Transvestism as a choice
Email This ArticleI have written elsewhere on this website about my decision not to go back to graduate school for (trans)gender studies. I’m just not that sure that what I do, on an individual level, can and should bow prostrate to political proclivities or years of devoted intellectual examination in order to be validated. While it is true that the trans* group identity demands and deserves a good fight for equal access, fair treatment, and due consideration from the public, as well as other formerly fringed lifestyle groups, I’ve always felt that my personal reasons for doing what I do need not have the lattice of political implications superimposed over it. In other words, what I chose to do and how I chose to do it should not be tempered by how such personal decisions need to answer first, to the representation of the trans community.
One of the mistakes that is sometimes made within transgender groups reminds me of debates during the pro-choice movement of the 90s. The plaintiff complains that the defendent favors pressing the red button, while defense argues that they are in favor of having the option, not the actual button-pushing. Fighting for freedom of speech is not equal to wanting to say mean hurtful things to innocent parties. A person who has lived a varied life, but also happens to be transgender, is not the same as a person who designs her life according to regulations and accepted terms of what it means to be “transgendered.” I have sometimes witness individuals within the transgender group mistakenly process their version of the gang mentality in defining transgender identity as an us-against-them concept. Among these examples are stances such as “if you don’t take hormones, you are not legit.” “If you are not aiming for SRS, don’t call yourself transgender.” It’s a syllogistic mistake. Instead of the proverbial umbrella the term transgender aspires to be, where different people from all ages, political persuasions, races, walks of life, and ideologies of their own choice, seek the same things: equal access, fair treatment, and due consideration from the public, it becomes used as a term to create an exclusive group membership according to one’s individual preference- or, feeling special about onself. The syllogistic mistake is this: It’s not about YOU. The term was designed as an umbrella because it needed a group identity to battle the prejudices trans folk suffer. The public remains uneducated about the lifestyle. When problems arise from this ignorance, they certainly won’t be mitigated by the difference between an estrogen doseage and a silicone insert. So to create a criteria and then turn it around to single out other people within the group strikes me as a grave form of emulating a limited mindset. It’s what gives assimilation its brass: To be able to do unto others what has previously been done to you.
When we treat transgender identity solely as a political idealogy, we then have to determine which political ideology takes precedence. We have to take sides unnecessarily. My belief is that while a transgender identity can fight for equal representation and equal treatment, it should never be utilized as a political platform in and of itself. Historically though, it seems as if it may go that way. In our simulacra-driven society, ideologies piggyback lifestyle options in the same way couples meet through church groups and job promotions golfing. Transgender identity suffers an additional setback in that it could appear to the public as a decision. In this sense, it will fight the same battles that gays and lesbians have fought regarding biological determinism versus social conditioning. If a case for the former can be proven, then it would be easier to fight for equal rights, since that would mean that the transgender state, like one’s skin color, is beyond one’s control. Of course, that’s just one explanation in the vast program of transgendered identities.
For me, it’s possibly a third dimension, which probably leans more towards a conscious choice. It’s about doing, not writing about doing. I have always viewed transvestism as an action, a thing one does. While many will invariably argue that aligning one’s physical gender with his/her mental gender state is an ultimate goal, I feel that the female version of me thinks the same way as the male version of me. No amount of hormones or silicone is going to magically transform my personality overnight.
I guess I do see it as an expression, an aesthetic preference evolved through psychological and physiological circumstances. It’s different from a pure choice in that the events of my life that led to this point of my existence were wholly beyond my control. I had no decision in how people, as individuals, in my life chose to do what they did, subsequently affecting what I regarded as beautiful, arousing, and gratifying. Once I cease to be involved in the act of transvestism, I believe I can no longer call myself a transvestite or a transgender. One is bound to ask: Can a person cease to be a heterosexual if he is not dating someone from the opposite sex? Here, another aspect of transvestism comes into focus. It does not require an other, separate entity to make the union a reality. The transvestite is his other. I’m sure in some instances, this may apply to some transgendered individuals as well.
With this in mind, is it then possible to continue indefinitely through one’s lifetime as a transvestite? Of course it is. For me however, my idea of what I think is pleasing takes precedence over my idea of transvestism. I’m not sure I can write effectively about or intellectually examine something that I no longer do, after I have stopped doing it. I think it would be hellish and particularly trying to bystanders, like garrish talking head pundits carrying on about the miracle of Paris Hilton, or Kirstie Alley writing an essay about Kentucky Fried Chicken. Certainly I’d emphathize (and continue to do so) with those who do not have the luxury to make a decision between two choices. I have no one to answer to but myself, and when it no longer looks good to my quirky eye, I think I’ll unhitch and catch the next ride into town.