Can I be Trans-Race or Trans-Class?

[CapnAwesome]

You think transgender people "choose" their gender. That's your first problem.

The idea that they don't have any choice is as equally muddled and problematic. Obviously being trans is on a spectrum, the same as being gay is on a spectrum. Some people can't help but want to be a girl and some people can go either way and choose how they want to identify, the flo-gendered. So it's not a black or white thing. However every trans person makes some level of choice, in terms of taking hormones or having surgery or whatever. I don't know how doing that doesn't qualify as a choice. So at the same time a trans-gendered person might have no choice over how they feel (nobody does) the whole process of being transgendered and how far you want to go with that (most trans-people choose not to have reassignment surgery) is definitely a choice. I don't know how anybody can say it isn't.

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Given that transgender people face higher rates of violence towards them, discrimination, ostracization from their families, and a whole host of other problems, it still boggles my mind that anyone would think that they actually choose that, like picking your gender identity is no different picking what cereal you're going to eat in the morning.

"Being transgender means people will mock you, your family might disown you, and religious conservatives will do everything in their power to keep you down."
"Sounds great!  Where do I sign up?"

Well that argument doesn't really hold water though, because so few people are transgendered. Perhaps there are more people who want to change gender, but choose not to because of the reasons that you say. In fact most people who identify as transgendered don't have final surgery. They choose not to for one reason or another. I mean, what do you say about someone who transitions in their 40s. Weren't they choosing to live as their birth gender for the first 40 decades of their life or choosing to not reassign? How do you classify that period. I mean I agree that people don't choose their desires, but they do choose their actions. I don't know how you can call it anything else.

I listened to a talk by a trans-woman in their mid-40s who was still in the process of transitioning. Often times phrases like 'the most difficult decision I've ever made..' or 'deciding to give up my children to do this' or 'still deciding about final surgery' were used. It all sounded to me like there was quite a bit of choice involved in the process.