GENDER JOURNEYS: "I'm not negative, goddammit!!"
Recently I was having lunch with a good friend, another M2F whom I love and respect, when the topic of conversation rolled to this monthly column. I was startled to learn she felt I was being too negative, and not fairly presenting the broader transsexual experience in Ventura County.
Whoa. For a moment during our very pleasant lunch I didn't know how to respond. Now, several weeks later, I'm still surprised by her conclusion. I have always fancied myself an energetic, self-confident, largely optimistic (albeit realistic) l'il firecracker. To be perceived as a misanthropic curmudgeon is a highway exit I never intended to take.
So what's really going on? As it turns out, perhaps several things.
For the past three months this column has focused on my recent experiences of discrimination, primarily regarding employment - more accurately, un-employment - in our own backyard. I shared my struggle in the hope that our broader GLBT community would understand the relevance of this discrimination to their own lives, and to the lives of their G/L friends.
Perhaps I was assuming too much. Maybe you suspect it's just Kelli behaving like a clown during her interviews that has produced such miserable job-hunting results. So {house band strikes up a cheesy fanfare} that's right, ladies and germs, it's audience participation time!! {thunderous applause}
Here's how we play. If you're a guy: put on a dress. If you're a woman: well, it's harder for a woman because y'all can pretty much look any damn way you please already. Still, you can freak people out in a suit and tie, with your hair slicked back or in a nice man-cut, for your own nihilistic interview experience.
After you're appropriately transformed, go on a job interview at any company you choose in Ventura County. Or the whole state of California. Or the whole fucking world. And please write me if you get a job.
What, no luck? You mean it's not Kelli being loony at the interview, or under/overqualified, or simply, as my friend concluded, being too NEGATIVE?
"But wait," you may say. "I'm not supposed to be able to pass as a woman/man. I haven't had the hormones, or the surgery. And anyway, that's not relevant to my situation as a gay man/lesbian woman."
People, people, people. The whole point of the GLBT community is this: Inclusion For All. It's not just the GOOD ones who should be empowered to participate. Or as Christ put it: "Whatsoever you do to the least of these, you do unto me."
Another friend and I were chatting about a couple of mutual M2F acquaintances who - let's be honest - will never make the cut. They present as women about as well as Dennis Rodman. I mentioned some of the difficulties and discrimination they'd encountered over the past several years, and was a little surprised to hear my friend conclude, "Well, look at them. What do you expect?"
Here's a secret, the transgender pecking order: Post-ops put down pre-ops. Pre-ops put down pre-transitionals. And everybody rejects transvestites (hmm, "transvestite," now there's a friendly, non-clinical word).
But it's no different in the Gay and Lesbian communities. "Swishy" gays occupy an entirely different social space than those who present as all-male. And how come every gay guy claims to be a pitcher? Doesn't SOMEBODY have to catch?
Similarly, the "biker dyke" does not get invited to the same parties as, say, Anne Heche. Welcome to reality.
I think this reality sucks, and I refuse to accept it. I don't believe that impassioned denial makes me negative. If it does, I suppose I'll grudgingly don the mantle. In the meantime, I'll continue to fight against discrimination in Ventura County, even though many days I feel I'm fighting alone.
I'm not claiming Buddha-like martyrdom on behalf of our local GLBT community. But from what I've seen, outside of a couple of days a year there's not much "community" in the Ventura County GLBT community.
I was recently at a G/L dinner. The girls (myself included) pretty much all sat together in the corner, just like in junior high. When I served on a GLBT planning committee last year, my leadership was unceremoniously attacked by another high-profile figure in our community. Internecine wars are a bitch.
I'm not our community's de facto Joan of Arc. I'm combating the Evil Warlords for Kelli, for my own personal self-interest. And as it turns out, doing it for Kelli ultimately means I'm also doing it for you.
When any one of us wins a small battle in any corner of our particular universe, we all benefit. Likewise, when those "unacceptable" M2Fs (who have as much chance at a real job as a penguin) get rebuffed once again, we all suffer.
I didn't choose this life, and I didn't choose this battle. Until four years ago, I had never met a gay guy or a lesbian. Now all of a sudden, I'm some fucking activist. I mentioned this to a friend, who said that's how activists are made - by necessity.
You may recall, more than a year ago I filed a complaint against the Ventura County Sheriff's Department regarding a routine traffic stop at 2 a.m., when Office Adolf Finley interrogated me about my vagina/penis. I just received a letter from the Investigative Department informing me that my complaint was sustained. Translation: I was right, the incident really happened and it shouldn't have. I don't believe anybody, including the officer in question, learned a thing. Still, score one for our side, eh?
I've contacted an attorney, and have just filed a discrimination complaint against Sage Publications in Thousand Oaks. Normally, discrimination is a charge as elusive as quicksilver. But in this case, after I passed their extraordinarily rigorous employment exam, Sage refused to grant me an interview. Their fatal mistake. Then, adding insult to injury, some bureaucratic hack phoned me to respond to a letter I had written. She apologized for their oversight but again refused to consider me for a position. Mistake #2.
My M2F friend I mentioned in the opening believes things are getting better for the Ventura trannie community because she just came out at work. Hell, she's still in the honeymoon; to her, everything these days looks pink and rosy as a Disney short. But when we parted, I saw every eye in the room staring as she made her exit. I became momentarily uncomfortable because she busted me through association. She never noticed - rosy Disney short, remember? Ignorance is bliss.
This column is about honesty. I hope I'm not negative. Maybe I can't tell the whole Ventura County transsexual story ... who can? But I hope I'm telling my story, my truth, and that in so doing - like dropping water on the Himalayas - we may eventually wear down this mountain of prejudice and discrimination.
I refer you to Matthew 25:40, spoken by the greatest friend a queer ever had.
