Doing a paper for transgender at school.

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theaspiemusician
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09 Jan 2012, 10:31 pm

It's about this whole kind of theme, we were supposed to do our projects on "outsiders" and why they are and how they are treated. I picked Transgender people. Unfortudently I haven't been able to find information specific enough for my project. What is it like to be trans?


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Hmmm...interesting. Shows what you know about Aspies, doesn't it rofl?

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kittylover
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13 Jan 2012, 5:20 am

I severely hate my body. I'm frequently late to work because I'll cry in the morning. I wish I were dead.

Many others aren't as bad as me though.



John_lzhc
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13 Jan 2012, 4:49 pm

What's it like being cis anyone? I've never not been trans*, so I don't exactly have an accurate comparison.

It has alternatively been the worst thing in my life, the most exciting thing in my life, the most bizzar experience I could ever imagine, made me want to die, made me feel empowered, made me want to claw my own skin off, given me a community, taught me how to live with my body for all it's imperfections, lost me my fear in injections (and gained me many a dead-leg), put me almost constantly on my guard around strangers, and given me an endless supply of knob gags (because no one in my family ever really gets the hang of growing up). It's a mixed baggage to say the least, although I spent about two and a half years in the same boat kittylover's in now.



cthulhureqiuem
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16 Feb 2012, 4:47 am

honestly for me, coming out as trans and being myself has been the best thing i could ever have done for myself. but it always felt like it was not the full story for me... and im glad i followed my instinct (now diagnosed with aspergers) and i have a much clearer picture of why the world is the way it is... and what i need to do to get myself from point a to point b. which is nice :3



just-lou
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18 Feb 2012, 3:01 am

Awkward? Or, that may well be due to being aspie. Or asexual. Or you know ... alive.

Quote:
What's it like being cis anyone? I've never not been trans

Good one! I agree. But in an effort to address the slant you're going for in your paper - what is it about being a transgendered person that could set you outside mainstream society? Lots.
Quote:
"outsiders" and why they are and how they are treated.

I guess you could say that our society in the west at least is heavily binary gendered. There are strict social rules (despite how pro-feminist and PC we insist we are) for males and females, and a complete picture of what is masculinity and what is femninity, based on thousands of years of very (unnecessarily) complicated history.
I don't know about a blanket explanation for "why" transgendered people are the way they are. If you're binary transgendered, you may percieve the opposite binary gender expression and feel more in common with that image. Think "that's me - why am I in the opposite body, with people treating me the wrong way?" I've heard many trans people say things like they want to "be a woman" or "be a man" and the expression of that gender identity - with all its indicators - is very important to them. So, say you're born in a male body, but being recognized as a "woman" means a lot to you, and you identify with all things classically feminine and you agree to subscribe to a certain look and set of behaviours your society has labelled "female" - you want to look like a woman with (generally - this is a stereotype after all) longer hair, softer skin, curved body, breasts, vagina, etc. You want all the things that go alone with being a female - expected behaviour, position in society, etc. It's just an example.
Then there's others who don't believe in the social construction at all - which is all gender is. Physical sex is one thing - whatever genitalia you have (though, through transition and surgery even that line blurs) gender is basically what we the consensus say it is. So, people who don't subscribe to that point of view see only options, without the gender influence placed on them. Generally, "genderqueer." Throw all sense of gender out the window, walk the middle road and be neither male nor female, and at the same time taking what you want from both.
Some people will say that trans people have a different brain chemistry - different physical or hormonal make-up. No idea if that's true or not.
How they're treated, as outsiders? Often the brunt of jokes - I remember watching a movie once where the female character was supposed to be feeling pathetic/sexuallyunattractive/generally a loser at a wedding reception because none of the guys would dance with her. Her mother suggested dancing with her cousin - who was pre-operative female-to-male, but wearing a very nice tux. Thus, insinuating that the only other person more undesirable than this girl was the token transguy. I've heard the whole "you're just a butch lesbian" kind of invalidation for some transguys, and often violence for being a "fag" against feminine transwomen. Gender is still rigid, thus anyone breaking it is doing something that is taboo in this society. So, people have to cope with it how they can. In the broader sense, say in the media, everything is targeted at cisgendered males or females, depending. Nothing is targeted at a transgendered person - which is fine for some who consider themselves binary anyways. Then there's the old public loo dilemma - transgender people often find that kind of awkward, because society is saying you must be "this" or "this," and a transperson may be neither, or physically one thing while identifying as the other.
But for those in-between, there's little outsider gaps. I always hate formal functions, because the line between male and female dress expectations is harder - say for example, a medically transitioning pre-operative transwoman. She may run into such a function - and be expected to wear a tux and play the "role" of a man, because that is how she appears, while in her head, she'd much rather go in an evening gown and heels - but she isn't allowed to do that, because of her masculine appearance. Same the other way. That could be an "outsider" kind of example.
Most people are cis. Most people don't question gender, so reinforce the roles they are comfortable with - binary gender. Transfolk may challenge that, making them uncomfortable. And people never react real well to something that fundamentally challenges their beliefs, or that which they can't understand.
That the kind of idea you were looking for?