Operation Sex Change

For the record: I am a boring CIS white female. I was born female I will die female, and I will most likely spend my whole life only interested in men. The wrong men usually. But there is this thing called EMPATHY that Human Beings are supposed to be able to do; do give it a try.

*Disclaimer: I am very far from being an expert, and have only knowledge gained by giving a fuck. Remember, not all transgender folk are even seeking gender reassignment surgery, people come to their own decisions for their own reasons and having a bit of respect for that will make you a better person. I promise.

Gender reassignment has a had a little bit of air time in the last couple of days. Partially because a politician I normally have quite a bit of respect for said a couple of very insensitive and ill considered things. Andrew Little I'm looking at you. It's usually the Nats wearing my abuse but for today you can wear the douchebag crown. I expect better from you. He wasn't the only one, but as I said I expect Nats to be Twats. And a new slogan is born.

I've asked my readers before, to take a trip down Imagination Lane and try to picture what it must be like to wake up every day in the wrong body. To have most of the people around you treat you as if you are what you know you are not. We all need to understand that this is something that is wrong with a person, in exactly the same way that nerve damage is something that is wrong with me. It's possible that the damage is being caused by something that can be fixed surgically. If this is the case then I can have funded surgery to fix my problem, because it's a repairable medical problem that is impairing my quality of life. Sometimes the signals that go on inside our bodies are messed up and they tell us things that aren't true. I have damage on a nerve bundle telling me that my left arm is a screaming pile of agony, as if it is in the midst of a terrible injury all the time. The signals are false, my arm is mostly fine. Oh, except that on top of the pain signals my arm is getting steadily weaker and deader. Fun. The false signal is coming from another part of my body altogether. Somewhere between my brain and my left shoulder there is something messing up the pathway. People happily accept this as being a horrible thing that I shouldn't have to live with. But when the signal that's wrong is affecting our sexual identity, our GENDER, suddenly a lot of people get funny ideas about what it is. And about what taxpayers should be responsible for. We live in a country with a funded health service. Necessary surgery can be had under government health services, for anyone. But a lot of people are arguing the necessity of gender reassignment. Not many EXPERT people mind you. Mostly just busy-bodies who think that because they don't understand something and it squicks them a bit, that somehow makes that thing WRONG. 

I cannot even begin to imagine how hard it is to wake up in a male body while KNOWING I am a female. (or the other way) My brain has no valid comparison to make - because I have all the right body parts despite the fact that a number of them don't work very well. But I can empathise. I know what it is to have an illness. I know what it is to have an illness that few people recognise. I know what it is to have people tell you that you are making it up. Making up the thing that causes me misery every minute of every day. It isn't the same, but it gives me a window to look through. And I'm telling everyone out there who doesn't understand to GET A GRIP. People don't choose to live miserable existences for your attention. That's another illness altogether - and it STILL isn't a choice. Look at your own life, oh lucky unaffected by hardship person... and tell me that you don't choose the path of least resistance more often than not? Tell me that the times when you chose the harder path in life were not ENTIRELY because the other choice went against your sense of being? 

Human Beings. We're very good at being stubborn motherfuckers. But only when the payoff is worth it. We'll only tolerate the intolerable when to do otherwise is WORSE. This above all else, to thine own self be true! (Thanks Shakespeare, you the man.) For many of us, being untrue to ourselves is intolerable. I can't keep my mouth shut in the face of douchebaggery for example. I really can't. It makes me feel bad about myself to ignore people being stupid cunts to each other. It makes me feel bad about humanity to just let it slide. (Obviously I can't respond to literally EVERY example of stupid cunt douchebaggery, but I make an effort.) This is part of who I am and it would be uncomfortable for me to have to pretend to be otherwise. And you, you douchebags in your glasshouses, you would be very uncomfortable if you were not being stupid cunts to people I suspect. But to be perfectly frank I don't give a rats arse how you feel about it, because you are being stupid cunts to other humans. When you learn not to be doucheholes about your opinions I'll listen.

Back to the transgender equation: because here in New Zealand we currently have a HUGE problem. Until last year we had ONE, yes just one, surgeon who could perform sex change operations. As part of a team of 3 surgeons they carried these out, to both paying customers - some from overseas, and also just 3 male to female government funded operations per year (1 female to male per year is carried out overseas under government funding). But then our ONE surgeon retired. Leaving us with NONE, for everyone who can do basic maths. And a debate over whether anyone should worry about this has begun. Should this be funded like so many other surgeries are in New Zealand? YES. A lot of people appear to be raising the 'it's a want, not a need flag' well let's talk about that a bit shall we? Why are you defining it as want rather than need and what goes on your need list? (Rhetorical)
Is my surgery to fix the nerves in my arm a need? The government thinks so, and so do the majority of people who know about my situation. I'm in pain all day every day. It seems obvious that to remove a source of constant pain is a need. Right? But is my physical pain any more demanding on me than constant emotional torment? I've been through a fair bit of emotional torment in my life too, and I can assure you that physical pain is considerably easier to live with. You get used to it, you learn to push it aside. It's annoying and intrusive, but it won't actually kill me. Emotional pain might. Because emotional pain eats away at your self image, eats away at your self worth, eats away at your trust in everyone around you. Until you think that you have no place in the world anymore. I have been there. It's a hell of a place to try to fight your way back up from. And if you cannot at least a little bit imagine the pain of your outside gender not matching the person you know yourself to be, then please, feel free to fuck off to the planet of the robots.
I think much of the issue hails back to the ongoing inability of so very many people to see that problems that live in the mind are REAL ACTUAL PROBLEMS. Perhaps I can shine a light down that rabbit hole. Mental illnesses, and all conditions of the mind STILL HAVE PHYSICAL CAUSES. There is still a basically mechanical fault at play even when appearances are that your brain is simply being a massive massive douche. Douglas Adams, author of that wildly popular series The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, drops the idea in one of those books that ... if someone thinks they're a hedgehog, presumably you just give them a mirror and a picture of a hedgehog and let them sort it out ... obviously it's nowhere near that simple or we wouldn't have hospitals full of people who think they are all kinds of strange things. Like worthless. The mind is an unbelievably complicated device, try figuring out the physics that goes into the act of catching a ball sometime. It'll do your head in - unless you're a science-y type obviously. But the comparison between how it feels to catch a ball (for most of us) and the actual math of catching a ball is a valid metaphor for trying to fix issues of the mind. It's like trying to make ice cubes by freezing your hands and trying to mold them out of water. Not aided by us still having only a fairly vague idea of HOW to fix it. It's becoming apparent to me that the current methodology of throw a lot of pills at it and hope for the best, interspersed with one size fits all therapy techniques is not really working. Mental health issues continue to plague our society at a hell of a rate of knots. For a start the more and more pervasive medical attitude that EVERYONE who has odd health issues is DEPRESSED is not helping. If you start from the assumption that someone is depressed you are a) unlikely to bother examining them further to look for other possibilities and b) potentially giving people utterly the wrong medication. Not to mention c) alienating a lot of patients who don't feel like they are being understood.
Is Gender Misalignment even a mental illness? We don't really know - perhaps it really is a straight forward as it sounds and you have been provided with an incorrect body type. Nature has all kinds of screw ups, is that really so far fetched? Is it more unusual than Conjoined Twins? More odd than Chimerism? Could it be a form of Chimerism? And in the short term, what the fuck difference does it make? If we can make a person's life better by operating then just the fuck DO IT.
What is the definition of need, where surgery is concerned? If we're only going to fund things in this country based on REAL ACTUAL NEED then my surgery (assuming that's what they decide) should probably be off the table. I've live. I'll be fucking miserable, pretty much useless and a burden. But I'll live. And a lot of other folk can come off the surgical roster too. That hip replacement? Fuck you, live with it. Reattaching the limb you just severed? Fuck off, your stupid fault for sticking your hand somewhere dumb. Reality is, the need you all mean is 'need that fits in with my view of the world' but I'm not interested in your opinion here, I'm interested in what medical science has to say. And medical science is more and more clear every day that people are suffering because they are not what they should be, and that we can and should fix this. In this country because of the way our medical service is set up this means funding surgeries sometimes. Get over it. Given that transgender is unlikely to be an issue that insurers are going to be keen to pick up without being shoved into it (not because it's unreasonable but because insurers are bastards and will wriggle out of anything) AND SHOULDN'T HAVE TO BE BECAUSE THIS IS NOT A COSMETIC PROCEDURE, we have to make the moral and scientific decision that we government fund these surgeries BECAUSE they will improve the lives of people who are suffering for MEDICAL REASONS. People don't want to change their gender on a fucking WHIM. Seriously what sort of ignorant dumbass even entertains that idea? The smallest bit of research into the hoops people have to jump through to just be APPROVED for gender reassignment should take that utterly facile idea right off the table. NO ONE is going to go through the lengthy, terrifying, and totally life altering process of going from one gender to another for LARKS. It's so patently obviously a NEED situation that I have to wonder if perhaps the people who think it isn't are in need of some form of help themselves.

We either need to get a new surgeon (or you know MORE THAN ONE) into New Zealand, or we need to accept the cost of sending our patients to reputable facilities overseas. We need to suck it up and do the right thing, for people who need our help. But I guess this is just another thing that we're going to let slide, as waiting lists get longer and longer (or get fake shorter by the exciting new technique of declaring that we can only have 4 months worth of people on the list at a time...and when those lists get overloaded what will the new number be...) as diagnosis becomes less about actually getting it right and more about not paying for extra testing, as your chances of seeing a specialist become more and more remote... BECAUSE FUCK YOU SICK AND POOR PERSON, if you can't afford to go private why don't you just die quietly?

Peace. Out.

Gender politics and the bathroom

Brought to you by the letters A & Hole. Rich with sarcasm.

Look, I know sexual/gender politics is a touchy subject. People get all uptight when we start talking about naughty bits, and all confused when you bring up the idea that maybe their idea of 'normal' might not be the only option. 

Today we discussed the subject of toilet choices appropriate for transgender persons. Because of a newspaper article quoting a guy who thinks the idea of letting transgender people use the bathroom of the gender they feel themselves to be is wrong. See here.

This article was specific to schools - and as a parent I can understand why these things are worrying to parents. The idea that we might screw up our kids is a constant dread. This particular subject seems very straightforward to me - and I'm 100% positive my daughter would agree entirely. A trans-girl is a girl and if there is a gender specific bathroom she should be able to use the GIRLS bathroom. The same applies for a trans-boy. They are a BOY. Gender is in the brain, and I count myself fortunate that the gender in my brain matches the genitalia I have been provided with. It is not so simple for everyone, and why the hell does everyone have to get so bloody uptight about it? I'm really at a loss to untangle the reasoning behind the concern. When you go to the bathroom do you also worry that there might be someone gay in there with you? If you do, you probably need to get over yourself a bit. Is there some kind of weird distortion in your head (and trust me, it's in YOUR head) that tells you that people who are outside your limited version of 'normal' are somehow creepy by default? Boys, is it about someone who might have a vagina potentially seeing your penis? Because besides the urinal I'm not really sure where what you have in your pants is actually relevant to the bathroom experience. I'm not there for the contents of YOUR undies.

In the bathroom I am generally not there to look at peoples bits. And if I am I probably have more to worry about than who's bits I'm looking at, also the fact that I'm looking is MY problem not the person I'm looking at. If you're worried that someone is looking at you in the bathroom then report them - it still isn't their gender that is the issue. 

A lot of men's bathrooms have urinals - I can see where this is causing an issue for some people, disconnecting yourself from the idea that the trans-boy maybe has a vagina and is somehow going to be obsessing over your penis while you're having a pee could certainly be a problem, FOR YOU. Try coming to grips with the idea that he's a boy and probably isn't that fascinated by your penis - unless he's also gay, but again it's not his GENDER that's the issue there, and any number of other men in the bathroom could also be gay AND have a penis. I suggest you just stop thinking about it, it'll make you blind.

I like the idea of Unisex bathrooms. I don't see the need for separating the genders as much as we do. I think we would go a long way further towards genuine equality in this and so many other things if we just stopped separating so much stuff out. What if we just stopped having a mens bathroom and a womens bathroom, we just have one big bathroom. Scrap the urinals, all cubicles. Sanitary disposal in each and every one. A reasonable number of wheelchair capable stalls. And baby change tables. Tampon/pad dispensers right out there in the open where people can learn to deal with the idea that menstruation is just a bodily function. A few people argued that kids might be 'confused' by the idea of a unisex bathroom. How? No seriously, in what way is this confusing? Do they use gender specific bathrooms at home? Probably not. Kids know what toilets are for better than adults do. It's adults that tend to do things in them that aren't actually toilet specific. My experience of children is that they are far more open to peoples differences than adults are - kids develop their hang-ups as a result of growing up. Growing up without them seems like a much better plan to me.

One of the reasons I'm so passionate about education is that I believe that most of the worlds ills can be solved by making a better job of raising the next generations. If we raise our children to respect each others differences, to have tolerance for others opinions, to be willing to listen and discuss not just stick their fingers in their ears and expect their way all the time then maybe we can all make some better decisions. So I think Unisex bathrooms is a good plan.

If it's all happening in a cubicle what difference does it make who's in there? 

I can see where changing rooms are more of a problem. I don't think they should be, but that's a whole other discussion. They are a problem and they will be a much trickier one to solve. But transgender is not the ONLY issue with changing rooms - many people are uncomfortable with changing in front of other people anyway. I've seen some pretty spectacular meltdowns in changing rooms because someone was uncomfortable about stripping in front of others and some staff member was utterly insensitive. So shouldn't we ALREADY have some private cubicles? Because mental health and wellbeing is important. If there's IS an option for people who are uncomfortable with changing in front of others, then just extend that to people who would otherwise have to change in a room that either isn't appropriate for them OR makes others uncomfortable by their presence. I want the universe to grow up, but I'm realistic about this happening overly quickly.

So here's what I think the answer is. Not what I expect the answer to be, but what I, personally, think the best solution is. Unisex toilet facilities, utilising ALL stalls (no urinals) with full length doors (those fucking short doors in school toilets are unbelievably demeaning - try sending an adult to one of those and see how they react) since adults seem to want real privacy in the bathroom why aren't kids granted this? And yes I mean it about having sanitary item dispensers in all bathrooms. This one came up for me on a discussion of the news article where someone suggested that women needed more privacy in bathrooms, because periods. Seriously. Because periods. I buy tampons and pads over the counter at the supermarket from both complete strangers and people I know quite well from my neighbourhood. I bleed once a month like most women do. Sometimes I need to change a tampon or pad in a public bathroom, and I have never felt in the least self conscious about the idea and since it's all in a cubicle - who bloody cares?? Yes I know that some people are more self conscious about it, and that girls are sometimes a bit embarrassed when Aunt Flow first comes a'calling but again I'm pretty sure this is a product of social conditioning. It doesn't have to be awkward, and I actually think young ladies are getting less and less concerned about such things - I think teens in general are getting far more upfront and unconcerned by all sorts of issues, which I think is bloody fantastic. Do guys get embarrassed about shaving? Then piss off, I'm not getting embarrassed about bleeding. 

Maybe we should ask teens what they think about all this. Because they're actually closer to the issue than us elderly folk, and attitudes HAVE changed. From what I hear from both my daughter and her friends, and from my own transgender friends the majority are not terrifically worried about the issue, at least not enough to actually say or do anything horrid. At my daughters school what might be considered as the disabled toilets have been more sensibly tagged as 'unisex' and anyone can use them. Though from what I hear the trans girls use the girls bathroom and the trans boys use the boys bathroom and no one seems very worried about it. 

At the same time, leave the changing rooms as they are, have private cubicles for those situations that warrant it, that are completely separate from the gendered changing rooms (yes this matters - otherwise the shy or trans or whatever kids STILL have to go into a choice of room and are still stigmatised), and I'll keep hoping for a day when we don't need to segregate anymore. 

Peace. Out.

* Another post I made about transgender issues a bit over a year ago here

Which way to the Trans bathroom?

*DISCLAIMER - I'm not an expert on transgender politics. No offence is intended. You know, unless you're a douchebag.


Gender is in the brain. This is a hard concept for many to understand, as it goes against what most of us think we know about human gender. But more and more science is coming to understand that the important bit is in your head not your genitalia. For most of us, this is a moot point – I think I’m a girl, and you see a girl. I’m a girl. Easy. But what happens when the inner and outer don’t match? If you understand that your gender is inside your brain, then you should be able to see that given the vagaries of genetics sometimes someone will be born without a correctly matched set. Like sometimes people are born with the wrong number of toes, or two different coloured eyes. Things are not always the way we expect them to be, and transgender is no different – except that it’s invisible. And gets close to sex and sexuality, so it’s all icky and difficult. AND I DON’T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT!

So before you go judging someone for an existence that you don't understand, take a step back and think about how it might feel to be that kind of different. The kind of different that 'normal' people are at a loss to understand at all. THERE IS NO NORMAL. Trust me, no matter how normal you think you are, someone out there thinks you're a freak.

*wandering off course for an example* I have a friend, who is deeply Christian (in that unbelievably annoying holier than thou kind of way) she's nice enough most of the time. Then she says things like "I just wish everyone was normal like me". And I'm forced to explain reality to her. She is a narrow minded bigot. Who actually believes that believing in God makes it all ok. For her, being a Christian is a licence to commit whatever douchebaggery takes her fancy, as long as she thinks God agrees with her. And telling her that her idea of God makes me glad I'm an atheist just makes her sad for my immortal soul. As the number of topics I simply will not discuss with her grows I spend less time bothering to find space for her in my life.

But it's not about sex. And it's REALLY not about sexuality. It's about how we perceive ourselves and how others perceive us. I have it pretty easy. I know I'm a girl on the inside, most people see a girl on the outside. But growing up it wasn't always like that. I was kind of a tomboy, I liked my hair short, I played rugby and I didn't like to hang around with the other girls. I hated skirts. I lived in shorts and T-shirts. It wasn't about sexuality at all. It was about me being comfortable. It wasn't anything to do with gender either, except the piece of me that saw that boys got to have sensible hair cut and wear comfortable clothes and I didn't see any reason why I shouldn't too. I guess I have it lucky there too, I don't really give a damn what anyone else thinks about my decisions. I can thank my father for that. Among other things.

But when I got older, it got a hell of a lot more obvious I was a girl no matter what I wore and no matter how short my hair was.

It's been shorter.

So I have it easy. I know who I am, and so do you. But for many it isn't that easy. I want you to try a little thought exercise: Imagine that tomorrow morning you wake up and you're Chinese. (I apologise for this arbitrary choice, I am aiming for a group whose culture and race are far different from my own - should Chinese be an inappropriate choice for you, please choose another.)

But it's more complicated than that. On the outside you're Chinese, but on the inside you're the same as you were yesterday. And you don't really understand Chinese. Your brain knows what all the words are but they just don't make proper sense to you. Worse and worse, no matter what you try to do about it people just keep treating you like you're Chinese. Uncomfortable yet? Of course you are, because NO ONE likes being treated like something they are not. Even when it's a pretty innocuous seeming thing like being expected to want to play with dolls when you like rugby.

Everyone is different. Sometimes a person’s difference is harder to understand but that is not even in the same ball park as being wrong. That way madness lies.

When I meet intolerance in my life, I try to meet it with understanding. I try to get people to look at their prejudice from a different direction. Because everyone has something that makes them uncomfortable. And nobody wants to be uncomfortable. Sometimes understanding your douchebaggery only comes when you understand how it might be applied to YOU.

So try stopping and imagining your opinion being applied to you before you go sticking your size twelves in. You are not obliged to agree with a persons lifestyle, but try not to be a dick about it.

Peace. Out.