linked more to whether people will question your sexuality ....like it's any business of theirs, I might add!  Are you gay? lesbian? too effeminate for a man? too butch for a woman?

You may be fortunate. Transition young, seem to be correct in your physical features, usually meaning 'attractive' for a female, 'manly' for a man...in short 'you pass'.    Perhaps you are older, transition later, don't have the resources for the surgical procedures, therapists and other specialist services that can help. So, you don't pass.

If you do, then you may hide your past, so you may be fearful that someone will 'out' you, discover your secret and expose you for the 'fake person' you are. 'You're just a bloke in a dress!'    'How could you lie to us?'   Your honesty questioned, integrity doubted, motives put up to the light of inspection. It can be hard to stand up and say 'yes this is me, and I used to pretend to be that person but now I am me'.

But then there is the lesson to be learned from those who don't pass. Ridicule, anger hate discrimination, violence may be your daily companion. Work colleagues, neighbours strangers in the street judging you because they don't understand, are ignorant, misinformed or bigoted through cultural or religious belief.  So better to hide? Safer to be thankful that you do pass? Are not questioned? Accepted....sort of?

For people who are trans, perception of who you are ....its deeper and more stark because it is about your gender identity, who you are and were and sadly, how you will be treated as a human being. The stereotypes of who is a woman or a man are slow to evolve and are often a cage of restrictions and masks for those not strong enough to break out of it and truly be themselves.

In every day life, what a lot of people take for granted is so different for people who are trans. Apparently, you may be 'disabled' when it comes to your choice of lavatory. Your rights to be treated with dignity and respect can be a battleground in so many ways, because to treat you differently is still seen as 'being realistic', to allow discrimination is merely 'a difference of opinion', questioning your assertion of feelings of hurt despair and anger as you 'being difficult, a troublemaker', not 'willing to make a compromise'.

In the past, people who were of Afro Caribbean origin were treated like this as a matter of course ...back of the bus with you, know your place. People who were Jewish had to change their name, deny their history for fear of hate. History has shown just how wrong it can be and how far this bigotry discrimination and hatred can go, the depths it can descend to. Apparently this kind of thinking is no longer accepted...isn't  it?

In some countries now, your right to travel on an air plane can rest on whether you seem to exhibit the correct 'look' to match the gender listed on your passport. This is decided arbitrarily by an official 'just doing his job'. In the past this may have been seeing if you had curlier hair than was to be expected, say Pretoria in the 1960's or a particular shaped nose, perhaps Berlin in the 1930's?

No escape if you are a child. Now, as I write this, a 10 year old is being told to use the disabled toilets at school to change in for gym....not because the other children have a problem with her, but for fear of what the parents may say.

Who you are is more than gender, race, sexuality, physical ability, age or origin of birth but it is clear that for some, this is all they are seen as, their existence is denied, their rights denied, their lives marred, scarred and poisoned because of institutional and individual bigotry intolerance hatred and ignorance.

Be old be physically psychologically or mentally impaired be gay lesbian genderqueer intersex trans look different look foreign it's all the same but be yourself.  

It's a hard fight and it's taking too bloody long at times it seems to me but what's the alternative?

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