Monday, May 7, 2012

The Sandeen List of "Trans" Shame

Well, talk about a want-to-be and someone who once was relevant.  It seems Autumn has a new idol and it is Riki Wilchins the self proclaimed gender warrior and "transsexual lesbian feminist". I have respect for a lot of what Wilchins has done over the years although I disagree with many of her positions on transsexuals and those she has allied herself with quite often.

Sandeen seems to have found Riki Wilchins' original A Shopping List of Transsexual Shame on Anne Lawrence's site which should tell you right there what the issue is. Whether this is still Wilchins position is not in my purvey but in 1993 it was and to be blunt it was offensive and deliberately antagonistic towards those transsexuals that just got on with living life after SRS and is aimed exclusively at the MTF transsexual with emphasis on many late transitioner situations.  It is offensive to all in my opinion.

At least Wilchins used transsexual but Sandeen in her zeal to be relevant has chosen a title that fits her actual pathetic view of the world with the title, A Shopping List of Trans Women's Shame. She then proceeds to up the anti from a shopping list of 26 items to 56 item list because well she is Autumn Sandeen.

If you look at Wilchins list then leads one to realize it was not Wilchins list originally but that of one Rachel Pollack Rachel Pollack who is a tarot card expert, comic book writer, science fiction writer, and believes transsexualism is a "passion" and not an "illness" or medical. Some of the original list is insightful in some ways.

The first thing that everyone needs to know about Wilchins and Sandeen is that if you are not out and proud then you have no relevance and are a coward and should not have the right to express your opinion primarily because someone might listen and realize that quietly living as a woman kind of seems really cool. One must be angry and against anything and everything that does not support "trans" rights and the "special" status they want for "trans" people which of course elevates their personal status since they are trans activists.

Most of what Sandeen has written in her list is her laundry list of why she hates transsexual separatists. It is also a pretty clear look into the mind of a "trans" person that has very little idea what being transsexual means to the vast majority of those of us born transsexual. She looks at life through her "trans" eyes and "trans" mind which was and will always be predominantly male.

Many of the items on her list are about being "read" and the angst it causes those that are read. It has never been an issue in my world but when someone so disparately wants to be recognized as a female only and not as "trans" like Sandeen what kind of reaction does she expect? Maybe the transsexual should walk up and throw coffee in a man's face like Sandeen did a while back but how ladylike is that?  That is an inherently "trans" act or in Sandeen's case a male act of aggression. Most women are not aggressive and certainly not aggressive with men but then can we honestly say Sandeen is a woman? She reacts like a man to her life situations because she was a man in the US Navy but of course she was an undercover woman the entire time.

Sandeen is so completely "trans" she will never be anything but "trans" and thus will never experience life as a women. We consider ourselves "normal" after surgery because all we ever wanted was to be accepted into the fold of womanhood by all the other women in the world. Sandeen wants everyone in the world to know "trans" is what she is. Several examples from her list.


We avoid discussing taking hormones with nontranssexual people.
We avoid discussing our operative status with nontranssexual people because we don’t want to be thought of as men — no matter what our operative status.

If we’ve had a vaginoplasty, we don’t discuss dilating and surgery with nontranssexual people.
Lord I bet those are great conversation starters when meeting new friends and I am sure John Q Public would love to talk about our hormone usage, operative status, and what happens in SRS and why we need to dilate for the first year a lot. Only in Sandeen's perverted world of Infantile Dressing and "trans" issues would this be a conversation starter with strangers.


We avoid discussing our dicks.
Well I gather Sandeen is quite proud of her/his dick but I certainly have never discussed my "old" dick with anyone and must ask the question. Why would any women discuss her "dick"? Now I do and have discussed dicks with my girlfriends and it is the "dicks" that men have.
If we have no children prior to surgery, we refuse to bank sperm prior to the genital surgeries that sterilize us.
Only a man would think like this. Why would any woman want to impregnate another woman but then Sandeen thinks like a man. This seems to be a big issue with transitioners that have married women so I will leave this for them to answer but personally saying that SRS sterilizes us is one of the new mantras for the "trans" crowd so they can keep their pricks and claim to be women. It is a complete dichotomy but then nobody ever said men had common sense.

We convince ourselves after our vaginoplasties that we no longer have dicks.
Well, actually we do not but then this is meant as an insult is it not. It is meant to say we will always be men just like Sandeen because Sandeen knows she will always be a man because well "trans" people cannot let go of that side of themselves because it is their pleasure palace.


   We convince ourselves after vaginoplasties that we’re “normal” women — even though our vaginas have no possibility of lubricating like nontranssexual women’s vaginas do. 
    We convince ourselves after vaginoplasties we’re “normal” women — even though our vaginas have to be stretched with dilator to make the depth as close to nontranssexual women’s vaginas as possible. 
    We convince ourselves after vaginoplasties we’re “normal” women — even though our vaginas will never be capable of passing a newborn through them.
We use “normal” to describe ourselves.

Do you get Sandeen's point here? Since she can never be a woman we can never be women. She does not understand and never will understand that "normal" is a mindset that allows us to function as a woman in the world of women without the limitation and the built in excuse of being born transsexual. An they wonder why those of us born transsexual and those still transsexual want to get as far away from these "trans" assholes and the Transgender Borg as we can. She will never understand that I am just a normal everyday woman that has lived and worked as a woman for so many decades I really have no concept of what it means to be "male" nor do I want to. To my friends I am one of them and thus a normal everyday female human. As far as I am concerned that means I WON and you have lost Sandeen.

We feel legitimate when we’re in a relationship; we feel inferior when we aren’t.
ROFLMAO. 90% of the genetic women in the world feel the same way because women are social creatures and it is a natural instinct to want a mate but we do not feel inferior if we have no mate.  What we feel is less fulfilled and this is something that all women feel if heterosexual. Another case where Sandeen has absolutely no clue what it means to be a heterosexual woman. She thinks like a man.


We publicly embrace transsexual as a term that applies to us, even if it sexualizes us to broader society, because we want to have our trans experience medicalized.
The continued assault on the use of the word transsexual by men in dresses. They want transsexual to be removed or turned into a pejorative and if being transsexual is medical then they feel "less" and after all we are "equal".  We are different for sure.

We tear other trans women down in an effort to build ourselves up.
One must recognize the simple truths in life. Whatever the "trans" people say is the truth and anyone that has a dissenting point of view is tearing down others.  Guilty as charged on this blog but then in this case guilt is in the eye of the individual. Just look what you have said in the few items I have copied. Are you not tearing me and all other transsexuals down and denigrating us? Sorry, I forgot you are the only one that gets to do that.

We feel internal pain because we’re putting our mothers through this.
 My mother loved me and despite paralytic polio of the worst kind she never stopped trying to help me. You were obviously never a young transsexual who was "out" to her parents and family. If you cannot realize that we put our families through hell then you are more clueless than I thought because a mother's love can be unbounded and I personally know what I put her through and it was not a lot of fun for her or anyone around my family. If you hurt your mother and she was a good mother and you do not feel internal pain then you are an asshole. When my mother visited me in NYC I apologized for hurting everyone so much  but she had a simple response. "We always loved you and look how you have turned out. You are the beautiful girl you should have been. That was worth everything we went through." She forgave me so I forgave myself.

A lot of what she puts in her list is directly relevant to later transitioners and in my opinion is deliberately hurtful.


We choose to be stealth, even knowing trans people who come after us will experience the same discrimination we did early in our transitions — and we do nothing to make their transitions easier than our own transitions were.
Well you have absolutely not one single idea what is involved with in being "stealth". This is the one that really irks me a lot. The only way Sandeen could ever be stealth is to walk through life with a fucking bag over his head and use a voice simulator so where does this experience come from? Every transition and every transsexual experience is different and today there is plenty of help but that is not the issue.  I guess I and every other successfully integrated woman born transsexual should be running around with a tee-shirt saying "trans" and never leave that fucking nightmare behind. The difference is that we see our futures as women and you see your future as a man in a dress screaming "trans" so you can be special. No transsexual owes anything to any other transsexual.  Giving back is a decision that is made after SRS and there are some of us that have helped a lot of kids but I have zero problem if someone walks off into the sunset to live life as a woman. We deserve it and the sad part is you will never understand that because you will always be "trans".

We denigrate gay men, crossdressers, drag queens, and genderqueer people, saying we have nothing in common with them. We do this even though we know that broader society can’t tell transsexual women, gay men who are perceived to be too feminine, crossdressers, drag queens, and many genderqueer people apart — in fact we do it in some measure because they can’t tell us apart.
Amazing, just freaking amazing. First I would never denigrate any gays or lesbians because they are not in the same situation as we are and yes I do not believe we have anything in common with crossdressers, drag queens, and gender-queer people. We are women and crossdressers and drag queens are men and the gender-queer are not sure what they are. This is a typical "trans" forever and Transgender Borg tenet but they have never provided a single incidence where we are in any way similar. I would just love to have some examples and Sandeen most people can tell us apart or certainly know the difference if the terms are used separately. Thus, your need for the "transgender umbrella" to include transsexuals so you can lie to people and make certain idiots not realize transsexual and transgender are mutually exclusive.

Most of what I read from this list is complaints Sandeen has about her life plus her "transgender" forever mentality and the Borg Mantra she believes in strongly. Are some of the items on the list valid. Absolutely but they are items that we women with a history have learned to live with because nothing is perfect and believe me we know our own limitations but all life has limitations so you learn to live with them and to cope like all the natal born women do. It is part of what it means to be a woman.  Women are the ones that compromise in life. I made compromises to raise my stepdaughter as do women when they raise a family. We are quite good at it and only a man in a dress would not realize those abilities to compromise and make do are what allow us to assimilate into society as women.

Sandeen and her ilk will always be stuck in the nether-land between male and female because they are unable to let go of their maleness.  Those women born transsexual that learn to let go of that side are the successful ones.  We know we have a history but we are women and the important thing is we are women to everyone that knows us. If being as complete a woman as you can possibly be is not your goal than I suggest wholeheartedly that you reconsider and realize you are not transsexual. Women do not have a penis.  Women do not talk about their dicks because women do not have dicks.

In reality Sandeen is describing the transvestite world when not specifically excoriating those of us born transsexual. "Trans" is not the same as "transsexual" but we all know that simple fact has long escaped Sandeen's limited cognitive abilities. 

In simple terms I am a woman Sandeen.  In simple terms Sandeen you are not.  End of story!!


 

13 comments:

Deena said...

Is this where we say cue Autumn to show up in 4, 3, 2, 1.....?

Anonymous said...

Sandeen has a place from which sh/he can troll and irritate legitimate women of TS history. Sandeen's internalized hate of real TS women really comes out in this peace. I have a friend who knows Sandeen quite well even when Sandeen was an out and proud sissy. The friend was invited to Sandeen's place where sh/he was renting a room and within the first ten minutes Sandeen had to show off the collection of sissy cloths. Someone as sick as this person can never be normal and wrongly assumes every person of TS history is as fucked up as sh/he.

Sandeen's hatred of women of TS history who move on and live their lives in mainstream society she outed my friend, another woman to her church and threatened to out SA-ET if she didn't back off. Sandeen's own behavior has destroyed what little credibility this person had to begin with. Sandeen't column over on http://lgbtweekly.com/category/commentary/transprogressive/
Seems to have fallen out of favor with the people at LGBT Weekly, she seems to be posting only once a month, I have a feeling they are tired of her crap, the sad part is they will be left with the impression all TG/TS people are like that creep, all the more reason to keep pushing to have the LTG,Tee-Gees just leave us alone.

Anonymous said...

Forgot to sign

NYF

Anonymous said...

Isn't this from Sandeen just a fine example of "The Politics of Envy" Sandeen and many of those like him are driven by a jealous rage that targets those of us who have what he can never have. Simple as that. Like the two people at the centre of your last essay Sandeen is irrelevant except to the other self-marginalised people. They point their fingers at everyone else forgetting that there are three more fingers pointing back at themselves. Nice post Liz.

CS

Anonymous said...

Good points CS.
This peace by Sandeen is also a prime example of how the Tee-Gees are out of bullets.

I was waiting for someone to write a peace about this where I could post.
Thanks Liz.

NYF

Miz Know-It-All said...

Autumn I want to thank you for opening my eyes!

Before this I was a deluded fool. I had these clearly erroneous thoughts that I was somehow just a female when I clearly am not! Thank you Thank you Thank you! Now that my eyes are open I am going to shed my shame and start proclaiming my trans-enss to the world! But before I do... would you mind telling me how do you think should we should refer to you Autumn Sandeen? Should we follow your Gladd Media Guide and refer to you as the "gender" you identify as, though all our senses say otherwise? " Do we say Yes Ma'am! No Ma'am" to your face, with a wink wink nudge nudge titter titter the moment your back is turned? Or should we just go with what is clearly there for the sake of "trans-honesty... ""Hey Buddy! Yeah you! You over there in the dress with the ratty hair and the goofy beret! Get a job!"

I mean, the ONLY reason I would even bring that up is that by your rather comprehensive postulations on trans-shame. Shouldn't you, as the activist and a leader in the community be proud of your being a man! After all Autumn, you still have a functioning god given phallus, you fathered children, you were married in the Catholic Church to the woman who bore your children and you passed Navy medicals for twenty years as a man. So it stands to reason that as you have been recognized as such by pretty much every social structure there is, you are indeed a man!

So why is that not part of your trans-shame list? Why is it that my wanting to be a normal woman, an act of such intense shame, when your pretending that you are something you clearly are not (female) is an act of strength and courage? Get real Autumn You really can't have it both ways you know. If we are as you say never to be 'real" women, then as the morphology is rather limiting we are men. And in that same vein, if you and we are the same as you say we are, then ergo. you too ARE male! So why not go with it? Fess up! Be a man! Stand up and be loud and proud of your proclivity for gender fucking as a dude! Well albeit a ball-less one these days! I mean why not march yourself into the nearest men's room and proclaim loudly your right to use these facilities as a man in a dress! A man who has every right to dress and act however he wants and to pee when he needs to!

Oh but that is not going to happen is it? If you use the mens room dude then your fantasy would be broken. You couldn't as a man then stand behind Janet Mock, or Jenna Talackovaand say I am just like "Her" because, well according to you she ain't a she! She is a he, you know, just another dude, dude!

Oh well and it was such a grand idea too! C'est la vie!
MKIA

Foxfire said...

What does Sandeen mean with this incessant babbling about "our" vaginas??! Sandeen doesn't have a vagina; Sandeen has a penis, so how in the hell would Sandeen know anything whatsoever about what it's like to have a vagina? Oh but I guess simply declaring yourself a woman makes you an instant authority on all things female, including what it's like to have female sex organs when you don't actually have them. WRONG!

There is no way anyone with a penis, like Sandeen, has a single possible inkling of a clue what it's like to possess a vagina, hence this reprehensible display of total and complete willful ignorance displayed here concerning female genitalia. Unless you really have a vagina, it is physically impossible to even begin to comprehend what it's like. The experience is non-transferable.

This sad person is so obviously delusional I cannot understand why anyone would give them a venue to spout their boundless ignorance concerning women. It's a DISGRACE.

"A Trans Woman's Shame":

1. Autumn Sandeen.

The end.

Anonymous said...

Well thought out post.

BS

Sagebrush said...

Number 52 is my favorite:

We treat our own trans experiences as universal trans experiences. We do this because we believe that if we acknowledge that there is a diversity of trans experiences we may be invalidating our personal trans experience

There aren't enough LOLs for the hypocrisy of this one! Because Autumn is of course doing that very thing -- considering her own experience to be universal, even to women born transsexual. But she has no clue about that. All she knows is transgender.

This "transgender forever" stuff and complaints about the "medicalization" of the condition seem to be going around right now. I know what my own experience was like. I know I was born with something that needed to be corrected medically. Outcome? Outstanding!

But really, please, Autumn and others, if you don't feel like you have a defect to fix, please don't fix it. At the same time, don't even try to tell those of us who know we had something that needed to be fixed that we don't know what we're doing.

I'm not sure that Autumn and other umbrella types want to hold onto being men. I think they want to hold onto being "trans." Because if they just changed sex and lived life normally, they wouldn't get to be "celebrities." Or rather, they'd have to do something worth celebrating, not just cling to their way of life.

Anonymous said...

Boils down to transvestites who think transsexuals are just transvestites who get carried away. Trouble is, some transvestites do get carried away.

- an old aunty

Anonymous said...

http://lgbtweekly.com/2012/05/10/trans-sexualization-trans-medicalization/

Looks like Sandeen is at it again.
Funny how I was around in the 90s and don't remember any of the crap Sandeen is talking about.

Indi X Yes Really... said...

FYI, some of us are proud to be Trans, that is non cis wich means you are trans and if you are cis then you aint trans.

your blog is horrible

Anonymous said...

Frankly, I could not stomach the level of self-serving CRAP that was projected by this self-described bi-polar, (read: schizophrenic, the old NON-PC terminology), onto the entire "trans* community".

Granted this, hmmmm.....person did hedge their statement in order to provide for plausible deniability by stating that "some trans*, MIGHT" experience these feelings, the message was clear that because Sandeen and other trans* folk did and do, we ALL must have and MUST.

Excuse me, but the simple truth is that those of us that do NOT identify as trans* anything, simply do not experience such victimization.

This is not to say that our individual paths to personal integrity was not fraught with difficulty. For many who made those neccesary corrective changes, the pain and the price paid to have a simple, happy, normal life, was in fact enormous.

But... what needs to be remembered, what is being intentionally ignored by Sandeen and his/her cronnies, is that once the correction was made, the pain stopped. It was over, and we are now able to live happy, productive, and yes, NORMAL lives.

If these folks want to be trans*, or identify as trans* forever, fine. Let them clearly and honestly define who they are and what they want. The key word here is 'honestly'. What that means by definition is that they stop their LIES by defining themselves, whoever or whatever they are, as anything even remotely related to what is or was experienced by those men and women born with a MEDICALLY treatable congenital defect. A defect, incidentally, treated VERY effectively and with a VERY high rate of success by HRT and SRS.