I am thinking about King Crimson’s record Three of A Perfect Pair, and I can’t say there’s a better phrase to describe a relationship with someone like me (note “Perfect” is pending review). I use to fancy the title to Robert Bly’s book of poems “Loving A Man In Two Worlds.” After Bly started running around naked, rolling in dirt, hugging trees, and crying with other men, I thought that wouldn’t reflect well on the guys I was dating.
Whether you are from old school film culture or the Photoshop generation, you will understand the concept of masking, where a cut out shape on a board placed over the picture reveals parts of an image you want visible, and the rest is “masked” beneath. Girls from my camp are always “masking” some part or another of ourselves throughout the day. The question is, which parts should we mask? Are we even masking the right parts? Since I am out to all my straight and gay friends, this topic is a favorite conversation piece.
I continue to be amazed by what many transgirls mask and what they chose to reveal. It’s almost as if they think makeup, gossip, tampons, girltalk, sluttiness, superficial niceness, and a constant preoccupation with oneself is the sum total of what it means to be a girl. Of course, I can’t then help but think: “Is this what they think of women?” (I’m sure that charge is being leveled against me all the time) I have actually seen online photo albums where t*girls snap photos of their new box of feminine napkins and tampons, almost fetishizing them as badges of honor or certificates of authenticity. When Mr. (Janet) Garrison loudly extolled the virtues of coming around to that time of the month again in South Park, it’s a well-researched piece of satire.
It’s gender vultures picking up discarded femininity.
I think my kind of girls are in an advantageous position to be extra special girls. Let’s say we have front row seats as to what is more likely to go on inside the heads of men: we know what tics them off; what they don’t want to talk about; what they don’t think about, and what they like. Unfortunately, in the push to acquire the authentic female experience (something I don’t believe is entirely possible, regardless of how militantly the notion of some uterus-less, womb-less girl trapped inside the body of a man is forced upon me), so many tgirls mask the parts of them that make them most special to their admirers, and amplify the qualities that made men leave their women and run to us in the first place.
If you have ever seen the unsavory look of confirmed self-worth in genetic women’s faces when men brawl over them, you’ll know that there are some things about women we shouldn’t blindly ape. And yet I can’t count the number of trans women I have come across who believe the greatest act of honor her man friend can show her is to beat the living hell out of another man who looks at her the wrong way. I always thought a lady walks away from uncouth people with her dignity intact.
Cattiness and manipulative behavior is another trait that doesn’t seem to win the fairer sex its stately appellation. Certainly many women live free of these personality traits, which then makes me wonder: just who are trans women looking to as their role models? It’s like a mix of Joan Collins and all the savages that are better known as Jerry Springer’s audience. I’m just puzzled why t*girls would mask the good typical qualities of their male self (lack of pettiness, easy-going personality, protectiveness) and exotify all the undesirable parts of what makes women hate other women (you know what I’m talking about…just nod and I’ll take the fall for saying what everybody knows but nobody wants to hear).
