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I’m calling it: The death of the TS separatist movement

Cristan

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I’m going to call it: the TS Separatist movement – as it has existed over the past 5 years – is dead. The foundational falsehoods upon which TS Separatism was built have been exposed and thus, destroyed.  Furthermore, in an ironic twist, it’s been shown that the guy HBSers (a subset of the TS Separatist group) named themselves after didn’t actually think one could transition from one sex to another. Practically all Separatist opinion leaders have moved on to (hopefully) do better things with their time and energy… and I wish them well! The only ones left seem to be the young earth creationists of the trans world:

It’s a conspiracy! All facts are faked!

The Separatists who are left seem to represent the JustJennifer/RadFem/Nick Chaleunphone/Ashley Love contingent. They are the remaining vanguard of a movement which now finds itself without a coherent  narrative. Here’s a quick review of the Separatist mythical fact claims which have been objectively busted:

The above memes were the narrative engine driving the Separatist movement. As it turns out, that engine was clearly running on nothing but BS. So where do the TS Separatists go from here? I predict that if they choose to carry on, they will fall into 1 of 2 broad narrative factions:

al
Ashley Love: Being called transgender is assault and sexual objectification in the same way that being called human is also be assault and sexual objectification since “gender variants” are also grouped under the human umbrella.

All that’s left for TS Separatists to do is become the trans equivalent of  fringe conspiracy folks (like birthers) or the young earth creationists who believe what they believe because their belief tells them to believe. I think folks will want to cling to having faith in TS Separatists dogma because I think the phony victim narrative will be too irresistible for some. I suspect that for some, the victim narrative has become part of their self-identity by now. Take away the victim narrative and who are they as a person who’s trans? What does it mean to be trans when a significant portion of what they knew about being trans turned out to be wrong?

History and definitions aren’t relevant in discussion about facts and definitions! I’m offended! “I know what’s going on. I’m not dumb.”

In any event, I expect the “I’m offended by transgender” meme to continue in some form. Never mind that they have nothing to base their preference on but preference alone; they’ll become like those white Irish-American people who claim offense if they’re referred to as caucasian  instead of “Irish” or worse, “Celtic” (BTW – my father was Irish).

A Post-Mortem

For years now, TS Separatists have told transsexuals that they’ve somehow been wronged, that somehow their identity has been forcibly taken from them. They’ve asserted (without evidence) that as long as “transgender” exists, the lives of transsexuals wouldn’t get better. In this way – at least on an emotional level – rejecting “transgender” felt as if we transsexuals were doing something to make things right… something empowering. When faced with two choices…

1.) Try to gain empowerment by rejecting a term: Become normal by contrasting transsexuals against what you assert to not be normal. Your plight isn’t your fault; crossdressers are to blame. In the 1950s and 60s, life was great for transsexuals until the crossdressers came along and colonized your identity. You’re a victim. You should feel victimized and you should tell others that you’ve been victimized. You should feel angry. All you need do to set everything right and become radical – special – is to repeat these memes to others from behind a computer screen.

2.) Try to gain empowerment through blood, sweat and tears: Work with people you might not like and constantly out yourself to political and social systems in your effort to promote equality. Commit to, at times, being the most unpopular person in a room full of uncomfortable people in your effort to promote real equality. Invest hours, days and weeks into organizing successful social justice campaigns. Meet your representatives and become involved in the political process… and for your efforts, become a possible target for anti-trans hyperbole while being branded a drone working for a TG Borg conspiracy; an effigy to be openly mocked by transsexuals who chose Choice #1.

… which choice seemed more attractive?  Which offered a special status and immediate gratification? If all I have to do to feel empowered – to feel that I’m special and/or the vessel of some special awareness or knowledge – is claim to be offended when I read term; well, that’s an easy choice to make. Of course, Choice #1 produced no tangible positive results by itself, but hey… like all mental masturbation, at least it felt good.

A special, select group of TS Separatist internet bullies who don’t care about facts and dialogue.

Regardless of how good delusional thinking might feel, the fact is that TS Separatists are no longer in possession of an unassailable reality that confers upon them a special status as both victim and freedom fighter. Now they’re just regular trans folk like the rest of us… not any better or more special and they are certainly no longer part of an elite battalion of a chosen few fueled by the fires of self-righteous hubris.

And, the Eulogy

Well, the time is at hand to admit that, by itself, the outcome of the hysterical rejection of “transgender” has only been drama, resentment and an elitist divisiveness. However, this is not to say that the past 5 years has been devoid of any positive growth. The assertions of fact made by TS Separatists have inspired – as a reaction to their hyperbole – a renascence of sorts within the trans community. The ad nauseum hyperbole spewed forth from  TS Separatists have…

For the beneficial reactions within the trans community, I want to THANK the TS Separatists. Even though their mean spirited, obdurate and fanatical behavior visited untold suffering upon the lives of those they targeted and even though they worked around the clock to spread a fear-based ignorance far and wide, they were, nonetheless, the irritant which lead to the trans community rediscovering and reclaiming our rich trans history. If it hadn’t been for their misinformation campaign, there would have been no need to respond to it and therefore I wouldn’t have found myself fact-checking their truth claims and everyone would still believe that “transgender” came from the 1990s and had evolved from a term which meant crossdresser. Additionally, this past 5 years has proven the trans community to be just that: a community; because, any “community” that doesn’t have space for dissent and rational introspection isn’t a community at all.

[box]PS: If, after reading this, you think I’m telling you that you must stop identifying as transsexual, please seek help. I didn’t say that and I’m not promoting that. What I am saying is that YOU ARE NOT A VICTIM of a conspiracy. If you want to identify as a transsexual because it’s a more exact way of identifying your experience, that’s great! Probably 90% of the time I identify as being a transsexual. But STOP pretending that it’s offensive every time someone refers to transsexuals as transgender people. It’s not; the TS separatists movement lied to you… now get on with living your life.[/box]

NOTES:

1.) Transgender was used as early as 1965 to describe the transsexual experience. Within 4 years of “transsexual” entering pop culture (1966) “transgender” meant surgical transsexual (1970). Within 4 years of that (1974), “transgender” also meant an umbrella term (see #9 below). While “transgender” was being used to identify surgical transsexuals, the term “transsexual” was meant an umbrella term which explicitly included crossdressers (Type 4 transsexual). Also, Here’s an evidence-based review of that narrative.

2.) Throughout the 1970s, transgender only ever meant transsexual or an umbrella term. No 1970s use of transgender has been found to only mean crossdressers. Transgender and transgenderist existed side-by-side, transgenderist meaning one thing while transgender another.

3.) As it turns out, NO evidence exists which support the idea that Prince’s 1 obscure (and immediate abandonment of) “transgenderal” (December, 1969) is where all trans terms come from. Again, transgender was being used years before that in 1965. If Prince’s 1 early, obscure and immediately abandoned usage of a term is the standard which should be used (without showing actual links between the terms), then we must now claim that all trans terms, including transsexual,transgenderal and transgender, somehow came from “trans-sexed” – a 1915 term which meant transgenderist… which is absurd. 

4.) “Transgender,” “Transgenderism” and “Transgndered” all predates Transgenderist. Transgenderist has been tracked to a newspaper from 1975.

5.) Transgender originally meant transsexual and transsexual was originally an umbrella term: transsexual, 1970 & transgender, 1970.

6.) It’s simple to track a robust, explicitly inclusive and unified community.

7.) From housing protections to Title VII protections, the proliferation of trans protections has exploded over the past 20 years.

8.) The arguments and bigotry that are used against trans folks today are the sames ones they were making against trans folks in the 1970s:

9.) Not only was transsexual and umbrella term, inclusive terms have been a part of trans culture since the early 1900s:

10.) The term existed decades before the 90s:

“In fact, in at least one transgender center the history of a single episode of cross-dressing in association with sexual arousal is sufficient to exclude the diagnosis of transsexualism (Baker).” – (1974:487). Clinical sexuality: A Manual for the Physician and the Professions, J Oliven,  [Link]

“The transvestite rarely seeks transgender surgery, since the core of his perversion is an attempt to realize the fantasy of a phallic woman.”  – (1974: 176). A Practical Handbook of Psychiatry 

“Some of the terminology used at the conference would take some twenty years to become widespread. As far as we are aware, the first use of the term trans.people (sic) was when Julia Tonner referred to “the two worlds of the trans.people” (ie transsexuals and transvestites). In addition, there was also talk of transsexuals seeking ‘gender alignment’ and of ‘trans-gender’ also used as an umbrella term.” – (2007) Gendys Journal, D King & R Elkins

“[R]aquel Welch (left), moviedom’s sex queen soon to be seen as the heroine/hero of Gore Vidal’s transgendered “Myra Breckinridge…” – (April 26, 1970). TV Guide, [Link

11.) Look up Type 4 and Type 5 transsexual… those classifications have been widely known since 1966. Even a “True Transsexual” can be a non-op (Type 5 transsexual).

12.) Again, as it turns out NO evidence exists to support this assertion. The challenge was made to TS Separatists, RadFems (see below) and right wingers to produce jut 10 real-world examples where protections against discrimination based upon gender identity and expression allowed abusers to circumvent laws prohibiting rape, assault, stalking and/or public indecency/disturbance. None of them have been able to do so.

The only group to try to back up their hyperbole with something that appeared to be evidance was a right-wing anti-trans group:

Really? Four rapes you say? Well, lets see what law enforcement has to say about that testable assertion of fact:

Yup, they just lied. Again, there is NO evidence to support the bathroom meme they push.

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Comments

  1. I go to Doonesbury for my daily laugh but this places a close second. I had a college professor who spoke 6 languages and could tell you the root and metamorphosis of any English term throughout 20 centuries. Were he still alive and should he read your struggles I am confident he would conclude you are a person with an agenda. But he is dead so we will never get to test that concept. Oh well.

    So, Cristan let’s get back to 2012. Basics. I don’t care about potty politics because that is foisted upon us by men. Male politicians and cross dressers care about such things. I don’t care about language because it is malleable and depends in part on the education of the speaker or reader. When I say blue it means one thing to your mind and may mean something else entirely to me. You like things that I do not like and and I like things you do not. I choose to associate with men and women. You choose to associate with people. You are not wrong, just different than I am. But your assertion that somehow your perspective has triumphed is laughable. It reminds me of George Bush landing on an aircraft carrier declaring victory in Iraq. Surprise, surprise, we spent a lot of money, killed a lot of people and still lost that war. I’ll bet you think we accomplished something over there.

    So Cristan, please enjoy your life. Pee with your friends and squawk to Congress about inclusive ENDA which will probably never be passed. You can thank youtube and all the gender variant video makers for that, at least in part. I sympathize with your struggles, I really do, but your defeat is inevitable. Take a real lesson from history and remember LBJ whose Texas sized ego would not allow him to believe that the destiny of southeast Asia was beyond his control.

  2. So, Cristan let’s get back to 2012

    Ah, so you’re going to go for the 1st category then are you?

    “History – the centerpiece of all the TS Separatist arguments over the past 5 years – will now become somehow irrelevant. They’ll argue that this is today – which has nothing to do with yesterday and “transgender” is evil. How did it become evil? It just did. Why is it evil? Just because… that’s why! The imagined horror of “transgender” will become a matter of faith and dogma.”

    Please re-read what I said. I didn’t say that there won’t be the fringe folks who choose to be offended every time they see the word “transgender” used in a manner consistent with the English language. What I said was that the TS Separatism movement of the past 5 years is dead.

    Other than personal preference, TS Separatists can’t make an reasoned argument for forcing all transsexuals to use only the terms they approve of.

    … but your defeat is inevitable.

    Defeat? What the hell are you talking about girl? Are you under the impression that I’m fighting a battle? And what, in your assessment, am I fighting for?

    Let me guess… to save “transgender.” Right? How obtuse!

    The only thing that I’ve ever fought for is to make facts available. The only thing it seems that TS Separatists have fought for is to try really, really hard to pretend that their narrative is somehow rational.

    The people who are left are those who think that I’ve time traveled or maybe photoshoped all evidence which doesn’t support their faith position. The reality is that the only reason someone has to tie themselves into a knot when they see “transgender” is that they like being tied into a knot.

    The charade is over; the emperor has no clothes! The fact is that every reason given for all of the bullying, all of the gnashing of teeth and all of the personal attacks WAS FOR NOTHING. It’s a sham that’s caused a lot of suffering over the past 5 years and I’m glad it’s dead and that the corpse lays in the inept hands of fringe conspiracy theorists.

  3. I too am glad it is dead. GWB landed on the aircraft carrier and pronounced the war over just as you have done. You are both right in a way but wrong about the victor. Sorry sweet pea but the Borg has lost.

  4. Oh gosh Cristan you suckered me in didn’t you. I forgot that you posted this on April 1st. Now I understand. It was all a joke. OK, I admit you had me fooled. Good job.

  5. I posted a message that said “I can only LOL @ this article” on Transadvocate and it got deleted. But here is why I laugh at it.

    You are so wrapped up in yourself that you actually think that YOU are the reason I removed my blog. You saw it as a victory in the TS vs TG debate. I am telling you that my closing my blog had zero to do with any of this debate. It was for totally different reasons. I can’t believe how wrapped up you are in your own self! Everyone can see how obsessive you are with the whole transgender vs transsexual debate. You have a vested interest in the word transgender just like RuPaul has a vested interest in the word tranny.

    You boast that we are opinion leaders in an effort to make people think you deal in truth and that is a fucking joke. You are one of the biggest liars I have ever seen. You have publicly lied about me on more than one occasion.

    So, my closing my own personal blog, for reasons unrelated to the TG vs TS debate, is the end of the TS Separatist movement. LOLOLOLOL. ROFL! OMG, I didn’t realize my blog was the last one standing. You are so freaking demented. VICTORY! Dana closed her blog! I won! LOLOLOL.

    My blog is archived and I will certainly be bringing it back but only after I have focused on other things I need to focus on right now.

    This is some seriously funny shit!

    1. You are so wrapped up in yourself that you actually think that YOU are the reason I removed my blog

      Your perception is mistaken. Paste into a reply where I make this claim.

      You saw it as a victory in the TS vs TG debate.

      Again, your perception is mistaken. Paste into a reply where I make this claim.

      I am telling you that my closing my blog had zero to do with any of this debate

      I never claimed to know why you closed down your blog. The only thing I said about this is: “Practically all Separatist opinion leaders have moved on to (hopefully) do better things with their time and energy… and I wish them well!”

      How you get that I think I forced you to close down your blog is beyond me.

      LET ME BE CLEAR: I’m happy that you’ve moved on to do better things with your time and energy. I wish you well!

      You boast that we are opinion leaders in an effort to make people think you deal in truth and that is a fucking joke. You are one of the biggest liars I have ever seen. You have publicly lied about me on more than one occasion.

      Post into a reply a statement that I made wherein I knowingly misrepresented the facts.

      VICTORY! Dana closed her blog! I won! LOLOLOL.

      Dana, please stop this nonsense. Paste into a reply wherein I claim that I single handedly beat all of TS Separatism. Yes, I played a part, but I don’t claim to play the David to your Goliath.

      What I said was that the narrative is dead… and it is dead. That narrative is what fueled the movement. The reason that it’s dead is that I fact-checked the truth assertions coming out of the movement and I provided ample evidence showing your claims are false. That won’t stop the nutty fringe folks from acting like anti-Obama birthers. It’s not like Separatism is dead; it’s not and may never be… and I don’t care about that. The movement as it stands is irrelivant. It has no reasoned argument to make.

      What is dead is the Separatist movement as it has been over the past 5 years. Most of you decided that you had better things to do with your time and energy. All I did was eviscerate the narrative; I don’t take credit you deciding that there’s more interesting and useful things to do with your time. You can’t tell me that you’ve not been tired of all this crap for some time mow. You’ve taken “breaks” more and more frequently.

      What I am crowing over is the death of what the movement as it has been: a robust, loud, aggressive, self-righteous, on-message group. That’s now dead. The message is now known to be BS. Most of the opinion leaders have better things to do with their time (like enjoy life). What’s left are the fringe people claiming that I’ve photoshopped everything that doesn’t support their preferred reality and/or those who believe what they believe because their belief instructs them to believe. That’s what’s left and that’s certainly not what the movement was 4 years ago. That movement is dead.

      My blog is archived and I will certainly be bringing it back but only after I have focused on other things I need to focus on right now.

      Which is fine. Your old writing are meaningless in the context of an informed community. As an archivist, I’m very grateful that you’ll put that stuff back up for historical reference. It’s good of you to do that!

      I congratulate you on having more interesting things to do with your time. Go live your life Dana. Don’t choose to become a nutty fringe conspiracy theorist. You’re better than that.

      1. “Paste into a reply wherein I claim that I single handedly beat all of TS Separatism. Yes, I played a part, but I don’t claim to play the David to your Goliath. ”

        Again, I did not close my blog due to anything you or any of the other transgender opinion leaders have done. This is what I am saying. I closed my blog for reasons that have nothing to do with any of that. Yet you are trying to make it appear that it did have something to do with it.

        1. Yet you are trying to make it appear that it did have something to do with it.

          No; again, your perception isn’t on the mark. I’m not suggesting that in any way, shape or form. I’ve been very clear with you about this.

          At this point if you choose to continue believing that this is something I’m claiming – while I certainly can’t stop you from holding that belief – I can tell you that the outcome of that belief will be resentment and/or drama. You’ll upset yourself over nothing.

          I don’t know how much clearer I can be on this point, Dana!

          As I said in my original post, I’m glad that you’re doing something better with your time and that you’ve moved past all this drama. I’m really happy for you! You’re obviously an intelligent, passionate and hard working women and I’m glad that you have something other than this nonsense to invest your time and attention into. I very much wish you well Dana!

        2. Strangely, I think Dana is the one who is full of herself thinking that Cristan is talking about her. A misguided sense of self-importance leads her to be so paranoid about how people see her. You’re a transsexual and not transgender, Dana. We get it. Now go out and live your life and stop caring so much about what other people think.

    1. Actually, I think it would be fun to reclaim that term, change the meaning so that it refers to anti-trans folk.

      But, calling me a tranny is about offensive to me as calling me a cracker.

        1. Someone calling me tranny is about as worrisome to me as being called dork. It’s just a schoolyard burbling; it’s the most simplistic ad hom one can attempt.

  6. So now you are the victim and I am insulting you by asking your preference in terms? Don’t be silly.

    I actually enjoy most of what you write. I especially enjoy all the old newspaper articles you turn up. They show how different people can use the same terms from different perspectives and hardly seem to be speaking about the same thing.

    My perspective on this mythical separatist movement is that it never even existed. Certain people simply did not accept and could not relate to the umbrella or spectrum concept. Why should that be a problem. I can certainly align with you in advocating that every person is entitled to certain inalienable rights and among those are the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

    If your happiness means believing grouping lots of people together under some mythical umbrella is worthwhile then I accept that and think it is wonderful for you. Although I once thought that was a marvelous concept experience has taught me to now discard it. Therefore you and I do not share a commonality of values or beliefs on that issue. Oh gosh, that means we are not alike. That doesn’t bother me at all and I’m certain it doesn’t bother you either. It also does not mean either of us is wrong or right. Just different.

    1. So now you are the victim and I am insulting you by asking your preference in terms? Don’t be silly.

      If your happiness means believing grouping lots of people together under some mythical umbrella is worthwhile then I accept that and think it is wonderful for you.

      Obloquy aside, you wrote:

      Although I once thought that was a marvelous concept experience has taught me to now discard it.

      What experience? For instance… ?

    2. Deena…Transgender Foundation of America. Why is it so hard to understand why Cristan works so hard advocating for the word transgender? She even goes back in time and assimilates those who had no idea what the term even meant into today’s version of transgender. She doesn’t differentiate between transgender then and transgender now. Cristan is so heavily vested in “transgender” that you can’t take her seriously. Cristan is crazy.

  7. No Dana that is not true. Cristan is not crazy. Besides, she just taught me a new word above (obloquy). Back later. I’m listening to the Baylor/Notre Dame championship basketball game live online. 27/15 with Baylor ahead and 6 minutes left in the first half.

  8. OK, Baylor won 80 to 61. Their star is a junior who is 6’8″. I wasn’t aware of Brittney Griner. As it turns out many people believe Brittney is either a man or intersex. Googling Brittney brings up youtube videos and web pages that question her sex. I am amazed that this controversy has been going on since Brittney’s high school years. If I was Brittney I would have put that all to rest years ago with published records and published medical tests. Unless, of course, there is something to hide.

    That brings us back to your question Cristan. You ask for specific experiences. There are too many and getting into detail is a bit senseless. Let me put it this way. When I have found myself in the company of GLBT folks that spectrum idea is highly accepted and even praised. But….in the much larger hetero-normative social circles it is a real mixed bucket of santorum. You see society at large (this is only my personal experience) can accept that cross dressers exist and drag queens exist and femme gay men exist and genderqueer people exist and so on and so forth. Society at large can even sorta wrap its mind around a very small minority of people who really really need to modify their bodies and live in the sex they were not assigned at birth. But, when you lay out to larger society this umbrella concept the reaction changes almost instantaneously. It becomes not an umbrella but a fruit basket. I’ve seen it happen way too many times in way too many settings. The eyes glaze over and you realize the perception just went through a rapid metamorphosis and the outcome is like “over my dead body”. Cristan I really am not trying to be melodramatic. Societies change very slowly. Perhaps that is sad but it is also reality.

    You like to parse out a few words or sentences from what I or others write and challenge those like some champion of etymology of conqueror of linguistics. It is just you and your way of discussing. I fully expect you to do it with this reply. But before you succumb to that temptation ask yourself a simple question. Will the fruit basket advance the cause of human rights or do we need to find a better mechanism to communicate with the vast majority of society who are outside the umbrella? And, just to be clear, I am outside it. It leaked.

    1. You ask for specific experiences. There are too many and getting into detail is a bit senseless.

      But that’s the point – for me, at least. Specifics, exact details and/or the substance – the specific ‘why’ – of a position is what’s interesting to me since it moves and assertion out of the realm of opinion an into the realm of something more solid. I can make just about any subjective assertion and say that the reason I believe it to be so is because ‘there are too many experiences for me to specifically list and getting into detail is senseless.’

  9. Yes, the logic the small-town Republican Judge used on the Nikki Araguz marriage is wrong and the insurance folks who used that same “logic” in this case were were egregious in their actions against the couple.

    Thank you for posting the judgement; I had only read reviews thus far 🙂

  10. sometimes i wonder if the separatists are nothing more than a bunch of people who want to form their own club because theyve been ousted from every other group they tried to belong to. so this club gets all the creepy arrogant people youd never want to be friends with.

  11. Cristan, as always, this was a very eloquent, well-researched post and I enjoyed reading it very much. It’s nice to see the TS separatist movement so thoroughly debunked, to the point where they will be rehashing the old, tired and ignorant arguments, work on the whole “conspiracy theory” angle or just (we can hope) give up that whole TS Separatist bullshit.

    However, I honestly don’t think that last one will happen. I think that the root behind the separatist movement is transphobia.

    1. Oh, I think that some will remain. Ashley Love is still living her delusion claiming that all I’ve presented was faked, that her reality is fact and that she is a colonized victim, damn it! COLONIZED!!!! I’m ignoring folks like that because they’re just stupid at this point. I mean, we now know transgender was being used in 1965 and yet they still claim that the term was invented by a crossdresser and/or a commie who proclaimed that all transsexuals must now give up their identity and that – for some inexplicable reason – all transsexuals were forced into doing so. It’s just nutty at this point.

      The movement as it has existed over the past several years is dead.

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