To A T

I will warn you before you being to get into the meat of this that it could tweak places in your psyche that will leave you feeling angry, or hurt. Some might feel that I am supporting their views, or standing beside their cause, when I am not. Others might feel that I am disparaging their views, or themselves, when that is certainly not my intention.

But, there I was this morning on that inevitable, it seems, “social network,” Facebook, when I began to look at some pictures posted by a “facebook friend” (this one I know actually, or at least knew, as an embodied acquaintance some time ago.) The pictures were of a party held in a public place. There were a lot of people there.

The party seemed to have a Christmas shindig kinda atmosphere, from the pics, and everyone was dressed fairly formally. It was definitely not a sweatshirt and jeans sort of affair.

A number of the female participants, the pictures were mostly of females, not males, were dressed in some remarkably revealing and short skirted dresses. Just absolutely gorgeous outfits were on display. The group of people seemed very festive. The party appeared to have been at a bar.

I’m intentionally setting a stage and am intentionally hesitant to wade into the deeper end of the pool I am trying to examine. I hesitate, because there are perfectly lovely people who may read this who will believe that I look down on them, I am almost certain of that.

Then I also hesitate because there are certain characters that might also read this and somehow imagine that I have changed my mind and now hew a course more closely aligned with their own political brand.

The truth is rather more complex. (Isn’t it always?) Brief and partisan “takes” are generally not quite so encompassingly valid as we would imagine when our emotions are tweaked. The truth is that through the years I have changed my mind a couple of times about the following subject matter. This particular post isn’t a change of mind; it’s an examination of something I hadn’t consciously noticed. It is an essay about something I’ve noticed and had a sort of visceral reaction to. But, as the reaction has been visceral, I have, of course, not examined it in any depth. I have merely felt it.

[A brief aside, my partner and I discussed feeling and examining this morning over breakfast in terms of practitioner resistance to dialectical-behavioral therapy vis-à-vis client interactions. One cannot continue to talk in opprobrious terminology: “splitting, attachment, borderline” while working with clients who have been so-designated. Why? Because the language one thinks she knows and can “handle” is merely a group of code-words that tack on alleged qualities that do not describe behavior, or even feeling, unless it is the feeling of the therapist herself that’s described by the absence of any sort of clear description. In other words, I can label you a sociopath or a fetishist, but those words tend to show my own prejudices and when I use them they mayn’t relate at all to what you may be talking about while using the same words. Human communication is a dicey game indeed.]

Aside, aside, I’m ready to continue. The party appeared to be one that had a number of transgender people were in attendance. How could I tell? Well, how could you tell? Just accept that I know what I saw, alright? Now, it wasn’t easy to winnow further and “know” whether there were transsexuals and cross-dressers and the so-called genetic women among the party-goers. (Oops, that word almost led to another aside about, Nell, the 1994 Jodie Foster vehicle!)

Anyway, I realized that I was having some sort of reaction. It wasn’t a horrified one, or a dismissive one. It was simply a reaction to some of the dress and some of the motions that I saw in the pictures. Then, I also knew that many of the participants had gotten drunk and that added to the reaction.

Some of you are prolly already aware of the reaction I am about to describe. Hell, you may be having it yourself as you read. The reaction was something like “Damn! Don’t they know how unsafe it is to get drunk and go back out dressed like that? Think of what might occur!”

Ah-ha. Wait for it, I’m getting there.

Preface: I have, on occasion worn skirts that show off what have been a really nice set of legs. I know, “Don’t hate me because I’m beautiful!” 1980s, Pantene, Kelly LeBrock: But, how many of us went right out and tried the shampoo and conditioner and still use it, perhaps? Memes are effective, aren’t they? But there is also this fact, anytime I decide to show off some leg I also have this alarm that sounds within me. Actually, two alarms.

Alarm one is: “damn, girl, is that going to be safe to wear?” Alarm two is related but slightly different, “Is this more of the reaction to rape syndrome you struggled so hard to get past?” sigh And here we begin to descend into the matter at hand.

My reaction to the pictures was something like: it must be nice to not have to consider the reaction of men to your dresses.

The second was more like, well, perhaps that’s just the reason, men don’t notice such things. They will dress in ways that do attract attention, do attract those who might not otherwise incline themselves to attraction to that person. In other words, this is just a bunch of men dressing up like women. BAM

There it was. It rose up, that resentment and the “they’re really men” meme. And, perhaps, most of those in those pics would agree that they are men. Crossdressers are not the same as women, right? I think most of them would agree that that’s prolly true. But, they and I both also agree that they are fully human and deserving of every consideration I grant to other human beings.

Of course the rub comes when people who’ve been dysphoric for decades inside of bodies they do not want and don’t feel comfortable with look at those pics and react in some fashion like: “they’re not like me, they’re disgusting and need to be alienated from transsexuals because they will queer the pitch for us.” There are many women born transsexual who would have such a reaction. Yep, I’ve had it as well.

I have both embraced the separatist ideals and have rejected them as well. But, I also have that reaction when I see what I see. And it does strike me very deeply as being exactly what many movement feminists from the 60s and 70s have called it: a sexualization of women’s bodies by men.

But, were it simply that simple, then I’d hardly need to write an essay and try to work out for myself what was and is going on. I think this isn’t as simple as separatist of any sort and Prince-followers on either side are willing to try to make it.

Humanity finds it easy to make wars. Most of us don’t want to work hard enough to make peace. Prolly why divorce rates remain high among heterosexuals and relationships are so hard to come by for many of us. The work can be excruciating. Hence, it’s much easier for Mary Daly to have made hateful statements about a group of women she never took time to know, than it would have been for her to actually get to know transsexuals and crossdressers. Hence, it’s easier for some transsexuals to dismiss crossdressers than it would be for people to work at relationship. (yes, I know, “years ago I was betrayed by crossdressers, transgenders, men, whatever and I will never put myself in that position again.” I respect that, but since your reaction is PTSD-related: the trauma of those betrayals such that you continue to live them, perhaps you could speak with a therapist about working through this ideation?

It’s not that the event was imaginary, or that it didn’t hurt me. The problem was that for years I relived those hours in my mind and acted as if, many times, they were still occurring. Working them out with a therapist wasn’t a sign that I was insane. It was a sign that I was willing to get better and take more charge of my life and who I am. Those are good things, not shameful ones.

Perhaps, there is a more simple answer and perhaps it’s already “out there.” Perhaps we haven’t looked at all deeply into the answer.

Perhaps the answer is, indeed, that it’s a much easier thing for men to sexualize women than it is for women to sexualize our selves. Perhaps the millennia of patriarchal oppression and training have given us a wariness of our own sexual selves.

Perhaps, being “taught” by means of sexual assault or rape of children have made sexualization of one’s self a frightening prospect and to view those who don’t seem to know the dangers is to have a deep and lasting resentment rise inside of one’s self. And just maybe I resent the fuck outta the men who wanna dress in femme garb and flaunt their sexual selves and lead others to think that women are just as fearfully sexual as church fathers and lineages of rabbis have said!

Perhaps, when I can remove the clothing, or remove the light voice or remove the perfume and make-up and the next morning dress in a white shirt, a pin-striped suit, a tie and shoes and then splash on Old Spice and meet the guys at the gym after work. Well, perhaps it IS easier for me to forget just how dangerous it seems to have dressed as a woman the night before and worn a very sexy outfit.

There is resentment. Isn’t there? I can feel it. “Why can’t I?” “Why should I live in trepidation and you don’t have to?” “Doncha know that dress could lead to rape?” — Even among those of us who know better, it becomes so easy to blame the fact of sexual assault on the way a woman dresses, eh? –That training runs deep, doesn’t it? How long is that train you’re trying to brake? That makes a difference in stopping times, doesn’t it?

Layers and layers to uncover and many of us don’t take the time to analyze, to find vocabulary that describes behavior that we can observe and come to some agreement that we can share a common vocabulary. Instead too many of us are involved with sharing our feelings, our reactions, our PTSD with others. Thus, the conversation never gets started because we are at the Tower of Babel and we’re all speaking in different tongues.

I think that if women can embrace our sexuality that would be a very good thing. Instead we have millennia of training and repression that say things like “she brought that on herself.” Did you see what se was wearing.” “How could she get that loaded?” Recriminate, fulminate, enrage.

Those are the contents of too many of our conversations, too many of our attempts to communicate are attempts to communicate instead an incoherent rage and anger at experiences. I understand that, quite well.

I have felt the alienation and rejection of transitioning from the outward appearance of one sex to the outward appearance of my own sex. I have felt the horror, the self-condemnation of the aftermath of rape. I have felt the demeaning sense of having my mouth shut for me by others. I have felt the fear of when will a beating stop and the fear that the next minute would see my death. Those feelings are basically beyond quantification and observation and rational expression while I am enmeshed with them.

When such feelings rule my quotidian existence I cannot conceive of any idea or behavioral expression that might not place me back into fear of immediate death. It’s only when I come to a place where I realize that I may or may not die in the next moment, but I will not die of a rape that isn’t happening any longer. … Then I become more able to find a common language with another.

But that language will not come about through fear mongering about the never before occurred becoming commonplace, nor will it come about through belaboring the obvious: “you are not like me.” It comes only when I see the obvious with the fear of death.

Au contraire, Radha, you are human and so am I. I bleed; you bleed. You desire connection; I desire connection. Perhaps we can attempt to make connection with each other? Perhaps we can, indeed.

But first, we must find a language we can all speak and dismiss the notion that I can somehow quantify the person you are by labeling you in ways that are demeaning and painful and dismissive. None of that behavior makes my point. It only leads to more alienation.

I’ve had that a-plenty in my life. I’d rather not continue to build walls that keep me away from others. The first step for me is learning to be authentic and to demolish the poses I wish to replace the poses I lived before. Blessed be.