From: glenn@access.digex.com (D. Glenn Arthur Jr.)
Newsgroups: alt.transgendered
Subject: Re: WHY?
Date: 16 Dec 1992 18:14:31 GMT
Organization: The Space-Time Fabrication Institute, Rockville, MD.
NNTP-Posting-Host: access.digex.com
Summary: It's not really something I can explain, but I'll try.
Keywords: Non-flame, might belong in a FAQ

Minor warning -- I get rather religious in this article.  It is
not my intent to offend those of other faiths.  When I argue here
from a religious perspective, please take my comments to be _in_the_
_context_of_my_faith_.  Thanks.


In article <1992Dec12.201502.940@jupiter.sun.csd.unb.ca> 
wdickeson@mta.ca SHOUTS:

> I HATE TO HAVE TO ASK YOU THIS BUT WHY IN GOD'S NAME WOULD
>ANYONE CHOOSE TO BE A CROSS-DRESSER?  

Well, I' wouldn't say I _chose_ to be a transvestite, actually.
Now, it's true that I do _choose_ _to_ crossdress, but I didn't
_choose_ to have the urge to do so; I didn't _choose_ to feel
"false" in men's clothes.

Oh, I can tell you all sorts of nifty things about crossdressing,
lots of aspects that ought to be appealing (the feel of silk
against my skin, the feel of a skirt against my legs, the
attention it gets me from women), but none of those are enough 
to attract most men to it -- those are things I've noticed
_because_ I'm a transvestite.  They don't really explain it.

So the urges that make me a transvestite, the feelings inside 
that make me what I am, I did not choose.  

So why do I choose to act on those urges?  Well, it makes me
happier for one thing.  And it makes me _healthier_.  You see,
transvestites who try to deny what they are manage to make
themselves quite miserable for the most part.  Transvestites are 
considered a high risk for alchohol abuse and other substance abuse,
depression, and suicide.  Most of that seems to be linked to 
self-denial and to a lack of acceptance by society.  After all,
if you were ashamed to be what you are and were constantly told
by society that you're sick and perverted, wouldn't it get to
you?  I live my life without shame and without living a lie, and 
I'm sure I'm healthier for it.  Ahh, but I digress.


As to why I _am_ a transvestite, why I have these feelings, 
I don't really know.  I can describe the feelings but not
explain them.  Being who I am feels so natural to me that
sometimes I don't quite understand why other men _aren't_ like
me.  I mean, gee, doesn't _everyone_ want to feel pretty?
Doesn't _everyone_ think skirts are more comfortable than
pants?  Don't _all_ het men like women so much that they
want to be like them?  Obviously not, but these feelings are
so normal for me that they're like basic assumptions about
my universe, and therefore hard for me to explain to anyone who
doesn't feel that way.  Many of the transvestites reading this 
will be nodding their heads and saying, "Uh huh, that's it,"
and many of the non-TVs will be staring at the screen saying,
"What's he talking about?  Of course most people don't feel
like that!"

As to what it's like to be a transvestite, I can really only 
describe it for myself.  While there will be others who say
they're just like me, there will also be others for whom it's
all quite different.  We're not all alike, even in this regard.


>NOT ONLY IS IT IMMORAL,
>UN-NATURAL,AND SINFULL, 

Is it?  Can you explain why, or how you know this, or is it
one of those things that's obvious to you and should therefore
be obvious to everyone else, just as "Everyone wants to feel
pretty" is obvious to me?

Let's start with "immoral".  Why is it immoral?  Am I hurting 
anyone by crossdressing?  What am I doing that's _wrong_ in 
a moral sense?

And "unnatural"?  That depends on how you use that word.  Am
I unnatural becase my _gender_ doesn't match my _sex_ the way it's
"supposed to"?  Perhaps.  Or am I "natural" because I live as I am
(a transvestite) and don't try to pretend to be something I'm not
(a non-transvestite)?  I'm certainly _unusual_, but people like 
me have existed for centuries.  In some cultures, we are 
considered holy.  Also, even if I am unnatural, is that nessecarily 
a bad thing?

Now we get to "sinfull".  "Sin" implies a religious basis.  Is
it safe to assume that you're speaking from a Judeo-Christian
point of view here?  First, let me point out that no matter what 
your religion, there are people who don't believe it, and 
calling them sinfull is moot in their eyes.  But having dispensed
with that aside, let's take a look at crossdressing within the
Judeo-Christian context.  Can you tell me how you know crossdressing
is sinfull?  If you can quote me the verse, you can read the next
paragraph.  Otherwise, you're just talking through your hat and
threw in "sinfull" as a content-free emotional charge.

Okay, there is a verse which says that men should not wear women's
clothes AND VICE VERSA.  I know women who refuse to wear pants
based on that verse.  Of course, they also keep kosher, observe 
the Sabbath _strictly_, and follow a lot of other laws set down
in Leviticus which are ignored by most Christians.  (Yeah, when
I said "Judeo-Christian" I wasn't just using currently fashionable
phrasing.)  So tell me, do you feel that women who wear pants, 
whether or not they are transvestites (and I think we've established 
that F->M TV's do exist) are sinfull?  Do you wear clothing made
of mixed fibers?  Do you eat cheeseburgers?  Do you shave, or trim your
beard?  (I don't shave.  I'm a vegetarian, so if I'm not keeping kosher 
I'm pretty close.  I'm guilty of wearing mixed fibers though.)  

If you are an Orthodox or Hassidic Jew, perhaps you might have a basis 
for calling my crossdressing sinfull and I'll respect that your opinion 
on that follows from your faith even while I disagree with it.  Otherwise, 
I suggest that if you feel crossdressing is sinfull you carefully 
reconsider a lot of things you do that you take for granted and start 
living your life in accordance with your beliefs instead of being a 
hypocrite.  You _can_ do it, after all.  My Orthodox friends do.

(Do I hear muttering from the back row about "casting the first stone"?)

But let's go beyond that little rant and look at crossdressing 
in the context of that verse (found it yet?)  I'm not quite
going to justify crossdressing in light of that verse, but I 
am going to give you a few things to think about.  What are
"women's clothes"?  Is the difference skirts?  How about togas?
Kilts?  Long tunics?  Functionally those are skirts and dresses, but 
each is (or was in its historical context) quite clearly _men's_
clothing.  Are pants unisex, or are they menswear?  Nowadays
most westerners would, as a first reaction at least, say that pants 
are suitable for either sex.  But you don't have to go back very
far to find a time when a woman wearing pants was considered
downright _scandalous_!  (History and costume buffs help me out
here, it was this century, right?  And am I correctly remembering 
that high schools in the 50's generally banned pants on girls?)
On the other hand, I've seen some eastern women's traditional 
garb which looks like pants to me.  So what _is_ "men's" and 
"women's" clothing from God's point of view?

Well, we coould say that the commandment is culture-dependent,
I suppose, just as what a transvestite wears is.

But let's also look at it from another point of view; what is a "man"?
What makes me a "man"?  Is it my penis and testes?  My beard?  My
alleged Y chromosome?  (I'm pretty sure I have one, but I've never 
had the appropriate test -- and there _are_ people whose bodies 
don't seem to match their _genetic_ sex.)  Is a eunuch a man?  If
a M->F transsexual undergoes sex reassignment surgery and has
her penis cut off and a vagina contructed, is she no longer a man
in your eyes?  If she's no longer a man, was she ever really a man?
If she's still a man, what makes her still a man?  Is a man who
would choose to have his penis cut off really a man in your eyes?  
Just what _is_ this sex thing?  Or this _gender_ thing?  Do you really 
have a good handle on what the words mean to you?  Can you define them
in a way that is meaningfull and that I can't pick apart?

There's a point to that paragraph.  You see, it comes down to a
question of who counts as what so we can say who's allowed to 
wear what clothes.  It also comes down to a fundamental question
of what it means to be male or female.  Physically, I am quite
male.  Spiritually, I feel that I am both male _and_ female.
So am I simply a man?  Or is it less simple?


Finally, let me give you an approach to that verse that avoids
word games and hard definitions.  

God made me what I am.  To deny what I am would be to throw His
gifts in His face, to reject His plan for me.  And _that_ would 
be sinfull.  God made me a transvestite.  To deny that and try
to pretend that I am a normal man would be wrong, and I would 
pay a great price in my soul.  God made me man and woman both
and put me in a male body.  To deny half of that would mean
trying to kill half of my self.  And that would be sinfull.
I am in touch with my God, I feel His presence around me every
moment of every day.  My Faith requires that I examine each 
moral question carefully within myself rather than swallow
dogma undigested.  And my Faith leads me to believe that my
crossdressing is not wrong in the eyes of the Lord.  And that,
for me, takes precedence over legalistic details in a book 
which, though I consider it Holy, I do not consider infallible.

I am a born-again Christian, and I try to lead a Holy life.
I have looked long and hard at the question of sin, and I
live my life without shame because I lead my life according
to what I believe.  (A verse from II Timothy 2 comes to mind.)

>IT IS JUST PLAIN PERVERTED!!!!!!!!

I simply disagree.  My being into BDSM is perverted.  My crossdressing
is just how I am.  (And I'm not ashamed of my BDSM interest, either.
So there!)

>LET'S FACE THE FACTS - YOU ARE WHAT GOD CREATED YOU TO BE-
>EITHER A MAN OR A WOMAN! WHAT KIND OF BLASPHEMOUS SINNERS ARE
>YOU EXPECTING TO INTERFERE WITH GOD'S POWER. 

How do you know that He didn't create me to be both man and woman?
Are you not blaspheming, usurping His role, by deigning to proclaim
your opinion as His?

How am I interfering with God's power by living as I am, as a 
transvestite?

I can see how one might argue that a transsexual who chooses to
undergo sex reassignment surger (SRS) is usurping God's power and
and changing what God gave him or her.  But I hope you're consistent
enough to rail against liposuction, breast augmentation, face lifts,
surgery to correct birth defects (cosmetic and otherwise) and 
orthodontia as well.  Or can you tell me where the line is, what
the difference is between those and SRS?  Each does, after all,
attempt to change what God has given.

Perhaps it might help to think of transsexuals as people with
a birth defect, one which makes them appear to be of the opposite
sex.

>YOU SURE AS HELL CAN'T
>BE BOTH GENDERS THAT'S FOR SURE.

Well, it's hard to be both _sexes_ at once, but I _am_ both _genders_
at once, so I'd have to say you're simply wrong on that count.

>ATTEMPTING TO BE SOMETHING YOU'RE NOT (WHICH IS WHAT YOU'RE DOING)
>IMPLIES DIRECTLY THAT YOU ARE SOMEHOW DISAPPOINTED WITH WHAT
>GOD CREATED YOU TO BE.

Well, speaking only for myself, I'm _not_ all that disappointed with
what God created me to be.  Okay, so I wish I wasn't losing my hair,
I would love to have breasts, and I dearly wish I could bear a child.
Maybe I'm a little disappointed.  (Okay, maybe more than a little 
when it comes to the fact that I can't get pregnant -- that part 
really hurts -- but that's the part I know I can't do anything about.)

But I'm not disappointed with the fact that I'm _me_, and part of my 
being _me_ is being a M->F TV.  Before I accepted the fact that I am a 
TV and that God made me such, I kept wishing I could just be normal.  
But I couldn't.  That was not in God's plan for me.  Once I _accepted_ 
that, I became much happier.

Now, as a reward for my having accepted the way I am as a gift instead
of wishing it would go away, God has given me other gifts.  I have
become less shy, more confident.  I have a very special relationship
with many of the women in my life (and I'm not talking about lovers --
that's yet another gift).  I've been given the opportunity to help
others.  All in all, I am happy with my life.

If I attempted to be something I'm not -- if I attempted to be a 
normal man, which I'm not -- then these gifts would not have come to me, 
and I would be be miserable.  Besides, I wasn't any good at it.  I just
don't _identify_ with other men well enough to understand how to 
play that role.

>   WE ARE ALL BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE IN OUR OWN RIGHT AND THE SOONER 
>YOU GAIN THE SELF-CONFIDENCE TO REALIZE THAT THE REAL YOU IS GOOD 
>ENOUGH FOR US ALL, THE BETTER OFF YOU'LL BE.

Yes, yes!  I agree!  It's just that your definition of "the real
you" is different from my definition.  For a transvestite who's
stil in denial, still trying to pretend to be something he or she
isn't because he or she feels he or she needs to live by _society's_ 
rules instead of as his or her real self, this message is important.

Whether or not you share my religous beliefs, denial of your true
self is a path that leads to despair and destruction.  That doesn't
mean that you have to "come out" to be healthy or sane -- hiding 
from the outside world is a pain but it won't kill you -- but 
trying to hide from _yourself_, feeling guilty aboout what you _are_,
is madness.  The real you _is_ good enough.  Embrace it.

>   IN SHORT, TAKE THE DRESSES OFF YOU GAY IMMORAL FREAKS!!!

Let's see, we've already covered "immoral", I guess "freaks" is  a
matter of definitions and opinion, I suppose, but "gay"?  Time to clear
up a misconception here:  crossdressing has _nothing_ to do with
homosexuality.  There is no statistical correlation (positive _or_
negative) between the two phenomena.  Het and gay crossdressers exist
in the same ratio to each other as to het and gat non-crossdressers.
Gender identity and sexual orientation are not the same thing.

Besides, are you trying to imply that there's something wrong with
my gay sisters being gay?


Anyhow, I hope that I've managed to answer part of your question, and
that I've given you some insight into people like me.  Thanks for asking!


D. Glenn Arthur Jr., The Human Vibrator, new address:  glenn@digex.com
"Being a _man_ means knowing that one has a choice not to act like a 'man'."

-- 
D. Glenn Arthur Jr., The Human Vibrator, new address:  glenn@digex.com
"Being a _man_ means knowing that one has a choice not to act like a 'man'."

Newsgroups: alt.transgendered