The
top news item lately has been Bruce Jenner’s transition to Caitlyn. The drastic transformation of such a public
figure has brought widespread attention, approval, outrage, and speculation for
weeks. Now that the process is complete,
there has been a positive storm of response, and for the most part, I mean that
literally. My feed and my wall have been
covered with people lauding Caitlyn’s choice and her courage, which may tell
you a bit about who my friends are, if not about who I am.
But
it is still a storm, and there are flashes of negativity out there. I recently read an article speaking to the
opposite side, mostly because a friend of mine shared it and I wanted to see
where she stood. The article was written
by Matt Walsh and is titled, “Calling Bruce Jenner a Woman is an Insult to
Women”. Not mincing words at all, is
he? As you might expect, the tone is
vicious and cruelly one-sided, and I hesitate to defend such a vicious piece in
any way, but there are one or two nuggets in all the vitriol.
I
think that to transgenders, the choice is a very personal one, and society has
made it a very public battle. That this process has been so visible may be part
of what made Caitlyn struggle with the decision. We have assigned conditions to
our love and acceptance of people—they have to fit into our ideas of who they
should be before we will give them any respect or concern. That's what makes
this fight so difficult for them. But the writer, in making that point,
embodies the cruelty he is describing.
He has missed the fact that disagreement and love are not mutually
exclusive. (Remember that friend I mentioned, the one who shared this
article? If she does agree with it, as
implied, well, I disagree with her, but she is still a good friend of mine.)
As
for "unveiling a new self", I agree that that's poorly worded. We
have only one "self", but that self is only partly seen by other
people. For Caitlyn and other transgenders, their true self is more obscured
than for most others, and it is brave of them to choose true self-expression
over easy acceptance from others. This form of bravery, while very different
from that of someone who gives up his life for others, is just as valid and
should not be dismissed.
Finally,
the point on Photoshop and plastic surgery being used to make an
"authentic" woman intrigues me. It is an interesting dichotomy, that
transgenders can use these methods to make themselves a "real" woman,
but women are discouraged from doing so. I think it comes down to
self-acceptance, and the point that we OURSELVES should decide whether we can
accept who and what we are, as we are, or if we need to make some changes. If I
retain anything from this article, it's that I should not criticize a woman for
deciding, for her own sake and not the sake of society, to make changes to her
appearance.
What
it comes down to, I believe, is that we need to stop looking at the world in
terms of black and white, because it simply isn’t. I’ve come to this conclusion again and again—gender
is a spectrum, sexuality is a spectrum, autism is a spectrum, the rainbow is a
spectrum. We humans are many things all
in one, and there is never one thing in all of us. That’s part of the glory of being human. When we learn to first accept, and then
cherish, that diversity, we will be making real progress.
No comments:
Post a Comment