Only a Crossdresser.

[Sally]

This article written by Riki Wilchins appeared in our current edition of our Gender Centre magazine. I'd be interested in any thoughts anyone has on it.
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Only A Crossdresser

by Riki Wilchins

I wish I could count the times I’ve heard the phrase “...only a crossdresser.” And not just from transsexuals, but also from crossdressing-identified people themselves. The reasoning seems to be that changing your very body, making a commitment to one sex or another, is somehow more sincere, more consequential, more (dare I say) radical than ... well, just dressing up. I freely admit to subscribing to this belief myself for a number of years. Until one morning ...I awoke, and with horror found myself trapped lll absolutely trapped, in a bias cut, pleated silk, backless Halston evening gown not of my own design.

No, wait a minute. That’s not right. Where was I? Oh, yeah, I think it’s arguably the case that crossdressing is the more radical identity, although I ought to state up front that I don’t belief in either the identity of “transsexual” or “crossdresser”. This is not to say that I don’t acknowledge and defend anyone’s right to identify as either, for I do. But I regard both as political accomplishments, invented to contain various kinds of disreputable genderqueers and transgressors, rather than names which recognise any naturally-occurring identity.

In short, for me, just categories are inevitably not about truth, but about power: who has it and who doesn’t; who gets to decide what’s “normal” and what’s “perversion”; whose ox gets gored and whose frock gets stored.

Now it’s one thing to change one’s body, as I have, to travel from one sex to another within the socially anointed binary. But in doing so, especially with the doctor’s blessing (“You know, inside, your daughter Riki is really a woman, Ms Wilchins”), I fear I struck a Faustian bargain, I legitimated myself, but I accomplished this feat through an axial proposition that looks something like this - “I am really a woman inside / I am willing to change my body to be female / I am willing to commit my whole life to this / I don’t do this because it is erotic but because it’s my identity / therefore I should be a socially legitimate and respectable subject”.

Unfortunately in the zero-sum game of gender politics, this logic succeeds to the extent that it delegitimises its converse. “You are not a woman ‘inside’ / you are not willing to change your body, just your clothes / you are not even willing to commit your life to it / you are aroused by it (you pervert, you!) / you are such a social dipstick” Granted this equation raises me up, but at a price paid by those who cannot make similar claims. They, of course, go down. And those are ... you guessed it: your friendly, neighbourhood crossdressers.

So it seems to me that crossdressing is some kind of ultimate act of gender politics. It does not have a single thing going for it: not the doctors, not the binary, not a full-time commitment, not even a pledge that they’re not doing it because it turns them on. Because of this, crossdressing -identified men confront conventional requirements for heterosexual male masculinity head-on. They stand on its head all that we’re supposed to know about big, hairy guys being, well, guy-like. This brings on endless trouble with their jobs, wives, children, courts, military and so on. Frankly, despite all the times I heard someone say “I only do this to relax,” it never sounded like a very relaxing thing to me at all. Every one of them put their life on the line when they walk out the door, perhaps down the wrong street, past the wrong patrol car, or into the wrong bar on the wrong night.

I sometimes amuse myself with the differing social legitimation of transsexuality and crossdressing at work when people ask me, “So when did you have your surgery?” I respond, “Surgery, shmurgery. Hey, I just love wearing ladies’ clothes.” Gawd, you should see their faces fall ... at about three feet per second. All that compassionate understanding evaporates. Suddenly, instead of visions of a “woman trapped in man’s body” they’re seeing a weirdo pervert in lacy panties.

Now that I mention it, I remember years ago getting busted by the cops for using the women’s changing room in a clothing store. They were distinctly unfriendly, looking me up and down like I was something they’d discovered after six months in the back of the freezer. That is, until I showed them my doctor’s “carry letter” explaining that I was just a patient with a genuine diagnosis of “gender identity disorder”. Then, of course, they both became amused, condescending, and at last middling friendly. They let me off with a lot of snickered warnings.

Now, granted I’m trying to focus on the politics of things here, because you can’t focus on what the crossdressing community is actually saying about itself publicly. Because the unfortunate fact is, most of the rhetoric coming out of the crossdressing community is banal to the point of tears. It’s often along the lines of, “I dress but my wife won’t accept me”, “I dress, and my wife does accept me”, “I dress, and I’m okay”, “I dress, does that mean I’m queer?”, I dress, does that make my wife a lesbian?”, and my personal favourite, “I dress and it gives me an erection but I’m still a regular guy relaxing, here, have a Bud six-pack, let’s watch the Packers and kick some butts after the game”. I mean, really!

A lot of this is because crossdressing is the more socially-despised identity. And the more despised and oppressed a group, the more assimilationist and conservative their rhetoric and politics. For when groups are radically disempowered they have no choice but to take an assimilationist conservative stance.

In other words, the experience of being a crossdresser is still sufficiently dislocating, both socially and psychologically, that much of the community is still completely engaged in merely coping, rather than analysing, organising and confronting the systematic oppression which maintains and even mandates such dislocations.

But as they find their voice, the stridency, the demands, the political awareness and the organisation to contest that oppression will emerge. It’s going to happen, just give it time. Once crossdressers ever really come out, and begin to enunciate the politics of the direct, head-on challenge their very existence poses to gender regimes, I think we will have a truly revolutionary force on our hands, a potent force. The only question is, how long will they think of themselves, and allow so many of us to think of them, as “...only crossdressers?”.

[Loretta Ann]

Hi Sally,

I had a hard time reading this, and if it had not come from you I would not have read it all the way through. The author seems to spend far to much time concerned about what other people are doing and thinking.

I am just a cross-dresser, and am content to be one. In fact I am some what relieved to be one, because there are issues others need to go through that I would rather not have to go through. I believe it is more difficult for people like her to live with who she is than it is for me. And I certainly would not want to make the comments about others that she talks about.

[Marda]

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[Estefania]

Hi Sally. Nice to cross paths with you again.

I have taken lots of fire in the past for expressing that I'm "Only a CD". I couldn't care less. I'm the only one who can understand what I feel, where I'm coming from, etc. And indeed, I'm only a CD.

I will have to say that reason to use the phrase comes in big part to differenciate myself from those who are so eager to assume the "I'm transgendered", just because they seem to have the idea that being a TG is better, or more cool, or more important than being "only a CD". They put on some panties, and voila! They become a woman, in their mind. Nothing wrong in that, if that's how they feel... but that's not me.

I am "Only a CD", because for me, there is not a "becoming a woman" or "being a woman". True, I would be a liar if I didn't tell you that during my soul searching earlier in life, I was lead to believe that maybe I was indeed a TS. And I was allowing myself to believe that. But I was lucky I was able to wakeup and realize that what others might think wasn't my problem. What I think about myself is far more important than what 1000 others may think.

And I'm happy being "Only a CD".

-------------------------------------------------------------

Marda, hi.

I'm a bit puzzled about your phrase... "all the corruption and destruction inherent in the "world of men". "

I guess I just don't understand the men bashing (or women bashing) which usually go around in cd/tg/ts chat rooms or forums. It is not the "world of men" out there.. It is the world of humanity. Men and women share their deal of corruption and destruction. Certainly, cd/tg/ts are not all "loving and caring" human beings. Being a jerk or worse is not lmited by gender. Same as being loving, or being hateful.

Gaby

[CJ]

Hi all,

Sally,

Interesting article. Thanks for sharing it. The responses so far have been more psychologically than politically oriented (which I guess validates one of the author's contentions, viz. that we haven't found our [political] voice yet).

I'm of two minds about this (that's completely aside from being two-souled, of course! ). On the one hand, I do believe that no political will can be mustered until the individuals who form such a social force for change can first learn to be okay with who they are. This is where a so-called "delegitimization" remains such solely in the eye of the beholder. On the other hand, I do care what people think. Mere civility (yes, even in the face of the most horrid discrimination) goes a long way to open up doors to dialogue. You don't get people to see a crooked picture by saying, "To hell with you! You can stuff it if you don't like it!" No, that will never work. It never has. There's a Hindu concept called ahimsa. Gandhi, for example, lived his life by it. American transcendentalists, such as Thoreau and Emerson and Whitman, lived by it also. We know it as "non-violence." It's much more than just a pledge to do no harm in your personal life; it's also a way of being in the world, in society, where you openly welcome dissent and variety as a tool for growth. And for change. Any political movement, radical or not, tepid or revolutionary, rests on the assumption that we acknowledge we have a need to better govern ourselves, to see realized, in society, all those ideals we espouse on paper. How can we succeed in even wanting to do that, without falling into endless cycles of conflict and confrontation? One way is to remain open and receptive, to actually listen and hear what our neighbour has to say, to not be affronted every time we're faced with a dissenting opinion. Personally, I find this is only possible when the other person listens, as well as speaks, to you. If, truly, we want political change, honest political change, we must change ourselves first.

The author speaks of the difficulties crossdressers have because what they do challenges "gender regimes," whereas transsexuals, by their adoption of female gender roles, don't. I think the only real way we can effect the kind of change we seek is not by saying, "This is who I am; deal with it!" but by saying, "This is who I am; I've dealt with it... and I've discovered that I'm as human as you are. Please let me know how you're dealing with your own humanity... maybe we can compare notes, and both come out the stronger for it." In order for this to work, though, we mustn't be hidden. We have to reveal ourselves (oh, I don't mean necessarily going out in the streets all dolled up, no... in subtle ways, gently, to those you know). Yes, it's risky, and we stand to lose much (even, here, on the forum, some have already lost much, I know) but the desire to live in a better world has to lead to action, otherwise it's an empty and pointless want. By "action" I mean: being authentic with those around you, not just volunteering at a soup kitchen on Thanksgiving. This authenticity inevitably becomes visibility. Visibility leads to social awareness. Social awareness is the cornerstone of political change.

No, I'm not out to change the world. In fact, I sort of like the world the way it is, believe it or not. I've managed to "accept" it long before I ever succeeded in accepting myself. And, then, I finally understood that the line we learn to draw between the world and ourselves is artificial, a product of our own powerful sense of ourselves as being something distinct, alien, other, separate from the world. I'm not, and never was. This is what John Donne was talking about when he said that "No man is an island," spiritual, not social isolation. What does this mean, then, in reality? Only this: we each do our part to make this a better world (this is something everyone seems to want) according to our disposition, temperament, personality, abilities, and means. To expect anything else is to walk down a dark road, indeed.

No, I'm not out to change the world. After all, I'm only a crossdresser.

Thanks for the post, Sally.

Love,
CJ

[NicoleL]

I think the author of this article is a very (overly?) sensitive soul.

And.....

I guess I just don't understand the men bashing (or women bashing) which usually go around in cd/tg/ts chat rooms or forums. It is not the "world of men" out there.. It is the world of humanity. Men and women share their deal of corruption and destruction. Certainly, cd/tg/ts are not all "loving and caring" human beings. Being a jerk or worse is not lmited by gender. Same as being loving, or being hateful.

Gaby

----------- Hear! Hear! ---------

[Ahzz]

To change the world, youi must first accept the reality that it is based upon. The author has accepted that reality. We ARE a part of that world, and from everything I have seen in this forum, the majority of us ARE still fighting to figure out ourselves. So it is not surprising to be told that we aren't yet ready to fight the sociopolitical battles that still lay ahead.

To make others understand us, we must first understand ourselves. This I believe to be the core of the author's statements. The author may have generalized liberally, but it is still a valid generalization for most.

One thing to remember, I think the author used overly dramatic examples to catch our attention, not to make us look/feel bad. After all, WE are the ones that matter to ourselves. What others think of us doesn't really enter into the equation of a happy life (it does somewhat, but not nearly as much as most CDs seem to think or indicate IMHO). Don't get too hot about them.

[Kathy]

So it seems to me that crossdressing is some kind of ultimate act of gender politics. It does not have a single thing going for it: not the doctors, not the binary, not a full-time commitment, not even a pledge that they’re not doing it because it turns them on. Because of this, crossdressing -identified men confront conventional requirements for heterosexual male masculinity head-on. They stand on its head all that we’re supposed to know about big, hairy guys being, well, guy-like. This brings on endless trouble with their jobs, wives, children, courts, military and so on. Frankly, despite all the times I heard someone say “I only do this to relax,” it never sounded like a very relaxing thing to me at all. Every one of them put their life on the line when they walk out the door, perhaps down the wrong street, past the wrong patrol car, or into the wrong bar on the wrong night.

This paragraph, to me, clearly describes the authors admiration for crossdressers in the face of the political mountain that is so stacked against us.

I have to agree that, as long as we remain hidden from view, we will never find our voice to challenge that mountain.

[Marda]

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[Rebecca]

Hi Marda,



Glad your'e with us Marda

Love
Rebecca xxx

[Virginia]

Well, I "slept on it" and I am sure I can not be as articulate as my sisters, who posted before me, but when we begin to quote, Emerson, Whitman, Thoreau, Jung, Ghandi, Jean Paul Sartre, Freud, Vernon Rosario, David Bakan, Dr. Lin Fraser, Gert Haekma it only leads me to further believe that there is more to crossdressing than simply putting on a dress!! Some of us however will never proceed, psychologically past that "phase" AND there ain't nuttin wrong with that!!!!, so don't take offense.
We as crossdresser are unique, yes, in society, we know that, but we are even unique within the (whatever the acceptable, politicallly correct term is) "transgendered" community??!! As I have stated before our issue is difficult to support! Most of us being (and it has been proven) are of above average intelligence, hetrosexual, parents and grandparents, quite, unassuming, tax paying, contributors to our community.AND WE LIKE DRESSING IN WOMEN'S CLOTHING! What the hell is that all about???Try standing up in front of your town counsel or Mayor and board of aldermen or what ever in small town America and try to convience them of your position! Probably some of them are sitting there in feminine under things, but stand up and support a citizen who brings up the issue? FORGET THAT!!! Hell, our own TG community has trouble supporting us! Why, because we, in general do not support them and their causes! We individually can not afford to, from a job, community, family recognition stand point!
The up side is to me and this again is only Deborah's opinion, we are the leading edge of another stage in human evolution. It make take years, hundereds of years, but we as a race are constantly evolving and just now "we" are beginning to understand this little quirk in our personalities.
Whatt do we know about crossdressing? If you have it, you got it, it ain't gonna go away, you can supress/repress it but its part of you 'till you die.
There are various stages that some of us go through, from just thinking about wearing girl's clothing to full battle dress and facing society with either an in your face attitude or "no really I am a woman, why do you ask?" To what Carl Jung feels is the ultimate stage, that being the ability to control our anima, yet let it become a part of our male personna to create a higher level of individual by merging male and female psychological components. Some have said that this does not make us better than our fellow man, that we have this gift, but it definitely makes us different and in our society, different ain't good - right now! You have to ask yourself, as a pioneer and they ar the ones that take the arrows, "are you willing to take the arrows??"
The post concerning the "letter writng position of crossdressing." Maybe I should, but I did not, hopefully someone took down all that, it was good stuff, a place to start our "political movement?" over my head, but a start. We can no longer give our "quirk" lip service on this forum. We have to take some action. The SCC in Atlanta - good start?! or just an excuse to dress inpublic among "our own kind?" Lots of questions and I know a lot of my sisters here have far better answers than (sorry CJ/Beauty). this dumb blonde. You guys ain't dumb, its the blonde part I just had to state.
Love you all.
Deborah

[Aislin]

WOW!!

I have been away too long, bu that will be covered soon in non-CD.

Marda - By suggesting WOM do we not pigeon hole our selves, suggesting that we live in a different world? It seems to me that all classifications should come tumbling down. That in fact I cannot be labled.

CDKathy - I have to agree that, as long as we remain hidden from view, we will never find our voice to challenge that mountain.

At what expense? Will it take a death in the family for all of us to be recognized as human?

It may be that we need to get off of our collective asses, and bring the subject up. Write letters, post e-mails, start a political action committee, be who you are to those you love.

Could it be that the time has come to start a revolution? This revolution must involve our sisters in arms. We must recognize that we are a part of every world not fitting in any kind of calssification. I will not fit into your description of what I should be because I hold many titles. I am trying to grasp the feminist side of life while continuing to deal with the masculine. I am a biker who bakes cookies and does the house work in a frock, a computer programmer who likes long walks and sunsets in a dress. I am human with all the foibles of humanity exposed for you to see.

I am not easily catagorized, being many catagories at once. I am evolution of the mind, able to multitask crucial issues while enjoying life. I am Woman, I am Man. I experience both sides of the gender equation crossing freely from side to side, gaining experience in both and relating those experiences for the good of all humanity.

I AM A CROSSDRESSER

I demand a right to be heard. My opinions to be listened to , not derided or rejected based on social norms. I accept the freedoms granted to all people and understand my responsibilty to defend these freedoms.

I accept that not all peoples will understand what I say. I understand that ignorance, and social responsibilty go hand-in-hand. I understand that such a public outcry may result in martyrdom, or obscure burial in a forgotten grave. I am comfortable giving my life to help the human race discover it's true potential.

I am not just a crossdresser. I am more human by my discoveries, sharing a common thread with all of humanity. I walk the grey area between Masculinity and Feminity. I am both and yet neither. I represent an evolutionary step in the family of man, and like all evolutionary steps an unready society is trying to disavow me.

I will not be stopped.

I AM A CROSSDRESSER

(Please feel Free to Share tis with as many people as possible.)

[Marda]

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[Rebecca]

Hi everyone,

Life isn't black and white, it's the shades inbetween that give it it's colour.

My dad once told me ( after much arguing and debate on something ) that the reason I have so many problems is that most men see the world in black and white. They pick a side and stay with it. He said I see all the shades inbetween and that's why I run into problems

Love to all
Rebecca xxx

[Marda]

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