If you're in college what about your university LGBT group do you appreciate as a trans person and what are you not satisfied with. I really need to know this because of the following So recently at my school there was an enormous debacle. A rad feminist had been allowed to post transphobic stuff on the groups facebook page for more than half a year now and she was challenged largely by myself and some by a few others. I specificly held the presdint specificly and the exec board accountable by questioning why they had handled this the way they had so far (inaction), called out their past decisions (or lack thereof) and commented on the exclusionary and transphobic nature of the group. The group has reached a new record for popularity and this came right before the first meeting of the 2nd semester. Gobs of people saw this and heard about it my area, students, professors and allies of us that aren't even gay or trans like family of the LGBT community members know about this. It's such bad PR they are finally willing to listen to trans people instead of ignoring our complaints or refusal to attend when asked and the board/president are meeting with me on soon to discuss the concerns I have. I'm creating a presentation inspired by the national LGBT task force's trans inclusion guide but I'd love to hear more trans people's opinions. If you know trans people and what their complaints or satisfactions are then feel free to share that as well.
hey! Im ftm, and I went only 1 LGBT meet at old college and only 2 or 3 here at uni. I see all women running it. mainly it is a lesbian group, with a few ultra femme gay men and a couple of us trans guys. yet out Queer students are at least 50% of school population! (i know an equal to majority) i can't be fair as i just got back no meetings yet, but it appears it is more geared for liberal feminist lesbians, as was my old school. that one meeting ended early as they wanted to run to feminist club and expected me to join. i made an excuse. (I'm consevstive and anti-feminist!) luckily my school the Queers are nothing like they portraited recently on LGBT news, Gallaudet Queers include Christians and nobody hates on them. i was told there was a request for a separate trans support group, but nobody showed up. in my case, i feel less a part of gay stuff. I am not a lesbian, I am close to straight...as in 90% liking girls as a guy. so i feel personally like an outsider at the Queer meetings cuz i feel so dang straight! i guess I'm attempting to be a gay ally?? i don't think many lesbians or gays know what FTM/MTF really is. even some of them assume it means i like girls and am a butch lesbian, when in actuality I'm struggling with me sexuality as some guys do as i find a couple men attractive...who are gay. but as everything is assumed I'm democrat, liberal, Christian-haing atheist, feminist, NOW supporter, lesbian, act ad nasuem...I feel more at home in cafe throwing a plate of blueberries at another cis-guy! (yeah i did that tonight...they respected that! ) What did they do your school that was anti trans? How do you think we can make LGBT groups stop being LGB-t groups?
I'm going through something SOOOO similar, I feel like I'm way to conventional in my apperance when I'm around the LGB people and I have these really small infrequent attractions to other women. I would go out on a coffee date with a girl and think I could enjoy a relationship with one but don't see myself activly ever seeking one out and I'm sooooo attracted to men and I don't know how to label that or if I even should. Its been similar here, the LG people dominate the LGBT group and when the trans community gets pissed about transphobia on the web page these cis gender people have actually taken votes and ruled against us almost every time on whether or not something in question casuses dysphoria or is transphobic when we tell them it is. I think that lack of self determination is why so many transgender specific groups have started to be requested or popped up at colleges and universities.
yep, i have small attraction to a couple gay men, but it can't go anywhere. why bother? so since i like girls, and look evidently good, i may even be on a date tomorrow night...i just focus on that and call myself a straight guy. but honestly I'm prob 10% gay. *shrugs* well, some transguys and girls are actually gay or lesbian too...and then there are Queers who are all the various gender-queerness, and some gays find out they are actually female and some lesbians find out they are male. i didn't. i was a confused closeted asexual who always dreamed to be a boy>man, and attraction to girls were limited to my being male bodied. which is why its strange how acceptance of my true male identity opened me up to dating! (yeah i got a packer cuz i felt the day is coming. ) so i undy why we are smushed into the gay circle, cuz it is Queer, not perfectly straight. But I don't feel gay! I feel outsider in my case. I don't wanna feel that way. I feel fine hanging with a gay guy buddy. But I feel odd in a huge group of gays and lesbians...like I should leave as I am not one of them. Id fit in better with straight men bowling. so, we don't have a webpage and what transphobic stuff they say? like we aren't really our gender or what? i can solve it...i will hold the chick down who wrote it, you beat her up! well, didn't it feel good to think it?
You know it's funny. I just very recently ended my "cloak and dagger" days, dressed in front of another person for the first time in my life, came out to the people closest to me and 2 IM friends, and dealt with most of the aftermath (although it's still a day at a time). I went all the way through school, and I'm about to leave. And I would not once - it's in the acronym even - thought to go to the school's LGBT group for support. I think a lot of it is that, at least for me, my condition made me a very shy and I kept to myself. I wanted to be perceived as a normal guy even while hiding the woman inside, and you can't keep up those appearances walking into a building with rainbows on the side. And of course I had an irrational fear that people would get the wrong idea about me and I'd get unwanted attention from other guys. Basically all the thoughts that probably go through most well adjusted miserable trans girls trying to keep up appearances and stay well within gender norms because academics are more important anyway. So I think probably the thing that would have helped the most would have been stuff - anything really - on the school's website. Especially if it meant talking to other people via the internet. Not other students - anonymity and safety - but maybe a school counselor or two wouldn't hurt. And other information on transitioning and cross dressing and maybe a link or two to depression help.
oh gee yeah...i wish we had stuff explaining all about transgender! what it is and symptoms kids have. and then that there are alternatives to faking a gender.
Our LGBT Resource Center at my university is actually pretty good about trans stuff. It helps that we have a strangely large amount of trans members. Not sure why, but I'm not complaining. At the same time, my friend tried to start a trans club at school and it ended up failing. Unfortunately, none of those trans people really showed up to the trans club. I heard that they thought it was redundant because of there was already a LGBT Alliance. I dunno, though.
I've never been to LGBT meetings/groups when I was still in college because they didn't have much visibility at all. A couple posters on walls with a phone number on it, that's it, and I didn't feel confident enough to directly call back then. What would have been great would be that the organization is very visible, well managed, and offers chat meetings with subgroups and offers food. Say, hot dogs and pop after school days. That would have convinced me to go because as a student, getting a free meal is very appealing! And what I mean by subgroups is that there may be one meeting where everyone gets there if they can, but the rest of the year it would be, say, transmen on Fridays, lesbians on Mondays, gay flaming guys on Tuesdays, questioning people on Wednesdays, and so on...
cassie29 that idea about the website is really cool thank you I'll probably bring that up in the meeting! Hot Pink yeah we have one a transgender club that was made last spring, it had a good turnout but this year a trans guy took over and was super disorganized and killed the momentum, he wanted me to help lead the group since he was having trouble. I agreed but he'd been kinda trans misogynystic, hadn't had any of his own ideas for group meetings/goals etc... and once this video that was labelled, "transwomen are not females" got posted and he said he didn't see anything at all being disrespectful about the video I just decided working with him wasn't worth it. ---------- Post added 28th Jan 2013 at 03:32 PM ---------- Hmmm that's pretty cool. how would you feel if the subgroups met bi-weekly or if there were different general meetings that at least in part got run by certain sub-groups of the community, like say a day or a half an hour for the bisexuals or transsexuals or genderqueer people?
Sounds great, whatever you can do! Bi-weekly is already a lot of work too ..OR the subgroups could be a theme (a different subgroup- a different theme) for each meeting. Everybody gets there, especially the ones who are most interested (that would be the subgroup!) and the theme/topic of the meeting would be to find ways for that subgroup to have it easier in society, and or to understand what that subgroup passes through better, create links between people and so on. That would work too. Example: the first of January 2016 at 18h in the cafeteria, the topic would be the reality of Transwomen. Everybody's invited to come and there will be free food and drinks. No judgement accepted, we will try to understand what transwomen go through in their everyday life in college and at home, resources available, scientific facts about transwomen, statistics, and then a group chat on the topic. The transwomen who show up get to be admired for everything they go through! Another day, that would be the reality of questioning people! (and so on...)
I know, allowing the different groups that autonomy and ability to share experiences would be great. I know with trans people and especially trans women at our school they don't really even feel comfortable or like it's worth it to come to the group so I wonder if we could even pull that off for some of the T community.
