[Adrian]

Moderator

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I’ve deleted all the toilet stuff that followed the previous (off-topic) post.

The ability of intelligent people to
a) ignore a reminder what the topic was about,
b) be so self-centred as to ignore the original question in a “seeking help” forum, and
c) ignore the actual check questions on posting is beyond my understanding.

[Adrian]

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And in the meantime, just continue loving yourself and being the only person you need to make you happy.

Ouch… another person pushing the “me me me” inward looking is bliss mantra.

Where is the evidence that just thinking of yourself is a recipe for hapiness!!!

[Adrian]

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We are all different & must do what we feel comfortable with but if each person moved on once they’ve got what they want there would be nobody to share with except others still finding their way.
…..
They take but do not give back.
There would be no help from & for anyone if we all had that attitude.

I puzzled how we got here from Kristyana’s original post, as wandering off topic is something I clearly must not enjoy. But I think we are exploring

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We hide it at the start, we transition and then we return to hiding in the future. It is not the way to achieve anything except for yourself . That by default is selfish. To take advantage of the support of the community and the leave it in your wake. To move on is to leave the world how you found it and to hell with that I will not .

In this context Chloe’s observation hits the nail right on the head.
However, as in any good construction, there is more than one nail to hit!

I’ve a long history of attempting to NOT leave the world as I found it. Since founding TrannyRadio and joining the Seahorse NSW committee about 14 years ago, I’ve always been involved in some way supporting our community.
And it hasn’t been an easy ride – because there is another elusive nail that I can’t quite hit.

Not only do many in our community have a very inward (I won’t say selfish) looking view – there is a trend to grab what they need from those offering support and then attack the support network. This means they can justify “moving on” to themselves.

To elaborate on Chloe’s example of a street performer. This is like taking the free entertainment, but kicking over the music stand and scattering the small change as one leaves.

I know Chloe will understand exactly what I am saying here, but how many others realise how destructive their “me , me” behaviour is on those who offer support.

Sadly, until we mature as a community being in a support role, and continuing to put back, is a difficult position that I suspect few will want to aspire to.

[Adrian]

I’ll skip discussing elephants – as that would be off-topic when we are discussing “extend this site to our trans brothers” (who are not remotely elephantine!)

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The journeys are similar… the destinations are worlds apart.

That is the type of thinking that I would hope would change if there was greater communication between the groups.

Having transitioned to a gender expression that is between the Male/female binary – I find that the destination is shared by many who were born female. So whilst our bodies have a different starting point, our chosen gender expression is undoubtedly similar.

[Adrian]

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The motivation for this came about by talking to a few different people, independently of each other, about the forums & realising that we each use the forum differently. It appears that for some, that they are only prompted by the home page listings & another by the digests. In my case: > homepage> forums> new posts since last viewing. That way I never miss anything.

That is the situation as I understand it too. Everyone finds a subset of the functionality that works for them, and of course has a preference for the site to change to facilitate their way of interacting. And yes, some people report bugs to me in parts of the site I didn’t even know worked at all!!!

The algorithms used by the site for lists and the like change quite frequently which is why they are not documented anywhere. I don’t adjust things to suit personal preferences, but rather watch the site navigation statistics and try to maximise the number of forum articles read – or if I’m trying to sell tickets the number of people visiting TrannyTix.

There is also a second side to this tracking that most members are probably not aware of, but which is crucial to the survival of the site. That is the way the forums and other information are presented to people who are NOT members. This is the largest load on the forums – and converting browsers to members is an ongoing challenge.

[Adrian]

On Friday I emailed everyone (I hope) who attended TransFormal and gave a link to the brief feedback survey.

After running the event for 4 years it is time to review what is important, what works, and if/how the TransFormal should continue.

So this year your feedback in the survey is particularly valuable to me.
Please don’t put it off till you forget – do it now – it should only take 5 – 10 minutes.

If you didn’t get the email then please contact me and I’ll send the survey link to you again.

Please note this survey is just for those who actually attended TransFormal last weekend.

[Adrian]

April 2013

[Adrian]

The anti-discrimination commission in Queensland is the place to go.

They have a brochure that clearly sates the rules.
http://www.adcq.qld.gov.au/Brochures07/GIdiscrim&vil.pdf

And I quote:

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What is discrimination based on gender identity?
It is treating you less favourably than someone else because you
• identify as a member of the opposite sex and seek to live as
someone of the opposite sex, or
• are of indeterminate sex and you seek to live as a member of a
particular sex.

Discrimination may be unlawful depending on the circumstances.
Examples
You don’t get a job because the employer says ‘a transgender wouldn’t fit in with the rest of the staff’.

You’re told in a pub to ‘use the other toilet’ when it doesn’t fit with your gender self-identity.

The law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender identity is the Queensland Anti-Discrimination Act 991.

[Adrian]

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I was prompted to make this post…

I’d forgotten about this thread!
Well it has been 5 years for me..I haven’t given up…and I still think of the $$$$$ I have saved.

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One down side though, poor plucking invariably leads to ingrown hairs.

Yes – but I’ve noticed the problem is always much worse if I pluck hairs on a summers day. There are parts of my face that are particularly prone to ingrowing hairs – and I avoid these completely when it is warm.

I get two types of ingrowing hairs. One type produces a bump – I never attack these as they are infected. Instead I apply regular liquid antiseptic and try not to fiddle with them. They invariably cough-up their hair naturally after a week or so and disappear. The other type is where the hair grows horizontally just under the skin. This is more of an issue if you are plucking to get rid of black hair!
I generally attack these horizontal hairs with a needle after a while and pull them out – trying to keep the wound as small as possible – just big enough to hook the hair and get the tweezers on it.

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I spend many hours each day plucking

It does become a bit of an obsession at times because it is so relaxing. But I find that the biggest visual impact occurs when you pluck all the obvious hairs…and that doesn’t take very long. So I now only spend a long time once or twice a week.

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I use the Braille system, i.e, by feel.

Most of the hairs I can feel are thick white “whisker” hair. Although they spoil the illusion of “smooth as a baby’s bottom” – they actually are not visible. I concentrate on things that look black – which because of my advancing years is becoming less of a challenge each year.

When I am short of time – I’ve taken to using an epilator on my chin which is the biggest breeding ground for coarse white whisker hair. It works well on the thicker hair – and is not an area where I am troubled with many ingrowing hairs as a result.

Happy plucking !!!

[Adrian]

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Is it resistance Amanda

No, I think it is understandable ignorance leading to insensitive behaviour. Certainly some of the responses I got to clarifying that I do not see my gender matching a 100% male-boy Adrian or 100% female-girl Amanda were anything but supportive.

Ignorance calls out for eductaion – so this is my take on it:

In the older generations the standard pathway for a gender diverse person born male to “come out” of the closet was though Crossdressing support groups. The conservative gender model these groups grew out of was based on models of male maleness and a sort of idealised female woman (the CWA stereotype). One of the first things we used to do is to adopt a female name – a first step towards projecting a more congruent gender identity.

My observation is that the pathway for the gender diverse born female is more fluid. They find themselves exploring their gender moving through lesbian relationships, identifying as gender queer, and so on. In this process there is no obvious watershed where they have to take out a boy name. As a result they don’t – or at least they don’t have obviously “boy” names. Names seem to be much less of an issue in their lives.

This observation is backed up by the small sample of those “born female” on this website and those I meet socially. Very few have what you would regard as an obvious “boy” name.

So that is why the assertion that:

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all those chatting have female names, you naturally say “Hello Ladies”

is so insensitive to our gender expression.

I look to a time when more people have an opportunity to meet and understand better our “trans brothers” (a rather suspect classification but you know what I mean). I encourage this by trying to grow TgR and TransFormal in that direction, and I look for your active support.

I know it will be uncomfortable in the short term for those who think girls have girls names and blokes boy names and everything in between is not real. But in the longer term, understanding and consequent uniting will I think drive much greater acceptance of each other, and acceptance of the gender diverse within society.

[Adrian]

Those who have been watching will note that the membership of the site is NOT restricted to those born male. That is just an assumption that some existing members have.

There are a few “trans brothers” and I actively encourage others….
BUT… whilst the culture of the majority is that “we are all girls” then it isn’t going to be a level playing field for the minority.

Last year I tried to discourage everyone greeting each other as a girl , as if that was the only acceptable thing to be round here. The resistance to dropping that convinced me that we have some way to go before the majority of TgR members empathise with the minority.

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what they go through isn’t it much the same?

Of course it is – that is why it is so silly to consider ourselves different.

[Adrian]

I think I’ve said everything I want to on this topic, as in the end it will come down to subjective opinions that depend on what media you actually look at.

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This thread, as its title suggests, is about MSM representations of trans people.

I saw no reference to MSM (I presume that is main Stream media?) either in the title or in the body of the initial post. To me media includes any form of mass communication – and I’m not sure what makes it mainstream or not. I guess this is semantics. For instance I assumed that the internet and social networking is media – and counting trans instances there would be a challenge!

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I would like to suggest another reason for this feeling of [M2Fs] not getting the deserved coverage.

I frequently detect in TgR and in TransFormal a feeling that the gender diverse who are born female are not in “our class”; ….

OK, this is too much of a departure from the thread theme, in my opinion. Plus I don’t harbour the views you touch on with regard to FtMs at all.

Far from it. If we are discussing a subjective view of the situation then we must include observer bias. As the subjective opinions we have seem to differ it is worthwhile to explore if they derive in part from a difference in sensitivity to that being observed.

[Adrian]

Here is our resident “chick-magnet” in action in the documentary

[Adrian]

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Are FTMs overrepresented in the media?

I had to re-read the question just to check – because it was so far from what I thought the situation was.
As Chloe says:

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My observations are obviously different to yours

Then I wondered – is this a box question? Are we just talking about people born female who are trying to live in society as binary males, and people born male living as binary females? Are we asking if F2Ms living as males are more likely to be visible than M2Fs living as women? Are trans males less sensitive about revealing their past? I’m not sure the answer will reflect anything other than the availability and success of sex reassignment in the two groups.

I use the term FtM to embrace everyone who is gender diverse and born female. To do otherwise is to draw pointless (and sometimes offensive) lines in the gender spectrum. Do I see more gender diverse people represented in the media who were born female than born male? Certainly not… in fact, I rarely see articles about the significant issues facing the F2M spectrum. Even in the series My Transexual Summer (which I felt was grossly over-simplifying the gender diverse spectrum down to a journey to physical sex reassignment) the M2Fs outnumbered F2M.

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First, a FtM transition is typically 10x more convincing than a MtF transition (well, come on, it’s true, isn’t it?), so they’re great talent for television.

I can’t think of anything less personally convincing for someone born female who needs to live their life in the male box than not having a penis. The MTF group makes a big deal of trips to Thailand to get the right physical accessories – so I’m sure without the disguise of clothes the MtF are far more “convincing”.

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I think there are a number of reasons for the lack of coverage

I would like to suggest another reason for this feeling of not getting the deserved coverage.

I frequently detect in TgR and in TransFormal a feeling that the gender diverse who are born female are not in “our class”; they have it easy; they aren’t making such a serious decision; society accepts them better; they don’t understand that being male is a bad thing…..I could go on… but I detect a lot of this in the original posting. Maybe I’m just being hyper-sensitive and everyone here actually embraces their born-female counterparts. But the fact is it doesn’t show in their language.

My response to this ignorance has been to actively encourage FtM participation in TgR and TransFormal. Learning to relate to and understand the FtM group is something that will enrichen all our lives.
So let’s hear more about the full spectrum of the FtM experience. Even if they end up with more media time that won’t be such a bad thing I think.
Can I finish by giving my strong support to Chloe’s assertion that

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The people that I do think are under-represented are those who do not identify as at one end or the other of the gender spectrum.

[Adrian]

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What happens when you’re born in the wrong body?
Biological sex doesn’t always match up with ‘brain sex’ and when that happens, you either spend your life in torment or you make the decision to transition and become the person you know you are inside.
Sabour sets out to get inside the Trans world but he finds it difficult to get people to talk to him on camera because it’s such a sensitive subject in Australia. So he heads off to the USA to meet a group of Trans teens, including teenage singing sensation and activist, Ryan Cassata.
Back in Australia, Sabour makes headway with a number of Trans people who invite him to follow them on their journeys as they move through different stages of transitioning.
Riley, 15, was born a boy, but is starting to go to school as a girl and pondering hormone treatment at age 16. Her parents are agonising over the decision because hormones will allow her feminine features to develop, but they are irreversible, meaning she’ll go sterile.
Jay, 32, once had a ‘well-groomed biker look’ but is now going through hormone treatment and is about to embark on facial feminisation surgery before she comes out at work as a woman. For her, the process is about finding the outer confidence she needs to match the inner confidence she feels as a woman.
Racy Rapidfire is a roller derby champion who was thrown out of a Tasmanian league for being Transgender but decided to fight back publicly. Two years later – after sex-reassignment surgery, mental breakdowns and suicide attempts – she’s left Tasmania, found new love, and is ready to try out for a new league in Brisbane.
In an effort to broaden his understanding of the Australian Trans community Sabour heads to a conference in Cairns and talks to Trans guys and girls, sings with Sista Girls, gets an exclusive interview with West Australian senator Louise Pratt and her Trans husband Aram, and is swept off his feet by the outrageously flirtatious, Rosie Jones – a 74 year old doctor from Adelaide who went through sex re-assignment surgery at age 68!
This is a journey like no other for Sabour, completely new, always complicated, and with unprecedented access into the lives of Trans people around Australia.

I somewhat surprised myself by watching all of “HEAD FIRST EP 4: THE WRONG BODY” last night. I have a low tolerance for the sex changing genre of Transexual documentary and with the word BODY in the title I was expecting a catalogue of surgical interventions. How wrong I was!

So why did i watch? It wasn’t just for the cameo appearance of Liz in Cairns!

Here are the things I was surprised about:

[ul]They talked about a transitioning in a general way of aligning presentation with inner gender – not in the narrow sense of changing ones physical sex

The people interviewed (albeit all born male) were on different journeys – seeking membership of a sporting team, a nose job. or physical sex (the last one I found a bit disturbing in a ‘senior’).

There was a thought provoking segment (with the parent of a Trans person) that questioned if taking hormones and blending in as a woman was for the benefit of others or for the Trans person.

The word “box” came up in a negative sense

The difference between sex and gender was presented in a clear way.

There was a scene where parents described how they realised their child was trans and not gay.

It was very well researched – and the message was one that would promote greater acceptance of all Trans (gender) people.[/ul]

Could go on…but why not watch it yourself.

http://www.abc.net.au/iview/#/view/39096