Tone arguments.I read this entire lengthy post – and isn’t all of it essentially a tone argument?  Isn’t all of it essentially telling trans people to stop using words that (I’m sorry but, unreasonably) upset cis people?  Doesn’t anyone see the problem with this?  
As a long-time lurker whose first post was one of the blank comments that Pam called “threadjacking” (nice terminology comparing trans people passively protesting the silencing of trans voices to hijackers, btw), I think one of the most frustrating things is that nasty comments directed at trans people generally and individual trans posters are NOT moderated with the same intensity as trans people who dare to use the term “cis,” and never have been.  I’ve seen that myself as someone who has just read the comments here.    
It’s hard for me, personally, to see this blog (and particularly its comments section) as a place that is welcoming and safe for trans people.  I don’t see a commitment from Autumn, Pam, or any of the other moderators here to make it better.  I see more of the same.  

The recent explosion of censorship of language and ideas is killing the blendAnd quite franky the damage may already be permanent.
I have encountered other blogs and groups who used a similar “heavy hand” to stifle controverial topics or respond to insults (both real and imagined) and in every single case where I encountered such tactics, I simply never went back to that site – ever again.
I didn’t post a dramatic “swan song” or explain my reasons, I simply went away…and later, so did the site.
Make no mistake, the only reason there IS a PHB is because of the contributors – and the more strident and opinionated voices are the real driving force behind the success that PHB has experienced.
Limit discourse to only those voices who a ‘vanilla’, only those who march in lock step with the party line, and only those who do not offend anyone, and the Blend will be gone within a year.  
I have watched from the sidelines throughout this recent Pogrom (and I use that word intentionally) and have come quite close to leaving forever.  And I am one of the moderate middle of the roaders here.
What was a vibrant interchange of ideas and opinions has devolved into a cult of personality – reminding me of snitty teenage girls.
I have a teenage daughter and I get enough of that in my house.
Stop the banning, stop the censorship, stop acting as the internet language police, or turn off the Blend for good.
Fighting over percieved insults between people who are seemingly allied in wanting the same results is just plain stupid, and gives ammunition to the opposition.  
As long as this continues, the Blend is actually hurting the cause of equality -

Pam and Autumn have to deal with a realityand that reality is that there are people from all kinds f viewpoints on the Blend; Some Gay men who are still uncomfortable with a Lesbian presence in the LGBT movement, let alone a trans one, Lesbians who are the remnants of the second wave separatist movement, Trans inclusive people of all stripes, Transsexuals who want out of the TG unbrella, TG universalists, radicals, conservatives, gradualists and revolutionaries.
What is the chance that all of those people are going to get along all of the time?
Heck, even Dave and I, radicals cut largely from the same cloth, got into it last eve but as always were sure to make our piece before it went too far.
All in all, Pam, Autumn and the rest do  great job.
Autumn, put th computer down and step away from the monitor…relax a bit sis, and don’t personalise the response. You know some of the lovely things that have been written about me

At this timeI have no opinion. Perhaps because its soo early for me and Ihave not finished my first cup of coffee.
I just wanted to say, “what a cute little kitty!”  

Questions, answers, and statementsComments: Leave them on. That’s the only way discussion and education can happen.
Moderation: Yes. Both ways. Have a moderator, and posters have some moderation.
Ratings: Meh, don’t care.
Moderator funding: where would the money come from? That’s just the first logistical problem in a never-ending litany of problems.
Expectations: Vary. Some want a free for all, some want a “only thing I agree with” space. Ultimately, this space belongs to Pam.
Offensive language: demeaning language certainly should be off-limits. Swear words? Not so much, IMO.
Reporting: set up an inbox for complaints.
Warnings: depends on the nature of the transgression.
Trap-door: depends on the transgression.
Banned for life: only in very infrequent, very extreme cases. People learn, grow, and change. Policy must recognize that.
=================================================
Statements:
I’m sad that Autumn has lost a word she feels is useful and productive.
I understand male privilege. I have four sisters, and I was raised in Southern Utah. I was taught to expect my life to go in certain ways, including a job, a family, and responsibilities toward that family. My sisters were taught to expect a husband, children, cooking, sewing, and cleaning. After my youngest sister’s divorce, I remember how shattered she was. Everything she’d been taught to expect and count on had dissolved, and what was left wasn’t anything she’d been taught to get satisfaction from. A woman doesn’t have a career, she holds a job until a suitable husband comes along. A woman’s only true satisfaction in life comes from being a wife and mother. Without those, she’s an empty cipher. My little sister paced back and forth in my backyard, more angry than I’ve ever seen her, demanding to know why she’d never been taught to have a career? Why wasn’t she taught that she could be happy and complete without being someone else’s property? She’s better now, but that early conditioning will always be with her.
I partially understand white privilege. I was raised in a mostly white community. We had a reservation near town, and I grew up hearing about drunk, lazy Indians. My religion taught me that Native Americans were dark because they’d sinned against God, and their skin was a curse. It also taught me that African Americans were cursed, and that’s why they couldn’t hold the priesthood, or any position of authority within the church. If I applied for a job, I didn’t have to be as educated, as talented, or as qualified as my fellow candidates, if I was the white candidate. No one would hire anyone who lived on the reservation, or rent a house in town to them, or give them a loan, or even socialize with them, because, well, they were all lazy, drunk Indians. Everybody knew that. When I was 20, the first black person moved into town. And – gasp – she was the wife in an interracial couple. If they’d known the new policeman they hired was married outside his race, he would never have been considered for the job. As it was, they only lasted six months before moving, and the town breathed a sigh of relief.
I struggle against what I learned every day. I question myself constantly, trying to reinforce who I’m trying to be, and suppress who I was raised to be. Some days I’m more successful than other days.
I’m just barely beginning to learn about (for lack of a better term) cis- privilege. It’s all theoretical at this point, and I’ve probably got some key points wrong, and I don’t trust my own judgment on it for a second, but I know it exists. The complete shape and scope of it escapes me, but I know it’s there. What I very much need at this point is some guidance. Not lecturing, not scolding, not flaming, just guidance. Point out unquestioned assumptions that should be questioned. Forgive stupid mistakes, and understand it wasn’t an intentional harm, just a stupid, thoughtless one. Several of my previous posts here are flashing through my head as I write this – things I wouldn’t post today, but didn’t have a qualm about when I posted them.
I’m not a person who wants to exclude people. I don’t want to break my group off from that group over there, and draw some artificial line between us. I don’t think that serves any useful purpose. Yes, I have my personal agenda, and I will do whatever I can to see that to completion, but I can adjust it. I can make it more inclusive. I can make it more fair. I just need to know where the adjustments have to be made.

welcome backI think that it was good to address the legitimacy of the term; I think that its not difficult to have that conflict between allowing free discourse and trying to create a space where no one is offended. Its not easy to draw the line and it can take stepping back a bit from the issue when in the center of the whole thing. Subjects where a GWM and his (Aravosis) anti-whole-community attitudes are being addressed can make other GWM’s feel as though they are already the one being singled out for attack when no, just Aravosis and ones like himself are being addressed. Knowing you I think causing any community hurt was the last thing you intended and I hope others can move past it and learn from it, recognize the good that has come from PHB, and return to the work of creating a better community.

Actually, I was wrong…the Blend is dead.I just read all the links, and did a fairly comprehensive web search for recent posts elsewhere pertaining to the the Blend.
There is nothing but contempt anywhere -
RIP

Weaponized against prejudices, not people,

Uh, hey, some of us were there when Aravosis publicly made the case that we [transgender people] don’t belong in his cisgender gay-rights movement.

In that comment, the term cisgender wasn’t used to explain privilege to people who didn’t understand it, but instead used to angrily — accusatorily — pointing a finger at John Aravosis for being a gay white male who doesn’t care about the civil rights of transgender people. It was that weaponized use of that cis- term that began the current Pam’s House Blend debate over cisgender and cissexual terminology here at The Blend. When I’ve mentioned repeatedly that the two cis- terms have been weaponized at The Blend, this is the is starting point as to where I feel the term was weaponized against gay white men.

At some point when you are talking about the real-world politics of discrimination, you have to as the questions of who is discriminating against whom and for what reasons.
I don’t see a problem with pointing out that there are many within the gay rights movement who see it as a movement for only cisgendered gays and lesbians. I saw it in the rhetoric surrounding ENDA, I see it in the open speculation regarding institutional complicity in the death of Lawrence King because they let him “cross-dress” in the classroom. And I see it in the way in which feminine men and butch women are scapegoated for anti-gay prejudice.
If we can’t say that activists such as Aravosis or legislators such as Barney Frank are privileging cisgendered gays and lesbians, then we have a big problem. If we can’t talk about who is discriminating against whom and to what ends within our community we have a big problem. To quote Martin Luther King:

Actually, we who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured.

The prejudices that many of my fellow cisgender white queer men demonstrate in regards to trans and gender-variant people within our community disgusts me. Sometimes, I feel the personal target of that. The derail of those topics from a discussion of how little trust we might have for Aravosis or Frank given their relatively recent commitments to inclusion was a serious problem IMO.  

Oppressed people get angry at their oppressors!It happens!
If I had a buck for every time a woman near me complained about men or when an Aboriginal, Islander, Chinese, Maori, Samoan, Tongan or Native American I knew complained about whites or a Gay or Lesbian or Bisexual complained about Straights or a disabled person complained about the abled and so on and so forth from a legitimate grievance of being oppressed and did so in a strongly angry way then I’d be a very rich Batty indeed!
The oppressed get angry! It happens! They have justification for it!
And even when I belonged (or was perceived to belong) to one of those citicised oppressor-groups even if I personally had not contributed to that oppression I at least realised that overall that group had done that injustice to this person and the person was legitimately angry. It’s not the most constructive way of dealing with an issue by any means but justified anger twists and poisons inside if it has no outlet or redress.
Now unless we are going to ban the terms:
Man
Straight
Heterosexual (and all its derivatives)
White
Able-bodied
Christian
And all the other terms of privileged groups mentioned in justified anger then i fail to see why Cis of all words should be singled out for special treatment!
Double-standards are not ok. All the above words have been used in anger ‘weoponised’ to use Autumns term.
Now if someones releasing their anger wildly try talking them down a little and help them redirect that anger productively.. anger is the primary energy-source of activism after all. And look at their grievance to see if it’s justified! Often it is! One need only look at the comparative suicide-rates, the murder-rates, the school-bullying-rates to see that the TG community has a massively valid grievance. Yes the GLB folk have a massive grievance too compared to the het folk (and plenty of TG folk are also GLB) but the TG community gets the worst of the hate and the least of the help.
Thats a legitimate grievance and a legitimate reason to be angry. And angry emotuons WILL result from it. If people don’t like that then they could do more to reduce the injustice that causes the anger rather than complain that people treated badly get emotional.

missing the pointThis shouldn’t be a discussion about general moderation, because the issue that caused it isn’t.
Trans people here are being moderated for using basic decentering language, or responding with anger to people who’d very happily throw us under the bus.
You want credibility? Start behaving like Feministe’s mods. Transphobes, racists, et al, get shown the door as soon as a mod spots them, and those they oppress can speak honestly without fear of being shut down in a tone argument.
This is a safe space for cis gay people to make ignorant comments, or to whine about being called on their cis privilege. But when a comment as basic as (angrily) pointing out that John Aravois defines his gay-rights movement as being a cisgender one is described as “weaponising” and its author threatened with banning, it sure as heck isn’t a safe space for trans people. It’s the sort of double standard I’d expect from people who don’t even pretend to be trans allies, so acting stunned when it damages your credibility seems to me to be a bit ridiculous.

Yeah, you and I are in about the same place.

I was there too.“In that comment, the term cisgender wasn’t used to explain privilege to people who didn’t understand it, but instead used to angrily — accusatorily — pointing a finger at John Aravosis for being a gay white male who doesn’t care about the civil rights of transgender people.”
John did say those things.  And people were rightfully upset with him.  And they rightfully pointed out that his perception that he was better off with out others was the primary factor at play.  
Namely, that his privilege as a cisgendered white man was leaving him unable to see the realities of other queer communities.
People don’t need my permission to point out my white, male, or class privilege.  And unless transpeople (and allies) are able to continue to describe what’s going on, the Blend is making a decisive and hurtful stand with those in power.
Summer and Pam, I’m dissapointed and hurt by this new course you’re plotting.  Consider this my last post.

WowI’m not even sure what I want to say beyond offering hugs and thanks to Autumn (and Pam) for putting yourself in the middle of this.
Lots of thoughts and ideas have been churning in my mind over the past few days.
It came down to this, though: I don’t have enough time or energy to fight here on the Blend, but I’m okay with using those resources for civil discussion.

CivilityThanks to Pam and Autumn (among others?) for moderating the discussions here at the Blend.  It’s a tough, thankless, but enormously important job.
What’s missing from the commentary of most of those objecting to the moderation is any discussion of what is lost when forums degenerate into name calling and metaphoric screaming at each other.
Forums are not just for venting, they are for education.
Education is a two way street, meaning, for example, that Autumn can teach me something, and I can hope to return the favour.
Venting is a one way forum, where I say whatever the f*ck I like, any f*cking way I want to, to satisfy whatever motivations move me at the moment.
People will disengage if they can’t put ideas out there without getting stomped on.  Not sure if that’s true?  Look for the threads where respectful disagreement and discussion takes place.  Can’t find them?  Wonder why?  How about the threads where someone acknowledges that they were wrong, or apologizes for misunderstanding something, or thanks somebody for enlightening them.  Shouldn’t that be happening regularly?
Free speech doesn’t mean freedom to come to Pam and Autumn’s place of business and treat it like it’s our own.  It’s not.  Those who want to treat it that way are free to create their own place of business, and then treat it like it’s their own.
If there is a reason that ideas can’t be expressed in a civil way, please let’s hear it (expressed in a civil way).  Otherwise, we should be able to put ideas out there and talk about them in a civil way.
That’s one of the things that should differentiate this place from wingnut forums.

I appreciate all of the barista’s hard workPam, Autumn, and all of the other baristas–I appreciate your hard work at making this ‘virtual coffeehouse’ a welcoming environment.  Autumn, you may have mis-handled the follow-up posting, but I think your instincts were correct in closing down threads that were devolving into flame wars.  Don’t be so hard on yourself.  Everyone makes mistakes.
To address Pam’s questions:
Comments–I like being able to comment on threads and discuss things.  Sometimes that discussion has clarified issues for me and helped me support or change positions on those issues.  
Moderation–I do think the threads should be moderated to keep it civil.  I once managed a yahoo group, and had a heckuva time keeping the trolls away and the threads civil.  
Ratings–I do like the ratings system, but I might post a “definition of ratings” in the TOS or in a thread similar to the thread on civility (if it’s not there already.)
Moderation expectations–With my experiences being a moderator elswhere and -when, I think the moderation you currently have is just fine.  The only way to change the system would be to fund a 24/7 moderator, which would then require possibly paid subscriptions or other methods that would probably sour things more.
Offensive language–With the depth and breadth of content and the types of discussion here, perhaps it should be a “Supreme Court pornography” definition: we’ll know it when we see it.
Turnaround time– 48-72 hours.  That allows for a comment/post on Monday, an allegedly offensive reply on Tuesday, and an investigation on Wednesday for instance.  I would rather err on the side of liberality–letting some offensive content pass by and/or stay up for a bit–than to stifle healthy discussion.
Flagging offensive messages–Rather than relying on reporting via comments or email, does Soapblox have a ‘flag this post’ feature?  Then when a post has been flagged a certain number of times, the baristas get a notification and the content can be investigated.  
As far as banning/suspension/trapdoors–I would have a ‘Three strikes’ rule.  Three warnings, then a couple of weeks suspension.  Then said user is allowed back, but on probation.  If they violate the TOS again, a longer suspension.  Finally, permanent banning if it happens the third time.
Thanks for all the wonderful work you do!

*sigh*
To quote an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond, “It’s like watching your mouth trip and fall down the stairs.”
You still refuse to make acknowledgements that have been laid bare with your behavior. Seriously. This is it? Accuse everyone full of justifiable anger over your behavior of having ‘hate’?
What part of the whole ‘pointing out a couple of statements to justify your behavior thing’ are you not understanding?
You sit by silently while your enforcers (you call them peers) drive out people that disagree with you on T matters, and then yank the lever claiming ‘incivility’ when your enforcers fail.
Things go boom. Insert emotional plea with Famous Quotes. This isn’t even close to what some people were wanting.
It’s why you continue ignoring emails and posts that point out your enforcer’s behavior. They’re doing your ‘dirty work’.
Telling somebody to ‘fuck off’ is pretty much grounds for a slap down in any forum i’ve ever participated in, so when you deliberately ignored it when it was pointed out to you, i wasn’t sure if i was free to respond to your enforcer (peer) in kind.
They spend such large amounts of post time praising you, i thought maybe that it was some sort of ticket to acting like an ass and getting away with it.
Or was having you effectively declare me a ‘classic transsexual’ what marked me as a free target? i tried straightening it out. It could have been done in any one of the emails you ignored. You would have learned i’m not post-op, and i think HBS is junk science.
But while we’re on it, are ‘they’ not allowed to post here?  Pam stated she would like ‘some’ of us to return to future discussions. Who are the ‘right’ people you want to allow here? Is rapid posting, ALL CAPPING and have ‘fuck off’ on speed dial preferred? As apposed to sincerely articulated disagreements?
Or just the whole praise-and-agree 24/7 thing?
It sent me into a spiral. Want to participate. Can’t trust the police officer in charge.
Most of Pam’s questions have only one real answer. i’m not sure what the point of asking most of them even was.
We don’t need more watchmen. We need someone watching the watchman we already have. It’s that simple. All the heart-tugging in the world won’t mask her real agenda at this point.
Pictures of your cat?
Seriously?

You are using…… a blunt instrument to measure life force.
Contempt is being expressed, that’s for sure.
Contempt is being expressed for the whole LGBT movement all the time.  Does that mean it’s dead?

Can I third this?Busy, no time to read the contention, but…without comments this blog becomes a news feed.
All the power you need is the power to trapdoor those who intend to troll.  

The Blend is hardly deadand the contempt is largely from people who object to either trans-friendliness or to radicalism in the LGBT community.
And the Blend embraces the Dallas principles, some other LGBT blogs have rejected them.
J’y suis, j’y reste

my preference is for the Blend to not turn into Shakesville.In other words, allowing for the end of the normal distribution everybody hates–the drive-by trolls–I’d like to see efforts at civility all around, while leaving people free to discuss and offer opinions that may not be shared by everyone. I’d prefer not to see the site devolve into the Pythonesque, self-flagellating exercise in demonstrating who’s the most ashamed of their privilege that you see at Shakesville. Recognizing your privilege and trying to rise above it? Good. Dramatic posturing over your sudden epiphany that you’ve been receiving 5’10″ privilege or cat-preferring privilege or Mac privilege and oh goddess I’ll try to do better in the future? Eh, not so much.
Discussing emotionally loaded, painful subjects is probably going to leave at least a few people feeling wounded. If you’re hurt, say so. Some will understand why and change their discourse, and others won’t give a shit. There are no completely “safe” public spaces on the web, and the ones that try to be the safest are locked in the continual spiral of offensive post-offensive response-blogmistress threatening to quit-loyal posters declaring their undying allegiance-everyone posting on eggshells for two days-offensive post…
Reason and moderation. Boot the chronic assholes-for-the-sake-of-being-assholes, and encourage people to look at their posts through the lenses of other readers before posting. Heavy-handed policing isn’t worth the headache.

Autumn, read your email from me.and if you want to post it, quote it, or keep it to your self, fine.
Just do not ignore it.
Maura

Tone ArgumentsPlease help me, and I say this without irony.
Is there something wrong with arguing that the “tone” of a comment can be inappropriate?
In other words, isn’t it possible to fully accept what is being said as acceptable in an exchange of ideas, but disagree, or even exclude a comment because of the way in which it’s being said?

I like the blend. A lot.When the “N” word (Nazi, not the other one) is used, the poster has gone over the line unless it is a response to an article about Hitler and National Socialism. Posts that simply name call – I am thinking specifically of the posts on Ann Coulter – are over the line. They are noise, static, empty content that adds nothing to the discussion.
If a comment does not engage the stated ideas or positions of the other person by responding with something of substance, then the comment does not contribute.
A while back I saw a neighbor with three identical bumper stickers on her car (right and left bumper and top of the window)that said, “Get Bush a blow job so he can be impeached.” I pointed to her car and said, “Those are great.” She started to proudly respond and I added, “Of course, for it to work we would have to get him to have multiple affairs, be charged in civil court with sexual assualt, get him to lie under oath, get his law license suspended, get his right to try a case in the Supreme Court taken away, get him charged and fined in Federal Courth with Purjury…” She inturpted me and with the cogent argument of calling me a “fucking Nazi.” Her whole position was a bumper sticker with no content.
SOME OF THE QUESTIONS:
Ratings? Who cares. I would prefer an “offensive post” button that members could hit. After “x” number of hits, the post would be bounced to a moderator to look at – that way a human eye can seperate “offensive” with “unpopular ideas.”
“Nazi” and a few other terms should generate an automatic final warning. Ditto with personal attacks.

You are rightI have a friend who has one method of communication – every interaction is a fight and he goes in on the attack. He has good things to say, but his tone tends to turn people off because there is never an attempt to listen or negotiate or be friendly.  

Some moderation is necessaryI wouldn’t be much interested in the Blend if comments were turned off.  Hearing a variety of opinions and reactions on any one topic is far more enlightening than just reading one person’s view.
I do think moderation is needed, though, because I stop going to forums where the comments are nothing but people attacking each other.  Personal attacks do shut down constructive discussion.  Occasionally two people will get into a snit with each other, and that’s to be expected.  But if someone’s whole purpose in commenting is to make trouble, they should eventually be removed.
It’s not good to make generalizations like the idea that we should just avoid cis terminology because it will upset people.  Just about anything you say will upset someone, and it isn’t reasonable to expect baristas to patrol 24/7.  I say give people the benefit of the doubt, and only ban them when you see that they are repeatedly and intentionally stirring up trouble.
I love the pictures of Bon-Bon.  She’s adorable.

Banning wordsHmmm. I think that banning cis from the debate was a bad call. I’d never heard of cis before reading this post, but I think it’s a good word. Decentering the language is the right approach. The word isn’t a weapon. Except for certain slurs (and cis clearly isn’t a slur), no single word is a weapon; only complete thoughts can be. No one should be compelled to use cisgendered if they want to refer to themselves or others as non-transgendered or anything else, but no one should be prevented from using the term either.
That’s nothing against anyone in particular, especially Autumn — we all make bad calls — and a short and simple apology and correction/clarification should fix it.
The “tone argument” debate is an entirely different issue, I think. On the one hand, everyone should be civil (and moderators or community members are morally entitled to enforce civility), but on the other hand, everyone deserves rights whether or not they act civilly. The reason tone arguments are so offensive is because they suggest that because someone who acts like a jerk generally isn’t advancing his cause (which I am willing to believe is usually true), he deserves not to have his cause advanced — and that’s a vicious and immoral thing to suggest.
In this case, I think moderators are totally justified in banning people who say nasty things about trans or cis people or indeed who make personal insults of any kind. But use of the word cis does by itself mean that that has occurred any more than use of the word trans.

I like your “offensive post” ideaThe ratings system is too complicated, and some people seem to use it as another form of attack.

My Experience and ThoughtsWhen I first came to the blend quite some time ago I ended up caught in a massive argument that raged for weeks and months across a number of pages.
Because I wouldn’t put up with all non-binary transgender people being repeatedly called mentally-ill fetishists, blamed for all the transphobia in the world and labeleed a danger to children and to women.
I got called quite a few nasty things for this.
And yet some people I argued with have eventually become allies.. others have been banned (and i hope one day change their minds on the subject).
Discussing controvertial topics is vital. It’s needed for people to learn.
Allowing the oppressed to stand up for themselves is also vital. If the privileged feel unconfortable with it being called out their suppossed to! Antiseptic stings! They should never be protected from that discomfort, eased into it at best and thats all. When there was desegregation on race and sex there was discomfort too. People had to endure that discomfort to get over it. If they were protected from that discomfort nothing would change or improve.
Sure when someone is making a harmful generalisation like ‘all cis people are hateful to TGs’ then the person making the comments needs to be reminded to be more accurate like saying ‘Cis-society marginalises and supports hate of TG people’ which would be accurate. Not every cis-person does that but the society does.
Thus far the examples used of Cis being weaponised pales compared to the claim, made here all too often during my time here, that allowing TG people to use the bathroom will harm women and children. Or the claim that crossdressers are all mentally ill fetishists. Oh and I almost forgot all the Anti-Goth and Emo stuff too!
That a few comments using the term Cis are seen as such a disaster is utterly unfair to the feellings and needs of the transgender community! Where was all the massive outrage when I was being called a freak repeatedly?
When that statement was made against the term Cis I was already in the middle of writing my own defence of the word when the ban on defence of it statement was made!
Because its an important word! A neccessary word! And fine if anyone comes up with a better one (that does not other me! Non-Trans is sure not equal, it others me!) thats fair and people find comfortable with than by all means, but we need some word to describe cis-privilege. And shutting down the defence of that word hurt me deeply emotionally.
And it further demonised the word by preventing it from being reinforced as a nuetral term! By reacting this way the loading of the term is magnified not reduced! And there is no way it’s been used as hostilely as plenty of words used here every day.
If the comments on Transgender issues often fall apart there may be some reasons for that… and I suggest the problem isn’t the term Cis.
But I believe in trying to reach people, in educating them, in building bridges. And I also believe in helping everyone make up for mistakes. Theres a heap of anger in the TG community. They’ve got good reason for that. They are sick of being derided, comdemned, hated, ridiculed, laughed at, mocked, excluded, sacrificed, ignored, sidelined and having to explain the same things over and over and over and over and over till they get so sick of it all they crawl under the doona if they are lucky enough to own one and cry and cry and leave the net for months at a time. So the over-reaction on this issue when there is so much hostility they face every day is just another ‘kicking the dog when it’s down’.
I think this can be rescued… the way the radio show and their transphobic remarks was handled! And you got a lot of respect from for your handling of that Autumn!
To be honest the two comments claimed as weaponised don’t read that way to me at all! “Here is main point for Aravosis and all other cisgendered, transbigoted privileged assholes” That says that that person is a cisgendered transbigoted asshole and it says that others exist. It doesn’t say that ever cisgender person is a transbigoted asshole! Just as saying that there are white swans does not mean that all swans are white!
Note: I know little of the person discussed, I am merely reading the comments as they seem to be written.
And “Uh, hey, some of us were there when Aravosis publicly made the case that we [transgender people] don’t belong in his cisgender gay-rights movement.” That only says that this person excludes TG people, it does not judge the entire cisgender gay population.. only ‘his’ movement.. his view of the movement and the version for which he was acting and speaking. Where Orson Welles character says “not your world” to the survivor he met near the end of the infamous war of the worlds radio broadcast he sure isn’t judging the world, just the persons plans for it.
I think these comments were missread! I do not think they were generalising in themselves (maybe thats not the case in full context of them though but reading them now they do not seem to condemn all cisgender people at all!) but were making statements about a person and many of the oppressive group to which they belong. Like saying ‘male chauvenist pig’ did not refer to all men as chauvenists and pigs or refer to all pigs as being male for that matter!
I think the time might have come for the Blend to Increase it’s discussion of Cis Privilege, not reduce it, to Increase it’s discussion of TG issues too. To invite prominant TG thinkers and activists to provide more content to the blend and to make sure it’s high-profile and a focus.
This hasn’t just hurt the community, it’s brought existing hurt of cis privilege and double standards out into the open. Use this opportunity to do more to fix that, not complain that hurt exists and the whipped are thin-skinned.

This is just what I was going to say

At some point when you are talking about the real-world politics of discrimination, you have to as the questions of who is discriminating against whom and for what reasons.

There is no way to identify the cissexual and/or cisgendered people who dislike transsexual and/or transgendered people and regard them as social and political nuisances that won’t make someone feel uncomfortable. This is a fact of life. The cure is exactly the same as with the reality of white privilege, of male privilege, of able-bodied privilege, and so on down the road: acknowledge the privilege and see what you can do to reduce its power over those who lack it.
The key mistake was Autumn’s rush to agree with Lane rather than telling him, “I’m sorry you feel uncomfortable, but the word is descriptive, and any other word would end up bugging you just as much because the thing it described is what’s making you uncomfortable.”
The key insight is this: experiencing one form of discrimination doesn’t bar you from having another kind of privilege. White GLBTs can be racist; GBT men can be sexist; Ts can be as ableist as anyone else; and so on. And we have to be able to talk about this…but it appears that we won’t here at PHB.  

I don’t mind increasing the discussionof the term (especially since I’m now Mr. Privileged Cisgender Asshole). I had to work on that one.
Just because links are provided either in a comment thread or in a story, though, doesn’t necessarily mean that anyone reads them.
In a sense, I think there was a liitle bit of an assumption that the term was understood and it really isn’t, by and large

this is just life–a lot of these problems are up to the individual blenders to deal withand while your efforts to soothe hurt feelings and try to resolve these issues are very admirable, pam and autumn, there is really only so much you can realistically do unless you are willing to completely alter the tone and accessibility of the blend.    
i love it the way it is.  i think you have a winning formula here, and the ratings, troll/abuse monitoring, comments–it all works fine.  i don’t want any of it to change, and while i’m seeing threats from blustering blenders about how it’s going to crash and how they’re leaving.  so the hell what?  how many blenders have come and gone over the years, and it’s still an outstanding place for discussion and insight?  
we as individuals need to be able to deal with incivility and attacks, to a certain degree.  misdirected anger and shitty words are the sole reason that some blenders come here–that’s life.  they’ll hijack threads in their own manner to put others down.  i’ve experienced my share of them and quickly learned that not everyone is my friend.  but for every one of those, there are 10 others who provide excellent commentary and who are quite capable of providing civil discourse.  i choose to focus on the positive.  

I missed itAnd I’m not a regular here.  That said, I rely on PHB for queer news and trans info, and I read Lisa Harney’s QT every couple of days (and respect it enormously).  I also spend (too much) time on daily kos.  I’ve followed Autumn’s reporting on and off and am very pleased to see her evolution as a voice for our community.
The thing to me is that no marginalized group is ever going to be a fount of civility and moderation.  Our lives make us, some of us, sad crazy, and regrettably enough, sometimes it shows.  Some blogs have a “be excellent to each other” vibe that works (docudharma, mostly) or simply a tradition of barking loudly while genuinely listening to the barks in response (dk).  PHB, while it does many excellent things, does not have that culture, at least when it comes to trans stuff.  People come in and say rotten things.  There’s a strong temptation to log in and respond.  I don’t know how one fixes that (in response to Pam’s end comment).  No idea.   I do know that as a genderqueer identified MTF medical transie, I shy away from PHB trans treads as a rule.  It isn’t so much that I think we are too cruel to the cis folks (deal, ban me, whatever), but that we are too cruel to each other.  I am too likely to read things that remind me of the saddest and angriest parts of a support group about who is real and who isn’t.  
And I don’t have a fix.  Just don’t.  I think this problem applies to discussion in any society with great gulfs of inequality though, because the folks on the edges go nuts and have trouble talking in a way that others can access.  So while it may be frustrating as all get out, any creative solution will help us all move forward…

ReluctantI have to admit, I tend to be a bit resistent to new terminology that is just designed to be politically correct.  This is probably because the first “safe” community I found was the leather community in the 1980s, at a time when Andrea Dworkin and Catherine MacKinnon were assailing that community, porn, sex work et. al. to a highly irrational degree.  So conforming to something just to be PC just isn’t my nature.
That said, “cissexual” still fits a void that would otherwise be occupied by words like “normal,” which intentional or not are backhanded slaps in the face.  I’ve kind of reluctantly settled into using it.
I really hate that we get so hung up on language, labels, terminology (and it doesn’t help that everyone’s definitions differ).  To me, it’s always the intent.  To me, “shemale,” “tranny” or “queer” spoken playfully or with friendship, admiration and respect is a damn sight better than “transsexual” coming out of someone’s mouth with a spit of venom.  But then, as much as I don’t care for those former terms, I’ve been in environments where you sometimes have to adapt to them, so that’s sort of taught me to see past the literal.  Words don’t have to wound; intent does that well enough.
I also get tired of arguments about who is the “most marginalized” and “you don’t have it as bad as we do.”  It’s not a bloody contest.  Ideally, yes, people should show respect for our lot — but that should also be mutual.  I tend to think that we have it “different,” moreso that “better” or “worse.”
Re: censorship, I missed most of what occurred, but the way I see it, you simply use your best judgment, and sometimes mess up.  That’s your prerogative.  For the longest time, I thought I was being true to principle to allow anything on Dented… and that escalated to the point of threats.  There always has to be limits somewhere.  Basically, be as patient as is reasonable.  ”Are banned users ever allowed to return?”  If you feel assured that the apology is adequate and the behaviour will not be repeated.

Each person must hold some responsibility for their educationSeriously every TG person cannot post a detailed explanation of the term everytime they post! Let alone a long list of cis-privileges both cisgender in one column and cissexual the other.
Every yer there are new terms! Scientific ones, slang ones and so-on. People manage pretty well in getting used to them. You see one you don’t understand and you look it up. Not so hard surely? People are still getting used to the term twitter for example. And I now can’t use the term twitterpating anynore without people missunderstanding me now because the old ter is swallowed by the new.
Whether it’s twitter or podcast or Cis there are always new terms!
So it makes no difference that a term is new or has yet to saturate the media and community yet. And if theres a link and you don’t read it whose fault is it if you don’t have the knowledge the link contained? Why you of course and you alone.
Actually one of the common complaints of TG people is that often when they have a discussion of TG issues open to the general public online some cis folks come in and derail often important discussions by demanding a personal explanation of Transgender in all it’s minutia and often debating much of it. Can you imagine how annoying that must be? Especially when even wiki would sufficiently answer the persons questions.
That too is a part of cis privilege don’t you see? The demanding of the victimised and oppressed and marginalised and excluded group that they explain and justify themselves to you when you don’t have to do that to them as cisgender is already everywhere, universally understood and filling society and the mdeia so much you don’t think about it at all but accept unconciously it as the way everything just is.

Sorry, I don’t

Isn’t all of it essentially telling trans people to stop using words that (I’m sorry but, unreasonably) upset cis people?  Doesn’t anyone see the problem with this?

I don’t see the problem, because it’s the mirror of telling everyone else to stop using words that upset trans people. It’s just basic courtesy to not use a word toward someone after they’ve said it upsets them.
The first time I met a woman who objected to my calling her a girl, I didn’t understand it. If she’d lashed out at me, I still wouldn’t understand it, I’d have dismissed her as a crank and moved on. Instead she explained, and I don’t call women “girls” any more. I understand that it belittles adult women, that it’s demeaning – even if it isn’t intended to be. That it propagates a view of women as eternal children, to be cared for, but not listened to, or taken seriously.
I wrote previously that the word cisgendered has no emotional component for me. I don’t particularly object to having it used toward me, but others do, and I definitely object to being told that I’ll be called something whether I like it or not. My first – and usually final – reaction to that is to dig in my heels and say “the hell you will”. That doesn’t get either of us what we want. I want to learn more, and you want people like me to understand your position, your goals, and your needs. Cooperation and education are the only way I can see that happening.

Rather than use terminologyMaybe an honest inventory of personal privileges (and handicaps) is a better strategy.  If done right, it will reveal far more about ourselves and others than assigning terminology.  It’s not something that can be off the cuff;  if it’s done quickly, or for that matter, finished up at all…it won’t be right.
Done so, I suspect we will all come to the conclusion that privilege is part of each and every one of us.
The next step is to come to the conclusion that exercising privilege over some one else is a deep violation of that person’s freedom.
I am privileged (in Michigan, where I live) to have a job, and unfortunately, I have to go work it.

But it does make a differencefor example, if a trans person is directly implicating Mr. Privileged Asshole that I am in every single injustice that has ever happened to transfolk (as happened at QT last night).
I don’t do that with white people (though I know black people that do). When a specific issue of white privilege arises in a particular instance, I sit down and at least try to explain. Sometimes I communicate well, sometimes I don’t, sometimes a person gets it, sometimes they don’t, sometimes they don’t give a rat’s ass (in which case I just move on).
And while I did feel a bit of vitriol being directed at my clueless ass at QT last night, there were others that were more restrained that took the time to explain ( in a tone that still let me know that I was a bit of a cisprivileged asshole) and now I know a little bit better.
I don’t know perfectly; I don’t know anything perfectly. But everyone has different learning curves, I guess.  

What Alternative?I know women that like being called Girl, a personal preferance for them.
But at least there are alternatives aren’t there!
And there’s a heap of terms that apply to you whether you like it or not.
Human for one.
Discussions of sexism require words like… sexism!
What alternative is there that puts Trans and the Cis-equivalent as equal? Cis does it but if people object what alternatives are there? Not-Trans is othering as far as I and a heap of other TG people are concerned.
And Cis still applies to me as I currently consider myself cis-sexual but Trans-gender!
It’s not like complaints about words like ‘tranny’ or ‘faggot’ where polite and nice alternatives exist. What more valid option is there to Cis?

He’s not suggesting an alternative, battybatty batshe’s not objecting to the term, at least not now.

I don’t particularly object to having it used toward me, but others do, and I definitely object to being told that I’ll be called something whether I like it or not. My first – and usually final – reaction to that is to dig in my heels and say “the hell you will”.

And that’s pretty much my attitude toward anyone.

At what cost?Sure speaking to a TG person and asking to be educated will work better like any one-on-one learning is better.
But as your literate enough to use the net you still could have gleaned most of it from some brief research without putting the burden on others.
If our time is totally filled with nothing but one-on-one educating we wont be able to do anything else. And it’s not like we are getting paid for it whereas if you bought a book on it written by a TG person they’d at least get some royalties.
All-too-often important discussions of tg issues on a deep level get dragged back to just providing basic education to someone too lazy to look it up!
That it works has nothing to do with the cost that many pay for your privilege to swan in and demand to be educated.
Now luckily for you I don’t mind personally doing that education But I see the cost others pay for it and so its important that one of the things that privileged communities as a whole need to learn is that they can’t demand the oppressed just drop everything and teach them personally.
Now feel free to contact me directly or on my own little blog if you have questions I might be able to answer that would be off-topic for this discussion here so it doesn’t become an object example of the trans-101-derailing.
But perhaps whats really needed is a community-wide education.

I noticedThe point is that if the term is the term and there’s no better term then thats what everyone is stuck with!
And there’s lots of things he is called without anyone asking. If he’s Cis then we can start with his being called He and him!
Then add man. Male. Human. Homo Sapiens Sapiens. There will be a truly massive host of descriptive terms that will apply, tall average or short.. terms of build, skin and eye and hair colour, personality type…. Where all these objected to also?
Where there are alternatives then a persons preferance and objections has meaning. Where there are none then all there can be until a better alternative is coined is an objection to the topic being discussed at all.

Not demanding to be educated at all at this pointAnd, as you said, the information is out there and i will read it and study it. Several people at QT actually offered to help and I appreciated.
But explain this to me. What is the cost that many in the trans communities pay for “my privilege?”

Fair enough

If our time is totally filled with nothing but one-on-one educating we wont be able to do anything else. And it’s not like we are getting paid for it whereas if you bought a book on it written by a TG person they’d at least get some royalties.

I’ve read several threads and various posts here and at other places where the same book can be lauded and pilloried. The same viewpoint can be esteemed and vilified. How do I know which to believe without asking someone?
And, you know, sometimes life isn’t fair. Sometimes life blows chunks. I don’t like that I have to explain my gayness, I don’t like that I always have to respond to stereotypes with gracious understanding for the clueless (not the willfully ignorant, then it’s open season). I don’t like that I can be bopping along, having a perfectly great day, and suddenly I have to stop and play Tutor To The Brain Dead. That’s one of the prices we pay for being a minority. No, it’s not fair, but it is. When some guy starts pissing and moaning that women get all the choices when it comes to childbirth, and he has none, I tell him “Welcome to Biology 101″. In this case, for both you and me, the only practical and realistic answer has to be “Welcome to Psychology 101″.

CostsWhich one?
As there are many.
In the context of my post specifically it is the regular derailment of TG issues on TG blogs with getting all sidetracked by Cis-concerns and basic education. Thats a cost in time, in effort, in loss of the original discussion. And it hapens plenty frequently. So much so that many TGs cannot have a TG-centred discussion unless they confine themselves to small backwaters because cis-concerns end up hijecking the discussions.
Essentially it becomes all about the Cis-person, the cis-persons needs, the cis-persons feellings.
And TG issues get filtered through the screen of how it will effect cis-people.
Example: Because Cis-people may find it uncomfortable to share a public toilet with a TG person TG-people are forced to justify why they should have access to public toilets at all. The real need of the TG people and their measured risk of violence (there have been a number of assaults on TG people in public toilets) is compared to an imagined risk to Cis people (after 30 years of some places allowing TG people to use the bathroom that matches their presentation there has been no increase in danger to cis-people. There is a greater risk from other cis-people than from TGs going by the data!) and to the cis-peoples comfort (where their squeemishness is more important than the TGs safety and basic access to the outside world).
Not only does that make a TG-safety and basic-amenities issue about cis-concerns it also underlines how TG people exist solely by the sufferance of cis people, without recognised equality as humans, who must beg or argue and fight snd educate till blue in the face just to get basic things everyone else takes for granted.
Just having to do that has a massive emotional and psychological cost. It’s othering in itself, marginalising and dehumanising.

Yep…I agree completely…well said.

Vocabularies and responsesI’m a cisgendered male. To me, that feels like a simple statement of fact. The adjective is new to me, so it has no sub-text for me.
(By contrast, “queer” and “faggot” always make me flinch, because those words were used to literally assault me.)
If someone refers to a “cisgendered gay rights movement”, I react the same as when someone refers to a “male gay rights movement” or a “white gay rights movement”. Those also feel to me like statements of fact. I understand all three labels as critiques of failures within the LGBT movement.
If someone actually asserts on principle that there should ONLY be an LGB movement (or an LG movement, or a G movement), well, I disagree with them on principle. It is an argument that fails to match reality. (In the 1970s I would have said it was “objectively counter-revolutionary”, but that was a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.)
I have a wistful nostalgia for the loss of the “gay rights movement”. I wish it still existed. I was saddened when it morphed into the united front against patriarchy that is the LGBT movement. But I absolutely do not agree in principle that that united front should be dissolved.
At every step of the transformation, I completely agreed (and continue to agree) with what was happening. When lesbians argued that “gay” implied “male”, I agreed. When bisexuals argued that “gay and lesbian” left them out, I agreed. When T-folk argued that they were being excluded, I agreed.
So — I personally am not offended by the term “cisgendered”, whether it is being used as a calm statement of fact or an angry accusation. YMMV, of course.
As a side issue, I do not agree that anyone has a right not to be offended by the speech of others. I assert my right to offend christianists, god-worshippers of all stripes, right-wing loons, and anyone else I disagree with. I also assert that my right to do so by necessity entails their right to offend me. Being offended does not harm me (me, personally); being criminalized, harassed, tortured, or murdered harm me.
As far as moderation, one of the reasons that I read the Blend and not Daily Kos is because the Blend is moderated to the extent that it is. My life is filled with many interests and obligations. I personally have no time to read vicious attacks, whether they are on me or on others I consider allies.

Peoples views differ tooYou wont get a better answer from one person than from one book.
Both will be from individual points of view. And getting multiple sources will be needed either way. But if you try looking up a few articles first, lurking on a blog or forum a little etc you’d be surprised what you pick up and then when you do ask a question it will be from a more informed level. So you can skip some of the worst mistakes that way and can begin to ask questions that will get better results.

bounce and be done with trollsSince the baristas already recognize the destructive effects of hostility and of trolls and other sociopaths, I wait with much interest to see if they will effectively put an end to this infestation.  I simply want to suggest that the baristas not struggle with exaggerated remorsefulness when they enforce the rules.
Maintain the blend as the sort of place where you would want to share your wedding pictures.  

stop looking to your goddamn CAT for answersSo, I asked my kat Bon-Bon last night and this morning “How do I fix this?” Again she silently stared at me from her window perch.
Maybe, just maybe, instead of making trans people your whipping girls — as you quite blatantly did with me — you should start listening to what trans people are saying about how you fucked up.
Instead of bowing and scraping to win favor among cisgender people.
Several very rational and friendly trans people have told you exactly how to start fixing this. But instead you did completely the wrong thing.
PS:  Thanks for throwing me to the wolves because I spoke the truth about what Aravosis did in 2007. I really appreciate that, you fucking asshole.

Poisoned wellI have been a long time lurker here, I have been hesitant to post until now because of what I see as being the almost abusive use political correctness by Autumn and a few others.
The actions of Ms Sandeen have extreme enough that I think the only to restore trust at the Blend would be for Autumn to resign and no longer post here.
Weaponizing political correctness chokes free thought, it also creates animosity.
Right now PHB is not seen in a good light for what has happened.
I feel if the Blend is to survive then there must be some big changes including changes in management.  

Wow44 comments and everyone is pretty much civil.

Wow44 comments and everyone is pretty much civil.

Don’t bother asking angry cis people what term to useThey are refusing to answer that question.
They want their privilege to remain invisible.

Good afternoon, KynnWell, it’s afternoon where I am.

Autumn and Pam are not being “civil”Their words may be honeyed but what they are really saying is very indecent.

please get kynn out of here already

The Kat (Cat)The Kat is a prop designed to divert one’s attention and personalize the discussion, it’s an old writers technique.

I’m at seaI’m one of the 3,000 newbies.  I came here originally because of my interest in marriage equality:  So many of you are feet-on-the-ground reporters, and you provide terrific insight into what’s really happening around the country on an issue I care deeply about.
IRL I’ve only ever had one trans friend (that I know of); and although I’ve made friends with trans people in online communities, I’m basically pretty uneducated when it comes to trans issues.
Which brings me to one of the reasons why I’m still here:  I don’t want to inadvertently hurt anyone through my ignorance.  I need to know what words are triggers for others so I can avoid them.  It’s not being PC…it’s simple civility.
My guess is that what the Blend is experiencing right now is major growing pains.  You’ve gone from a small tight-knit community where certain responses were automatically anticipated to a larger (nearly double in size) place with a lot of new blood.  It will simply take time for the community to reform in its new configuration.
Value what you have here.  Value each other.  And value the amazing insight you bring to others.

PropagandaAutumn, I will keep my promise never to dare to discuss transgender issues in the future.
However, I have to protest your statement that I compared transgender people to Nazis. I did nothing of the kind.
The Nazis did more than just kill millions of people. They invented modern political propaganda. They were experts at silencing the opposition.
There is a fairly decent Wiki about the subject here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N…
I believe that the use of the terms “cisgender” and “cissexual” as a method of identifying a group as one that enjoys undeserved privilege is classic political propaganda. It is exactly what the Nazis did to gain power and influence in Germany.
That doesn’t mean the objectives of the transgender movement are the same as the Nazis. Of course, they don’t want to exterminate the “cis” people. (Stating that was my intended message is really just a hyperbolic way of demeaning me.) However, I do believe that they are politically motivated and wish to silence those they view as oppressors. The comments on this blog and your action to ban me from The Blend support that.
I find it ironic that you quote Martin Luther King Jr. frequently without acknowledging how he felt about the concept of privilege.

My friends, I must say to you that we have not made a single gain in civil rights without determined legal and nonviolent pressure. Lamentably, it is an historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture; but, as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us, groups tend to be more immoral than individuals.
– Martin Luther King, Jr. Letter From A Birmingham Jail

This is why it is futile to discuss “cisgender privilege” and focus on groups that are perceived to be your oppressors. King recognized that.
Equality must be attained through legal channels, not by identifying a privileged class and alienating individual allies who happen to belong to a particular group.
In order to succeed, you must appeal to individuals. You must recognize that morality and compassion resides in the individual and not a group. This is why is saddens me to see transgender people actually invent a name for a broad group that they see as privileged.
You can’t just pick a choose your King philosophies. If you want to model your movement on his, you must abandon this attempt to invent a singular oppressive group and appeal to the individual conscience. That’s what King did. He didn’t lump all white people together and condemn them all for the privileges that they enjoyed.
Hitler, on the other hand, used the concept of undeserved privilege to effectively silence his political opponents. If a Jew objected to his argument, he simply said, “Of course you would say that, you’re a privileged Jew.” It is immpossible to argue with that statement. That is the position “cisgender” people are being put in by some in the transgender community. Is it any wonder that people like Aravosis are distancing themselves from this?
I have no choice but to distance myself as well. Good luck to you. You will not see my commentary on your articles in the future.

Hi, Pam and Autumn!Where exactly do trans people lodge our complaints when cis people are being rude? I’d like to know, I haven’t found that button on the web site.
Do you think Matt was being civil to me?
I would like a reply from Autumn regarding this. If she is serious about being willing to take her knocks from everyone, then she’ll respond to the trans woman who she specifically singled out to place the blame on for “weaponizing” the term cisgender.

Some trepidation entering this threadI don’t want to add any more heat to what is burning.
I have read at some trangender people’s sites, and the anger and hurt is palpable, but so is the blame against Autumn, who most sides should all agree, is in a difficult situation. She makes mistakes and she admits it, I can understand making mistakes…I do so often.
I hope the Blend attracts diverse voices, but I’m reminded of the saying “watch what you wish for.” Living in interesting times, is both a curse and a blessing.
There is a scene in Stonewall, where the two older characters speak of the younger ones, while one dances for the first time with a man. “You can’t tell them young uns, nothin’”
   BBC’s Stonewall
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…
I’m one of the older folks, and I won’t change easily, and you don’t need my approval, you’ll do as well as you can, like we did. Not perfectly.
I do hope those who are hurt and angry visit this thread, and we try to listen to each other…it’s a start.
I like videos lately so here’s Beyonce….”LISTEN”
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…

Actually Fritz;This is the very position transgender people put classic TS, WBT, HBS, woman of operative history in. (use whatever alphabet soup you wish there is plenty to go around.)
The Very behavior you sighted is the behavior that is the driving force in the alienation of the above groups from the TG cause.
Transgender people, especially the activists can be the movement’s worst enemy.
Everybody is privileged in one way or another.

Most people herecall me some variation of my handle, but if you really hate that, you can call me Scott. That’s my name IRL.
If you’re talking to me, or about me, that’s what I’d prefer. If you’re talking about aggregate groups of people, and not singling anyone out, then you can use whatever word you choose. I’ll decide whether I’m part of the group you’re describing or not.

sometimes one is reading along……trying to understand a brouhaha one missed, and a particular comment makes everything crystal clear.
Good grief Fritz.  Dude, I agree with you that one must appeal to individuals, and there is no “them”.  But, um, speaking as just one trans chica, this goes about it all wrong.  People hear “them” in lots of ways, and to my reading you light the fuse on a half dozen or so in as many paragraphs; the way to bring it back to individuals is to avoid the broad point and speak to…individuals.  Though I suspect you have heard this before, maybe :}

we’re all doing our best here…Not to sound namby-pamby, but being a queer person of any kind (L, B, G, T, Cis, poly, etc) is damn hard in this world. I think most people involved with PHB are really trying to make some sense out of the hatred that’s out there, and to support each other in the face of a still-hostile, straight-dominated culture. I wish we could give each other a break. Pam (and Autumn) work hard to keep the Blend going, to keep us informed, to encourage discussion, to support queer bloggers…I could go on.  I am not saying that people’s anger about feeling censored has no merit–it does–but calling anyone a “f#cking assh&le” is profoundly unhelpful. Nor does it answer any of the questions Pam asked above.
Here are my thoughts, if anyone cares (and it’s OK if you don’t).
1. Yes to comments…they are a way to delve more deeply into our discussions, to get to know each other, and, when needed, to call each other out on our sh*t.
2. Please keep moderating. Not everyone will like your decisions but I think it’s a huge plus of PHB that comments ARE moderated and it’s not a complete free-for-all flame war all the time.
3. I’m not really sure what purpose the ratings serve. Of course it feels nice when one or more other blenders give me a high rating, but that’s really all it is, and I do think some folks seem to use the ratings to diss people they don’t agree with. I do think we need some way to identify “trolls” or abusive comments. Maybe we could just have a “troll” rating and not the others?
4. I think the amount of moderating currently done seems fine. No more, no less.
5. Offensive language is so subjective…but I would agree with the poster who said we will know it when we see it. Cuss words, to me, are not offensive, unless you are calling someone a shithead, or whatever.
6. 24 hours to address an offensive comment.
7. Email to PHB tips seems more effective than the comment system.
8. Three strikes, you’re out.
9. Same.
10. I would like to think that anyone can be redeemed…perhaps a banned user could return after 6 months?

Everyone gets their say; I get to listen; Pam gets to listen.No commentary from me on a particular blender‘s comment(s) unless that particular blender specifically asks for a personal commentary back from me, and no one will be ejected for their comments here today.
This is what Pam and I said we were going to do, and this is what we’re going to do.  

Except Matt didn’t ask for a specific commentaryBut since you responded, are you going to take responsibility for the mob you’ve set on me, which includes Matt who apparently wants me gone, Autumn?
You’ve made me the whipping girl by pinning this on me — for a statement that was in no way “weaponized” — are you going to own up to your scapegoating or are you going to insist that your actions (which you admit were wrong) are justified by whatever you imagine I did?
This is a specific request from personal commentary from Autumn Sandeen.

While my generation couldn’t envision all the changesMaybe it’d suprise the younger voices, YOU are exactly what we hoped you’d be.
Unafraid, fiesty, and taking ZERO sh*t.
So while those qualities are amazing, they can also be uncomfortable to live with at times.

What’s wrong with me down-rating unproductive comments?Here, I’ll be nice, and even refrain from rating you down.
For what it’s worth, though — I don’t “get all worked up over civility” — I get worked up over oppression. There’s a difference and you’d best learn it.

See, I have a real appreciation for you, petey.

Everyone gets their say; I get to listen; Pam gets to listen. No commentary from me on a particular blender’s comment(s) unless that particular blender specifically asks for a personal commentary back from me, and no one will be ejected for their comments here today.
This is what Pam and I said we were going to do, and this is what we’re going to do.
To answer your question that you asked, there is not button. However, the function you would be looking for is the tips email address to The Blend, which is up at the top of our front page under the red block labeled “News Tips.”
How it works: you would give us a News Tip to a comment that you believed violated the Pam’s House Blend Terms And Conditions Of Service (Sometimes referred to as the Terms Of Service, or by the abbreviation TOS). You would tell us what the comment said, and why/how you believe the comment violated the TOS.
That’s the tool that’s been used by many in the past to make us aware of comments that violated the PHB TOS. You are free to use that email link in the future to report comments that violate the PHB TOS, although we’ve suspended the TOS rules for this thread.
Again; everyone gets their say; I get to listen; Pam gets to listen.  

Yes AutumnI second that.
Are you going to take responsibility for what you said and the actions that were a result of your words?

To answer your other question…No, I don’t think so — Matt wasn’t particularly kind to you, and talking past you instead of to you wasn’t particulary civil. I don’t believe his comment rose to a TOS violation — but in this thread that wouldn’t matter aanyway as these are suspended here today.
And on the other hand, if I had time to review every comment in every thread (like I’m doing with this thread — because I said I would) and send an email out regarding civil behavior, I might ask him to be more civil in the future to people he disagrees with. At a virtual coffee house of virtual friends, I believe we should be able to disagree without being disagreeable, and I didn’t see that kind of “virtual friendliness” happening in Matt’s comment to you.
But that said, I don’t have that kind of time. As Pam said, she doesn’t spend her whole day in front of the computer monitoring the threads at The Blend. I don’t either. Today, I’m only reading this thread.
If Matt asks me what I think of your comments, I’ll tell him whether or not I believe your comments were civil to him. Otherwise — and again — no commentary from me on any of the comments within this thread. It’s Pam’s and my turn to listen.
And, mostly my turn. So, I’m listening.

Matt isn’t aloneand it has nothing to do with Autumn or anything else, it has to do with your behavior, today, in this thread.
We get it, you’re angry. Are you anything else? Is there some other side to you? Can you get over your anger and contribute anything productive, or do you just want to continue being a dam in the middle of everyone else’s stream? I don’t have much use for a dam, and I’ve sure as hell never let a dam change my mind about anything.
I don’t see where you being here today leads to anyone’s progress, including your own.

it’s mutualand the same goes for Pam, Autumn, Louise, dyssonance, Zoe B, Pollyanna, and many others.

pointless to respond to a Godwin but…

Equality must be attained through legal channels, not by identifying a privileged class and alienating individual allies who happen to belong to a particular group.
-Fritz

Certainly, the question is, what do you do when someone like Barney Frank or Aravosis specifically act in order to prevent justice through legal channels? How should we respond when Frank revises a bill to exclude trans people, or Aravosis openly questions whether an inclusive ENDA is in the best interests of everyone?
I have Letter from a Birmingham Jail bookmarked, and I don’t think it says the same thing you claim. In that response, King wasn’t opposed to calling white moderates out on their shit:

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
-MLK, “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”

People made the exact same criticism of Avarosis that King made of the white moderate from the Birmingham Jail. Because Avarosis did not see himself personally affected by a trans-inclusive ENDA, he considered it reasonable to question the viability of those protections. And pointing out that Avarosis is, or at least identifies as cisgender (non-trans) strikes me as much less a personal attack on him than King’s statement that the white moderate was more frustrating than organizations engaged in murder.

You can’t just pick a choose your King philosophies. If you want to model your movement on his, you must abandon this attempt to invent a singular oppressive group and appeal to the individual conscience. That’s what King did. He didn’t lump all white people together and condemn them all for the privileges that they enjoyed.
-Fritz

Certainly you can’t do that, so why do you quote from a text that did condemn white moderates as a class for their blindness and unwillingness to support change?
Saying that Avarosis is cisgender isn’t a condemnation. It’s pointing out that he, personally, does not have a vested interest in gender identity protections for ENDA, DADT or DOMA.
Avarosis had a bill in congress that would have given him substantial employment protection had it been made into law. Trans people were explicitly excluded from that bill, in spite of being subject to the same kinds of discrimination. That’s privilege, and it’s no slur to point out that perhaps Avarosis may have acted on the basis of it.  

When does ‘descriptive’ become ‘weaponised’?I’m read about half the entry so far, and am about to go back and read the other half, but I do feel the need to call out one bit:
“In that comment, the term cisgender wasn’t used to explain privilege to people who didn’t understand it, but instead used to angrily — accusatorily — pointing a finger at John Aravosis for being a gay white male who doesn’t care about the civil rights of transgender people.”
The term ‘cisgender’ was, as i read that commebnt, being used to denote that Aravoisis’ priorities are exclusive rather than inclusive, and that the nature of his exclusivity was that he included cis and excluded trans.  It was descriptive and pertinent to the problem.  (I do not, off the top of my head, know whether ‘white’ and ‘male’ were equally pertinent — I have more back-reading to do.)
If the intent of labelling someone cisgendered is to claim that their words don’t count because their gender happens to match their natal assigned sex, then I can see you having a problem with that.  If the intent of labelling someone’s version of LTBG activism as being peculiarly non-T-inclusive — as being cissexist, then the word is being used in a meaningfully descriptive way and the thing it’s pointing out is what’s ugly, not the word being used to point it out.
So yeah, up to that point in this essay, it still sounds like a Tone Argument.
Now I’ll go read the rest.

A question for AutumnWhy are you lying about the sequence of events?
Your “discovery” that “cisgender” is offensive came BEFORE my post that you call out as the start of all this.
Your banning discussion supportive of “cis” came BEFORE my post.
You are scapegoating me, pure and simple, by using revisionist history in the most appalling way possible.
Here is my blog post with links to the comments and their timestamps.
I make it very clear at the end of blog post what I expect from both you and Pam: A retraction of your fabrication and an apology, posted on the top level of this site.
I will not be made the whipping girl because you moderated poorly.
Note: I request a specific response to this post from both Autumn and Pam.

or in other wordsHad the 2007 exclusive ENDA passed, Avarosis would have his day in court if he experienced certain forms of discrimination. Transgendered people would have been denied that same option.
If that’s not privilege, I’ll eat my shoe.  

My two centsI agree with the sentiment that we don’t want to go the way of Shakesville and become a pay-to-play members-only clique.  I’m incredibly offended by what that site has become.
I’m a gay white man who knows very little about the lesbian or bisexual experience and even less – much less – about transgender issues.
But the Blend is a place where I come to learn and understand what the other letters in LGBT are all about.
While I do advocate for civility and respect, I also believe it is the responsibility of a community to be self-policing.  Pam and Autumn – I suggest that your roles be as arbiters, authorities to whom we can appeal.  Not overseers, as some paint you here.
You have posted the rules and I believe the majority of us abide by them. When others don’t, (except in extraordinary situations) the community should attempt to handle the situation first and then appeal for intervention if the situation isn’t adequately addressed.

HmmmA lot of people are acting silly in this whole argument. Let me break this all down to show just how silly it is.
1) Someone gets upset and offended by something they were called when they don’t even know what it means.
2) Someone gets upset and offended that someone was upset and offended by something and tells them why they shouldn’t be offended.
3) People (including me) argue back and forth about why or why not someone should or should not be offended.
4) People on both sides take everything out of context, don’t listen to the other side, and blame the other side for being whatever they feel.
5) Great people who are forced to make judgment calls because of how the readers are acting get blasted all over the internet for making a judgment call that YOU FORCED THEM TO MAKE.
6) Those people feel horribly about it and post with their feelings, and people again come back and blast them.
People, both trans and cis (or not trans whatever you want to be called) need to realize that YOU FORCED AUTUMNS HAND.
Don’t try to be all innocent and say that you were thrown to the wolves or thrown under the bus by this. You were posting angrily with a lot of vitriol. So was the other side, but that doesn’t make what you did right.
Autumn tried to point out that she handled it wrong, but the posts were stopped because there wasn’t civility. You are the one throwing her under the bus because you are pissed that you were called out on being vitriolic.
No one should get a free pass for being mean. It doesn’t matter if you are cis or trans, if you are white or black, if you are L, G, B, T, Q, I, TS, or any other letters we have. You have no idea at all what anyone else is or has been through. If they ask you to back off, then back off. You’re not helping anyone’s cause by pushing them and making them defensive. You can educate without being vitriolic.
I should explain my position. I think the people upset over being called cis are wrong, because they don’t understand it completely. I think part of that problem is people using the word in a derogatory sense and rarely in it’s intended usage. I think that cutting off the word is the worst thing that can happen. People should start using the word in it’s intended sense and not only when hurling insults.
To all the Ts here at the Blend: We’re not all Ts and this is not a 100% T board. Some people don’t know anything. Most of us here are for you, and for 100% inclusivity. Don’t treat us as the enemy, and don’t talk down to us. Not all cisgendered white gay men want you to shut up and be quiet. Quite a few of us fight for inclusivity just as hard as you. Some of us use our privilege to try and add Ts to everything we do. So please don’t lump us all together as has been done. Some people don’t understand the concept of privilege very well or at all. Work with them to educate and don’t blast them for not knowing.
To all the non-Ts here at the Blend: Lighten up. No one is out to get you. If you are a cisgendered gay white male (like me) and you’re screaming about oppression from the LGBT community, take a step back and realize you’re like christians screaming that they are oppressed. The fact is that cisgendered gay white males (like me) DO oppress the LBTs in our community (not like me). The fact is also if you do not do that, then COMMENTS ABOUT THE OPPRESSORS DO NOT POINT TO YOU. THEY ARE NOT TALKING ABOUT YOU. They are talking about the ones like Aravosis. NOT YOU.
To Autumn: You made a bad judgment call, and it blew up in your face. You didn’t handle a situation correctly, and it made you look bad. Everyone does things like this. You’ve apologized for your mistakes with a personal and heartfelt post and that’s all you can do. You don’t deserve to have this shitstorm come down on you at all. There were no innocent parties in the debate, and anyone trying to look innocent or like a victim is a drama llama.
To Pam: Disabling comments would be counterproductive in my opinion. The blend thrives on the blenders, and it would shrivel and die without them. My only suggestion is to be patient with people, but when people are being intentionally vitriolic warn/ban them for that reason, and that reason alone. Don’t say it was because of specific words, because that always gets taken out of context.
If the Blend can afford it, I would suggest a few 24/7 moderators to take the stress off the bloggers. Especially people who don’t post diaries, so there isn’t double duty being done. And/or a way to mark possibly harrassing/vitriolic comments to bring them to a modertors attention right away, even if they don’t see it as it comes up.
And to everyone on all sides of the argument: CALM DOWN. Take a deep breath and realize that infighting will help no one. By being intentionally mean you are alienating our allies. Anger helps no one.
Feel free to respond Autumn, Pam, anyone. I hope I don’t seem vitriolic, I just had some strong feelings about what went on lately. If I do seem vitriolic, please feel free to delete me or send me a warning. If either happens, I know I will have earned it.

contemptYour observation is significant, indeed.   It is worthy of very serious consideration and I hope that it won’t get overlooked in all of the hand-wringing over “cis” and whatnot.  How dreadful for “GLBT” to be linked  with “contempt.”  Yet your conclusion must be an exaggeration, if for no other reason than your comment about contempt was not itself made in contempt.  
On the one hand, some characters of the Blend unashamedly excrete tons of contempt for everybody and everything that they dislike.  I imagine that these kids must be stewing in their own bile.  On the other hand, the Blend has been blessed with more than a few sparks of real class, of genial wit and of wisdom — If your web search didn’t come across any of these, look again.

Personally, I like it…I’m cisgendered and very happy to have discovered the term.  I’ve often been uncomfortable with trying to find some way to delineate cisgendered/transgendered in discussion.  Using transwoman or transman is simple.  But how do you describe the cisgendered without perpetuating stereotypes with words like “real,” “normal,” “natural,” “born a…”.  None of these terms are accurate to describe the differences and all of them are insulting.  Having the word allows us to stop pretending that there’s some sex/gender default from which all others deviate rather than a complex spectrum of sexes and genders.  
Okay, I’ll shut up now.

the experiment begins…Blend reboot – a week-long, free-speech comment zone experiment

Sympathy for a difficult position, but not letting you off the hook yet“So, I’ve been slow to respond because I’ve taking a few days off to cool my anger, and to recharge.”
Y’know, that was pretty frustrating to everyone wanting an instant reaction to their criticisms of what you did and said, and yes, it let things build up pretty big without being addresed right away, but I’m going to have to say that IMNSHO, it was probably the right thing to do.  I, for one, would rather be made to wait a while for answers not made in the heat of “OMG I’m under attack!” defensiveness and anger, than see positions staked out and defended as surrogates for defending one’s self, that turned out to be the wrong positions to defend in the first place.
I do still see big problems with your current response.  But having taken an emotional step back, and some time to sort out what you mean from what you wrote, shows.
(I know it’s Not The Same, because I was only criticized by one stranger rather than a whole community, but the first time a gay man called me out on my use of ‘straight’ as a synonym for ‘het’, my gut reaction was to defend it … instead I asked for a day to think about my response, and came back calmer and agreed that he’d been right, and have tried to stick to using ‘het’ since.  If I’d answered straightaway (no pun intended), we each would have left thinking the other was an oversensitive and bigoted asshole.)
It sucks to have most of the community hating on you, and I hope you do turn this around.  At the moment, you’ve still got statements out there that need to be better argued/explained, or recanted.  Despite being one of us, you did manage to convey a Tone Argument (to be fair:  most of the criticisms of you that I’ve seen have asserted that you were first taken in by Fritz’s tone argument) and make many trans people feel as though we were being told to let those with cis privilege prescribe the language to our detriment.
Walking the line between “civility” and “not falling for the tone argument” is, well, delicate and difficult.  I do appreciate that it’s difficult, and all the more so for being in such a well-known place.  (It’s much less effort at my blog, which has only a few hundred readers.)  Sometimes, even in a friendly little café or coffeshop, people do need to bellow a little to let other people know how important a line they’ve just crossed, and things can go back to being friendly once it’s all been sorted out; whereas being told that raising a voice is forbidden, people will seethe, get even angrier, and find other outlets (including passive-aggressiveness, or leaving in disgust and telling outsiders why).  And even the short, justified explosions can be uncomfortable as hell, both for those of us who simply do not cope well with being around angry people (or feeling anger ourselves), and for moderators and other “space owners” who fear the day when a blow-up marks the start of a downward slide into perpetual ugliness instead of a much needed venting of steam.
Sometimes bottling up the steam just leads to a bigger explosion.

the only trouble is findingwhich of your abusive comment out of dozens of your abusive comments could be submitted.  you really have some nerve calling for civility when you can’t muster it yourself, to anyone.  i have every right to call it out when it’s spattered around these threads like the shit that it is.  yes–loves to dish it out, hates to eat it.  why am i not surprised?  it’s the same line that we hear from bigots when they say that calling out their bigotry IS bigotry.  
speaking of hypocrisy, it’s nice how you’ve singled me out as “cis” now, several times, in spite of the fact that it’s irrelevant to the fact that you’re rude.  and you really still think that it’s just a word, when you’re clearly using it as a perjorative?  this is some game you’re playing–i hope you’re enjoying it because it’s really ugly.    

I don’t see it that wayYes, I’ve read the original posts. But I don’t see it that way. His calls for having open dialog and questioning comes entirely from a position of privilege that it’s not his right to employment that Frank is not placing on the chopping block.
And well, we’ve been having these conversations for the last 20 years. Trans people were pointing out that they were marginalized in groups that nominally included them when I came out in ’90. We were debating whether gender-variant people helped or harmed the community in ’90.
This isn’t a new discussion, and suddenly asking the question as to whether transfolk are part of the community in the midst of their most vulnerable hour, as if the question wasn’t a chronic dead horse that’s been revisited time and time again since Stonewall is incredibly short-sighted.  

I’m right here with you – gay, white, male – barely a minority according to some, but trying to learn and understand.
Unfortunately it’s gotten to the point that I pretty much ignore any posts that seem to be trans related on the front page simply because they keep devolving in ways that seem like a very juvenile “oneupmanship” of some person or group over another.
It’s a shame, because I feel the most of the people involved have things to share with the rest of us, education and understandings that we don’t currently have – but as allies, we’d really like to know.
It sure was a helluva lot easier when we could just come in here and have a common bitch session about whatever wrongs BushCo was up to on a daily basis.
If someone calls me ‘cis’ – I don’t care – simply because I’m not even sure enough of the term to know whether I should be insulted or feel complimented.  And the saddest part of that is that once or twice in different diaries when I asked – it just got lost in the flame wars.  Everyone got so caught up in proving their point of view as the right one, nobody bothered asking if any of the rest of us were learning
Sure seems like a pretty non-productive way to build allies and coalitions

The Issue Is That the Trans Community Is Seeking to Define OTHERS – Not ThemselvesI’ve been reading Pam’s House Blend for over a year now, but registered until this discussion (although I’ve always considered the comments as much a part of the content as the blog posts themselves, I was happy to just read).
I’m a twenty-something year old gay man.  I think the point the transgender community is missing is that they are not looking to define themselves or to determine their own lexicon.  However a group chooses to define themselves, the broader society should respect that.  When gay men demanded to be called “gay” instead of faggots, society eventually complied.  The same for people of color who, after the civil rights movement, claimed the identity of “African American” and demanded, in many cases, for the older generations to stop referring to them as “negro” or “colored”.  As an oppressed group, that was their right.  
What is happening here, however, is entirely different.  The transgendered community is not seeking to define themselves or ask the broader society to refer to them with a specific term that shows them respect.  Instead, they are labeling another group and demanding that group accept the label.  At that point, they exceeded their rights.  When they found out that others found the labeling offensive and yet still persisted, it’s no different than the intolerant man or woman who still uses derogatory terms for other races, genders, or sexualities.
To illustrate from the earlier example: Although the term itself wouldn’t have been different, if it had been white men who labeled people of color “African American” and demanded that the black community describe itself that way, it would have been offensive and unjustified – again, even though the term didn’t change.
No group has the right to label another group.  Regardless of the intention (which, I believe, in many cases was good natured), the idea of labeling a large cross section of society without their consent, and in many cases, after they’ve informed you they find the word offensive, is only counterproductive to the transgendered rights movement.  Not only is it a losing battle, the damage is going to include the loss of support from the gay community who, right or wrong, will be hesitant to fight for a group that they feel doesn’t care about their own requests and continues to label them a term they find derogatory.  It’s just human nature.

But is it the term, or the existence of any term, that made him uncomfortable?“The first time I met a woman who objected to my calling her a girl, I didn’t understand it. If she’d lashed out at me, I still wouldn’t understand it, I’d have dismissed her as a crank and moved on. Instead she explained, and I don’t call women ‘girls’ any more.”
Yup, and she didn’t just say, “Don’t call me ‘girl’,” did she?  Her explanation probably mentioned ‘woman’ or led you by the nose to it.
The objection to ‘cis’ that trans people objected to in turn did not say, “that’s an uncomfortable term and i want you to use this other one instead.”  Rather, it just said not to use the term, and by extension, the concept.  Since then, I’ve seen assertions that the very concept of ‘cisgender’ is a meaningless, made-up class — not just claiming offense at one name for it, but trying to invalidate the entire idea.
Is it any wonder that so many trans people and allies dug in ourheels this time?  It was not, as far as we could tell from the start and as further evidenced by where things went later, an honest request to pick a less offensive term; it was a heavy-handed attempt at silencing trans people.

@ FritzNazi’s didn’t invent propoganda, communists in Russia used the film Battleship Potemkin for propoganda…very efficiently
  http://historical-films.suite1…

Not everybody wants to see wedding picturesI for one would much rather have PHB be a place where all issues (yes, even the divisive ones) touching the queer/TBLG communities can be discussed openly. Do I think that discussing divisive issues will sometimes result in angry discussions? Yes, but silencing dissent by not allowing angry people to speak, no matter how justified their anger might be, isn’t going to make the Blend a better place.

PleaseExcept that Avarosis wasn’t just having that conversation.
He was raising the conversation at a critical point in time in connection with what he described as the most sweeping civil rights legislation to ever be proposed in regards to LGBT people. He wasn’t just questioning the role of transgender people in the movement, he was questioning their role to a piece of legislation he called revolutionary.
The fact that his rights were not on Frank’s chopping block gives him the privilege of asking those questions at the worst possible time.  

Not exactly

Although the term itself wouldn’t have been different, if it had been white men who labeled people of color “African American” and demanded that the black community describe itself that way, it would have been offensive and unjustified – again, even though the term didn’t change.

Now if African Americans (the minority) had demanded that white people be called “white people” under that scenario then, well…that would fit your scenario.
The connotations of the words “white” and “black”, simple as they are, are extremely loaded with white privilege. That part of the reason that some wanted to be “African American” and not “black”
Now if the African American community commanded at the same time that white people be called ___________ that also would be close to the present scenario. But notice, you rarely hear “white Americans”. it’s invisible there, but understood.

Don’t let the Blend turn into ShakesvilleI was on the verge of asking for my account to be deleted. Depending on how this all goes, I still might. I took two hours to write this comment, because I’m still so angry I wanted to take time and do it right, and say exactly what I mean. When I use the terms “cis” and “trans” here, they are meant as descriptors, not weapons. I’m not attacking any individuals here. Please bear that in mind.
Kynn said upthread: They want their privilege to remain invisible. I believe that she is right, and that her assessment does apply to a large portion of the LGB community.
That is the first reason why I am so angry at all this – there are cis LGB people who have in fact examined and who recognize their privilege as cissexual people. I believe this describes the majority of cis LGB Blenders. They are allies to the T community, and fight just as hard for T inclusion as they do for their own civil rights. God bless ‘em, because our community needs as many inclusive-minded fighters as we can get, and then some.
On the other side of the coin, if commenters in places like AmericaBlog, Joe.My.God, and Towleroad are any indication, there are even more cis LGBs who refuse to examine their privilege as such, and who would deny and obfuscate our transgender brothers and sisters. It’s dehumanizing, it’s exclusive, and it’s the same kind of behavior that straight majority christians exhibit towards LGB people. That makes me angry, for all the reasons listed above and then some. I’m livid on behalf of my transgender family, and livid on behalf of our movement, which 40 years after Stonewall STILL cannot seem to get its shit together, put aside our internal squabbles, clasp hands, and plow forward.
My fight is against ATTITUDES, not people. It always has been. A bigoted asshole is a bigoted asshole no matter what minority status s/he has. I re-state my truth that the fight for LGB rights and the fight for transgender rights are one and same. They are rooted in the fight for people other than cisgender heterosexual (wealthy, white) men to have a sexuality and a gender identity and not be legally punished or socially condemned for it. (FTR, I include a woman’s right to choose in this fight for the same reason, even though as a lesbian it’s highly unlikely I will be personally faced with the situation.)
The fact that it’s been mostly GWM making such a fuss reinforces a highly unpleasant truth. Aside from being gay, these cis white men have the most privilege out of ANYONE in this country; if they are wealthy that privilege is magnified. We all know that privilege does not generally like to share. I honestly do not understand this attitude. It really perplexes and offends me. Recognizing one’s privilege and using it to lift up other, more disadvantaged people is a goal of liberal philosophy. So when I see a stereotypical cis GWM (or a transphobic lesbian such as Norah Vincent, or a separatist radfem) who refuses to be inclusive, my hackles go up. That person isn’t necessarily my ally, or an ally to people I care about. They’re dividing us, not uniting us.
This raises a question in my mind, and I would really, REALLY appreciate an answer: Why is it okay for us at the Blend to point out, discuss, condemn, and try to erase the racism in the white LGBT community, but pointing out transphobia and tightly-held cis privilege in the LGB community is taboo?
The second reason this situation made me angry is because we do in fact need combative voices in our community, people who are willing to administer the verbal smackdown when required. As we have seen in the political arena, attempting to have a good faith discussion with people whose fundamental opinion is that you are wrong by virtue of simply being is a useless endeavor. This entire exchange felt to me like trying to have a conversation with my mormon father, or with President Obama. It didn’t matter that people were still clinging to their privilege, ignoring reality, and oppressing the most vulnerable among us with impunity while smile-fucking the room (big thanks to Michael Bedwell for the term “smile-fucking”). So long as everyone was using their polite, indoor voices and their nice girl words, that’s all that mattered. To that, I say horseshit. The Blend isn’t Shakesville, for which I give thanks, and I would hate to see it go that way with silencing and cronyism taking the place of discussion, even when it becomes angry and strident. Like any family, we NEED to air our differences and grievances, and every now and then we even need a good knock-down drag-out screaming fight to clear the air. One of the things I’ve always admired about this place is that Pam and the other Baristas, with few exceptions until now, have pulled no punches, taken no prisoners, and called it like it is. There has been no mincing of words out of fear of offending someone with inconvenient, embarrassing truths. We as a community can’t avoid truth just because it’s painful. Part of that is confronting privilege within our own ranks, recognizing it, and using it as a stepstool instead of an anvil. There is no such thing as a real safe space in public, and we do ourselves a disservice pretending that there is.
This raises the second question in my mind: Will the Blend return to its roots as a truly progressive community, committed to raising awareness of and combatting racism, classism, misogyny, police brutality, homophobia, AND transphobia, especially within our own community, or will this place just become another echo chamber? Will the desire to be “nice” and “civil” override the need to raise awareness? Because raising awareness and fighting bigotry isn’t always a nice, civil business. It’s usually ugly as sin.
For the record, I am not transgendered. I am a white, middle-class, college-educated, early 30s, cisgendered, femme-presenting, straight-passing, able-bodied, military veteran woman. Each of those is a social privilege. I am a minority by virtue of being a non-christian childfree lesbian. That’s it. Nothing about my minority status makes me easily identifiable as a minority, which is in itself a privilege. It is my responsibility to examine and recognize each of my social privileges, and use them to raise awareness and fight the bigotry of those around me. To not do so and remain silent makes me no better than my mormon father who donated to pass Prop 8.
That is all I have to say right now.

Ah, an easy question to answer!“If someone calls me ‘cis’ – I don’t care – simply because I’m not even sure enough of the term to know whether I should be insulted or feel complimented.”
Generally, neither, any more than being called brunet or blue-eyed or able-bodied or Anglophone.  It just means that you identify as the gender that matches the sex you were assigned at birth based on a) the initial appearance of your genitals or b) a surgeon’s decision of which sex your ambiguous infant genitals would be easiest to ‘correct’ to, if you were born intersexed and never told.
It can be correct if that describes you, or incorrect if you’re actually transgendered, but the word by itself is no more of a compliment or an insult than ‘Russian-speaker’, ‘American’, ‘sighted’, or ‘electrician’.
OTOH, tone of voice can add meaning that is not inherent to the word.  If someone says it with a tone of relief, they may mean it as the kind of compliment that’s really an insult to us trans folk.  If they say it with a sneer that suggests that merely being cis implies other, darker things, then they’re probably pissed off about having been whacked over the head by somebody’s cis privilege.  (Fairly so if it was you who hit them with the privilege stick; unfairly if it was somebody else and you’re just a convenient target.)  In either case, it’s not the word, it’s the tone of voice and the whole sentence.
Similarly, ‘American’ can be a positive word to an American jingoist, a sneering slur to someone feeling oppressed by Americans or bigoted against us, and an absolutely neutral term 99% of the time.
So no, in general you should not feel insulted or complimented when somebody calls you ‘cis’.  Unless you’re not cis, in which case it’s your trans-invisibility that should bother you or please you as the case may be, and you can correct the speaker or not, at your pleasure.

wowkeori you summed up alot of the best arguments with a very forward non angry thinking post.  thank you

In a nutshell

The key mistake was Autumn’s rush to agree with Lane rather than telling him, “I’m sorry you feel uncomfortable, but the word is descriptive, and any other word would end up bugging you just as much because the thing it described is what’s making you uncomfortable.”

Yes, this, in a nutshell.

What we hopedWhat Petey said, doubled. As furious as I am at the limitations that are still in place, I am in awe of the refusal of so many younger than me to put up with crap. Thank you all for making this old fart proud.

“heterosexual” wasn’t naturalThe notion of heterosexuality as equivalent but different from bisexuality and homosexuality is a relatively new invention and came out of some radical research in the middle of the 20th century. Even then, it took until the early 70s before homosexuality was removed from the DSM. Many, many, many people openly criticize this idea, and advocate going back to a model in which homosexual and bisexual people can be treated as mentally ill, or jailed as deviants.
“Straight” was initially documented by a gay author in 1941 to describe men who had “gone straight,” and came into popular use only after it was ubiquitous within the gay community.
There are certainly other parallels. The neurodiversity movement coined the term “neurotypical” in an effort to promote greater tolerance for mental illnesses and disabilities. Feminist literary, cinema, and art critics specifically named male perspectives rather than treating them as universal.  

Sad.My first reaction is . . .I will never make comments on PHB again . ..
I’ve become the subject hate from people I love, embrace and have been integral support for me in other forums for several years.
I left PHB before the “cis-term debates” because I was not only reminded that my opinion was worthless, but also that my family experience isn’t worth the time of day . . because I’m not trans, and apparently because of that status I cannot and will never be able to truly stand up for my family in the eyes of many.
Today, I don’t feel that I can ever again advocate on behalf of myself or my own trans family members without being accused of white-gay-male-homo-privilege. I feel that I have been labeled as white-gay-homo who is not allowed to have an opinion on any issue in any way whatsoever unless it’s about white male homo marriage.
And so with that knowledge I will continue fighting for civil rights for myself and my family, but most certainly without the support of many in the trans community, family exluded.
This whole episode hurts me to the core in ways many cannot ever understand.
Anger and sadness.

YOURS I will respond to….I love you, my daughter, and am so proud of you.

Autumn explains in the introI don’t want to give into “the tone argument” — the argument that oppressors get to define what words the oppressed get to use, and get to say “I’d pay attention to you if your tone was better”
Frequently when oppressed groups object to how they’re being treated they’re accused of being nasty and unreasonable.  I don’t personally think the “tone” is necessarily the point – maybe the person whose tone you don’t like has a reason to be angry.  Or maybe you’re reading their objections as anger or nastiness.  I think it needs to be used with caution.  

That’s One Thing I’ve ConsideredSome friends and I have been talking about that – the introduction of heterosexual into the vernacular – trying to figure out why it wasn’t offensive but the other (“cis”) seems to be to a lot of people.  
The conclusion we’ve come to mirrors what another commenter said on here during the original post.  One of our friends was a linguist in college and said that it really could be the pronunciation (“siss” as opposed to “kiss”).  Comedians talk about how words with a hard “k” are funnier and more acceptable.  It’s something deep in the cultural language for English speakers, he argues.  As irrational as it sounds (and I attempt to be rational above all else), I finally concluded he’s right.  It could just be the word itself sounds ugly, therefore it seems ugly.  A more attractive sounding term really may be the key.  
Why?  Who knows.  Maybe it is subconscious.  Perhaps it’s because it sounds comparable to a snake’s slither or hiss.  Maybe it’s because a lot of gay men were called sissies.  That’s for psychologists and linguist to debate among themselves.
Regardless, the point remains: If heterosexuals had found the term offensive, the word won’t have gotten very far.  No group has the right to label other groups.  That’s just civility 101.  Even if the request not to be called something seems irrational, that’s beside the point because we all have the right to determine our own identity and label.  The “concept” may someday be acceptable, but I doubt with that particular sounding prefix.

ButWhy do others object?  Many trans people are suggesting that people object to the term because they object to being placed on the same level as trans people.
It would be the same as supporting heterosexual people who object to that term because their sexuality is normal/the default, while other types of sexuality are deviant and need to be named.  

It’s not really that much of an issueSo? I’m not Jewish, but that doesn’t mean that goy or gentile aren’t useful descriptions of me in some contexts. I may not identify as either, but I’m not going to begrudge being referred to as such in those contexts. Just because you (meaning you as a group, not you personally) didn’t make up yourself doesn’t mean it’s a bad word. Is it a word that’s meant to be used all the time as an identity? No. You don’t have to identify as cis yourself, but that doesn’t mean that nobody can use it to describe you in certain situations.

Ha! IRL!Thank you!  I always say “In real life” and my friends ask me, “How is the Internet not real life?”  I’m glad to see I’m not the only one that does that.

Some visuals might help, thoughOr it could hurt, for all I know!
I am envisioning multiple quadrants and axes with various labels (cis, trans, man, woma, black, white, gay, straight, etc.)  

Precisely …That’s a great point but if you were Jewish, and in a conversation you referred to me as goy or gentile and I asked you not to because (rational or irrational) I found it offensive, common civility said you refrain from using that label for me.  You could still use it in your conversations, with other Jewish people, etc.
I don’t have a huge vested interest in the term because I was fortunate and blessed enough to be born where my gender and body match.  My point is, the concept of “cis” is a valid one.  The label has begun to offend people.  
There have been cases where merely changing the title of a book led to massive increases in sales despite the same contents cover-to-cover.  Maybe it’s my rational world view, but if I were a trans-rights activist, I would realize that I was fighting for an idea – which is valid – and needed to find a better label for it.  It’s a needless battle, one that can only cost allies, which means further delay in civil rights.  
Even if I were to use the term in private, I’m a pragmatic.  I’d repackage it, relabel it, and make it palpable to the masses to accelerate the true goal – the right for transgendered people to be accepted as they are in society and the workplace, feel free from bodily harm, and enjoy the same rights as they would if they their gender and biology had been congruent at birth.

glad that the discussion is open againI first realized the ban on cis terminology by trying to post a comment to that thread, but hadn’t refreshed my page for a while. Too bad, as my comment that disappeared into the ether was so brilliant
While I was initially very upset, I also believed, based on past history, that there isn’t a desire to silence trans (or any other) voices here at the blend. If I thought any such thing was true, I’d leave. To me, a positive aspect of the Blend is that we can discuss difficult issues here, including privilege. I aspire to find commonality with other people, even those who are against us, in the hopes that change is possible.
Here’s what I was going to say in the closed thread. I am trans, or more specifically, non hrt, non-op androgyne. I am all too often gendered male by others, thus if one didn’t know me personally, they might perceive me as cis at a glance. I also recognize that because of this, I do benefit, whether I wish to or not, from cis privilege, even though I am trans. Being trans does not somehow make me immune from experiencing cis privilege.
Finally, I want to say to Autumn that I truly appreciate your work here at the Blend, your activism, and your willingness to say sorry when you make mistakes. We’re all human and I make my share too.

I can’t answer for anyone elseI don’t object to it, because it’s just a word. If it means something to you, and you want to use it, I’m all right with that. My sole objection – the only one I’ve ever voiced, or even thought to myself – is when the argument turned from “you don’t understand the word” to “I’ll use this word whether you like it or not, because you’re privileged”. The unilateral decision, and the implication that its use was a form of punishment for privilege, was my objection, not the word.
There may be people here who object to the word for precisely the reasons some are pointing to – that they define themselves as normal, and anyone who isn’t like them as abnormal. I don’t know what to say about them, except they’re wrong. The way the word normal is usually defined today simply doesn’t exist. It’s normal for me to be gay, just as it’s normal for my little sister to be straight. It’s normal for Autumn to be transgendered, just as it’s normal for me to be cisgendered. And there’s no value to be had, for any of us, by dividing us up into little groups and competing with each other. I can’t, and wouldn’t want to, defend anyone actually protecting their (dubious) higher status than another group, but it seems over the last several days there have been a lot of assumptions, and a lot of accusations, and way too few moments spent actually listening to and trying to understand each other.

heterosexual was offensiveHeterosexual was offensive and it still is offensive to many people.

No group has the right to label other groups.  That’s just civility 101.

I disagree. MLK had every right to name the “white moderate” and say that their prejudices were more frustrating than the KKK. Early gay rights activists had every right to name straights. Feminists had every right to talk about men as a class, and to talk about the privileges of their works. Civility isn’t a virtue when it allows for certain forms of privilege to go unanswered.
In my experience, opposition to cis- comes primarily from certain political quarters that have a big investment in not recognizing gender identity as analogous to sexual orientation or sex.  

Nice Pussy, Autumn!I’ve got two of my own.

Accidental derailing?

Not all cisgendered white gay men want you to shut up and be quiet. Quite a few of us fight for inclusivity just as hard as you. Some of us use our privilege to try and add Ts to everything we do. So please don’t lump us all together as has been done.

One problem that I’ve seen come up in context after context, including racism, sexism, and most other isms, is where someone points out that a) the privileged class is privileged and as a whole works against the disprivileged despite the efforts of allies within the privileged class, or b) that one particular person is throwing hir privilege around … and then other members of the privileged-in-that-context class jump in and say, “Oh no, I feel insulted, and you’re lumping us all together when we’re Not All Like That!”
Here’s a tip:  if the shoe doesn’t fit, don’t jam it on your foot and then complain about how it pinches!
If a trans person (for example) makes a bigoted statement that All Cis People Are [something bad], then the exceptions get to stand up and say, “Hey, not so fast.”  But when a trans person complains that the dominant cis-normative culture oppresses us, or that F. Random Derailler is abusing hir cis privilege, or that a particular group shows signs of being cis-centric, and you’re not that person or doing the things that person is accused of or forgetting to help resist the cis-normativity of the culture — if you’re not the one being complained about — then it’s not about you and it isn’t lumping you all together.  You’re reacting to more than what was said, out of fear that we might mean you.
So it winds up coming across as something like this:  an apparent ally asks for a cookie for not being an oppressor and simultaneously invokes a tone argument … which means that despite a positive history and good intentions, at that moment the would-be ally is Not Acting Like An Ally — sie’s (inadvertently, we hope) aiding the oppressors that sie’s complaining about having been lumped in with.
There’s irony there.  Way more irony than we need.
(Goodness knows I’ve done this too, on the other end of the privilege stick, and still have to choke down the urge to get inappropriately defensive sometimes.  And I was being unhelpful and wrong when I let that urge get ahead of reason.  I’m saying that I know better now, but not claiming to be, or to have been, perfect.  I wish it weren’t such an easy mistake to make.  But it’s still a mistake, and it can still be derailing.)
I closed my most recent blog entry with:

Some people will read this who have already progressed beyond this stage, with or without input from me.  You should be able to figure out whether you’re one of the people I’m yelling at or not.  If you’re offended because I yelled at all, then even if I wasn’t yelling at you when I started, I might be once I find that out.

Fortunately my friends who have commented so far seem to have been able to figure out whether my complaint about some cisgendered people’s stubborn opposition to neutral language is an attack on them or not.
So, really, if the shoe doesn’t fit, don’t insist on jamming your foot into it.

Most of the time I won’t just “second” things because I find that non-productive and a touch sycophantic, but in this case I will make an exception. The reason for the exception is that I think your comments are very much correct and to the point, but as you stated you were a gay male and with the pitting of gay versus trans in this whole train of threads I want to similarly make clear that I as a trans woman would have been proud to post something this elegant as a comment on what happened. I found your insights and suggestions to each particular person and the groups in general useful, constructive, and at times inspired. But I wanted to make clear that your insights–while they SHOULD stand on their own–were not simply perceived as another bow shot one of two sides.
Thank you for taking the time to post this comment.  

Not HelpingOkay, for whatever reasons, whether it’s unconscious associations with a phoneme or something more privilege-grasping, you don’t like the term and object to having it stuck on you.  Unless you’re suggesting less offensive terms, you are not helping any camp in this discussion … unless it’s all just a ruse to shut trans people up and make being cisgendered so much an ‘unmarked class’ that it never needs to be mentioned by name again (which can only happen if trans people become invisible), or to revert to cis-normative language like ‘real man’, ‘genetic woman’, and ‘normal people’.
You say your intent is none of those things, that you just don’t like the word.  So in the interest of not silencing or othering us, turn your criticism into something constructive and suggest a better word, one that, like ‘cis’, doesn’t other trans people, and which even more cis people don’t object to than ‘cis’.
I would really like to think that you are making an honest complaint that can be addressed, rather than just leaping on the latest excuse for not giving up unmarked status.  so please, help me out here, and make some suggestions.  I don’t tell people not to call me ‘tranny’ or ‘he-she’ without also telling them to call me transgendered or intergendered instead.  So what should we call you?

The reply Autumn Sandeen doesn’t want you to seeDespite saying that she’d reply to people who posted here requesting a reply, Autumn decided instead to write to me “offline” and then demand that I grant her a level of confidentiality that was not previously agreed to.
Here’s her email response to me that she insisted I hide from the world.
Yeah, I know some of you are going to flame me for “violating email confidentiality” — and will excuse Autumn’s deceptive telling of the story (which she made up) where I caused all the problems with “cis.” I’m mainly writing to the rest of you, who don’t justify cissexism.

This is exactly what I was trying to say

Civility isn’t a virtue when it allows for certain forms of privilege to go unanswered.

I can only add the words “and unchallenged” to end of this sentence.

You are correct… unless it’s all just a ruse to shut trans people up and make being cisgendered so much an ‘unmarked class’ that it never needs to be mentioned by name again (which can only happen if trans people become invisible), or to revert to cis-normative language like ‘real man’, ‘genetic woman’, and ‘normal people’.
That’s exactly what this ruse is about.
You won’t get an answer to “what should we call you?” Because that isn’t what this is about.

Wow, you’re cis?So that means that one of the two examples of mean trans people imposing “cis” on cis people against their will was actually … self-identification?
This keeps getting worse and worse. Way to fuck everything up, Autumn!

There isn’t a desire to silence anyone……but there’s a desire to defend privilege and maintain the status quo.
And there’s an effect of silencing trans people, even if the desire isn’t there.
As far as Autumn being willing to say sorry? Autumn refuses to apologize for creating a complete fable in order to cast me in the role of whipping girl for her moderation failures.

Cool, so what label do you recommend?I’m curious whether (a) you think anti-Semites have the right to demand that Jews not refer to them as “gentile”, and (b) you have a suggestion to replace the “cis” term which you feel is offensive.
What’s your label of choice?
(Nobody who has objected to “cis” has been willing to answer this question. Will you?)

You have demanded an apology from both Pam and Autumn.You may have made other demands, as well, that I missed, since you parachuted back into the Blend in the last couple of days, lobbing grenades in all directions.
May I ask, “Or what”?
If your “demands” are not met, what then?

I’m not calling out “civility”I don’t care about civility. I care about oppression.
And I am calling you out as cis because you are one of many cis people here who actively attack any trans person who doesn’t bow the cissexism rampant here.
There are other cis people here, too, and they’re not flaunting their cis privilege. If you want me to stop calling you “cis”, then stop being cissexist. Simple, you transphobic idiot.

To be honest……One of my many, many mistakes I’ve made in the past couple of years is assuming that trans people made a convincing argument and one the day when we, as a community, had convinced all of the major LGBT civil rights organizations to embrace the T in LGBT. By 2004, everyone of the major LGBT non-profits had added the T to their mission statements.
When the HRC backtracked, and congressional representatives backtracked, from keeping the gender identity inclusion in ENDA that trans people had fought so hard for, I was actually shocked.
However, I’d rarely talked about inclusion with my LGB peers, and had never talked to an elected representative about gender identity inclusion. Neither had most of my peers.
I’ve rectified that now.
John’s statement was in 2007. It’s 2009 now. It’s not that he had that opinion in 2007, it’s that it’s 2009 and he never publicly backed down from it.
Have we talked enough yet? Have trans people shown why to John Aravosis, in trans people fighting for LGBT issues like marriage equality that we’re parts of a broader LGBT community yet, instead of the “gay community” John Aravosis envisioned in 2007?
He’s never publicly backtracked, he’s made no comment about us all being a broader community. Do we need to talk more? Exactly how do we convince him that we are part of a broader community?
Which leads me back to our civility discussions here at The Blend. Do T people belong in an LGBT community of subcommunities, where all of us fight for each others’ rights because these are human rights, or because we agree on everything and perfectly understand what makes you a gay man and me a trans woman?
When some trans people lose there humanity to some gay people because of how they talk to gay people, and visa versa — and others watch the uncivil discussions between members of these two subcommunities of the LGBT community I envision — do we all become so inhuman to each other that we lose the concept that this is supposed to be about human rights for all humans — no matter how they identify?
My fear is that it does. When I or my trans peers look inhuman to you (better said as not necessarily “you” in particular, Bursey, but you in the some somewhat nebulous world of individual gay males meaning of someone who could be “you”, but not necessarily “you” you — that was tough to say, btw!), how do you fight for my human rights?
I’d argue uncivil conversations between individual gay men (who talk to other gay males about their negative experiences with trans people) and trans people (who talk to other trans people about their negative experiences talking to gay males) will have the secondary consequence of no one fighting effectively for all of our broader communities human rights — our “civil rights,” so to speak.

Glad of the mob to check in!Thank you so much Autumn Sandeen for validating these angry cis queers in their attacks on me!
You’ve designated me as a target, Autumn, and not only linked to my comment but also my personal blog and my twitter feed — and also made up provably false tales in order to make me the one “responsible” for an argument that started before I ever got here.
Great job, Autumn! Thanks for throwing me under the bus, you self-promoting sell-out!

Are you cisgender?Okay, Scott, I’ll ask you.
Are you cisgender?

Just for the record:That person whose use of the word “cis” offended Lane?
Was not me.
Because that happened before what Autumn falsely identifies as the start of the argument.
I just want to make that clear to everyone:  Despite Autumn’s revisionist history, I was not the one whose usage Lane objected to, and I really really object to Autumn’s transparent attempt to make me the whipping girl here.

Well…No, it really isn’t the same.
When someone tells us to accept what we’re told by cis people, it sounds like the same things that have been told to us in the past — that their needs are paramount to ours in some fashion, and it’s because we’re defective and they’re not.
It’s systemic in our case, and not so in theirs — at least not as much.
I’m perfectly willing to not use a term to directly refer to someone if they ask me not to, personally.  But that’s the term I use in my head until I’m corrected otherwise, because that’s the TERM for that.  Using something else is inexact, dissembling.
I’m not suggesting cis queer people don’t have their own different issues — merely that these lines aren’t drawn where some people think they are.  I’ve been told to shut up because I was “really a man” or “not a real woman” by gays and lesbians alike.  It was okay to them — I didn’t count.  They were “men or women”, and I was the freak, in their mind.
With a history like that, it’s absolutely not the same at all.  And cis people don’t realize this history exists — but how else do we tell them?  We have to use this word.
It’s a resistance I understand to the term — it’s borne of our occasional lashing out at the mass of people who erase, ignore, or point fingers at us every day combined with the general horror of someone who’s got privilege trying to accept the idea.  But the word itself has a meaning, and that meaning is absolutely necessary for a discussion of trans issues in some meaningful way.

As a noteA sissy is an effeminate man, a phrase used to delinate a man who is lesser than those around them.
The purpose of the slur is to, essentially, say that one is  a woman — or at least gender variant enough that it does not apply.
Linguistically, one could readily make an argument that sissy is, in effect, calling some a trans person, so for transfolk to be doing that would be rather odd, since the purpose of the word is to equalize and decenter the concept of not trans as being normative.
(yes, first post since I’m back, but I had to purposely disconnect my internet earlier in order to get to this point without comment, and I’m displeased with myself for doing so right now.)
(but I will have one later)

The cost of this blow-up……as I explained (and other people explained) on QT is that, gee, thanks angry cis men — now there’s one less blog that trans people can feel safe talking about our issues.
You and others — with assist from Pam and Autumn — have transformed this from an LGBT blog to an LGB blog.
Yeah, there was no cost to you. But quit fucking shitting all over the cost you’ve forced us to pay.
Look at what upset trans people are saying, look at how our view of PHB has changed thanks to this. That disappointment and pain is the price tag of your privilege.

Cissexual =/= CisgenderTranssexual and transgender don’t mean the same thing.
It’s very possible to be, for example, transgender and cissexual.

When I make mistakes……I own up to them. I don’t create false stories that blame other people for my mistakes. That’s what Autumn did here — she lied. And falsely blamed me.
Meanwhile, have you been to Derailing for Dummies? Because your concern trolling about “oh no, you aren’t helping your cause by being so angry” is right out of the derailing playbook.

John Aravosis was clearly arguing against trans inclusion……so that ENDA could get passed.
If you can’t see that — if you’re so blinded by the rhetorical dodge of “but I’m just asking questions!” — then either you’re willingly ignoring what’s going on, or you’re pretty oblivious.

one minor addition“a still-hostile, straight-dominated culture”
Please add sexist, and cis to that.

Could you please stop talking about “my trans peers”?It’s getting really offensive, giving your quick willingness to throw trans people under the goddamn bus faster than John Aravosis, Autumn.
Also, quit blaming the trans community for the fact that the cis LGB community that you suck up to isn’t being decent to us. Stop the damn victim blaming already.

“having that conversation”You do realize that for all the talk of “John Aravosis just wants to ask questions,” he was actively banning anyone who disagreed with his conclusions and deleting their comments from his blog, right?
Right?
You know that, right?
And you’re still wanting to argue that Aravosis was simply arguing in good faith?

And isn’t it ironic, don’t you think? Naphtali can vouch; she knows me in the flesh.
As I said, my fight is against ATTITUDES, not people.

accurate naming of violence and harmHere’s the quote that Autumn writes was the “starting point as to where I [Autumn] feel the term was weaponized against gay white men”:

Uh, hey, some of us were there when Aravosis publicly made the case that we [transgender people] don’t belong in his cisgender gay-rights movement.
It’s not ancient history for us. It’s the way Aravosis treats trans people. We’ve borne the scars; we’re the ones who had our comments deleted or edited, earned our bans from his site.
And you wonder why we hate the guy? ..

And this is the interpretation Autumn offers of this statement:

In that comment, the term cisgender wasn’t used to explain privilege to people who didn’t understand it, but instead used to angrily — accusatorily — pointing a finger at John Aravosis for being a gay white male who doesn’t care about the civil rights of transgender people. It was that weaponized use of that cis- term that began the current Pam’s House Blend debate over cisgender and cissexual terminology here at The Blend. When I’ve mentioned repeatedly that the two cis- terms have been weaponized at The Blend, this is the is starting point as to where I feel the term was weaponized against gay white men

Wait a minute.
When a cis activist acts and speaks in favor of shutting out trans people from the movement, it is accurate description to name it as him

making that case that trans people we [transgender people] don’t belong in his cisgender gay-rights movement.

That is flat-out accurate description. It is not hateful, it is not “weaponized” except as it accurately names that this is a violent situation to start with. It is an accurate description.
It is followed by another accurate description, here:

It’s not ancient history for us. It’s the way Aravosis treats trans people. We’ve borne the scars; we’re the ones who had our comments deleted or edited, earned our bans from his site.

This is a description of (virtual/web-based) violence and its effect — harm that leaves scars — on those who experienced the violence. It is a description by someone who has experienced this violence. Listen to it. Attend to it. This is an accurate and crucial description of harm and violence done by Aravosis to the commenter.
Look. I am cis, but in other layers of my life, I have first hand and deep experience with the deceptive dynamics of covert violence being done to me by people with more privilege. This is not “we are enemies on a physical battlefield” kind of violence. This other kind of violence is covert, subtle.
Perpetrators of this kind of violence take advantage of a certain kind of plausible deniability where the perpetrator (or his/her supporters) can say: “I didn’t do any violence” and this is culturally reasonable. The topic then turns from what harm was done and what should be done to deal with the violence the perpetrator did and what harm that caused the target …. to an argument about was there any violence/harm at all.
This shift in focus dehumanizes the target further. And given the cultural context, when the target of this invisible violence names it, then that person is blamed for “making it” a violent situation — in this case, saying that the commenter “weaponized” the term cisgender. NO.
No. This is a violent situation to start with. the commenter clearly and accurately named it as such. The only reason that it is plausible to mis-name accurate description of and response to violence as “weaponizing” is because the larger cultural/institutional context protects the initial violence from scrutiny.
And who/what is served by that?
I am talking about situations where one or more people do violence to others using institutionally-granted power as the basis, but there is culturally-induced confusion — which leads often to denial — about the actual fact of that violence.
It’s like being harmed by weapons that are invisible in the cultural context, it’s like having wounds and scars that aren’t “supposed to” exist.
Accurately perceiving and naming that violence, and accurately naming the location/privilege of those who do it (because that privilege is relevant to why they can do and cover up the violence in the first place) is crucial.
It is crucial.
Crucial to accuracy about what is going on, crucial for any action that does not further condone and perpetuate and cover up the violence and harm.
So here it is. Aravosis pulled a weapon, and used it against trans people. This was a violent act and caused harm. The comment Autumn is quoting accurately describes the violence and harm, and accurately describes the context and location of the one who perpetrated the violence and harm.
So now.

And you wonder why we hate the guy? ..

Hate can be exhausting, but don’t anyone ever tell me that someone who has been targeted by this kind of “invisible” plausible-deniability violence should be denied the option of hate if they choose it at any given point. I have chosen hate and used it at specific times for specific purposes, and it is in some contexts a tool for resisting this kind of heinous violence and the denial of the violence. Perpetrators who do violence inside this plausible deniability dynamic … yes, hate as a response to expererincing that violence is an option that should not be denied IMO.
It has its pros and cons as does any other resistance strategy, but I say don’t deny targets of this kind of violence the right to choose it at any given point. That’s my experience-based perspective on this, as someone who has chosen hate for particular purposes in particular contexts.
One of the uses of hate, in my experience, is that can help keep the subtle violence really clearly visible amidst tremendous pressure to forget or ignore that someone has done and/or is doing violence to me.
That’s my own experience, and don’t anyone tell me I am wrong to choose that when it serves my ability to resist the violence done to me by those with more privilege, those who get to hide their weapons and the violence they do under the cover that this heinous system gives to them when they act as its agents.
So now. The word cisgender in that statement.
The reason that Aravosis is able to get away with the plausible-deniability violence that he is/was dong is because he is drawing directly on the institutionalized power that is granted by this system to cis people/groups. But this is supposed to be an invisible move. Plausible deniability. Invisible weapon.
Naming the presence and use of one of these culturally/institutionally invisible weapons is not itself the use of violence or threat of violence.
It is accurately naming the violence that already is present in the situation.
And this dynamic I am describing, this dynamic where I even have to talk about it, this dynamic where there are culturally-invisible weapons that do real violence and harm but are so well-protected that to accurately name them appears in the cultural system as itself an act of violence or threat … oh, this is terrible. Terrible.
When someone talks about violence that is done to them by another who has more institutional power, when names it accurately — and the response to that accurate naming is to further target that person who is accurately naming the harm, and further target anyone who perceives and/or experiences the violence/harm described … Oh no, this is terrible, Terrible.
It is so clear to me how terrible this is. Why is this so hard? Why would anyone who does not hold a stake in maintaining and perpetuating the violence done by this system advocate that these invisible weapons stay invisible, and instead turn on the target of the violence? What are the stakes here, what are the attachments to maintaining the invisibility of the actual weapons and the violence done by the perpetrators who use those weapons?
Terrible, terrible, horrible dynamic here.
Really attending to what is going on here would IMO require a far deeper and way more honest level of critical reflection than anything I have ever seen on the web or in situations like this. I won’t hold my breath. But I wish it could happen, because to my eyes, this sh** goes deep, deep, deep.

Yes, I’ve demanded an apologyI have no power to back it up; I’m not an admin here or anything.
I’m just going to keep asking for it.
And no, I didn’t “parachute” in (hell, I’ve been here longer than you), and I didn’t “lob grenades.”
An apology for creating a false timeline that blames the wrong person is the only decent thing to do. If Pam and Autumn aren’t decent, that will become pretty clear quite soon.
Do you disagree?

Except this didn’t happen

I think part of that problem is people using the word in a derogatory sense and rarely in it’s intended usage.

That hasn’t occurred, except in Autumn’s fantasy world where any use of “cisgender” that isn’t “for education” (whatever that means) is automatically offensive.

Also, the “hate” wording was a reply to a cis personIn the thread — Autumn only links to my comment so as to demonize me through lack of of context — JusticeDemon asked:

The DOMA brief pulled me back in.  John’s reaction to the DOMA brief and subsequent posts have KEPT me in.  I’m not saying he’s a saint but I don’t understand why people hate him so much on this site.

…and I answered with his language.

“sissies”“Cis” also starts the same way as “sister.”
Yeah, no cisgender gay man would EVER be put up with being called a sister, right?
Right?

thank you for adding that information. More accuracy = better IMO n/t

“Veteran” is a minority tooWhat do veterans call non-veterans?

wellwell some of your trans peers like me for example don’t agree with your hate or vitriol.  i feel sad this had to happen. your original post was pretty square on but after the flame war started you made it public to everyone all over the tubes and pretty much drummed up lots of support for something that should have remained and finished her.  Most people on the internet take comments with a grain of salt and move on.  Yes the other poster should have not fought back either or you should have taken it private.  But taking a fight like this public makes it harder for us non hate-filled trans people to have better lives because all the transphobic assholes get to point to things like this and say see this is what happens so they oppress us more.  It is harder to work for our rights and the rights of the broader community if we hate instead of educate.  You tried to educate, it was rebuffed and you turned to hate.  Autumn admits she screwed up, take it with what you will and leave.  I am guessing most blenders don’t agree with teh hate being spewed by your mouth.

actually, Keori

Here is main point for Aravosis and all other cisgendered, transbigoted privileged assholes

I had a sense of dissonance from that comment when I read it. It felt off to me, and wasn’t sure what to make of it.
Knowing you are cis explains to me what felt off/wrong about your comment.
It is a distancing move. You are saying one thing with the words, but the underlying energy of your statement is “I’m not like that!” Or, to use your word, “They have wrong attitudes, I don’t.”
When there is a gap between surface content and underlying content, I feel a sense of dissonance and off-ness.
That you could use those words and that energy in a discussion like this is IMO a function of your privilege as much as anything else. Did you think about the risks of what you wrote and how you wrote it?

Where Do You Suggest She Be?Kynn was specifically called out by Autumn, and has yet to get an explanation — or better yet — a retraction of the claim that she started the whole cis controversy, a provable falsehood because Kynn’s first comments came a day after the controversy started. There are timestamps on comments, you know.
As far as I can tell, she has every right to be present and be angry until someone with some authority here explains why she was specifically called out — and therefore targetted — for something that she didn’t do.
I’d consider the “baristas” recalcitrance to address this issue publicly and fairly to be the “dam” in this stream. And also the sticking point for a lot of people (including queer cis allies like myself) in ever feeling that this is going to be a trustworthy and safe environment to be a part of again.

YesIf I understand the question to mean “Were you born with male genitalia, and do you function as a male in your day-to-day life?”, then yes.
And still, if you’re speaking to me directly, or about me in particular to other people, I prefer you to use my name or my handle. It’s polite. I’m a proper noun, not an adjective. For the record, I also don’t like being referred to as “the gay guy down the hall”, or “the bald guy down the hall”, or “the short guy down the hall”, or any of several other ways that, while perfectly accurate and are labels I don’t particularly object to (especially since they’re true), I consider impolite if used to speak to me or about me in particular.

Erasure is erasureI’m reminded of For Your Consideration, where the low-budget no-buzz film Home For Purim was instantly a big deal — by simply changing the entire point of the film.
Labels offend people.  White offends some white people, even Caucasian does.  If a skinhead asks you nicely to refer to him instead as a “member of the Master race”, it’s irrelevant because he’s hateful; but if a cis person asks you not to use that cis term because they’ve been offended by it, couldn’t you just call them “normal” or “non-trans” or “real” or “born”, out of a lack of understanding, that needs to be accommodated.  No, sorry — even nice, upstanding people can get offended about a privilege they don’t want to believe they have.  And all the trans literature that exists doesn’t say “non-trans” because it others us, it doesn’t say “normal” because that’s really offensive, and it doesn’t say “natal” because we were born too, we just had doctors who didn’t know better or couldn’t when it happened.
We’re invisible in a lot of cases, and a lot of queer people don’t have that luck.  Heteros can tell a gay couple from a distance; a trans person, not necessarily.  And that means there isn’t an “obvious” decision here, and cis people aren’t going to make a term for themselves, something to denote what they are in a neutral way.  We’re going to have to do it ourselves, because we’re the ones it actually affects, not cis people.  Before the words existed, there was a percieved need for it — heterosexual people needed something to call themselves.  Cis people really don’t have that force driving them, as is clearly evidenced by, well, nobody providing a useful alternative.  The offended party is assuming they are offended by a “label”.  I’m curious — what do you call yourself in your head?  A “non-trans man”?  Please.  You call yourself a man if you think about it at all.  If the divide is between two neutral terms — cis and trans — it levels that.  If the opposite of “trans” is nothing, then we’re just freaks.  If it’s “natal”, we’re somehow artificial.  If it’s “non-trans”, we’re still freaks, it’s as good as “normal”.
Queer cis people are still oppressed, but their discomfort in this case would come at the expense of our ability to discuss this using exact terminology.  They have my sympathy, and while I would respect individuals myself this way, someone who asked all trans people to not call them cis is offending ALL OF US.  Not one of us.  Not one of the uppity trannies, but ALL of us.
Erasure is erasure.  Get rid of cis, and you’re opening the door for far less useful, less exact terms, and they’re going to end up being the “opposite of trans”, and we’re going to be seen as abnormal, as freaks, or as fakes.
If we asked you to stop using heterosexual or straight during a discussion of queer issues, we’d be laughed off the site.  You’re asking us the same thing, but it’s not obvious to you why.

Good As YouJeremy has a policy / habit / standard practice of not calling someone a bigot or homophobe. Period. He is very, VERY good about avoiding ad hominem attacks.
Here’s a piece he wrote for the Advocate:
http://www.advocate.com/issue_…
I think much of the problem here is that we are NOT that good at it.
Looking through these threads there are tons of examples of people being called transbigot or transphobe or variations on those. The ad hominem attacks are all over the place.
How about we (the Blenders) call each other out on ad hominem attacks? That might be a way of focusing on the message rather than the messenger.
Thoughts?

Hi again.I will keep this as short as I can (being overly verbose).
1 – Autumn, your order and sequence of faulting is incorrect.
2 – Thanks for letting me back in.
3 – Please provide context for my response quoted above (that is, the statement it was in response to), and explain why you found it was uncivil and a personal attack.
4 – Please explain why you felt it necessary to use a threat when asking me to stop (which, notably, I did do — after that point, there were no further defenses, and not because you banned me).
Those are the personal, “me”, Dyssonance stuff I’d like to know.  I would prefer all responses be visible, as I want it known.
And yes, its ok with me if you don’t want to explain or answer.  Those are the things I want to know for me, but that I feel deserve to be made aware.
The non-personal stuff:
5 – I don’t particularly like the ratings system.
6 – IT is my field, my skill set, to know where that line of balance you are seeking is, and, to be blunt, right now there is none when it comes to trans decentering.  If history is a guide, it will take about 15 years to achieve, given changes in mass communication and overall cultural awareness (a good general point of reference will be when a trans person is portrayed as a non-victimized hero and seen that way).  ITs wonderful to want to go there, but such isn’t, at this time, generally possible — and especially not within just the T itself nor just the LGBT itself.
To get there, though, we need to have these sometimes harsh conversations.
7 – I do not hate any group.  That is to say I do not have an intense dislike of any particular group, although I can be angry at them.
When using the term hate, remember that it is an intense dislike, and if you want to really reference such, remember that homophobia and transphobia are described as:
an aversion (such as avoiding things dealing with them or them in particular), an intense dislike, and/or a fear of homosexuals/homosexuality or transfolk or qualities associated with trans people.
Any single one of those, or any of them in combination.
As a result, such things can range from the very mild ( ex: oh, I don’t like gay bars because, well, there are gay people there) to the extremely overpowering.
Why, one could say a spectrum.
Within the LGBT, something more than just the lightest touches is generally not acceptable.  OUtside of it, more than half the median point, perceptually (not measured, but how it appears) makes someone an opponent.
Be honest, be open — some trans folk would absolutely love to do nothing more than jettison the T from the rest.  Some cis folk would love to do the same thing.
In both cases, that particular viewpoint must, to some extent or other, remove and cast aside members of both sides. Usually by saying something to the effect of “well they are not X enough” in all sorts of different ways.
You want that place to tread, you have to work to make everyone comfortable with being part of everything.
8 – In order to increase the availability of places to go, I have gone and created a new site: http://www.thespectrumcafe.com.  In doing so, I made sure to link here and use the description of affirming.  Because we have very few to go to, and this has not, in my opinion, done enough to make it a safe place.
Safe doesn’t mean exclusive — it is an LGBT site, but it has a trans centric focus.
9 – I appreciate the support, but the overall issue here is not about me — it is about freedom to express trans lives as being something equal and on the same footing with cis lives.
Like many of the trans people today, I am expressing that we are tired of being ignored, tired of being treated as the red headed step child.
When you talk about an issue, talk about the trans side of it.  Its really that simple.
Thanks for the chance to speak, I’m going to step away for a bit now.

I suggested that less clearly and more broadlyin my post anticipating civility day.

Can we all just get along?I was one of the GWM’s who was originally offended on the Aravosis post. Before you write me off as a troll I want to say this much. I was not necessarily offended by Cis as I was by how it was being tossed around in that particular post in the comments.
I am also one of the new Blenders, I have been a lurker for some time now and reading all kinds of posts. I commented on that particular post for one reason and one reason only and that was how it was used in relationship to one particular comment that I did find offensive and it was I thought a gross generalization of Gay White Men.
I dug my heels in and honestly if someone had told me that Cis meant a kindhearted, tireless supporter of the LGBT movement I would still have found it offensive in the moment because that one comment just set me off.
There was a rather heated exchange between myself and another Blender. I want to say thank you to her for giving me a chance to read my own words and now I am willing to eat them. Cis is not offensive in the language that I have since read and it is not an offensive term for non-transgender people.
If it is easier to label us others as Cis then I say by all means go right ahead, but I will urge one caution. If you are going to use it, do not use it in the context that it was used in the Aravosis post to pain all GWM’s as transphobic assholes, because we aren’t.
I want to apologize to everyone at the blend for digging my heels in. My eyes just glazed over in the moment and all I could read at that point was that everybody thought that “I” was a transphobic asshole. That hurt, because ever since I first came out I have always supported the T in LGBT. I was also one of the first G’s to put the L before the G without even thinking about it when the L’s complained about the movement being dominated by the G’s, my thought was yeah…that is probably true.
When Barney Frank agreed to drop the T with regards to ENDA I agreed with you that it was a sell out and should not have been done. I was actually glad that it did not pass in that format because I thought it was wrong, even though it would have increased my privilege.
This whole conversation about otherness has me thinking. For the record I have to ask: Aren’t we all “other”, G, L, B & T? As a G when I refer to non-gays I am typically talking about well, non gay men. Didn’t we all ask to become “other” when we stopped referring to the movement as the “gay rights” movement? Personally I would have been happy if the L’s, G’s, B’s and T’s had just settled on the “Gay Rights Movement”. We all othered ourselves didn’t we when we broke up into different factions and said well I am a X and I am not a G, L, B or a T? I mean that as a serious question and I am curious as to the L, B & T perspective on this. Feel free to email me if you want to dialogue about this.
For the record I hate the concept of banning anything, after getting dressed down over the Aravosis post I lurked and read. A LOT. I was unhappy that any word would be censored, or any commenter for that fact. That is a part of education and a part of a free society. If someone is offensive to you you can always change the channel or report it.
Personally I like that I was challenged to think about my position. Maybe I am a privileged white male, but I love that we have the T in LGBT and I would not want it any other way. All I ask is that we not use broad brushes to paint everyone in any one of the other categories as a “insert hateful adjective here”. That is all I ask.
I also want to thank Autumn, Pam, Louise and everyone for taking the time to flesh this wound and to have a conversation that is unfettered and honest without moderation or rules. Sometimes when wounds fester they need to get drained if they become infected. This wound was lanced for me today and I am better for it.

There’s Civil and then there’s Ri-damn-diculousNot complying with an irrational demand for special consideration to be exempt from neutral labels which apply by any and all definitions isn’t an act of incivility. There is no reason to allow irrationality — or, in the case of the discussion at hand, privilege — to set the tone of a conversation.

Add this to your list of mastakes;Over the years you have made the assumption that people of operative history had the same “group think” as cross dressers transvestites sissies and transgenders.
That is a huge mistake on your part. Our goal and the goal of those who seek us out for help and support is to fit in with the mainstream and not have to rely on special privilege in the form of special laws to protect us.
Your lobbying GlAAD to dilute the meaning of the term TS has brought much anger toward you and the TG community.
We are not like you,
We want to live in the greater part of society by their rules.
We for the most part art not boxed into the GLBT.
We now have to work to reeducate the greater society that we are not like transgenders.
Thanks Autumn.
for making our lives more difficult.  

Do you own a dictionary?Civilian. A neutral term. Are you really playing this semantics game? Really?

You’re not my “trans peer” eitherQuit trying to use the term “trans peers” to silence me.
As far as taking a fight public? I’m sorry, but Autumn and Pam have a far larger megaphone than I do — as do TransAdvocate and Questioning Transphobia, two other sites which have blogged about this.
In neither case were they doing so in response to me.
As far as me turning to “hate”? No, you confuse righteous indignation with “hate.”
I’ll cop to hating on John Aravosis, but as far as Autumn admitting she screwed up? No, she has not done this. She has spread front-page lies about my role in this in an attempt to make me her whipping girl.
Until she address that, I’m not going to “take that with what [I] will and leave.”

Thank you for making this pointThis is part of why I have changed my mind about the use of “transgender” as an “umbrella term.” I am working on using transsexual when I mean transsexual, and I think we need to get rid of the umbrella term and/or come up with a term that means “non-transsexual, non-transvestite transgender people.”

Yes, I do disagree.

And no, I didn’t “parachute” in (hell, I’ve been here longer than you)

You registered in October, 2007; you essentially stopped posting at the end of 2007. Characterize that however you wish, though.

…and I didn’t “lob grenades.”

Want to put your money where your mouth is? I’d be happy to have that put to an anonymous front page poll (exact wording to be determined). How much money would you be willing to lose?

An apology for creating a false timeline that blames the wrong person is the only decent thing to do. If Pam and Autumn aren’t decent, that will become pretty clear quite soon.

I’m so tired of listening to you blame everybody for something on this board that I frankly am unwilling to verify whether this particular grievance about a “timeline” is accurate or not. I just don’t care, and I suspect most members here feel the same. You appear to have come on here itchin’ for a fight. What happens when only a couple of people choose to engage with you? Meanwhile you poison the well.
A “tone argument”? You betcha.

Veteran is indeed a minorityAnd to my knowledge, we call non-veterans “non-veterans.” Unless they’re Dick Cheney, then we refer to them as neo-con draft dodging scum. What derogatory term is there for a non-veteran? “Dirty hippie,” maybe? I can’t really think of one.
Being a veteran is a minority status, but I include it in my list of social privilege because it IS one. With the end of the Vietnam War and the anti-troop era, military service has been highly glamorized. When people find out I’m a veteran, the first thing they do is grab my hand and say, “Thanks for your service.” I have hiring preferences when I apply for government jobs. Prospective employers note my veteran status and automatically take me more seriously than non-veterans. I’m assumed to be more responsible, more trustworthy, more American than other people just because I served in the military.
This privilege is not inherent and immutable like skin color, sexual orientation, and gender identity. It’s something I worked for. But that doesn’t mean it’s not a social privilege that others lack, that makes my life easier.  

Eh, not quiteCivilian is anyone who isn’t currently on active duty. I’m a veteran, ergo no longer active duty, ergo I’m a civilian.

Wait, civilian sounds like villain!This is all about derailing into semantic games, and Lane has yet to explain what terminology he prefers to be used regarding his cisgender status.

unforunately for me you have ruined other safe spacesyou have ruined other safe spaces i once had on other sites that will not be named but i no longer feel welcome because i will be silenced for being a transwoman who supports pam and autumn in this. so thanks alot for ruining phb and some of my safe spaces on other sites..

Civilians

Psst, for some people, some of those are mutableSexual orientation, gender identity, and even skin color can be mutable in some people, so let’s try to remember that and not make them invisible.

However, there is one intersting quirk to the english language I loveTHere is no gender neutral word for a single specimen of the bovine animal from which we get beef.
That is, cow is for female.  Bull is for males.  Steer is for neutered bulls.
ok, yeah, totally OT, but one of my fave thing.

fuck the mainstreamdo you really want to appear to be part of the mainstream and blend in with the same cissexual people you have ranted and raved about..apparently you do.  that i dont get..join the haters for all i care.  but i do feel its fair to be lumped in with the lgb part of the community because we have been there since the beginning.  This type of in fighting within the community makes it worse for use and dilutes the idea that we can have rights.  they aren’t special rights, they are protective.  Do you think Civil rights are special rights? Because it appears that you think that way.  And what about us trans people who want to id with the lgb community or us ts that want to be tg. it seems to me you are trying to deny our existance by saying we are not like you etc… well im more like pam than i am like you. I dont want to blend into a cissexist society and feel boxed in to acting a certain way. I am who i am. I am proud to be a transsexual and to deny that you are anything but that is to deny a part of your own soul.  

ggw59I like your posts, and hope you’ll consider staying, or take a break and return, do what’s best for you.

I don’t think it will catch onUnless you’re talking only about banning terms used by trans people to describe cissexism.
Because this site — including posts by Pam and Autumn — has no problem in calling out homophobes or anti-gay bigots.
I don’t think any of them would step down from being able to do that.
…but silencing trans people will probably fly.

Trans*Or, what I use frequently since I’ve long made that my point:
Gender variant.
I am transsexual.  I share much in common perceptually in the eyes of others with crossdressers (which, as an idea, essentially misgenders me and is an insult).
I am not genderqueer.  To be frank, I don’t grok it. I do have an understanding that the common issues we face are greater overall than my particular problem.
Because it is my problem that I don’t understand it.  Not theirs.

Thanks for your response, RickYes, queer people — LGBTTQQI++ people — are all “other” in some way.
But some people are more “other” than others.
Within our communities, we often have a number of people who are invested in the existing paradigms in society, and who will try to enforce their racial privilege, their male privilege, their cis privilege, their able privilege, or any other privilege they may have.
It’s hard for some people who are “other” from society as a whole to realize how their actions continue to affect the rest of the “others” around them.
Within the LGBTTQQI++ communities:
* White people exercise white privilege in ways that oppress people of color
* Men exercise male privilege in ways that oppress women
* Able people exercise able privilege in ways that oppress people with disabilities
* Cis people exercise cis privilege in ways that oppress trans people
* People who are not intersex [*] exercise their not-intersex privilege in ways that oppress intersex people
[*] The fact that we don’t have a word to use for “people who are not intersex” shows just how privileged non-intersex people are. Those of us who are not intersex don’t have to think of what we are — just “normal” [sic] one supposes? — because only “those intersex people” need a label for them.
This is a concept called intersectionality — it’s not enough to just say “we’re all oppressed/othered” but also to examine the power and privilege dynamics of those conditions even within a group of people who are “othered” by society as a whole.

Hi Rick.How are you today?

I’m glad you were willing to returnRegardless if posting here feels right for you, I think stepping back over here showed a willingness to try.
Good luck with your cafe, if the worst thing that happens is another safe place for our communit(ies), that doesn’t seem so bad.

yeahgender variant sounds good

Feel free to put up a pollYou’ve already admitted that you don’t care about the truth, but hey, I don’t mind if you’re going to put up a top level poll anyway, asking if I “lobbed grenades.”
I have no money to lose, though — I am unemployed.

Honestly?I’ll answer that in a second, but to the other response (a bit higher up) on this same thread by some other posters, I really disagree: Even if I don’t have a better term in the 30 seconds it takes to write a response to a blog post, by simply attempting to explain to those who wonder why many felt offended by the term, we might be able to find some place to start and work from there.  If you don’t see the value in understanding the roots of a conflict so they can be addressed, I doubt we’re going to agree on much else so it’s pointless to even continue the discussion.  What I find baffling is that you are attacking a good-faith effort by allies who are on your side in the fight for equality, alienating people that have already been won to your cause.  What can be gained from such a course of action?
There were a few people – not many, but a few – that still just missed my point entirely so here it is: Whether it’s right or wrong, rational or irrational, fair or not fair, if my objective were to create a world in which transgendered men and women were treated no differently than those who were lucky enough to be born with a congruent gender and biological construct, I would spend my time working to connect with people on a broader level to explain the struggles, pains, and obstacles that society has imposed.  If, in communicating that message, a single syllable word (“cis”, this case) caused offense, I would explain the concept I was trying to communicate – that most people take for granted these societal privileges (which is absolutely true) and find a way to establish that same concept so that it wasn’t offensive.  Very few people disagree with the ideology behind the word “cis”.  What they find offensive is the word.  In this case, the the likely cause is because it’s lies somewhere deep in our shared language (the sound is typically associated with things bad – cyst, sissie, etc.)  I doubt this would be a problem if Pam’s House Blend happened to be a German or Mandarin site.
If you’re really interested in why words matter so much, please read the work of Clotaire Rapaille in “The Culture Code”.  He explains how the word “sun” is feminine in one culture, masculine in another, and causes haircare products to tank or skyrocket based upon deeply rooted convictions of the meaning of the noun.  This is the man that single-handedly caused Hummers to sell by adding four stars to the design of the body because his research indicated the subconscious American obsession with Imperial military rule.  He caused Folgers to become the dominate coffee brand by creating the “Best Part of Waking Up” campaign using this same type of research.  What is going on here, I imagine, is very, very much similar.  Something, somewhere, in the word “cis” is triggering a visceral reaction.  
In response to the question of a replacement term, you could literally use “lemon” and “cherry” or “blue” and “red” or even the “kis” that was discussed previously.  For whatever reason, the word cis, when pronounced, sounds offensive.  Words have meaning and they have power.  As I said before, I am pragmatic to the core.  If I were fighting for what truly mattered – equal right and a society in which I could feel as an equally valued member regardless of the congruency of my biological construct – I would jump on “kis” or something along those lines.
There is at least one thing: At least we are better at labeling than the Japanese.  Has anyone been following the sociological panic caused by the “Grass Eating Men” movement in that country?  (How’s that for a label?  I’m hoping it sounds better in the native language.)  
You know, as a closing note, part of me wonders if it’s a generational thing.  As someone who grew up in a world of mass individualism, if you will, where everything from our music selections on our iPods to our computer color, sneakers, and clothing was personalized to express ourselves, this whole discussion seems a tag anachronistic.  If I worked with a man named David and he came to the office, announced he wanted to be called Gretchen and referred to as “she”, I feel like that’s a fundamental right as a human and would be more than happy to comply.  It’s just not that big of a deal to me, frankly.  My family’s always had a pretty big libertarian streak, so maybe that’s the reason.  In my head, it’s just “Gretchen” just as with me, it’s just my name.  That’s the label I prefer, in answer to your question.  My sexuality, race, socioeconomic status, educational history, talents, preferences, and favorite flavor of ice cream all make up part of me, but none of them define who I am.  

Veal!Please, won’t anyone think of the calves?
Sorry, dys… couldn’t resist, hon!

Hi Scott.How is Scott today?
I ask because I don’t want Scott to suddenly think that use of adjectival phrasing implies that Scott is any less an individual, but since Scott is a person who is also homosexual, of some ethnic background that is in part at least not the same as myself, and possess a congruity of self that is markedly different from my own, I would say that Scott is possessed of particular privileges that are not possessed by me since Scott is not someone who lacks those privileges, even when there is an intersection between the privileges that Scott is lacking and that I lack as well.
So, given that particular aspect about Scott, It would be proper to say that Scott is possessed of cisgender privilege, and that it is the facing of this particular privilege that needs to be dealt with on the part of Scott, not on  the part of Kynn or Dyssonance.
All of which would be much easier to say by simply noting that you are a cisgender person and I am not.

After a few days of “radio silence”let me add the following to the conversation, because I do love the Blend, warts and all:

I think of my calves all the time.I mean, They get all tight, occasionally cramp on me, but I’m told they look good…

Kynn on how to get banned in the free-speech zone in record timeRight there in the post on the week of a free speech zone on the Blend that is only a few hours old, I listed precious few exceptions:

– diaries created for spamming (we have some dolts who sign up to promote a product, not write a discussion post)
– direct physical threats between commenters, or publishing of private information.

Yet Kynn managed to do it! Autumn had copied me on the email that Kynn republished on her blog after Autumn specifically said in the email “This is a private email, and I’m not giving you permission to repost the comments in it.”
Private information breached. Now how hard was that not to follow, people? It has nothing to do with being trans, nothing to do privilege, and nothing to do with stopping Kynn from speaking her mind in the comments. This is about attempting to gain allies to continue the rancor. She didn’t ask that Autumn reconsider the privacy matter, nor did Kynn ask why the necessity for privacy; she just breached it.
This is troubling behavior — would you trust Kynn with your private communication based on this interaction? Would you trust her to adhere to any terms of service, no matter how favorable to her POV at the Blend? She volunteered the answer with her actions.
If Kynn’s point of doing this was to be banned in order to say “see, I’ve been silenced” to her allies, as you’ve just seen, it clearly had nothing to do with a political or personal POV, or inability to freely speak, it was simply common indecency bourne of rage that she used to justify her lack of principle — no one made her do it.

Huggs!Petey, I am always willing to return.
But I am aware I am still not welcome.
One thing I’d like is for everyone to have an avatar — so we can see the person, and be reminded that they are real human beings.
But that’s a pipe dream right now, lol  We have closets and stealth and woodworking, and some people just don’t like their pics taken.
I always remember that.  Usually I’m grinning, because a good conversation is better than sitting home alone.

LOLOLOLOL!!Touche’…
Petey and Kev have taught me so much about keeping a sense of humor- I had misplaced mine the last week or so, but it seems to have wandered back.  

Check AboveI think you misunderstood what I’m saying (see above, I just posted it).  No one disagrees – or very few people, I would say – with the concept of cis or that privilege exists.  You’re arguing a point upon which almost everyone already agrees.  It’s the word itself and the fact that it sounds offensive.
As for the danger of less specific words, let’s be honest – other than a small niche of highly educated specialists, what’s the percentage of the U.S. populace that speaks latin and is going to know the literal translation of the word?  New words are created every day with an estimate of over 1,000,000 currently in existence in the English language alone.  I’ll bet that very few people actually know the latin to english translation of “hetero” and “homo”.  By creating a new word with a specific definition, that danger can be obliterated.

Seriously?After everything i’ve said, i have to specifically ask you to respond to me?
Autumn Sandeen, please respond to my prior post i made today at 10:25 EDT. If necessary, i can print this request out and wrap it around a brick for less subtley.
Email rather than public post would be fine if you like. i’m not looking for a public show. Just real answers.

I understand having anger, I have days when it seems all that’s holding me togetherThis anonymous means of communicating can mask that their are real people with authentic emotions, and they can be deeply hurt. So I’d like to ask those in this conversation, to consider Autumn’s feelings in this matter too.

I have not ruined any of your “safe spaces”So grow the fuck up.

Humor is criticalIf you can’t laugh at yourself then why are you whining?

Another two-hour long formulation of commentMichelle, this comment confused me, and I’m going to try to explain myself without offending you.
If you had a sense of off-ness, I’m not sure what caused it. At no point in any Blend discussions in the past year have I ever claimed to be transgendered. I thought it was common knowledge by now. I’ve also been a very strident, vocal supporter of transgender individuals, and T inclusion in the movement, as dyssonance, MauraHennessey, and others can attest to. The comment you referenced is entirely within my normal M.O. If it felt off to you, well…that was your perception, and I honestly don’t know what else to say about it. **shrug**
Was my comment a distancing move? Thinking from your perspective, I can see how it may have come across as such. But again, considering my history here, I don’t see it as such. Rather than an attempt to distance myself from other cissexual people, it was an attempt to drag them along in trans-inclusion. I don’t feel the need to distance myself from bigots when commenting in the Blend, because the regulars here already know what I’m about.
The words and energy (and anger) that I used in that discussion were very much a function of my privilege. That’s the whole point of being an ally – that a person in the majority can argue for inclusion of those in a minority. In addition to being a part of the LGBT community – one of our own – I consider myself a T ally specifically because we have so much transbigotry in the LGB segments.
I hope this made sense.

So I am banned?Neat.

I have.Carefully, Petey.  Carefully.

You know, of course, that I posted no private information here?Right?
I know, you don’t care.
You’re powermad, Spaulding.
You’re shutting me down because I am a threat to your grasp on power.
But he more you tighten your grip, Spaudling, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.
Er, I mean blenders.

That is where I get lost…We can all agree that we are all othered right?
If we are all othered and we are all fighting for LGBT equality how is my otherness worth any less than your otherness if I am fighting just as hard for your otherness as I am my own and none of us have any rights whatsoever?
Take me for example I am the only gay man I know that works in my industry at my position and in my company. I am surrounded by heterosexual males daily. I do my job and I am successful because I am a good employee, not because I am white, gay, tall, short, skinny or fat. I just am. I am successful just because I exist and that is exactly what my peers dislike about me. They hate it that I do it effortlessly, not because I am white or gay or tall or fat or what ever, but they hate that I do it effortlessly…does that make sense?
So when we digress into privilege it sounds like class warfare to me and I just don’t get that because I go to work every day and feel like I have to prove myself way more than my counterparts because I am gay and I never want anyone to say to me that I got a free ride because I am gay.
At every opportunity I have ever had in management I have always attempted to push to hire minorities, specifically Women and African Americans which is not the norm in my profession. I do this at a risk to my own career, the wrong choice becomes a direct reflection on the manager in question. I use my privilege as a manager at work to bring new voices to my very white, straight peers.
I still see us as all othered in some way. Yes some of the others have it rougher than some of us others, I get that. I am at the top of the food chain, I get that too. When I get lost is that when I am doing the very best that I can to be an out, successful, gwm who is open minded and steps outside of the “box” that I work in and I challenge my peers to do better as well and I use my “privilege” to the best of my ability I have to ask, what more can I do?

incorrect.You are a veteran after active duty.
You are a civilian if you do not serve.
Hoo-ah. (you can take the girl out of the rangers, but never take the ranger out of the girl…)

Thing is?We already did.
There was a word for our opposite before.  ”Real” or “born” or “normal” or “natal”.  Each was rejected, not by you, not by the medical community, but by US, because it also defines us by being our complement.  If the opposite of “trans” is some word that has no connection to the word “trans”, and nobody knows what “trans” means, they’ll just define it as “opposite” of the word they do know — “normal” or “natal” or “born” or “real”.  Or, yanno, nothing at all.  ”Women” or “Men”.  If we’re the opposite of a “woman” or “man”, there’s a severe problem there.
We know what we are, and what we’re not, and it’s really not for other people to tell us what we aren’t.  That’s kind of the point.
There was probably a point where heterosexual people were new to the term, and didn’t know what it meant, and resisted it, calling it silly and saying it wouldn’t catch on, because it was easier to just say “normal”…or nothing at all.
I mean, in their mind, you were either gay or normal.

all I said about emotions and feelingsI apply to you, as well

And in your caseI’m happy to have it, and if you’d like to drop by sometime, I’ll be thrilled to wave it like a flag, while sticking out my tongue and saying “neener, neener, neener”.
See? You’re not the only one who can be childish.

I am glad to see you here…My comments are heartfelt and my emotions are raw. Several times over the course of this I have teared up…it is emotional for all of us. As a GWM, Cis, Slightly effeminate, over the hill, tall, skinny, privileged guy, on this night I come here with a more open mind and a more open heart in a true attempt to dialogue in a sincere way that is not offensive to any of the participants but one that truly attempts to dialogue.
We all deserve to be here, and we are all hurt and wounded in some way. I am here because I want this process to work, and more than anything I want you here too.

come over to the junk drawer…anytime    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…

Ah, but..the whole while I would, of course, flaunt my female privilegeand revel in it
Except on the phone.  Then I’d use male privilege because some times they just won’t let a gal get stuff done the way a guy can.
Childish its not.  And you can’t help but to wave it about and all that.  Indeed, it takes work and effort not to do so.
Privilege is not racism.
IT is not something to be ashamed of.
Its something to be aware of.  And use.
As for saying neener neener neener — I’m afraid I do that already.
take care, Scott. I’m not welcome here, and it has nothing to do with you, but know that I always liked ya.

Not Suggesting OtherwiseSomeone who suggests you’re not othered is suffering a delusion.  We’re all othered, any queer person.
When I say that you are a cis person, I’m not blaming you for it.  I’m not saying you should feel guilty about it, I’m not even saying that there’s something wrong with you.  I’m saying that you probably don’t know, because it’s not in your face all day long, like it is for me.  I am continually shocked when I do talk with cis people who are conversant on these issues, because, well — why would they be?  You’re lucky.  Sometimes I resent it, sure — but what person doesn’t?  I mean, honestly — do you never resent that straight people you know aren’t treated the way you are?  It breeds resentment.  We’re damn touchy about our words, and whether “cis” offends people or not, it’s part of our stuff, it’s part of our literature, and it’s a concept we cannot discard.  If somehow you could even get trans people as a whole to agree, we’d all have to communicate it, and we’d go “say X instead of cis now”, and it’d be cis, it’d just be a different word for it.  Same problem.
I’m actually really glad you want to know.  :)  I’ve had a number of hostile encounters with gay men in my life, and sometimes I get a feeling that it simply doesn’t matter to them, they’ve moved on from the issue of rights because they “got theirs”.  Intellectually, I know it’s not true — but it’s what I feel sometimes.
So thanks  :)

Thanks RickI’m a tough debater, and I don’t pretend to be better than others.
But I listen, and I pay attention, and it is from such things that I grow as a person.
I may stop in time to time, but I’ve been made aware that I am not welcome here, ban or no ban.
You keep ‘em honest, y’hear?

But what other word would you suggest?OK, I get it, you don’t like “cis” because it sounds icky, and you’d like to be labeled by your name.
But you still haven’t answered the question: what term should trans people use to collectively refer to people who aren’t trans, and is a term that put trans people on an equal footing with the non-trans people.
Because, while as a practical matter, I usually use “non trans people” when talking with those who aren’t familiar with trans people, it does imply that there’s “people” and there’s “trans people.” Which is othering in the same sort of way that “sports” = “men’s sports,” unless it’s specifically identified as “women’s sports.”
So what term would you prefer we use to refer to non-trans people as a group?

*echo*Firmly agreed, about conversations being better than loneliness.

What do you think?Wow — All I did was ask a question. I think you read an awful lot more into it than was intended.

Regardless of what you may have heard…myself included, I want you here. It is only when we converse, all be it sometimes loudly and sometime in anger that we can get to a place where we actually grow as a result of that anger and that fury that hits us in the moment. I am a better person for our exchanges and the Blend is better for both of our presence. Arguments can lead to understanding. Your words while in the moment were not comforting to me they did need to be said, and I needed to hear them, really hear them, and the only way for them to really be heard was for everything that transpired to really occur. It was the shut down on the comments that made me go back one more time and re-read each and every comment, and at the end of the day that got me here today and to comment again. Remember that…and know that I love a good debate and you belong here and your voice while at times can be abrupt and in your face it still deserves to be heard. You can stand in my protest line anytime and I will be a better man for it.  :)

I can’t speak for the lesbiansBut if a secondary definition of
cis = younger and sexier than you thought possible
gay men would knock themselves out embracing it…and who would it hurt?  LOL

your self-descriptionI was just intrigued that you left veteran out:
“I am a minority by virtue of being a non-christian childfree lesbian. That’s it.”
I guess in the same vein you left out college-educated (although I’m not certain whether that’s a minority or not).
You’re right that they convey privilege, but that they’re ones that are earned. If we’re going to start begrudging people for their achievements, well — I’m not sure where we’ll end up.

like I said earlierI like the T in LGBT and have always embraced the inclusion. Some of the first people I ever met as a gay boy back in the late 80′s were some really beautiful people who just happened to be T and they treated me very kindly. Since those good old days I have never forgotten their generosity and kindness to me when I thought I had no one. It has stayed with me for 20 years now and I try my best to keep an open mind…
I do want to know more…and I am really glad I stopped by for a cup a joe tonight…

my perceptionOh, Keori, you’re speaking with a being who physically and otherwise perceives what I call off-ness or dissonance.
It is real. It is my perception. Not my perspective, but my perception. Perception as in the kind of perception in the five senses that are accepted as real. This society is so full of these deceptions that it is normal and natural and unspoken. You don’t have to feel them so you don’t have to notice or attend.
But don’t worry, I don’t even exist in this landscape.
In other landscapes, when something that has this kind of perception speaks and points to off-ness, it is an indication of something that needs to be attended to and corrected. But not here. So don’t worry, it’s about “how you came across” to one with ungrounded perception, and you can redirect the narrative and frame to whatever you want. Because that’s how it works.
So. You don’t know what you are speaking to/with. If you did, well … but you don’t. I don’t exist in this landscape.
This kind of response doesn’t offend me, exactly, but it does offend something bigger than me that is also invisible in this landscape.
Of course my first comment (and very likely this reply) will be confusing to you. You’re speaking with something that does not exist in your landscape, how could that not be confusing in a situation like this?
In my assessment, this is now entirely off topic to the larger thread at this point IMO. It is perhaps on topic to other issues of the range of difference and invisibility in the overall “LGBT community,” but not in this thread.

Who would hurt?Us older and uglier non-cis people?

Wait, what?“For whatever reason, the word cis, when pronounced, sounds offensive.”
To you.
And maybe to all the people you’ve ever talked to.  How many is that?
I mean, seriously — this is the issue that people think is causing the problem?  The word SOUNDS offensive?
I used “niggling” the other day on the phone.  It’s a word with any number of usefully functional synonyms; I rarely use it because it can be misheard.  I’m not unaware of the impact of the sound of a word.
But that this word “sounds unusual” doesn’t help your point — plenty of specialized/medical terms sound horrible in one way or another, and if it sounds unusual, people are LESS likely to consider it automatically offensive somehow, IMHO.
Let’s assume that I accept this.  Let’s assume I can find that many people who find the term “hetero” strange, clinical, etc. — does this mean we remove it from discussion, for the sake of the straights who COULD love queers, if only it wasn’t for that blasted word?
Look, I feel marginalized by even the concept that the word “sounding offensive” is somehow grounds to change our terminology.  I get the impression you’re trying to convince, and I’m not unsympathetic to the idea that if we called it “Mc-Gendered” or something people would take to it like ducks.  But it wouldn’t MEAN the same thing, it would still get used as a slur, some other people would decide it sounds offensive for whatever reason, etc., and the problem wouldn’t go away.

Here’s the thing I had to learnSometimes, when people with privilege speak out against their privilege, they do so in a way that the cost will be borne by those without privilege.
If trans people feel excluded from here, that may be an annoyance and something for you, as a cis person, to get angry about — but it’s not the same as what we are feeling.
I had to learn — and am still working on learning — this lesson as relates to race. When I mouth off angrily because of white racist people, the cost of that will be borne by people of color, not by me.
You can see it here — the backlash has been against, as Autumn puts it, “my trans peers” who have been rude to cis people. The fact that one of her two examples was not a trans person (and the other one was not weaponized!) doesn’t matter — trans people will feel the hurt, not cis people.
That is why would-be “allies” (such as me on matters of race, or you for trans issues) have to watch ourselves very carefully and remember who is going to pay the price for our actions. Consider what we are saying and where we are saying it, and act accordingly.
As I said, I’m still trying to fully absorb that. But I am a lot more careful about talking about issues related to race if it’s somewhere that I, a white person, will be forcing people of color to bear the brunt of the backlash — even though my “motives are good.”

Not if trans also had a flattering second definitionPick what ever feels best for you.
It’s like gay meant happy, but it ain’t used that way anymore.

Promote an adjectiveTechnically there is no gender neutral singular of ‘cattle’.  In practice, you can understandably ‘substantify’ the adjective ‘bovine’ to use it as a noun, so even though it comes off as technical sounding, you can refer to “one bovine” if you really need the gender neutral singular.

I agreeIn reference to Bobbi’s first paragraph: I bought the box, but never connected it, so when tv went digital, here and JoeMyGod are where I get most of my news on those issues.  NPR is always at least 12 hours behind you all, if not a whole day.  The others are good, but Joe is quickie and Pam has more of the details (as Joe often recommends).  So—I hope this is all just growing pains and that the community will reform in its new configuration.
I don’t know any of you personally, but I still love you all.
Love,
Rick Cabral

Point takenHeard and heeded and will work on learning. Much more understandable. Thanks, Kynn.

That’s good.
If you told her to go fuck herself, i’d feel less ‘special’.

What?Lane, at first I was confused, but now I understand what you’re talking about. I think.
Let me add that as a white, middle-class, femme-presenting female, to NOT be a college graduate would be a perceived failure and put me in a minority. It’s just something that’s socially expected of someone who has all the other privileges that I do. It’s both an expectation and an achievement. I am simply mindful that when combined with the whole package, college-educated it adds to the privilege cookie. That’s why I consider both it and my veteran’s status as privilege. Yes, they’re personal achievements, I worked damn hard to earn them, and I am PROUD of both. But I’m not talking about each individual aspect. I’m looking at the whole package.

Hello Sandeen.Here, you dropped this. i picked it up for you.
Autumn Sandeen, please respond to my prior post i made today at 10:25 EDT. If necessary, i can print this request out and wrap it around a brick for less subtley.
Email rather than public post would be fine if you like. i’m not looking for a public show. Just real answers.

It’s a descriptor not a NAME!I don’t go by the name Transgender. My handle here is Battybattybats because BBB were my birth intials, Ba are the first two letters of my male birth name and Te was the same from the name chosen for me were I born female-bodied and I am a Goth and Bats are important animals to me and I’ve looked after orphaned bats.
So your own name wasn’t going to be replaced with Cis.
Your point that you have a name is nonsensical.
This is just about a term that describes merely an aspect of you, one with many advantages that I as transgender don’t have because of the different ways we are treated because of that descriptor! Nothing more than that.
So the next VITAL question is… where does your hyper-sensititvity come from?
Why do you suddenly feel when a descriptor of a class you belong to that makes visible unfair advantage you get and disadvantage you don’t get that this somehow is an assault on your very identity? How can it threaten your name? It Can’t! How can it threaten your identity? Why are you irreationally upset over this term and raising an irrational argument about it?
Take a moment to consider that carefully. Because it could provide ou a powerful insight.

Some privilege is based on visibilityThis one is pretty clear if you think about it. Let me explain.
A clearly androgynous person is going to easilly suffer discrimination based on gender-non-conformity right?
Well a closeted crossdresser will avoid that! Now they will still suffer, they will suffer from the closeting, from internalising the hostility they see others face and the like, but they will get advantages in employment and education and reduced risk of being bashed or murdered so long as they stay in the closet.
If the same crossdresser comes out or expresses too much femininity publicly those advantages start falling away.
A transsexual who is stealth, who passes every day, will have different advantages to the androgynous person, also avoiding the appearance-based judgements, but will have healthcare issues that the Androgynous person does not.
This is because the Androgynous person is Cissexual but Transgender. And to the public eye the stealth TS is Cisgender. The crossdresser to the public eye so long as they are closeted and hide well enough is seen to be cisgender too.
If the crossdresser is sufficiently effeminate anyway, like I was, they will get less cisgender privilege but still more than if they were out.
And a TS who does not pass, no matter how cisgender they feel inside will still suffer from discrimination based on the gender-non-conformity of their appearance. Because while they have a Cisgender identity and a transsexual body their appearance is perceived as Trans anyway so they don’t get any or much Cis privilege.

Sex And Gender DiversityThats the umbrella thats been used recently in Australian Human Rights discussions. Covering Transsexuals from non-op to post-op including those who are Cisgender Transsexuals through to Crossdressersd and including Intersex people.
We share discrimination, we share human rights causes.
Sex and Gender Diversity. S&GD.
Easy term, huge umbrella, no more excuses for horizontal transphobic hatred, of cisgender transsexuals using othering terms like ‘classic’ and ‘true’ transsexual in order to invalidate other transsexuals or non-binary people.

Greek and Latin rootsBefore 1995, I didn’t know what ‘cis-’ meant, either.  I looked it up when I encountered it.  That’s what English speakers who give a darn about understanding each other do when, in a language with a lexicon at least seventy times (IIRC) the size of most folks’ ‘working vocabulary’.  We ask, or look it up.  Especially now that we have the web.

I’ll bet that very few people actually know the latin to english translation of “hetero” and “homo”.

I’ll grant you that there are folks who mistake ‘homo-’ (same) for ‘homo’ (man), and who perhaps have not gotten around to wondering why ‘hetero-’ is the oposite, but we all had to learn vocabulary a word at a time as children, and the people worth talking to are still learning words.  I’m used to pulling Greek and Latin roots out of unfamiliar terms to understand them, and looking up or asking about the ones I don’t know.  Complaining that folks might not know enough classical roots sounds a little odd, in a language chock full of words like ‘oxygen’, ‘photograph’, ‘sonogram’, ‘luminescent’, ‘democracy’, ‘homogenized’, ‘bicycle’, ‘hemisphere’, and ‘monarch’.
I mean, come on:  ‘bicycle’ is Greek, fercryinoutloud.  (From κυκλος, ‘circle’; same root as the first half of ‘cyclops’, “round eye”.)  Every play sports as a kid?  ’Ball’ is Greek (β&alphaλλω — “I throw”).
That some people are ignorant of the etymology of ‘heterosexual’ and ‘homosexual’ doesn’t make them any less understandable than similar ignorance of ‘bicycle’, as can be seen by the fact that now, some decades after their introduction, people use them in non-jargon settings all the time and Joe Random Anglophone over the age of fourteen can be expected to understand them.  That people can use those words without having studied Latin or Greek actually makes a better argument in favour of sticking with ‘cisgendered’ than against it.
The problem with ‘cisgender’/'cissexual’ isn’t that they’re latinate and thus oh so cryptic (Latin:  ’crypticus’, from Greek:  verb, κρυπτω) — the problem is that, like ‘homosexual’ back when gay men were more often called ‘inverts’, and ‘heterosexual’ back before the culture as a whole realized we needed a neutral term for it, ‘cisgendered’ is still new.  The word is only what, fifteen years old?  You can’t hold its mere unfamiliarity against it, whether it’s Latin, French (see ‘beef’, ‘ennui’), Hindi (see ‘pajama’, ‘bungalow’, ‘bangle’), Turkish (‘coffee’), or Arabic (see ‘alcohol’, ‘algebra’, ‘sugar’), because any new word you try to replace it with will be fifteen years farther behind in getting known.
There may be legitimate problems with ‘cis’, and there may be a better word, but “not enough people know it yet” isn’t the problem with that word; it’s the problem with the culture that the word (or some other, if a better one is found) will help us to address!
I don’t think that knowing all these imported words is flaunting my education — I knew ‘bicycle’ and ‘pajamas’ when I was a wee tyke, and ‘homogenized’ is on most milk cartons — it’s that English speakers build new words out of old roots all the time, sometimes — often, in fact — Latin roots, and we use these words everywhere.  As you yourself point out, “New words are created every day,” and this is how a good many of them are created.
Is your Big Objection, your “sounds offensive”, the fact that it shares a syllable with ‘sissy’?  Or is it just that (as a few of us have conjectured) hearing a label applied at all where wearing a label is unfamiliar sounds like an insult by default?  (Don’t worry, the new-label itching stops after a while.)  Or is there some larger problem with the word that won’t be solved by simply educating people on its meaning and use for another decade or two?
And if there is a real problem with it, whether it’s that ‘sissy’ thing (not the first thing I think of when I hear it, but hey, I’ve got intergendered ears so maybe I hear it differently) or something more significant yet to be explained, what the [expletive] are we supposed to say instead?  ’Cause as you may have noticed, we’re not inclined to simply shut up.
(For an idea of how far we have to bend to avoid Greek roots in some fields, read “Uncleftish Beholding” (HTML)  Also, look up James Nichol’s famous quote about the purity of English.)

That was precisely my reactionThat was exactly, almost literally, how I felt about a lot of the labeling that goes on in society until I came across Rapaille’s body of work.  

Look, I feel marginalized by even the concept that the word “sounding offensive” is somehow grounds to change our terminology.

A few years ago, I would have said,  ”You’ve got to be kidding me.  People need to just get over it,” and wondered why all of the emotion on both sides.
Really, though, I promise: His results speak for themselves.  When I studied what it was he was doing and how ruthlessly effective it was, I realized that the way our brains are wired, everything matters – the way something sounds, looks, tastes.  It all matters.  It may seem trivial, but he has convinced me, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that what seems trivial can mean the difference between success and utter failure in a marketing campaign.  And that’s exactly what any form of lobbying is – a marketing campaign.  Instead of products, you’re selling ideas, in this case, the notion that trans-gendered men and women have the right to live equally and freely in society without being made to feel “less than”.
If I or a family member were a trans-activist, we’d be in Tuxedo Park, New York knocking on his door and recruiting him to the cause.  He’d do more good using his knowledge of this stuff than decades of marches and speeches.  That assumes, of course, that you can actually get ahold of him.  He’s so good his fee normally runs several million dollars for a single idea.  But he’s never failed.  His firm runs specialized research sessions and within a few weeks, you’ll know the root cause of people’s oppositions and the most effective way to mentally neutralize it.  It’s terrifying how accurate his models turn out to be.  (Your reaction, by the way, is perfectly normal.  Most executives think he’s nutty when he shows up and says, “make this pink” or “put the letter J here in blue letters”.  But then the product sells tens of millions of units because he’s removed whatever brain wiring was causing the objection.)
Okay, wait… I suppose at this point, this does sound like a secret gay agenda.  Of course, he’s used it on coffee and cars in the past, but, again, lobbying is marketing.

Dratgrrr  My browser took my spacebar that I meant as “scroll down a screenful” as meaning “click the submit button”, and I still had typos to correct.  Gonna leave ‘em in there though, because that’s too long a comment to inflict on everyone twice.

EasyIt’s fake life, hadn’t you heard?
I always say that the “internet is made of PEOPLE”.  Because, yanno, it is.  (They’re squeezed through the tubes!)

Cis came from existing English use of Cis as opposite to Trans!It’s not a label-of-identity. It’s a term of description.
And some term is needed. One that is equal the way ‘normal’ ‘non-trans’ and ‘ordinary’ and ‘natural’ are not equal.
And as some term was needed someone found that the term Trans meaning accross or beyond and used for centuries in everything from Countries names like Transylvania where some of my ancestors came from to words like Transcend had its own underused but nevertheless pre-existing opposite term Cis!
So our language invented Cis and someone needing a term discovered it was there and started using it.
Because in our language Cis already existed as the counter-term to Trans if you object to it’s existence doesn’t that object to Trans as well?
Sorry but Cis wasn’t invented by TG people, it’s been around for ages, just someone went “of course the opposite of Trans is Cis so the opposite of Transgender is Cisgender! Yay now we have a word for that!” doesn’t mean they made-up the word or created a label!
It’s the logical consequence of our existing language and the exusting term Trans!
And here’s another word that exists in Engkish but is rarely used anyomore except in legal arguments. Wrongous. As in the opposite of Rightous. A real but underused word.
And I’ll use it in a sentence to: “All arguments against the application of Cis as opposite to Trans are by historical though limited use of the term Cis as opposite to Trans in other fields inherantly and unaviodably even if unintentionally Wrongous!”
So as long as you speak english or any of the other languages that have used Trans and Cis unrelated to connecting it to gender and sexual then your stuck with Cis just the way Up is opposite to Down, Left is to Right, Forward is to Backward, hot is to cold etc etc etc.
I can’t conceive of a more equal and fair term than Cis! But if someine can find another they sure can use it if they wish.. good luck on that.
And if you don’t like that legitimately upset TG people are using the proper pre-existing term in english for your difference to them because their anger makes you worried it will be demonised then try a little Cis-pride and ensure that good people free of cissexism who recognise their cisprivilege stand side-by-side with transgender people and proclaim that Cis people can be pro-Trans.
You have Gay-Straight alliances right? So try a Trans-Cis one!
But please, don’t blame current Trans people for the existence of the Cis label, that became a logical neccessity the moment Trans was attached to us… which was beyond the lifetime of those in this conversation as it was the 30′s iirc.

I needed to a statement in here that said you definitely……wanted a response. When I first saw the questions, I assumed you were asking rhetorical questions; however, your note below tells me otherwise now, so now I’m responding.

Autumn, Louise, Lurleen, and I can’t be everywhere, monitoring everything. The routine, such as it is, has been piecemeal, as we discover inappropriate comments (a very subjective exercise, as we know all too well), or when they have been brought to our attention.
…People really do want to believe we’re tethered to computers staring at threads all the time, I have no earthly idea why, and are ready to charge that we are purposely “letting someone get away with it.”.

I’m not sure who the enforcer is that you are referring to. To me, it’s an unclear reference I don’t understand.
Yes, telling people to “fuck off” would have been  unacceptable before the reboot. Again, I must have missed that email…currently I’m sorry to say I have 3000 plus emails in my inbox today. I imagine that in the future emails send to the tips e-addy with a “TOS Issue” in the subject line would get our attention — although we’ll do nothing about moderation this week, except:

* The exceptions:
– diaries created for spamming (we have some dolts who sign up to promote a product, not write a discussion post)
– direct physical threats between commenters, or publishing of private information.

Who will be the watchmens’s watchmen you envision? Seriously, no clue. Doesn’t sound very grass roots though.
I apologize for misidentifying you. It’s wrong to mislabel people, and apparently I did it to you in guessing or assuming you were a classic transsexual when you were not. Seriously, you have my apologies for f*cking that up.
And lastly, Bon-Bon is my friend. Seriously. I do all that talking to my kat that I say I do. I don’t have a GF, BF, or QF in my life, so the kat fills in a surrogate significant other for me. If I has and SO to talk to, you’d have heard his, her, or hir responses…but my friend is a Kat.
As to why the pics of the kat, well, the blog was long and without graphics — which meant visually thin. I added what I had file pics of, which included the kat in question. Don’t like seeing Bon-Bon? Sorry — she came with my write up to give the post some visual depth. My apologies for irritating you with those pics. However, some in this thread positively commented on seeing the Kat, so as life goes, we can’t satisfy everyone.
Pam did the final edit — she agreed with the kat pics too. So, we ran with ‘em.

My disjointed thoughtsI’ve been reading here for a long time, and have never been moved enough to register to comment, as mostly i just use it as a news feed and occasionally read the comments. But this has really gotten to me.  I never expected to see this level of protecting of privilege here.  Because that is the only thing i can see this as.  
I said on QT when Pam posted there, The only way Cis was being used as a weapon was in the sense  that any tool to point out privilege is a weapon against the kyriarchy, and will be seen as a threatening weapon to those who don’t want to address their privilege.   But that’s all it was being used to do. To point out that there is a group that is not-trans, and that that group has privilege, and some of them abuse that privilege.  Because some people were uncomfortable having that privilege pointed out, they took offense, and the authority here stepped p to protect their privilege.
It is entirely congruent to saying, frex, “I’m sick of the way bigoted white feminists have excluded black women from the movement.”   have I weaponized white there?  
also, I am DISGUSTED at how kynn has been scapegoated here.  She did not post personal information as commonly accepted, she shared personal correspondnce, whiich is a different matter, and given that she was asking for clarification of untrue accusations made against her in public, it was ridiculous to try to take that to a private conversation, when the accusations had been made out here where all saw it.  She had a right to publicize the response to her public query.

You think ‘Trans’ sounds like strawberries and rainbows and unicorns?C’mon!
For many it seems like Train, oh so masculine an image there.
They think of Transport, Transylvania (Hey’ im Goth and part Transylvanian Gypsy so love that but many are not), they fuss over Transsexual having the word Sex in it and seeming like homosexual, others fuss over being like transvestite which in the USA has fetishistic connotations leading many in the USA to use the term Crossdresser instead…
And many forget that Trans can mean beyond so get upset that the term means they cross something that had always been that way, others get upset with transgender being an umbrella term when their issues are about their bodies not gender-expression.
But we get over that as we get over our own internalised transphobia (and some don’t and redirect it leading to horizontal hostility and pointless terminology wars as subgroups desperste;y try to avoid association with ‘icky’ others on all sides).
And you know what? ‘Gay’ people are not all happy! Not every Lesbian came from Lesbos or cares about the writings of Sappho either! So maybe we all have to live with the fact language isn’t always ideal!
Cis has a pre-existing meaning, and so it’s more valid logically than the term Gay! Or lesbian.
But if you want to come up with the equivalent of crossdresser or gay or lesbian feel free… But it better be equal to transgender with no connotation of being better or worse.
And just in case if I don’t think your new term is neutrally equal to transgender then I will claim the new colloquial term for transgender will be: “Perfect”

Phrasing for the Unfamiliar

as a practical matter, I usually use “non trans people” when talking with those who aren’t familiar with trans people [...]

Unless I’m in a real hurry these days, I use “people lucky enough to have their birth(-assigned) sex match their gender,” and then try to introduce ‘cisgendered’ as a more convenient synonym as soon as possible.
But yeah, sometimes there isn’t time for that and one needs to fall back on ‘non-trans’ with all of its problems.
The “women’s sports” example is a good one, by the way — I’ll be borrowing that.

Visually thin…?

Don’t like seeing Bon-Bon? Sorry — she came with my write up to give the post some visual depth.

What exactly was the point of the pitchfork?

I’ve got mineFuck you.  I don’t want to stick out, but fuck your fucking rules and laws.  Good for you if you found your place on one extreme.  We all try to find our comfort zone and some of us find it and some of us search for it our whole lives.  If you or I find it, wow, good for us.  But for you or I to tell anyone behind us that doesn’t fit our criteria to shut up and go away is incredibly privileged.  Ger your ass back to the Women-Born-Transsexual blogs and fuck off.  I prefer to help everyone feel comfortable in their lives.  There are infinite stops between the ends of the gender spectrum.

WowAutumn?  I’m 36, and I’m thinking, maybe you’re too old.  Or disconnected from the modern trans movement.  Wow.  If you’re comfortable subordinating yourself to L, G and b…  damn.   We have to fight harder than anyone.  We need to be less accepting of shit than anyone.  If you wanna be the house trans, that’s your decision.  But when I watch the master’s house burn from the field, I will not feel sorry for you.

what is ultimately wrong with non-trans?I understand the concept of othering. I can also live with “cis”, I get it. That said though, as a gay man when talking about non-gays that is what I call them, non-gays, when I say that it refers to everyone other than gays. I don’t feel like that makes me “less than” just by saying it. As I posted below about “otherness” my feeling is that all of us L, G, B or T I think makes us all “other”.
For the life of me I have never met a gay man or a lesbian who feels like when someone says non-gay or non-lesbian that it makes them feel less than normal. News flash, we aren’t “normal” in the context of being heterosexual, we are all “other”. I like being other. What is so wrong with being other? Whether we are born L, G, B or T we all slide on that same “other” scale and what is so bad about that?

Limitation is that bovine is not limitedgiven that it includes a class of only recently extinct animals (aurochs come to mind).
People generally just use cow — function over form…
(I leave it as an exercise to the reader to determine why I say that)

FWIW — unfamiliar vocabularyFWIW, I learned a new (to me) word yesterday:  ’kyriarchy’.  I saw it once and thought, “I wonder whether that’s a typo for something,” and made a reasonable but very vague guess at the meaning from the context.  I saw it twice and thought, “Is this that poster’s pet made-up word?”  I saw it four times, and Googled it because the people using it were obviously trying to communicate a concept they found useful.  So now I know a new word which I may find useful later.
This is what one does with unfamiliar words.  This will usually find you an etymology as well.  So even if the word has unfamiliar roots, after seeing it enough times to decide to look it up (for some folks that’ll be but once; for others, far too long), one winds up knowing the roots as well, afterward.
So really, I didn’t learn one new word today.  I learned as many words as I can make up intelligibly according to rules of English word formation, from the root, ‘κυριος’ … if/when I ever need them.
This is what one does when a word looks odd or sounds strange; when a word is unfamiliar.  (And no, you don’t need to know Greek — the Greek parts of the etymology are usually given in Roman characters.)
Or I could complain that it sounds way too close to a religious phrase and is therefore confusing, and possibly offensive to atheists.  But I like my way better.

AutumnDo you remember you fit in the trans spectrum after CourtTV put you on air?  Maybe you are the token trans now, but just wait until they find a more “acceptable” (ie “natural”) woman.  Do you remember when you were the “piece of shit” rather than “the shit”?  Do you remember those you’ve left behind?  Wake up.  ”Cis” is entirely proper in opposition to “trans”.  If you want to fit in and sell out, that’s your decision.  But don’t expect anyone (and I mean ANYONE) to respect you.  And no trans person will feel sorry for you, house trans.

Can we refrain from framing things as valid and invalid…That is subjective to each L, G, B, or T individual. To make a statement like “Cis has a pre-existing meaning, and so it’s more valid logically than the term Gay! Or lesbian.” demeans our chosen terminology which for us, defines us in our chosen terminology, it is saying we are illogical for defining ourselves with our chosen words. Personally I think we are all perfect…each and every L, G, B or T. Framing an argument for Cis in this manner will not win anyone over, and I say this as someone who finally gets Cis and the meaning behind it and it’s usage.

Kyriarchy……eleison down the road that I must travel

When ‘other’ implies ‘false’Speaking from a position of het privilege (I don’t know that I am het, since I’m not sure which gender is opposite in-between, but even though folks often guess wrong about my orientation I’ve had the luxury of being able to think of myself as het when convenient)… sorry, let me start over:
Speaking from a position of het privilege, so I cannot speak for B/G/L people, I can point out that with regard to trans-*, being othered often means being perceived not just as ‘other’, but as false, unreal, invalid, and even de-gendered altogether.  I’ll go out on a limb here and venture a guess that bisexual people can understand what having one’s identity invalidated is like.  (“It’s just a phase.”  ”You’re confused.”)  When a trans person’s gender is invalidated, it can be crushing.  ”It doesn’t matter how pretty you look, you’re really still a man (and how dare you deceive me into being attracted to a fake-woman).”  ”Testosterone and a beard don’t make you a man, sweetie, just a confused dyke.”  ”Nobody will ever love you if you do that to your body, because you’ll never be real.”  ”No matter what you call yourself, you’ll always be my son, not a daughter.”  I freely admit that I do not know whether there are similarly hurtful invalidations lurking for cisgendered gays and lesbians as a consequence of being othered to the point of being considered “not real”, but I do know the “not real” effect hurts trans people and comes up awfully bloody often.
Replacing “genetic woman”, “bio-male”, “real man”, and “woman-born woman” with “cisgendered person” will not make these ideas magically go away, certainly not quickly — I’m pretty sure we all know that — but this may help you to understand why some trans people are so very sensitive about othering language, even something as subtle as making trans the marked class and leaving cis unmarked so that we have “women” and “trans women”, “men” and “trans men”, which is one of the effects of using ‘non-trans’ in place of ‘cis’.
What I’ve written clearly applies most obviously to transsexual men and women, but there are similar consequences of othering for CD/TV, GQ, intergender/bigender, and other transgendered people.  (I currently identify as intergendered myself, FWIW.)  When we’re othered, we’re frequently not just “freaks” or “sick” as a result of being othered; othering casts us as “not real”.  Without the invisibility that bisexual people wind up with when they’re invalidated (which is, yes, both a blessing and a curse (when invisibility is the very nature of the invalidation, it’s obviously a curse — I do get that; for folks who want to go stealth it can be a blessing)).
Again, I don’t know whether cis lesbians and gay men suffer the same kind of invalidation from othering, nor whether it’s as soul-crushing when they do.  I don’t know whether it matters more to us; I’m just trying to explain why it matters so much.
This isn’t assimilationism:  being different is okay for many of us (the ones who choose not to go stealth, and the ones whose genders aren’t so conveniently binary anyhow, for example), but being different among many equally valid identities is not the same as being The Other.  

You’re rightDrat.  I concede that point.

OddMy comment appears to have gotten detached from the one eit was meant to be a reply to.  (In the OT tangent regarding ‘bovine’.)

Apologies should not be apologiasLook up the words if you must.
I’ve found that when I make an apology, when I just make one, without going into all of the ins and outs of what I may have been thinking or how I was triggered by something someone else said or did; they can often be taken with inherent grace by whomever I apologize to.
Apologies I make that run to between 5 & 10,000 words prolly don’t flow or get heard as well as those where I just say something like:
“I got really sensitive about having maybe offended someone who said he was offended by what I wrote.
And I got too caught up in defending the mistake I made to begin with.”
The secret of nonviolence seems like it may be in owning my own mistakes. Just simply owning them, without a lot of fanfare and explanation of why I did what I did.
Otherwise I sound a lot like someone who isn’t apologizing at all.

Perhaps that, the short, sweet silence of Bon-Bon, or in my case of Kringle, was saying and I simply missed the point.  

self-designated alllies

You can see it here — the backlash has been against, as Autumn puts it, “my trans peers” who have been rude to cis people. The fact that one of her two examples was not a trans person (and the other one was not weaponized!) doesn’t matter — trans people will feel the hurt, not cis people.
That is why would-be “allies” (such as me on matters of race, or you for trans issues) have to watch ourselves very carefully and remember who is going to pay the price for our actions. Consider what we are saying and where we are saying it, and act accordingly.

My observation is that self-designated “allies” are often more concerned about their own appearance/image as “one of the good ones” than with dealing with how power flows and what their actions do.
It’s one of the reasons that I view with extra suspicion anyone who names themselves an ally where they are privileged. Because often there is more wrapped up in promoting an identity/self-image than there is attention to dealing with how power is operating in a given situation.
Of course, if you can fold the kind thoughtfulness you describe into the self-designation of ally, get it to be part of the self-image that is required for ally credibility, then maybe it will in fact help keep from happening what you describe here:

Sometimes, when people with privilege speak out against their privilege, they do so in a way that the cost will be borne by those without privilege.

And preventing that whenever/however possible is something I can seriously support.

eh. It happens.Its a rarity, though.
I’m rarely right.
Occasionally correct, perhaps.
But when a right handed person sets up their entire kitchen left handed, there’s something definitely left about them…
(sorry, I’m in a strange and silly mood tonight, in need of comic absurdity that even mahna mahna is not providing).

Ah!It does, then.
Its some sort of weird technical jargon for some chemical schtuff.
Too much for my wee little girl brain.
ANd whatcha mean?  I still use “gay”.
And, since I’m still int hat weird mood rferenced earlier, Ishould point out that gay originally meant “happy and content” and was usually self referential.  IT held the connotative quality of meaning that is best expressed as “content in the way of one’s life and very happy in the moment”.
Which may give some insight into why it was claimed…

That’s kinda the point BBB is making, RIck.So you got it.

People uncomfortable with one anotherIt’s all too true, Maura… and it’s sad.  You’d think that GLBT’s of all stripes could see the common struggle we have.
Transphobia = gender-based judgmental hatred.  (“How dare you go outside the manufactured binaries in your mind, your body, or both?”)  Homophobia = gender-based judgmental hatred.  (“You’re a woman, so you’re ‘supposed’ to be physically and mentally drawn to men!”)
Trans, gay, lesbian, and bisexual people are natural allies… Let’s start acting that way.

That’s a Really Big AssumptionNo, that’s what the type of people who read Pam’s House Blend do when they encounter a word they don’t know.  
We live in a country where most people think Benjamin Franklin and Alexander Hamilton were Presidents, have no idea what the hell the electoral college does or the role it plays in ensuring we don’t fall into the nightmare that is direct democracy, and still don’t grasp the concept that you pay 17% weighted tax rates on $10 million in income but 30% or higher on $40k as a business owner.  Why?  Because they are too damn lazy to look it up, even to their own detriment.
You cannot forget that the type of people here, on a blog that deals primarily with politics, gender, and law, do not represent most Americans.  It’s sad, but it is the reality.

Ha!

I will claim the new colloquial term for transgender will be: “Perfect”

I’m not going to lie.  I love it.

So do IBut then for some reason I started on the logical extension of what being perfect means, which, properly, of course, is to rule the world.
Apparently some people found the mere idea of my ruling the world cause to attempt harm on my person.
go figure…
I am perfect, of course.  NO one is more perfect than I.
Because I’m a perfect me. And that would be a challenge for anyone.

But people from PHB don’t do that…or else this whole meltdown over “cisgender” would never have happened.

Often times it seemsthe four letters are only held together by the dictum of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” It’s depressing.

Doot doo, do doo dootI set up my drum kit kinda rightie and leftie at the same time (instead of playing crossed, I hit the snare on my left with my left hand and the hi-hat on my right with my right hand) but that really has as much to do with dominant foot as dominant hand.  Hey waitaminute!  That makes me a cis-drummer, doesn’t it?  (One field where crossed is more common, and I wind up being cis there — who’d-a thunk it?)   A brain hemisphere dominance test I took in high school said I had “mixed dominance”.

Now I’m curiousWhat was intended by the question?

What type of people have been objecting here?Who has been objecting to ‘cis’ here at PHB, the type of people who read PHB, Or the type of people who don’t?
IME, people in lots of places and economic classes look at you funny when you use a word they don’t know, then ask what it means.  Not everyone, but a pretty god portion of the folks who haven’t already made up their mind to be disagreeable no matter what you say or how you phrase it.  (I’m … conspicuous.  So I do run into people who’ve already decided to hate me before I even open my mouth.  But the larger number who just have questions are usually willing to learn a couple of new words.)

It’s the word itself and the fact that it sounds offensive.Emotive and aesthetic arguments  

WaitAre YOU seriously telling someone to grow the fuck up after your actions and comments here? Seriously?

I thinkI covered that a bit later in my post, in the section speaking to non-trans people. Unless I missed your point.

To all the non-Ts here at the Blend: Lighten up. No one is out to get you. If you are a cisgendered gay white male (like me) and you’re screaming about oppression from the LGBT community, take a step back and realize you’re like christians screaming that they are oppressed. The fact is that cisgendered gay white males (like me) DO oppress the LBTs in our community (not like me). The fact is also if you do not do that, then COMMENTS ABOUT THE OPPRESSORS DO NOT POINT TO YOU. THEY ARE NOT TALKING ABOUT YOU. They are talking about the ones like Aravosis. NOT YOU.

I didn’t really take any of it personally, but I was addressing those who seem to think everyone is against them.

ThanksI wasn’t sure if I’d get anyone who agreed, or if I would piss off both sides. Glad to see people are taking it as it was meant.

Yes, it has.It happens all over the place. People may not use it like that, but that is often how it comes across.
It’s the same as being called a homo can be insulting or not depending on context. If a gay friend said, “You’re such a sweet lovable homo” to me I would not take offense. If a straight person whom I didn’t know said, “You’re a dirty sodomite homo” I would take offense.
If a friend of mine said, “Hey bitches” to some friends and I, I wouldn’t take offense. If a stranger to me said, “Hey bitches” to me I would take offense.
If a friend of mine said, “You’re such a sweet lovable cisgender” to people, they wouldn’t take offense. But if a stranger uses “gay white male cisgender oppressors”, then cisgender comes out as offensive, because it’s linked with oppressors.
How many times do you see cis used to just describe non-trans people, versus how much it is used in conjunction with bad sentiment? Cisgender and Cissexual are not offensive terms, but they can be viewed as that in a mixed audience when they are often used with words and themes like “oppressors” “throwing us under the bus” and such.
Keep in mind I am not pointing a finger at anyone, just calling it as I see it.

Whoops

I covered that a bit later in my post, in the section speaking to non-trans people. Unless I missed your point.

Well, [mild expletive] — my eyes bounced right over that rather important bit the first time I read your comment.  :-(  Mine should have been cast as an amplification of that paragraph, rather than as a rebuttal to the one before it.
So no, you didn’t miss my point; I missed the half of yours that agreed with mine.  I still like my shoe metaphor, but I probably didn’t need to be so shouty, and I should have called attention directly to the paragraph that I unfortunately overlooked myself.

To all the non-Ts here at the Blend: Lighten up. No one is out to get you. If you are a cisgendered gay white male (like me) and you’re screaming about oppression from the LGBT community, take a step back and realize you’re like christians screaming that they are oppressed. The fact is that cisgendered gay white males (like me) DO oppress the LBTs in our community (not like me). The fact is also if you do not do that, then COMMENTS ABOUT THE OPPRESSORS DO NOT POINT TO YOU. THEY ARE NOT TALKING ABOUT YOU. They are talking about the ones like Aravosis. NOT YOU.

Thanks for pointing out my gaffe so gently.  (And for writing something that really should be requoted and highlighted like this.)

All true.Very well explained, batty.

well considering i feel no longer safe in safe spaces that we both were members at then yes you have ruined safe spaces so there for you did. because i feel now that i’ve defended autumn the same vitriol you have used against people here will spill out there.  

WellI like your shoe metaphor too and wish I had thought of it
I’m guilty of my eyes bouncing back and forth and missing points, so I really understand.
And thank you for the compliment.

Hadn’t consideredthat someone would label themselves as an ally for selfish and self-serving motives- I know, that sounds DUMB as hell. But true.
Thank you Michelle.
I DO have privilege- buckets of the stuff and in assorted flavors- and it was invisible to me for a long time.  

That image works!Serious, dys, that explains so frigging much in my noggin.
Be scared- be very scared- you’ve dropped to “Louise Level” on the intellectual scale!

this is the main point of contention,and I wish this point would get a lot more attention: that what Autumn called “weaponized” use of the word ‘cisgender’ is actually a use of what the word was intended to convey: to point to an act that was dripping with cis privilege.
Frankly I can’t trust anyone who tries to claim with a straight face that poor John Aravosis was simply asking questions when the point he wanted to discuss was whether gay men should ‘let’ weirdo trannies in their movement.  Never mind that for forty years there has been a concerted effort to cis-wash (like white-wash, get it?) over the historical role that gender-variant people played in the Stonewall riots and numerous other seminal events in the modern LGBT rights movement.  There is no ‘letting’ us trans* folks into the movement, we’ve been here since the beginning because we are you and you are us and we all need each other.
So far I have yet to see anyone explain what “weaponized” is really supposed to mean.  How is this to be distinguished from calling someone out on their privilege?  Because this is not always a pleasant act.  Sometimes calling out privilege really hurts for everyone involved.  But that doesn’t make it any less necessary.

It’s all context.Cisgender is a neutral word. It can be used a variety of ways. If cisgender was used often in every day conversation, “I met a wonderful cisgender woman today.” then it would be balanced with “white gay cisgender oppressors.”
But the simple fact is that cisgender is used almost exclusively when describing people like Aravosis, the connotation with it becomes negative.
“You and all your cisgender friends hate America”
“You and all your gay friends hate America”
“You and all your lovely friends hate America”
versus

“I met a cisgender man today, and we went for coffee”
“I met a gay man today, and we went for coffee”
“I met a lovely man today, and we went for coffee.”
The problem is, you almost never see cisgender used as it is in the bolded area. It’s almost always used in the italicized sentence. Most people learn words from context, and if you always see something interwoven with negativity, then you see the word itself as negative.

Among trans* folks,Among trans*folks, I see cis* used the bolded way quite often.  The thing is, trans*folks are such a small minority that there is not often much reason to use “cis” outside of the context of discussing trans* or oppression issues.
And what you call “negativity” is often actually “much needed (but painful) unpacking of privilege.”

Actually,How often do you ever see one white person say to another white person, “I met a white man today, and we went for coffee”?

i’m so glad we have autumn on this blogwho has done more to win passive observers to the cause of the transcommunity with her thoughtful, reasonable reports and dialogues than someone like you–who only serves to divide and drive away with homophobia and false accusations.  you want to talk about tone and how even well-meaning allies can hurt the cause that they are advocating?  look in the mirror, honey.  you’re a rageaholic whose selfish impulses have hijacked every thread you’ve posted on in order to put the focus on kynn, kynn, kynn.  
really, your focus ISN’T civility when you ask “Do you think Matt was being civil to me?” to autumn?  LOL!!  how many postings do i need to make to point out yet another hypocritical statement you’ve made?  it’s getting tiresome.  you care nothing about oppression–you care about demeaning others and casting labels/blame where it isn’t warranted.  you’ve acted like an asshole on this blog and it’s past time for you to hang it up and retreat to wherever you came from.  pam and autumn have accomplished and will accomplish far more for everyone’s rights than you could ever dream.      

Hi, I don’t know you, but….Has any of this vitriol-spillover actually happened?
I’m just confused by the concept you’re trying to push here. It doesn’t make sense. What exactly has Kynn done to you?

What were wrong with Kynn’s actions and comments?You may object to the idea of a trans person speaking up for trans people against cissexism, but is that really something that is inappropriate on a site that claims to be LGBT?

From how I read it….That was not Kynn asking for civility as much as her pointing out the hypocritical standards to which trans people are held, but cisgender gay men are not.

Why did Autumn post a link to Kynn’s journal and tweets?I’m still confused about that.
Especially given that Autumn claims Kynn originated the problem — which was ongoing a day BEFORE Kynn posted here.
Can anyone explain that to me? I haven’t seen that answered yet.

Wait, so you’re saying that trans people can never talk about cis oppression?That’s quite a stretch here.
It sounds to me like you, a cisgender man, are saying that you want to control the dialogue and prevent trans people from describing who exactly is doing the oppressing.
What’s offensive is not the terminology; what’s offensive is the oppression.
You are putting the blame on the victims when they speak out against what’s wrong with cis-dominated society.

I’ve seen that before as wellI am actually opposed to the “ally” terminology, but it’s often too derailing to go off on a diversion into just what’s wrong with the “ally” self-designation whenever it comes up.
Maybe I should write a FAQ.

Don’t blame trans people for society’s defaultQuite frankly, I don’t expect anyone to say “I met a wonderful transgender woman today” either, and I can’t imagine most trans people are advocating for that either. Most trans women would prefer if the sentence were “I met a wonderful woman today.”
You still haven’t explained why it’s wrong to use “cis” terminology when talking about cis privilege/oppression.
Most of the references to “Christian” on the Blend are not what we’d call positive, but that’s appropriate, since the primary persecutors of LGBT in Western society are Christian. It’s oppression from Christians that harms us.
In the same way, demanding that trans people only use the word “cis” in a positive sense is a rather telling one — it’s again trying to control the conversation for the sake of privileging cis “feelings” over the valid and legitimate need of trans people to discuss their oppression with other members of the larger LGBT community.
If trans people are only using “cis” in a negative context, that really should be a wakeup call to privileged cis people that there’s something that they need to fix about cissexist society, not a call to arms to get trans people to stop saying such awful things about them.

Is it betteror for lack of words, more acceptable to call oneself “fully supportive” than “ally”? Or is this a “person by person” judgement call?
Here’s the thing. I AM supportive and also very new to many phrases, words, concepts and ideas. I know enough to have a minimal understanding and am trying to learn more. With that comes looking into my own privilege, as I find it myself and as others point it out, as well as figuring out language.
Otherwise, it’s like trying to play Monopoly without knowing the rules- rather difficult and doesn’t make a heckuva lot of sense…
I’m trying to learn not just quickly, but more importantly, THOROUGHLY AND ACCURATELY.
Thanks!
 

Yet againsomeone twists a point to make them look like a victim being oppressed.
I never once said not to use it to point out oppression. What I said was stop using it ONLY for that. Use it when dealing with any cisgender person, and they will stop seeing it as a negative term, and the neutral term that it is.
I really wish people would take a deep breath and stop looking for ways to be victimized. We’re not out to get you. We’re not telling you to shut up. If you look at my posts, you’ll see I am telling you to be louder and talk more. Just stop being angry at people who aren’t deserving of it.

That’s the point of my argumentamong trans folk you see it a lot. In mixed company you don’t. Therefore trans people see both sides, and mixed company doesn’t.
Therefore when used among mixed company, they don’t know the word, see it only the italicized way, and see it as a negative term.
When someone only sees it in the italicized way, they don’t see it as pointing out privilege, they see it as a pot shot at them, because they are not familiar with the term.

That’s because……cis people drive out trans people who talk about cis privilege.
Hooray! A victory for cissexism once again.

I see your correlation but…How often do you meet someone who doesn’t know what white is?
Now how often do you meet someone who doesn’t know what cis* is?

Interesting pointLike Louise, I hadn’t considered that someone would label themselves an ally for self-serving means. The concept doesn’t make any sense to me. Does not compute. But apparently, people do it. **brain hurts**
Having had more time to think about it, michelle, I’m supportive of transgender rights and protections for all the reasons already listed, and I’m angry, impatient, and frustrated with other cis people who “don’t get it” because the concept seems to me to be such a simple one. And apparently letting that anger, frustration, and impatience out causes a backlash against the very people I’m trying to stand up for and with.
So, what do you suggest as a course of action or designation for those of us who are fully supportive, as Louise states, in order to be allies without causing more pain?

I don’t blame them for anything, reallyBut you’re taking my words and working out meaning that is not there.
Nowhere did I say not to use the term, and nowhere did I talk about silencing trans people. I never said only use it in a positive way, either.
But if it’s ONLY used negatively, then it’s going to be taken negatively. So the word needs to be used more than just negatively.
This comes from a cis person who actively uses cis when dealing with LGBT people, both positively and negatively in real life. I use it to point out privilege, and I also use it in other ways too. It’s not really that hard. It’s something that many trans people aready do with other trans people. Just start doing it with the LGBs as well.
It would be a wonderful world if we didn’t need to use trans and cis, but it’s not a wonderful world, so they get used.

Honestlytry not looking for any way to be a victim for a second. Please.
I’m cis, and I’m not driving anyone out. In fact, I am trying to point out how to make people less defensive when you point out their privilege. I have seen this work in real life, with my trans friends and myself. It’s the only way to not get people defensive, and to open actual dialogue and learning, rather than pushing them away.
You are taking a lot of what I am saying in the worst way possible. Try reading things neutrally.

Use it otherwise where? Here?

I never once said not to use it to point out oppression. What I said was stop using it ONLY for that.

As someone who has been using the word ‘cisgendered’ (and occasionally ‘cissexual’) in spoken and written communication for over a decade, I can tell you that it is used for more than just pointing out oppression.  You’re seeing just the point-out-oppression use because that was the context in which it came up here, so asking for a raft of other uses of it here, which would require a boatload of tangents even less related to the main discussion than what we’ve already had, is asking for a big distraction.  Frankly, I’m inclined to see, “you have to prove the word is neutral by talking about everything else but the privilege for a while first”, to be a new and sneaky form of derailing.  (Maybe somebody who has paid more attention will tell me it’s not so new, I dunno.)
Derailing may not be your intent, but it would be the effect of what you’re requesting.
Look, if you’re not a member of various T* communities, either as a trans person or as an ally who is also socially involved with trans people, then I can understand how you wouldn’t be aware of the complete history of how ‘cisgender’ has been used in conversations.  But fercryinoutloud, please understand that you haven’t been listening in on all those conversations and don’t know what you don’t know, instead of leaning on us for only using the word one way in a conversation that started off being about cis privilege and trans exclusion.
We folks who’ve been using it since the late 1990s do know better than you how we use it.  And hearing that we have to Prove It To You just to be allowed to use it in a discussion-of-privilege context as well …
… well golly gee, if you can insist on that, what does that make our relationship?  If you get to dictate terms like that, is it because you’re the grownup and we’re the kiddies?  Because you’re the language police and we’re the suspected semantic miscreants?  Because what you know firsthand is all that counts, and our testimony about our own language cannot be trusted unless vouched for by a cis person?
[expletive] that.  You’re not my mommy and your’re not my schoolteacher, and you have no better claim than I do to set the ground rules and force others to do your sociological, anthropological, and linguistic homework for you.  You want to know for yourself how ‘cis’ is used the rest of the time?  Go hang out in T* spaces other than just activist ones, get to know the people as people foremost and as study subjects second, and listen.  Do your own research …
… Or Take Our Word For It When We Explain How We Use Language In Place Other Than Right Here where you happen to be.
Right now, by insisting that we must not really know how we use the term elsewhere, or that we must be lying just to sidestep your objections, well even if you intend to be a trans ally, you are acting like an oppressor.
It’s bad enough that we have to get various sorts of permission from our ‘betters’ just to shape our lives and our bodies to match our genders, and have to go nine rounds of debate just to get our own families to believe we are what we say we are.  It’s bad enough that we’re asked to Prove Things to officialdom at every turn, and worry about something as simple as whether we can safely go to the bathroom.  Now, here, people are telling us how we are permitted to speak, and claiming they know better than we do how we speak elsewhere?
Can You See How Offensive That Is?
If you can’t stop othering us, at least, for the love of all that is decent and humane, try to stop infantalizing us.  And don’t assume that because we use ‘cisgender’ to talk about privilege in a conversation about privilege, our more humdrum uses of it elsewhere don’t exist without documentation.  Come hang out with us, get to know us as people, and see how we talk the rest of the time.
Or if you can’t be bothered, grant us this much:  that we know what we’re talking about when we try to tell you how we speak when we’re not picking apart privilege.

Use it when dealing with any cisgender person, and they will stop seeing it as a negative term, and the neutral term that it is.

Golly gee, ya’ think maybe that’s why none of my cis friends who replied to my blog entry yesterday could see why anyone could consider it negative — because in general, everyday, casual, social life, I (we) do use it the way we’ve been trying to tell you we do?
I can understand your assuming on first contact with the word in a politically charged context, that it was a politically charged word.  But even though we’ve tried to educate you out of that misapprehension, some people here seem to be actively resisting that education.  If I spend the rest of the day and night compiling old email, diary entries, Usenet posts, blog entries, and IRC logs to document neutral uses of ‘cisgendered’, will that be enough or will you say, “tl;dr”, or move the goalposts?
But I’m not going to blow my entire Friday night doing that.  Because I shouldn’t have to.  Accept that we know our own language habits, come hang out with us socially for a year to find out for yourself, or stop even pretending that you respect us as humans and as adults.

= exact attitude that caused all this dramaI’m not against the terms. However, the notion that these terms are “neutral” is patently absurd. The very fact that every time this is brought up, bigger issues about majority privilege get immediately invoked along with it, proves this isn’t simply a neutral term.
Question: Can you fierce proponents defend “cisgender” as a “neutral” term without accusing others of benefitting from some sort of social privilege and being in denial about it? Or being angry, ignorant and oblivious? Or launching any insult at all?
Can you?
I know I can describe someone as “white” without launching into a sermon about white privilege. I also know I could explain to them what white privilege is, and that it is a social reality, without resorting to childish behavior or hurting their feelings.
On top of it all, cisgender is not synonmous with cissexual, just like transgender is not the same as transsexual. So when you throw around the prefix “cis” on its own, you need to be more specific.
Cisgender and transgender are broad UMBRELLA TERMS that describe theoretical concepts dealing with large scale group dynamics. They are not labels to be applied to any individual. Transgender vaguely means “transgressing gender norms”. Therefore its opposite, cisgender, should mean “conforming to gender norms.”
Therefore, arguably, all LGBT people are “transgender” in that we all violate prevailing gender norms (although the norms themselves aren’t cut-and-dry to begin with either).
Cisgender privilege certainly exists, but it’s not a static characteristic an individual can possess at all times. Some people can access it more than others, and sometimes the same person can access it in certain situations but not in others.
Meanwhile, transsexual is usually understood in academic discourse to be more specific; it is meant to describe, in particular, the phenomenon of people being born as biologically one sex while having the mind or brain gender identity of the opposite gender.
***90% of the bitchy comments I am reading are completely failing to make this distinction.***
- Most gay people can be said to fall under “transgender” since we violate dominant gender norms simply by being attracted to the same gender.
- Depending on their gender expression/mannerisms, gay people can either benefit from cisgender privilege or be harmed by it. I am a fairly masculine male. Therefore I benefit, usually, from cisgender privilege. However men who are more effeminate will be perceived as transgender and be harmed by cisgender privilege. In social situations in which I am perceived as “not masculine enough”, I will also be harmed by cisgender privilege.
- Anyone who experiences their brain gender identity as being aligned with their biological sex can be reasonably labeled cissexual. This, unlike cisgender, CAN be a neutral and scientific term that doesn’t come attached to all kinds of other issues and judgments.
I am a masculine gay man. I am cissexual. I am transgender. In many social situations I benefit from cisgender privilege. In others, I am harmed by it.
Either way, we are all in the same boat.

NoYou’re being oppressive.
You’re being privileged.
I won’t stop pointing it out because it makes you feel bad.

LOL

You are taking a lot of what I am saying in the worst way possible. Try reading things neutrally.

This whole conversation is about cis people refusing to read things neutrally, and you’ve got the nerve to pull that out?
Honestly.

Keori:My suggestion to you — for reasons entirely my own — is to be ruthlessly honest with yourself and others.

Like Louise, I hadn’t considered that someone would label themselves an ally for self-serving means. The concept doesn’t make any sense to me. Does not compute. But apparently, people do it. **brain hurts**

Keori, you’re not being ruthlessly honest with yourself and others here.
Since lack of such ruthless honesty is the norm in this society, your actions won’t stand out as any more problematic than anyone else’s.
Since as far as you know, there is no such thing as a being that can perceive dishonesty like you would perceive smells and sounds, you’re protected and covered. No one can really see, right? The only knowledge anyone would have of what you’re doing would be over-ridden by your claims of what you feel and see inside, and since you’re the expert in that, no one can call out what you’re actually doing. Because such a thing does not exist in your landscape.
So look, Keori, I don’t want to pretend that we’re in a real conversation. Because we’re not. You’re speaking to me as if I don’t exist. That is not a conversation. That is me experiencing pain in interaction with an agent of this deceptive cultural system for no good reason I can see.

So, what do you suggest as a course of action or designation for those of us who are fully supportive, as Louise states, in order to be allies without causing more pain?

Others here have been and will continue to be better resources for you in addressing this question, IMO.

Hey LouiseMy suggestion is to not focus on what you call yourself at all.
Do what you do and allow your doing to speak for itself.
Your actions will likely be a mix of support for the larger system and opposition to it. That is what it is and you can keep track and seek to shift more of your actions toward opposing the horrors. But speak with your actions, and don’t try to hide what is going on even if it makes you look bad or threatens a desire to be (appear to be) a good person.
In my observation, this cultural system teaches its members/insiders to focus on controlling definitions and perception. So in this system, to the extent that you have privilege, you’re supposed to focus more on how to appear as something and get others to accept how you define and describe yourself (eg self-defining as an ally, as a supporter, whatever)… and less on letting what you do speak for what you’re doing and attending to how that relates to the larger power dynamics that cause so much harm and pain.
So people often get all into explaining and interpreting what they do in order to affect the perception of those around them, especially those who are members of oppressed groups where they are privileged. Trying to make it look good, to make themselves look good. Interactions from this space are about control and domination even when they appear to be otherwise.
So I would say: don’t call yourself anything. Step back from interpreting and defining your role. Those who are targets of oppression can perceive what role(s) you are playing at any given moment in time.
And I would say: Know that sometimes you do and will function as an agent of the system. IMO it’s better to attend to how that works so you can try to minimize it. Focusing on naming yourself and implicitly or otherwise claiming you are one of the good ones is IMO a tremendous diversion — waste of time and energy.
I only speak for myself in this.

I would like to see such a FAQ, Caoimhe n/t

Thank you for this, michelle…this means I don’t have to write it up myself, and you said it better than I would.

wowThanks for telling me this, Caoimhe. I’m accustomed to other people responding as if I am not making sense when I say this kind of stuff in public. So, wow and thank you.

AlliesMy suggestion is to not focus on what you call yourself at all.
Do what you do and allow your doing to speak for itself.
Thank you for pointing this out. So so much.

I’d like to read that FAQI don’t trust “allies” at all. I think of cis* people who actively work to create positive change for trans* people as either decent folk, or friends. Same goes for men who work against sexism and misogyny, het folk who actively work for LGB rights, and so on…
When I meet people who are bursting at the seams to tell me they’re my ally, my mind goes to michelle’s comment about worrying about one’s actions, not one’s self-identification.

ojrocks, pls notice how your focus divertsOjrocks, I don’t know if you have stepped back and looked at how your response here functions. Please take a look at it.
Situation: Aravosis did violence and a trans commenter named that violence and its source.
Stop and attend to this. Aravosis did violence.
That should be the focus. That is not right, it is something to attend to and try to prevent from happening in the movement, and it should be the focus.
Diversion: The “uses of cis” discussion is a pure diversion from attending to the violence that Aravosis did. Notice how the focus turns. Now we’re not talking about someone in our community who has done harm to trans people. Now we’re talking about how cis is or isn’t used.
That is a diversion.
Notice who is most human inside this diversion. The violence done to trans people is normalized, unremarkable, not worth the focus. Trans people’s use of cis is so much more important as a focus.
The claim is that certain uses harm some cis people. Minor harm, face up to that reality  – any harm to individual cis people here is minor because it is not backed up by institutionalized power. And make no freaking mistake, what kills us and hurts us for real is backed by institutionalized power. That’s the real risk we face as LGBT people, the real danger. Not what those with less privilege than ourselves call us or how.
So minor harm to individual cis people is more important than institutionally-based and institutionally-backed harm done by a cis person to a trans person. Why is minor non-institutionalized harm to cis people our focus when the real danger to all of us in our lives is the harm backed up by institutionalized power?
In this diversion, cis people are so much more human than trans people that a minor scrape on a cis person is more worthy of focus than a serious wound on a trans person.
Stop and think about that.
This “how cis is used” thing — all of it — is a diversion that perpetuates the power dynamics that can and do harm us.  That this diversion is so prevalent in this discussion here speaks to a deep disrespect here for the humanity of trans people. IMO.
So ojrocks, can you please not contribute to the diverting? Would you be willing to step away from that and re-focus your attention on the violence that is backed by institutionalized power and what it means when one of our own uses that same power to do violence to another of our own?  

Excellent adviceThanks, michelle. I really appreciate your thoughts and advice, and am much happier not worrying about labels and stuff.
I’ve been trying so hard to STFU here and learn this past week. Have lost track of how many times I have read each thread…
Also been reading more than a dozen blogs I had never ventured to before- lurking quietly on some and commenting on others- and chatting with friends, old and new.
It has been eye-opening and educational; I highly recommend that others who have yet to do so reach out beyond their own comfort levels and do the same.
To them I also say this: Be honest about your intentions, keep your heart, ears and mind open, and really LISTEN. Read the links people are kind enough to provide, really PAY ATTENTION. Hopefully you will also come away with better understanding.

wow again, and you’re welcome! n/t

Good pointI gravitate to the word “folk” and use it alot w/o thinking about it- imo it describes someone I trust and is a friendly word.  

Reaching out with the pitchfork of reconciliationThis wasn’t an apology. This was grandstanding to avoid responsibility.
Despite your sense of self-importance, we aren’t looking for a crucifixion, we’re just looking for acknowledgment and sincere regret. You aren’t giving that, and you are actively trying to frame those who disagree with you as mean, civil, weaponizing…
So are you shocked people aren’t showering you with accolades for your upstanding actions here?
And really, the ‘weaponizing’ thing is despicable. It’s the sort of thing we’d all be disgusted by if it came from the right. Your coining of it and insistence on continuing to use it is offensive not just to trans people, but to any group seeking balanced discussions of oppression and privilege.
“Weaponize” will be your undoing if you insist on keeping it up. That isn’t me threatening, that’s me expecting people who are truly engaged in progressive movements and social justice to see this dirty, right-wing-style tactic for what it is.

I do know Keorias an online friend I have “adopted” and hope to meet someday…
Keori, we can chat via emails on this one- got some  suggestions and links that have helped me this week.

Well…I think you’re weaponizing “neutral.”
How long until someone weaponizes ‘weaponize’?

Weaponize ‘weaponize’Hasn’t that already happened (unacknowledged)?

HehYou really know nothing about me and are making a lot of assumptions.
I have been using the word for ten years to educate people. To assume that I don’t know or hang out with any trans people is wrong. I do know them, and I have hung out with them.
My best friend in high schools father is transsexual. When I started what was going to be a gay straight alliance in high school, I made absolutely sure that we included transgender into it. I had to do my homework, and explain to the school board, administrators, and faculty why we needed it in our school. It was then, in 1998, that I learned the term cisgender, and used it to explain to those people. I did it thoughtfully, not to demean them, but to explain to them what it was and how it affected trans teens in my school. They told me I shouldn’t include transgender nmy group because it would rile up parents, and I said that it was all or nothing. I pushed hard to have transgender kids be treated the same as the Ls, Gs, and Bs.
Oddly enough I didn’t have a single person there, all of them cisgender, take offense to the term. I won them over, and they finally agreed with me, letting my group be inclusive.
Since then I have worked with, and been friends with, many many trans people. I’ve spoken to classes of students about GLBT issues, and cisgender comes up in each and every one of them. I’ve spoken to panels of people about GLBT issues and included cisgender in them. I fought hard with the administration of another school to add transgender to their personal anti-discrimination policy, all the while using cisgender.
During all of that time, over ten years, I have never once had someone take offence to my use of cisgender, even when I was pointing out their privilege.
I’ve gone well out of my way, sometimes losing something that would benefit me personally to press trans issues. I’ve spent a hell of a lot more time than I had to to make sure things I worked for were inclusive. Yet you don’t have the time to try and educate people on your own issue, and then scream when people try to throw you under the bus?
So how dare you come here trying to be all high and mighty telling me I don’t know how to use the term or concept correctly. How dare you assume that because I have a different viewpoint, one that apparently works a hell of a lot better than yours, that I am wrong, and that I am oppressing you.
Now, throwing me, a cisgender gay white male into that category, and telling me that I can’t even pretend to respect you as a human or an adult is incredulous. You are the one oppressing my viewpoint on the matter. Because you are trans it is assumed that you know everything oh so much better regarding the word. Because I am cis it’s assumed that I am a dumb ignorant fool who has no idea what you deal with. How’s that for privilege?

Pleasetell me where stop, or that I feel bad. I really don’t give a fuck what you think of me, what you do, or what you point out.
I have privilege. I never said I didn’t. I use my various privileges in many ways, as everyone does.
Not one word you said has made me feel bad. I think most of what you say makes you look bad. But I don’t feel bad. Point out what you will whenever.
I don’t care about you. Your opinion means nothing to me.
It may have had an impact if you weren’t so quick to assume and be angry about things. If you spoke logically, and didn’t imply that I said things that I never said, maybe I would have listened to you.
But you’re angry, and you’re lashing out at me trying to make me feel bad.
It doesn’t work. Because I don’t know you, and I don’t give a fuck who you are, what you do, where you go, and what you say.
None of that matters though. I’ll still fight just as hard as I have been for your rights because you are my ally in the battle for rights, even if you can’t see past your own nose on this issue. Even if you don’t read what I say and lash out at me.  

No, she might be INSULTING your point of viewBut she is not OPPRESSING you, because there is no system of oppression by which trans people can OPPRESS cis people.
Really, we don’t need the long, defensive essay from you about how self-sacrificing you are by including trans people, and what a great friend you are to trans people including your buddy with an FTM parent, and how dare we and all that other bullshit.
Her judgment was based on the way you are acting on this thread and nothing more, nothing less. You may have been wonderful back in high school, but you’re being criticized for what you are doing now.
Oh, and this?

I’ve spent a hell of a lot more time than I had to to make sure things I worked for were inclusive. Yet you don’t have the time to try and educate people on your own issue, and then scream when people try to throw you under the bus?

This is privileged bullshit. And if you would spend less time lecturing trans people while puffing yourself up for being an “ally” and more time listening to trans people, you might actually get somewhere.
First thing you gotta do is stop misusing the term “oppressing” to mean “trans lady is being MEAN TO ME.”

PS: If you don’t get it…You said right here that trans inclusion is something that was OPTIONAL and you deserve A COOKIE FOR:

I’ve spent a hell of a lot more time than I had to to make sure things I worked for were inclusive.

Anyone who is serious about trans equality would not sit there and claim that he didn’t HAVE to include us, but he DID ANYWAY and we should be grateful now and HOW DARE YOU criticize me.
Privilege check. You need one. Massively. You are being oppressive and privileged. Whether you mean to or not.

NoIt’s about some people who are cis not reading something, that was presented to them as negative, neutrally.
Keep in mind that I think the people who didn’t check the meaning of the word were acting ignorantly.
Yet you continually try to put me on the defensive about it, which, if I didn’t know better, would completely close my mind to taking the term as anything but an insult. Which has happened before to people here on the blend.
Honestly.

oh how nice of you to still fight for my rights!I’m so happy to have such a great supportive ally on my side!
Here, have a cookie! You oh-so-very-special cis white gay man!

It may have had an impact if you weren’t so quick to assume and be angry about things. If you spoke logically, and didn’t imply that I said things that I never said, maybe I would have listened to you.

“Maybe”? No, you weren’t even willing to listen. There have been people much nicer than me trying to explain things to you, begging you to put aside what you’re doing here and stop hurting trans people, and you won’t listen. Not one bit. So quit trying to pretend this is about anything other than your unchecked privilege; quit saying things would have worked out if only trans people were kinder to you.
Nice tone argument, though. Almost classically awful.

What am I doing now, really?Trying to explain what I did that worked opposed to what you did that has, if you look all over, failed miserably?
In order for you to be mean to me I would have to be affected by what you say. But I am not, because you’re angry and when someone is pissy I don’t pay attention to what they try to do to hurt me.
I didn’t say trans were the only people I was inclusive for.
I could fight for my own rights and do whatever I wanted, but I don’t. Because I think everyone should be equal. But you won’t take the time to do that, and to make people see you otherwise. You lash out at them.
You were dealt a crappy hand in life. So was I. I’m sorry your hand was more difficult that mine, but there is nothing I can do about that. What I can do is try and make everyone’s hand equal.
I have privilege and I use it. I never said I didn’t. But if you weren’t being stubborn and looked more into what I said than looking for things trying to demonize me you’d realize that I am not against you.
Also, there are plenty of ways that trans people can oppress cis queers. For instance, if you’re cissexual, you can hold hands and do things with your partner in public in front of me, yet I am not allowed. If you’re post op, or able to change your birth certificate pre-op, there are more places you can get married than I can. Chances are that after transition you can pass better than I can. Those are all privilege whether you want to admit it or not, and those all oppress me.
You personally are trying to oppress me personally by trying to paint me as a bigot that is oppressing you. It has nothing to do with trans or cis privilege.  

I am always privilegedand I can not help that, until things change.
Also, I do not need to include you. I can fight for my rights and throw you under the bus. You not being able to do what you want to do has no effect on my life, at all. I signed no contract saying I wanted trans people to be associated with me. I didn’t come up with LGBT.
But that doesn’t matter to me, because I think everyone should be equal. I have plenty of friends and colleagues who all work together to make sure everyone is equal on all levels. I’m not martyring myself, and I am not saying I am doing any great thing by being inclusive to everyone. It’s just what I do.  

WhatI’m not willing to listen to you saying that I am dumb, wrong, ignorant, and should change my life and mindset, even though what I do works, and what you do fails?
Way to troll.

OkayPersonally, I think Aravosis does/did a great disservice to the whole LGBT community. The fact that he wants an exclusive wealthy gay white male club is horrible to me.
I do see your point on the diversion. My arguments were more based at the comments coming out on both sides after the article, versus the article and the grand scheme of things.
The infighting that happens all over the GLBT community is horrible, and sets us back. On the forefront of that are many of the big names, and big organizations that supposedly work for our rights, but end up throwing people under the bus at the first sign of dissonance.
Aravosis needs a good figurative smack on the head to realize just how much trans works for us, and how little they get in return.
I apologize for the diversion regarding this, and will keep that in mind.

“What am I doing now, really?”

What am I doing now, really?

ojrocks, as an observer of your participation in this discussion thread, here is what I see you “doing now, really:”
1. Elevating the defense of your ego over other more useful priorities and using your own and others’ time and energy in service to your ego.
2. Participating in the diversion of attention as I wrote about here.
3. Quite possibly you are also getting a rush of argument adrenaline that has taken on a life of its own and is running your replies in conjunction with your ego-defense.
(and BTW, no one can make you get defensive. You have to have a defensive to get to first, and that’s your choice).

Hey now…Don’t try pinning the actions of the HRC on me!!
I was in barbados at the time!!
tap
huh?
whisper whisper
Oh!!!
The other dissonance.  Oh.  Ok.
.
.
.
.
nevermind…

I wasn’t dealt a crappy handNo, what we need to do is change the rules of the game. My hand isn’t any more or less crappy than anyone else’s.

Also, there are plenty of ways that trans people can oppress cis queers. For instance, if you’re cissexual, you can hold hands and do things with your partner in public in front of me, yet I am not allowed. If you’re post op, or able to change your birth certificate pre-op, there are more places you can get married than I can.

You do know that none of that is true? Unless you’re going to assume that trans people are always straight.
That’s not trans privilege oppressing you. That’s straight privilege.
Stop confusing the two.

You personally are trying to oppress me personally by trying to paint me as a bigot that is oppressing you. It has nothing to do with trans or cis privilege.  

LOL, no.
You don’t understand what “oppression” means, clearly.
Calling you out on your privilege? Not oppression.

that is incorrect, reallythat you have not seen such does not mean that such is the case.

ThatYou’re clearly dumb and ignorant when you confuse straight privilege (possessed by SOME trans people) with a mythological trans privilege.

yes, regardless of desire, the effect of silencing was feltI do appreciate the efforts made since for open discussion. Perhaps we can heal the wounds and grow stronger from a constructive dialog. I’m learning a lot as I come back to read this thread.

Hrm1) I’m not entirely sure how I am trying to defend my ego. The only part I am seeing about that is talking about the work I’ve done making sure things I do are inclusive. If that is the case, the reason I brought it up was because it was implied that I had never dealt with the word, that it was new to me, and that I had never talked to or dealt with transgender issues. Though I can see how that can be seen as working on my ego.
If there are other instances, please point them out to me as I am not seeing them like that.
2) In that section of the comment, yes I was diverting, and I recognized that. That was completely my fault. The main parent comment of that was something I was diverting from, and that was my fault. The issue of Aravosis, and on a grander scheme, needs to be addressed completely.
But in this parent thread I am addressing the comments specifically. Something that needs to be addressed separately from the other part. I’m trying to mediate between two sets of people who are both right and both wrong in their own ways.
Frankly, I think the people who took offense to cisgender were just being ignorant. But I also think that the people who pushed the point instead of educating were also just as ignorant. I think a lot of this had been solved had people thought more clearly instead of being defensive. This is solely dealing with the comments I read about cisgender being used. While I don’t agree, I understand why people on both sides were hurt.
3) I will admit that argument adrenaline is a slight part of my replies, but I still don’t see how I’m trying to defend my ego. I’ve spent most of my time in comments explaining to people how other people were offended, and how to get the same point across without sounding vitriolic.
(I don’t get defensive because I realize at any given point I may be right or wrong on any subject in a variety of ways. But to change my mind about that someone needs to be civil and not argue for arguments sake. Many people are angry here, and rightfully so. But I don’t appreciate the anger pointed at me, when people half read my posts to go with whatever they think I am going to say because of my cisgender privilege. Thank you for your well thought out and stated replies to me michelle. I appreciate them)

a small retractionIn my previous comment what I meant was:
I can work to make the game so everyone’s hand is equal. I agree with you on that.
Also, I mistakenly used cissexual instead of heterosexual. I have cis on the mind. With that in mind, the point I was trying to make was that some trans people have the ability to switch to a better privilege than they had. Admittedly a weak argument.
But so are a lot of privilege arguments on the internet. You don’t know where my privileges move up and down.
If you look at my white male privilege, I have a ton. Add gay and I lose some. Add poor and I lose some. Add effeminate and I lose some. Add atheist and I lose some. My privilege is there, and I use it. With how much you throw around privilege you really should know all this. A straight, passing, trans male blows my privilege out of the water. Are you suggesting that he can’t be oppressive to me? A straight white passing christian trans woman would blow mine away to be honest.
You are trying to dehumanize and demonize me to justify your aggression towards me. That is textbook oppression. Can you not see how you are doing that? I am not saying a trans person is oppressing a cis person with their privilege, I am saying YOU as a person are oppressing ME as a person. There is a difference, you know.
You have, numerous times, skipped over what I said and argued with me what you thought I would say, even when it’s directly in opposition to what I did say.  

Um, that’s great.This isn’t even a discussion about our terminology at this point; it’s a sales pitch.
I had a giant response here, and I really wanted to post it and try to respect this mess and all that.  I really did.  It was along the lines of “we know how to neutralize it, but that would be steamrolling over us, so it’s not acceptable.”  And you know what?
I realized this really just tells us how trivial we are.
You have your terms, and for you, that’s fine — because even if those terms are hard-won and mean something important, they’re finally popular enough.  Whereas trans people’s issue along the same lines are a marketing experiment, as far as you’re concerned.  This doesn’t just trivialize what we’re dealing with now — it trivializes what any minority does to be accepted, and it’s really not insulting to just me — it’s insulting, period.
Society’s SUPPOSED to have to deal with uncomfortable things, conflict, and change.  If we’re just changing our own peg to fit the current society’s hole, it’s going to be the same society, whether they like “cis” or not, and the point is moot — and we’re not going to be part of it.
Message received, and I’m really sorry it took me so long to realize I was discussing this with your Kool-Aid instead of you.  I stopped fighting anybody’s Kool-Aid a long time ago.

Trans people do not have the ability to “switch”I am not trying to “dehumanize” you.
You, however, are playing very silly privilege games when you start trying to compare yourself to “straight white passing Christian trans women” and so on.
As for whether someone can be oppressive to you, it depends on the context.
As for whether I am being mean to you or if I am oppressing you, please remember that oppression is not something one person does to someone else, oppression is “meanness” that flows in the direction that society has decided is appropriate.
There is no privilege called “trans privilege” because trans people are not, as a group, privileged by society; cis people are. There is no privilege called “female privilege” because females are not, as a group, privileged by society; male people are. There is no privilege called “gay privilege” because gay people are not, as a group, privileged by society; straight people are.
“A straight, passing, trans male blows my privilege out of the water.” — in some circumstances, yes. In others? No. There are no absolute scales of privilege; they are all contextual.

What’s moreThe fact that you mixed up “straight privilege” (i.e., an FTM can maybe marry a woman) with “trans privilege” shows just how little you’ve thought about this.
You need to start over, and stop telling me that I throw privilege around, and start thinking about what privileges you have and refuse to acknowledge.
Do I need to get out the link to the invisible knapsack essay for you?

Oh, And Before I ForgetYou didn’t tell me how many people you surveyed to come up with this insightful understanding of how the word sounds bad to most people, either.
Two dozen?  A hundred?  A thousand?  Five?
You’re talking about what might be the problem, you’re saying that no matter what Rapaille’s work has the solution, and you’re missing the point entirely.  You’re not responding to direct, answerable questions; you are still stepping around them and making arguments about how your Kool-Aid tastes good.
I have to wonder if that’s intentional.

Note that within the area of pragmatics (where the aforementioned book is dealing in)it is not considered a reliable indicator because its culturally restricted and fails to address certain key constants that have not been proven satisfactorily to date.
It is, to use a parallel that’s got more baggage than needed but fun to do anyway, sorta “the Man who would be queen” of the pragmatics world.
(reference since its a familiar word used in an unfamiliar way: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P…

Okay, let’s back up a couple of steps

You really know nothing about me and are making a lot of assumptions.
I have been using the word for ten years to educate people. To assume that I don’t know or hang out with any trans people is wrong. I do know them, and I have hung out with them.

That’s good to know.  But it’s a little perplexing in light of your earlier:

I never once said not to use it to point out oppression. What I said was stop using it ONLY for that.

… though I suppose this could be ‘sampling error’, where you and I have managed, for a decade, to each only see one of two very different types of T* community WRT how they speak and how they use the term ‘cisgendered’.
Because I’m having trouble interpreting the earlier comment as not contradicting our claims about how we use the word.
Look, I did make assumptions — well, draw conclusions from your words — that are now contradicted by new information from you.  Okay, you have hung out with us.  But you still said something that came off as chidingly paternalistic (yes, I know there’s a problematic gender stereotype in that adjective; I’d like to set that aside for another day) about How We Ought To Speak.  Step back from your invisible-to-me-until-just-now track record and look again at what you wrote, and see whether you can understand how button-pushing you came across.  In the meantime, I’ll step back and try to figure out what you might have meant to say in light of previously unknown history.

Oddly enough I didn’t have a single person there, all of them cisgender, take offense to the term.

Similarly, when I posted a strongly worded statement about ‘cis’ being neutral, in my blog, cisgendered friends piped up to say, “Well, of course it’s neutral; what’s the fuss?”  I think I know my friends well enough that somebody would have called me out on that to say, “gee, you always seem to use it as an attack,” if I hadn’t been using it as a neutral term all these years.  And it makes the pushback against the words ‘cisgender’ and ‘cissexual’ here seem all the more fishy, more like the people complaining about having it imposed on them were looking for an excuse for a derailing tactic more than voicing a real offense.  (Though I’m still waiting for someone to suggest a better term, and for someone to better explain what makes it offensive other than “it sounds funny”, as signs that there’s some fire under that smoke after all.  And yeah, I’m keeping “it sounds wrong” in the “maybe that’s real but very poorly articulated” bin for further study — right now it’s the only thing in that box.)

I’ve spent a hell of a lot more time than I had to to make sure things I worked for were inclusive. Yet you don’t have the time to try and educate people on your own issue, and then scream when people try to throw you under the bus?

Speaking of assumptions, what makes you so sure I/we haven’t done our share and then some of education and activism over the years?  Where do you suppose most of my cis friends learned the words ‘trans’ and ‘cis’ and how wide the spectrum of T* people is?  I’m visible to an unusual degree, too, so I’ve spent an awful lot of time educating complete strangers on the sidewalk, in the supermarket, at the beach, my own doctors, … and I’ve been doing this sixteen years longer than you have, without the head start that modern genderqueer kids get from building on what I and my peers did before them (but very much indebted to everyone who came before me, including those who worked to pave the way both before and after Stonewall).
I’m used to, “What does that unfamiliar term mean?”  I’m rather less patient with, “That’s an offensive term and I know better than you what it means so stop using it.”  (Not what you’re saying now, but what was said about it not being a neutral term right from the get-go.)  And I’m even less patient with being told that we haven’t been using the word the way I know so many of us have been and oh my gosh if only we would do so nobody would be offended.
The immediate attempts to educate here got short-circuited and shut down prematurely — people were ordered not to try, on pain of banishment.  Regardless of whether “you have to educate us if you want us to listen to you” would have been a distracting tactic or not, using the last few days’ events here to justify a “you’re not willing to educate” claim is … let me settle for calling it Extremely Unhelpful, and not looking at the whole picture.
(And yes, like you, I’ve done what I can to agitate for equal rights and supportive environments for B/G/L people, not just my own narrow interests, all the way down to details like being very, very careful not to sound like I’m denigrating or invalidating gay identity when I explain how gender identity and orientation are statistically unrelated despite the dramatic and comedic shorthand most people absorb into their default assumptions.)

So how dare you come here trying to be all high and mighty telling me I don’t know how to use the term or concept correctly.

I didn’t say you didn’t know how to use it.  I said that you didn’t know how I (and lots of other T* people) have been using it (neutrally, just as you lectured) for the past fourteen years.

How dare you assume that because I have a different viewpoint, one that apparently works a hell of a lot better than yours, that I am wrong, and that I am oppressing you.

Here’s the thing:  you probably didn’t mean to — you were probably sincerely trying to help — but you were acting as the oppressor.  I called you out on what you did and said, not what I thought you were, and I gave you a privilege check.  I did get an important detail wrong, when I assumed that if you’d spent so much time with us you would have known better.  I apologize for leaping to the wrong conclusion … but I’m not sure whether that makes your patronizing tone and attempt to tell me I’ve not been using ‘cis’ the way I’ve used it for years, better or worse than if it really had been from complete ignorance of trans spaces.
I wrote:

Derailing may not be your intent, but it would be the effect of what you’re requesting.

(emphasis added).  I stand by that, and hope the added emphasis makes my meaning clearer.  I’m complaining about what you said, not claiming that you are Oppressive Evil Incarnate.
You wrote:

Now, throwing me, a cisgender gay white male into that category, and telling me that I can’t even pretend to respect you as a human or an adult is incredulous. You are the one oppressing my viewpoint on the matter.

I’m not oppressing you; I’m asking you to stop being patronizing.  I complained about a lack of respect because patronizingly lecturing us in a tone argument was disrespectful, whether you meant to be condescending or not.  Your history of helping us out for the past eleven years doesn’t give you a free pass to tell us to our faces that you know we’ve been using the language differently than we have been without getting called on it.
I’m not inclined to apologize for telling you you acted disrespectful.  I am willing to call your actions harmful rather than calling you, the actor, evil — to hold onto the idea that you did so unintentionally out of some sort of privilege blindness (temporary, I hope) and the hope that having the magnitude of the wrongness pointed out to you will help you avoid doing it again.  For the record, that was already my position before you posted your activist credentials, but probably wasn’t as clear as it should have been.

Because you are trans it is assumed that you know everything oh so much better regarding the word.

I know far, far better than you how I have been using the word.
Finally, let me state that I am, in fact grateful for your willingness to agitate on behalf of T* people in the past.  I may not be willing to put up with being condescendingly lectured on how to speak, or whether I’ve done enough educating elsewhere based in impatience with a derailing tactic here, but I do appreciate that you’ve done good things in the past and hope you will continue to do the right thing in the future.
In the meantime, I hope you’ll get past the inclination to defend tone arguments being used as derailing tactics against trans people complaining about exclusion or cissexism.  As we discovered in another subthread, you and I do see some parts of this the same way and seem to be able to communicate with each other on some aspects of the larger discussion.
I know I’m going to screw up in ways similar to what you’ve done here at some point, in the context of some other *ism (I’ve done it before), and if I blow past the gently chiding or prickly warning responses and get yelled out outright, I’m going to absolutely hate how that makes me feel once I finally realize I’ve screwed up.  But I can only hope that when it happens, I’ll have the perception and control to replace defensiveness with a more productive mindset and learn the message I’m being yelled at to learn.  (In the past, I’ve done a good job of this some times and been kind of an ass other times, to my shame.)  To quote someone on a different site, whom I know only as ‘z’:

A good ally is not made up with single deeds done in the past and no more, but deeds continuing into the future.
A good ally is allowed to stumble, but must recognize their mistakes, apologize from them, understand why they were made, and avoid making them again.

You’re not being kicked out of the trans-ally club (as if I controlled the roster anyhow).  You’re being asked to be a better ally by recognizing how patronizing ‘If you’d just stop using cis ONLY for pointing out oppression’ was to somebody who has been using it for more than that for even longer than you say you’ve been an ally-activist, and by recognizing how/why it sounds as though you’re telling us, ‘oh if you were just more polite then those cissexists wouldn’t have raised a distracting objection to being called cis’.

Some doAnd also, as you seem to be fairly well versed as either a trained sociologist, or an armchair sociologist, you should be able to realize that there are various viewpoints on privilege, and various viewpoints on institutional privilege versus personal privilege.
In your train of thought, you’ll see what I call privilege as advantages. You’ll also argue with me that institutional privilege trumps personal privilege, etc. etc. And frankly I’ve had this same argument over and over again.
Your valid viewpoints of privilege are different than my valid viewpoints of privilege. So, we will never get anywhere with this discussion.
This is my agreement to disagree and with you luck with that.

ojrocksU of A on my part, under Williams before he passed.
Yours?

There is some miscommunication herewhich is indeed my fault. I want to address a few things quickly though, but it’s late and I need to get to bed.
1)

I’ve spent a hell of a lot more time than I had to to make sure things I worked for were inclusive. Yet you don’t have the time to try and educate people on your own issue, and then scream when people try to throw you under the bus?

I meant this as a response to

But I’m not going to blow my entire Friday night doing that. Because I shouldn’t have to.  Accept that we know our own language habits, come hang out with us socially for a year to find out for yourself, or stop even pretending that you respect us as humans and as adults.

which I misread. I read it as saying, “I don’t have time to educate people on the correct usage of the word.” That was my fault, and I apologize for it.
I’m going to bed, because I am tired. I’ll be around later to explain myself a bit more later.

Ok, after waiting a day: contextThe context for what I was quoted above as saying uncivilly:

Well I can’t say
I’d be surprised I’ve been saying it here forever….. Society is not going to conform to women with penis….no matter how those individuals see themselves…… and those that refuse to conform to socieatal standard or complete transition are Awlayts going to have a difficult time in life both with documentation and in general…..I’m not trying to be the bad girl …just being a realist…They are not going to create a third gender and change every document in every court house and office office in this country to satisfy the transgender community……….only those transexuals who comeplte transition and conform to tyipcal gender stereo types are going to be accepted or be able to blend back in….not my rule just the way it is in my opinion.
Brandi Parker  
by: sweetbrandigirl @ Thu Jun 25, 2009 at 10:50:29 AM MST
[ Parent | | Reply ]

Immediately following that, I said:

Now now, Brandi
I’m sill cuter than you are, and I’m putting the lie to everything you just said, simply by existing.
Care to explain that one?
War is what they call it.  I call it living. http://www.dyssonance.com
by: dyssonance @ Thu Jun 25, 2009 at 15:17:11 PM MST
[ Parent | | Reply ]

So, if I was uncivil, then well, I’m afraid I have to call it on Brandi, too.
Then again, I hear that she’ll be moving to my neck of the woods within a few months. So perhaps I can call her on it in person.

When I was youngI thought of growing old
And what my life would mean to me
I have traveled down my chosen road
I only wished what I could be.
By freaking MEMORY and without looking it up online, Caoimhe.
I want to say it’s by “Mister Mister”, who also performed “Broken Wings”, but not sure..

Well, a bit offBut my hearing/ interpretation of song lyrics usually is:

Kyrie Eleison
Down the road that I must travel
Kyrie Eleison
Through the darkness of the night
Kyrie Eleison
Where I’m going will you follow
Kyrie Eleison
On a highway in the light
When I was young I thought of growing old
Of what my life would mean to me
Would I have followed down my chosen road
Or only wished what I could be

But I was right that it was Mr. Mister…

I think you’re on to something here LiZThe pro-choice, gay and (I’m guessing since I may actually be too young to remember this) feminist movements went through similar issues with what is perceived by “others” (for lack of a better word” as baiting, “in-your-face” tactics and language.  I’m not sure I recognized it for what it was until I was in grad school working as an escort at a local clinic and absolutely cringed at the “Abortion, on demand, NOW” stickers and statements that made an adamant supporter of choice like me think it sounded like people wanted to intentionally get pregnant just so they could abort.  Frankly, the vitriol that went along with those proudly chanting or displaying those words created an atmosphere in which it really felt as though that was their intent. To say it was off-putting is an understatement.
The reason I’m bringing this up is because people who are fighting for their very rights (as well as a modicum of respect, dignity & common courtesy) end up being hurt by those who insist on battling their supporters who do not face the same exact issue(s)  and often do so in the most patronizing of manner that only the least squeamish and most committed of those outside supporters just check out.  Some non-committed outsiders may be so tired of the attacks and unnecessary histrionics that they start to believe the haters who claim people are demanding special rights and privileges.
The arguments and power we give words, regardless of the intent/context, are distracting [from the cause] at best and can actually be downright destructive to the cause.
I haven’t been to Shakesville in ages because of the overabundance of “political correctness”; I have spent time away from the blend because I’ve noticed an increase in unnecessary over reactions.   As you point out, everyone has some sort of “privilege” (being a member of some group that makes up the majority and is therefor a “norm”) to attack those whose privilege is different from your own because it is where you are not part of that group is counter-productive.

“What do veterans call non-veterans”I saw that Keori had listed veteran status among the others.
It made me think: what do veterans call non-veterans?
If y’all want to read more into it, go ahead. It’s not there.
Really.

See reply as new 1st level comment belowMore thoughts than I want to put right here. See new 1st level comment below.

longer reply to post above, plus some other questions[I recognize that this is a long post with several separate concepts in it.]
1. Semantics game: not that I’m aware of. If my original question (about “veteran”) is part of what you perceive as a “semantics game” then I’m not sure what you mean. I was honestly unsure of the non-veteran descriptor, and frankly, the word “civilian” did not pop into my head — call it a brain fart or whatever — it just wasn’t there. I asked an honest question, and got accused of playing games, of being stupid or lazy by TR (unless your dictionary question was sincere and you were concerned for my vocabulary), and treated to a bout of sarcasm by Kynn. No, I’m not playing a sematics game.
—–
2. To address Kynn’s other concern about nomenclature (what would I prefer to the term “cis”):
I was thinking about something that means “gender aligned” but I don’t really like that phrasing either, because the opposite is “mis-aligned.” But since “trans” means “across” and “cis” means “nearer to” or “on this side of” I still don’t think it’s actually neutral, but to the transfolk. It still strikes me as a synonym for “normal”, and as some sort of binary demarcation where I pretty sure it’s a spectrum or range. Just as I don’t say “opposite sex marriage” (I say “different sex marriage”), why are we looking at a concept that is “either / or”? And I know that some transfolk don’t call themselves trans after surgery.
So then I was thinking, well, why is “trans” used in the first place? I’m sure this has been brought up before, possibly here on PHB, certainly in academic and theorist circles. And I don’t honestly expect that Kynn thinks I’m suddenly going to come up with the magic answer.
So, what to do? Do the folks whose bodies match their brains at birth (at any time) get one term, and those whose don’t get another, or get several? What should they be? Pick one and make variations on it (like heterosexual and homosexual), or pick several completely different ones (like straight, gay, lesbian)?
So is that the right word? Is there a better one, or more than one? I don’t have an answer to that question. Does anyone else? Again, don’t tell me to look in the dictionary. Don’t tell me to go dig it up on Wikipedia. I’m asking people who are using the terms to self-describe. I want to know why YOU use it, and would you prefer a different word?
We (as a minority) started with “gay” and expanded to include “lesbian” and “bisexual” for basic non-straight orientations. We’ve lumped transsexual and transgender and sometimes transvestite under “trans”. Since people can fit more than one category (like with race), maybe we need a little more refinement to the words.
—–
3. And maybe cis is the right word (for non-trans). I just know, as I’ve said all along, that in general the LGBT community allows those so-labeled to choose their own identifiers, and that I found that one offensive. It may well have been the context: had you called me a “water buffalo” or “nappy headed” in the same breath as “[jerk]” (I’m paraphrasing with “jerk” to mean “some pejorative or clearly pejorative-sounding word or phrase”), I would almost certainly have been offended by that too — EVEN THOUGH those words may be perfectly fine “neutral” “academic” terms in other contexts. But when I asked people not to label me as such, I was met with enormous hostility and righteous indignation. It was my fault for being offended. Was it the fault of the black women at Penn State (or maybe just Penn) who were offended at being called “water buffalo”? Was it the fault of the athletes who were called “nappy headed hos” that they were offended by “nappy headed” as much as “hos”?
What if someone had used “cis” in a generic context as my intro to the term? Maybe I’d be okay, maybe not. We’ll never know now.  Will I ever come around to it? Maybe. I’m not sure — and that’s an honest answer. Because it’s so connected with the battle waged here and the anger and the outrage, it’s lost its neutrality to me.
Instead, I had tried to be helpful, tried to be friendly, tried to be considerate and mindful, and got a huge ration of shit for not being any of those things enough. So when I used a wrong word — a word that some consider offensive (natal) because I had seen it used by a trans person before, I was castigated. When I tried to make supportive comments, I was told I that I clearly only considered post-operative transfolks to be “real” transfolk. I was taken to task and told my support of marriage equality was at the expense of trans rights, not in conjunction with it.
And so I stopped using “natal” because some people were offended by it, even though in some contexts it can be considered “neutral” and “academic.” But I was not offered the same consideration. My concerns were due to my “privilege” being threatened.
—–
And here’s a final observation:
4. Part of the problem is also the lack of audible tone and nuance that comes with spoken in-person conversation and that is missing with asynchronous text-based communication. This is not a PHB issue; this is an Internet-wide issue, from email to the web to even IM. That may be the biggest problem of all, and is not one that is easily fixed.
But what I’ve seen of the ensuing — and continuing — conflagration, too many Blenders would rather be right than be friends. Too many Blenders seem to think other Blenders are “the enemy” rather than current or potential allies.  Frankly, radical rightwingers couldn’t do a better job of dividing us than what’s happening here.

Curious Failure

What am I doing now, really?
Trying to explain what I did that worked opposed to what you did that has, if you look all over, failed miserably?

My response tto “failed miserably” got way too long, so I’m posting it separately.  Somewhere along the way it stopped being about this argument and more just something that was years overdue for me to say.

For the record

Chances are that after transition you can pass better than I can.

The conflation of straight privilege vs. trans privilege has already been addressed and acknowledged; I’m not trying to keep flogging you for that, but I do feel the need to include a reminder for future reference:
Not all of us ‘pass’; not all of us can.
I get het privilege — oddly or not oddly, depending on how you see it, considering that I’m not even sure what “the opposite gender” would be for a third-gender person — because when strangers see me kiss a woman I’m easy for them to pigeonhole as ‘male’ despite also being so very visibly trans.  I have het privilege and am very much aware of it; use it when I need to but try to be very careful how I use it, to try to avoid harming those who lack it.  Here’s the funny thing though, in light of what you said:  if I did pass, while that would be a buffer for my trans disprivilege, it would also cost me every drop of my het privilege.  (It’d be worth it, mind you, but it would be a cost.)
Not jumping up and down on you shouting “Yer doin’ it wrnog!!” this time; just offering some food for though.

Apology acceptedLooks like we’re tied at one and one for recognized-so-far (and acknowledged) accidental misreadings of each other.

Where we use it

The point was how it has been used HERE on PHB.  And it has only been used as a negative here, always with oppressor.  [...]  When a word is used surrounded by only negatives, how is the supposed neutrality of the word supposed to come through?

There’s a balancing act required here.
On the one hand, yeah, it’s not a word that everybody already knows.  On the other hand, being required to give its history and examples of neutral use, not just its definition, each and every time we want to use it in discussions about privilege just in case a newcomer doesn’t know how we use it the rest of the time, is putting an awfully large burden of education on us.  Why, we might spend so much time educating about vocabulary that we never get around to making the point that we wanted to use the concept in … Oh, wait.
How do we balance these two problems, the fact that some people do need to learn the word in context, versus the need to be able to speak without having to give an entire history and sociology lesson as a preamble?  I’m not sure exactly where that balancing point is.  But wherever it is, the willingness of a third group of speakers to feign ignorance in order to then feign offense and derail the conversation by design … muddies the waters and makes the right balancing spot even harder to see.
Personally, I think that, “You’ve made a mistake regarding your interpretation of that word; it’s a neutral term that’s been used neutrally since its coinage and just looks negative here because we’re specifically talking about privilege here and so yeah, it’s an adjective you’ll see attached to phrases identifying privilege,” is a reply that makes a certain amount of sense.  (You may then want to do your own research instead of taking our word for it, but be willing to look outside of the discussions-of-privilege context to see whether it’s used in ways other than pointing out privilege.  And if you’re not going to do the research, then take our word for it.)  And when the question of whether it’s ever used not as an adjective for oppressors in discussion of privilege is asked, then how we do use it the rest of the time becomes relevant.  Because right here, that whole privilege thing and whether pointing it out is offensive was where we started.
Finally, bear this in mind, from ojrocks:

To all the non-Ts here at the Blend: Lighten up. No one is out to get you. If you are a cisgendered gay white male (like me) and you’re screaming about oppression from the LGBT community, take a step back and realize you’re like christians screaming that they are oppressed. The fact is that cisgendered gay white males (like me) DO oppress the LBTs in our community (not like me). The fact is also if you do not do that, then COMMENTS ABOUT THE OPPRESSORS DO NOT POINT TO YOU. THEY ARE NOT TALKING ABOUT YOU. They are talking about the ones like Aravosis. NOT YOU.

and my own version:

Here’s a tip:  if the shoe doesn’t fit, don’t jam it on your foot and then complain about how it pinches!

In light of that advice, is it a bit easier to see that ‘cis’ has been used descriptively, and the negative attachments referred to what particular cis people were doing?
To get back to the most important point here;  no, I don’t know where the appropriate and useful balancing point is.  I do know that having to “break in” ‘cis’ gradually in each discussion where it comes up, just in case a newbie gets the wrong impression of it, seriously undermines our ability to use it.  And that as important as education and outreach are, people do have some responsibility for educating themselves as well.

A clarificationMy quote of what is working versus what hasn’t been working was pointing directly to Pam’s House Blend, and the usage of the word cisgender and cissexual. All of my arguments have been focused on that.
I didn’t mean to imply that things in your 3d life weren’t working, and I did mean ‘you’ as a collective ‘you’ and not pointing you out.
I’m aware, and I hope that we are all aware that being on the internet causes a lot of misunderstandings, which build on each other to make worse ones. It is so much different than working with people in person.
I’ve seen a lot of people with good points acting horribly and having their points lost because of it.
I have found over time that the explicit way that I deal with language in person works just as well on the internet, and because everyone has a different way that they work with it, some peoples ways don’t work on the internet.
I apologize for my lack of clarification before with that comment.

coming back to this

But I don’t appreciate the anger pointed at me, when people half read my posts to go with whatever they think I am going to say because of my cisgender privilege.

IMO this statement could be a good starting point for reflection if you want to understand better what I mean by ego and how it’s playing out.
Look at it. Why does it matter what you do or don’t appreciate, and why is it about you at all? You’re engaging in a discussion of and playing out of some really heinous power dynamics — why are you focused on whether people express anger at you or what you do or don’t appreciate or whether they think you can speak from anything other than cis privilege?
Keep your eye on the birdie, you know? Keep your eye on the operation of the larger power dynamics and what you can effectively do to resist them. That’s my take.
And I will also say: everything I say about this stuff is a translation from a different kind of extremely vivid perception into much less vivid (to me at least) words. A lot of times the words aren’t there for me to be as accurate as I want to.
Anyway, thanks for your response to my other comment here in #2 especially.

beautifully accurate statement IMO

oppression is not something one person does to someone else, oppression is “meanness” that flows in the direction that society has decided is appropriate.

Wow, that’s gorgeously accurate to how I actually perceive and experience this stuff working. Thank you.  

A bit more of a reply

Similarly, when I posted a strongly worded statement about ‘cis’ being neutral, in my blog, cisgendered friends piped up to say, “Well, of course it’s neutral; what’s the fuss?”  I think I know my friends well enough that somebody would have called me out on that to say, “gee, you always seem to use it as an attack,” if I hadn’t been using it as a neutral term all these years.  And it makes the pushback against the words ‘cisgender’ and ‘cissexual’ here seem all the more fishy, more like the people complaining about having it imposed on them were looking for an excuse for a derailing tactic more than voicing a real offense.

I’ve known the word for a while, and I wasn’t taking offense to how it was used here. When I saw people starting to get riled up over it I was getting ready to tell them they were in the wrong, that’s not what the word meant. Then I started looking over the usage and arguments that were surrounding it.
Here, on Pam’s House Blend, almost all of the incidences I saw of it were negative. I am not saying that the word was used wrongly in any of those cases, because it generally wasn’t. I’m going to list the uses of it from the aravosis thread. None of these were used incorrectly, but imagine that you didn’t know what the word meant. Tell me what your feelings would be on it.

Uh, hey, some of us were there when Aravosis publicly made the case that we don’t belong in his cisgender gay-rights movement.

Kind of neutral, but it also links the term to Aravosis. If you don’t know better, it kind of makes cisgender look like it would be a supreme gender, all others are inferior, because that is Aravosis’ gay rights movement.

privileged, white, cisgendered, male, Stepford gays

Does that look like it’s neutral? Add those two together and the term is looking pretty bad.

Here is main point for Aravosis and all other cisgendered, transbigoted privileged assholes

cisgender, transbigoted, priveleges, asshole are all put on the same level here.
Right after that is when someone said they found it offensive. The next response to that had a short explanation of cisgender, then went into how it’s not an identity but it’s what you are. ALl true. But then the definition went into

ANd historically, it has been those relatively few white, gay men that have made the deals and undercut our rights, and they do so using the same transphobic arguments that John Avarosis uses, whcih are little more than minor variations on the same things said about white gay men.
I realize this doesn’t make how you feel any less hurt for being grouped in a category that you don’t feel you belong in.
But it one based predominantly on history, in response to current words and actions.

Again linking cisgender to Aravosis, the transbigoted asshole. The definition again linked cisgender (which you don’t choose, you just are) with Aravosis (who is, truly, a transbigoted asshole). So cisgender doesn’t look any better from this definition, because of  what it was linked to.
The argument then went on to all gay white men constantly lumped into one catagory, and the man still had a wrongly defined cisgender. The next post was speaking harshly down on him, putting him in the defensive. It doesn’t matter that most of what was said was valid and true, he was pushed into defensive because he still had a wrongly defined cisgender.
Now, right at the beginning he should have looked up cisgender and gotten a correct neutral definition. He didn’t, and it ended up making him look silly. But that also doesn’t make the vitriol spewed any better.

You don’t like the word “cisgendered” because it points out your privilege within the LGBT community during discussions of transgender issues. I notice all your comments since registering on the 18th are only on posts discussing trans-inclusivity, and they’re all the same lady-doth-protest-too-much theme

No, he didn’t like it because he had the wrong definition.
After that the definition of it kept coming up and up, with people arguing what I am arguing now, and they kept getting talked down to and insulted, saying the only reason they didn’t like it was because they wanted to give up their privilege. They were getting written off as transbigoted assholes for expressing their views.
Both sides here were wrong, both sides. Some people have admitted it, and some people keep spewing more and more vitriol at each other.
As for my actions, I will admit I act privileged. I am also patronizing and condescending at times. Those are personality traits of mine that come out often, as much as I try to stop them. Often I won’t mean to be, but I am anyway. It puts my arguments into question and overlooked.
But as for my  comments regarding using cis for more than only negative, here, at Pam’s House Blend, that is how it is most often used, and it should be used for more than that. With such a diverse community, we should be using it as a descriptor more, not less.  

HrmAnger over the whole incident is being used towards me, when people aren’t fully reading what I am saying. Misdirected anger is never a good thing.
Saying that cisgender needs to be used more in all contexts got turned around by people into me trying to silence transgender people and being called an oppressor for that.
If my saying use cisgender more in all forms is turned into silencing transgender people, doesn’t it seem like other things will be turned into other bad things too?
The reason I don’t appreciate, and in essence no one should appreciate it, that is because if people are jumping the gun and seeing bad in anything said, it makes the situation worse. People mistaking and misreading what people say because they assume they will say something else because they are cisgender, transgender, gay, straight, bi, etc. is disruptive and detrimental to the cause.
I didn’t mean “Appease me on this forum, it’s all about me.”

A perfect example of non-neutral language useWould be connecting “cis” to racial slurs, y’know, “just as an example”.  Just as an example.  :)
If you said “different sex marriage” in reference to someone’s marriage, and they objected, you can’t label my marriage, etc. etc., you’d be bewildered.  And if they were an ally in some way, or even just a friend of yours, you’d do them the favor of trying to explain what the miscommunication was.
And if we say “cis” and you tell us we can’t label you, we are bewildered, and we (albeit not gently in some people’s cases) are attempting to actually explain why the term is necessary — because we’re not the opposite of nothing.  Just as there’s not “normal” and “gay”, there shouldn’t be “men” and “trans men”, or “women” and “trans women”.
That’s kind of the point — cis is meant to LEVEL the field, because cis people as a group generally consider gender to be completely described by the concept they have in their head — just like an unchallenged straight person, who “loves gays!” and “doesn’t have anything against them” probably still thinks that they are “normal” compared to gays.
And it’s not, which is unfortunate for them (especially the ones who find the concept unpalatable for various reasons) and for us — because we do need the word.
I should probably be offended about the implication contained in the rightwingers comment, and should probably even say something about it like “you’re drawing a parallel between people you can have a possibly difficult conversation with and people who would gladly hang you, and you really shouldn’t do that while you talk about how we need to be allies”, but you know what?  I’m tired.  I’ve been gouging my brain with this friggin’ discussion for days now, and as far as I can tell, the whole thing was started by some people who decided trans people were freaks a long time ago, not by “potential allies”.  They were offended not by the implications of the word, but by the fact that “some tranny” threw it at them, and decided the freaks shouldn’t get away with it.  shrugs  ”Potential allies” sounds conditional, and this is not a condition we can give up.
Let me toss an example out here for a second — this is a bit of a difference, but maybe it’ll get my point across.  My father is a somewhat tolerant Republican.  Yes, he’s bought into Fox News.  Yes, he converted to catholicism a few years back (and he’s 70.)
When I told him about my transition, he told me he loved me and he’d never stop standing by me.  And we have had numerous discussions that challenge his concept of the world on a weekly, sometimes daily basis — and he’s never wavered in this.  We’re family.  That’s how that works.
It should be similarly, although perhaps not as intensely, with allies.  If an ally is only an ally to the cause until the cause challenges them about a single word, what do you think they’re going to do on the front lines of this struggle?
They’re not going to be our allies.  It’s going to be too hard.
Nobody said this was easy.  You are asking us to be sensitive to some of the people — you included — who are telling us that we’re effectively not going to be allowed to discuss trans issues freely.  If someone challenged you that way about being able to discuss homosexual issues freely, it would take a hell of a thing for it to be okay.  They’d better have a magic lamp or something, right?
Well, we’re still here talking to you.  I’m actually pretty shocked that the discussion’s gone as smoothly as it has up there.
I think we get why it’s offensive to you — and I think you also understand why we cannot give it up.
If you cannot be our ally over this word, then I’ll be really sorry.  Your words are persuasive, and one person is a significant thing.  But the word’s more important than any given ally, because the word smooths the playing field for the entire cause, not just one or two or a dozen of us.  The discussion of gender, by those society includes happily and those it considers exiles, has to go on, because it doesn’t just affect trans people, it affects you too.  Large parts of the reasons that trans people are “problems” for the mainstream are similar to parts of the reasons gay people are still sometimes “problems” for the mainstream.  We’re part of the history, we’re part of the present, and gender issues as a whole are inseparable from the entire discussion, even if they don’t always show up in some parts here and there.
Would you give up a more level playing field for your entire group over the objections of a handful of dissenting allies?

Secretary HamiltonWhen I was strictly practicing law concerning banking and currency, policies “instituted by Secretary Hamilton” concerning debt and currency came up fairly frequently when dealing with the Americans. Secretary Taney, Secretary Chase and Secretary Gage set policies that continued to be quoted by Treasury officials at us. Secretary Cortelyou is responsible for the banking bailouts that are occuring today.
Not all of us can ignore the past….

Dys, in fairnessI am a civilian. Yes, I served (not in your armed forces so I cannot buy back my military retirement time if I work for an American employer) but as a veteran of the Cold War and the far less cold Angola weapons smuggling wars, for US purposes I am a civilian.

I am trying to figure out what is going on.There are hundreds of comments here.  I have been out of the loop just oiver a week and I am not sure I am getting the whole controversy.
Cissexual = anyone who is not transsexual.
Cisgender = anyone who is not transgender.
These are useful terms in a lot of ways.  When I give a trans 101 lecture to non-trans people, having the terminology helps them understand – a trans person is not “a” transgender, otherwise a cisgender person becomes “a” cisgender.
Perhaps one has to look at what differences there are between cisgender/cissexual and transgender/transsexual people.
“Cis” people identify with the sex they were assigned at birth – their gender and their birth sex assignment are in harmony.
“Trans” people don’t identify with that birth sex assignment (transsexual people identify with the opposite sex of that initially assigned).
The essence of cissexual “privilege” is being accepted for one’s true sex.  Trans people need the protection of the law to be recognized as their true sex. “Cis” people have an entitlement.
Of course, sometimes “cis” people have their true sex questioned – ask a woman with obvious symptoms of PCOS, or a butch-looking lesbian who has been asked to leave a New York City restaurant because the bouncer thought she was wrong in using the women’s restroom.  
But those are exceptions – most “cis” folks never have the experience of having their sex questioned, or legally denied.
Rather than invoke “Godwin’s Law,” let’s discuss this comparison to Nazi propaganda by citing to some facts:

“It might just as easily be argued that the right of privacy protects a person’s decision to be surgically transformed into a donkey. The transformation, by its very happening, would lose the quality of privateness. Certainly, those who had known the donkey as a man would detect the change, even though those acquainted only with the donkey might never have occasion to remark upon it. In addition, the change from man to beast might be just as devoutly wished, as psychologically  imperative, and as medically appropriate as the change from man to woman, but the Constitution, I fear, could not long bear the weight of such an interpretation.”

Ashlie v. Chester-Upland School District. No. 78-4037, 1979 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12516, at 13 (E.D. Pa. May 9, 1979)
Or for a more familiar case ridiculing and dissecting a trans person, how about this quote:

“Ulane is entitled to any personal belief about her sexual identity she desires. After the surgery, hormones, appearance changes, and a new Illinois birth certificate and FAA pilot’s certificate, it may be that society … considers Ulane to be female. But even if one believes that a woman can be so easily created from what remains of a man, that does not decide this case… . If Eastern did discriminate against Ulane, it  was not because she is female, but because Ulane is a transsexual – a biological male who takes female hormones, cross-dresses, and has surgically altered parts of her body to make it appear to be female.”

Ulane v. Eastern Airlines, Inc. 742 F.2d 1081 (7th Cir. 1984)
There are numerous cases out there denying transsexual and transgender people their real sex, imposing society’s narrow birth-genital-based paradigm on people who kust do not fit into the binary in that way.
That isn’t anything like the Protocols of the Elders of Zion – the likeness painted by a good number of courts in the United States of trans people to freaks, frauds, and donkeys is not some opium dream.
There are cases like Littleton, Kantaras and Gardiner that treat post-op transsexual people as members of their birth sex.

As to getting thrown under the busIn New York, ESPA (The Empire State Pride Agenda) did that to the trans community from the time I got involved politically in 1998 to December 2002 when SONDA passed in the state senate without trans inclusion.  Since then, and some changes in personnel, ESPA has been a huge supporter of trans civil rights in New York.
HRC has historically “thrown the trans community under the bus” after giving us lip service, most notably in 2007 with the non-inclusive ENDA getting passed in the House of Representatives.
Not all white gay men do the “throw the trans community under the bus” thing.  My friend Matt Foreman acknowledged his role in New York, and apologized for that role in keeping trans inclusion out of SONDA.  We have yet to see an honest apology from Joe Solmonese.
There are trans leaders in New York who still don’t trust ESPA, and who think that any positive move on marriage (which itself is trans-inclusive) without a corresponding positive move on GENDA is a betrayal. (I think they’re overreacting, but the historical context gives them reason to be twitchy.)
The best analogy is to see the trans community as the equivalent of the women’s movement in its struggle for equal rights at the same time as the movement for abolition of slavery and the civil rights for African Americans being the equivalent of the gay rights movement.
Women, like trans people, were told time and again that they had to wait.
The history is there.

C’mon thats simple!People with bias who didn’t realise they have bias or thought that their biased position was justified and neutral don’t like their bias being highlighted! And so they get upset. Because they must cede the position of ‘normal’.
And of course cis-privilege is variable! Just like a tanned white guy might not always get much white privilege compared to a pale white guy but still has heaps more than the really dark-skinned guy. Lots of privilege is variable and that doesn’t invalidate the existence of ‘white provilege’! And then you add Intersections of privilege/discrimination on top of that.
That Cis privilege comes in degrees like white-privilege and lots of other privileges do that doesn’t invalidate it, it supports it!

Not everyone was Listening!The conversation was being had for decades.. but many juust haven’t been listening! Many GLBpeople were allowed to ignore TG issues, were not called out on their transphobic comments and attitudes..
The problem hasn’t been TG people not speaking up! It’s been TG people being ignored or given just token opportunities to be heard, or being heard only so long as what they say doesn’t make the more acceptable folk uncomfortable.
And TG folk aren’t the only ones treated like that in the GLBT community either. Like all the rest of society it’s time those more advantaged in the GLBT community start to listen to the less advantaged and start to look at their own biases and double-standards and weighing the comforts of the more privileged over the needs and rights and legitimate grievances of the less so.

YesIt’s absolutely horrible that that has happened time and time again. I don’t think it has been disputed (by me at least) that it has happened. It makes me sick that people actually think it’s a viable option.

YahI couldn’t tell which you meant, just right here or in general, and the right answer did occur to me as a possibility, but I answered the question that felt more important to me instead of asking which youmeant — which would’ve been as much a reason as the essay’s length for taking it out of the comment stream and posting it as a diary.
Being on the Internet does provide plenty of opportunities for misunderstandings, but the same short feedback loop that enables rapidly developing flamewars also, when folks are thinking about what was said yesterday while composing today’s angry reply, can enable a quicker sorting-out of those same misunderstandings, than in the days when such battles were fought in the letters pages of magazines.  It can go either way, and sometimes bothways at once.
I don’t think the ‘net causes the misunderstandings; it just provides more paths once they happen.
I usually have more success with my verbal style online than I have here, and in between trying to take care of the bunch of other things I should be trying to finish, I’ve been mulling over what has made this episode different.  I’ve got some ague hypotheses, none more than half-baked, which I may describe when they’re a little closer to being done.
It’s clear that you and I disagree strongly on some points, agree on others, talk past each other in a few places, and still seem to see each other as rational and well meaning enough to keep trying to convince, despite the offenses given and taken.  I plan to keep arguing when I have time, because we might be in a mutual-education situation here, not just a head-butting contest.

As an observation…

“I’ve seen a lot of people with good points acting horribly and having their points lost because of it. ”

Is pretty much the definition of a tone argument.
I’m not saying that to upset ya or anything.  I’m just saying that’s what is meant when people say a tone argument.
As individuals, we are each responsible ourselves for our own emotional reactions to things we see and hear and feel etc.
For online communication, which is absent the various social cues and structures that dominate in person, close proximity communication (face to face), we have a greater responsibility, ourselves, to control our reactions to what people are saying.
So a tone argument’s flaw is based in that it is blaming the victim, and through projective behavior, it increases the tonal quality of the discussion.
Again, this is strictly an observation, and not a direct commentary on the particular subject matter at hand, nor the people involved.

Tenses matter here. So does the Overton window.

Just because the conversation was being held in the past does not mean everyone is up to speed or in agreement, or that everyone has been OUT long enough to have that conversation.  

[...]
The conversation was being had for decades.. but many juust haven’t been listening! Many GLBpeople were allowed to ignore TG issues, were not called out on their transphobic comments and attitudes..

#nod#  This is what I saw wrong there too:  I wasn’t aware the conversation had been held [pluperfect] “in the past”, because I wasn’t aware that it had ever stopped; from the point of view of T* folk, we’re still having this conversation (as I think you are pointing out, BBBats; I’m just tidying up the tenses a little), and I know we were already having it in the 1980s because I was there, and expect somebody older to point out that it had been going on a while already by that point.
So yes, somebody coming in honestly ignorant, a fresh-out-of-the-closet newbie to the community, may well show up unaware of the long conversation sie’s stumbling into the middle of — true! — but it’s not ancient history, and anybody who manages to stay unaware despite it seeming to come up every doggone time there’s another attempt to pass ENDA for example (current enough?) is, as BBBats points out, Not Listening.
Do we trans people need to educate and agitate?  Why yes, we do.  And we have been for at least as long as I’ve known there were labels for people like me.  Some of us take breaks sometimes and let somebody else drive for a while, but I don’t think The Conversation ever stopped.  
Maybe more of the cis people in the community (don’t worry, I’m well aware that many of you already do this — and even many of my friends outside the BTGL community), once they do learn this stuff, need to help propogate the message so that folks who are legitimately ignorant get some education even before a weary, weary trans advocate shows up and has to have the same decades-old arguments again like some ossified ritual before they feel they have to actually start listening to us as though we have a clue what we’re talking about.
Oh, no, wait, maybe that’s not the answer (though those of you doiing this, please don’t stop) … like I said parenthetically, there are cis allies out there helping with Trans 101 education, but it seems that in some quarters even though the message is presented, it’s being tuned out until a weary, angry trans person shows up and insists on being loud about it and displaying, if not anger, at least extreme irritation.

The problem hasn’t been TG people not speaking up! It’s been TG people being ignored or given just token opportunities to be heard, or being heard only so long as what they say doesn’t make the more acceptable folk uncomfortable.

Yeah, that.
Some intelligent and mostly reasonable people (despite my feeling like they’ve seriously stepped in it a few times) have tried to make the case that we T*folk need to be gentler with our words and avoid pissing cis people off before we get our explanations out.  Here’s the problem:  that reaches some people (a great many, really (some only need to hear a definition and suddenly the rest clicks into place!)), but being “too polite” lets a bunch of other people just Keep Not Noticing an issue that doesn’t sound like it affects them personally (y’all remember what an ‘SEP field’ is, right?).  To reach those people, we do need to get loud, call out bullshit when we smell it, and be allowed — no, allow ourselves — to own the anger that we feel over being ignored repeatedly, and express it.
To reach everybody we need to reach, I think both styles of discourse need to be employed.  And each of us has a slightly different threshold for figuring out when it’s time to switch registers.
And yes, we do occasionally misjudge which type of person we’re talking to and unload on the wrong target — I hope most of us have the sense to try to make nice again after realizing that’s what has happened — and sometimes both kinds of people are in the same room and the ones who’ve heard the message politely but don’t realize how thick other folks’ SEP shields are, get startled and wonder, “Where the [expletive] did that explosion come from?”  (I think the latter is (most of) what has happened these last several days in this space.)
An ex-lover with a background in psychology once told me of one of her university professors who was active in the civil rights movement in the 1960s, where there were factions within the movement who wanted to get in white people’s faces, show their anger, demand rights, even riot if that was what it took to be heard; and who wanted to do everything peacefully, step by step, appealing calmly to reason and showing the white mainstream that they were reasonable.  My ex-lover found out that her professor had been working with both factions, and asked him about the apparent contradiction.
He explained that both were needed simultaneously, because although nobody was going to give the loud, angry people what they wanted just because they yelled a lot and caused trouble, the polite, reasonable group was going to have to settle for “reasonable compromises” that weren’t really reasonable because they still weren’t full equality, as long as the reasonable activists seemed like the far pole of the debate.
But if the reasonable group could point to the angry group and say, “No, they’re the far pole of radicalism; we are the compromise, real progress could be made.
Many years later I learned of the Overton window, and the tactic of deliberately shifting it, and immediately thought of my ex-lover’s former professor.
Unfortunately, some people react very badly to being made uncomfortable.  Even more unfortunately, just knowing what trans people are and what we need is enough to make them uncomfortable.  I reserve the right to make people uncomfortable, even though their discomfort is not my goal.  I literally could not walk to the grocery store if I did not assert that right.  
Soft words and harsh words.  Both are tools.  I ain’t giving up either one, as long as I have breath in me.  But no, I don’t use either All The Time.

I really really want to argue thisbut I can’t. So I won’t.  

LOL!I know that feeling…

Good points and Interesting NotionYou raise a heap of good points, and indeed your right Tense is very important as we haven’t stopped talking and many are still not listening. Thanks for the correction.
The idea that the loud extreme is needed to make the moderates look like an acceptable compromise is interesting.
Especially as if truely the way it works it makes those who call for the loud folk to demand less doing the exact opposite of what is needed.
As in such a system the more the loud folk demand the more the moderates can call for as the compromise.