Well, I think the time has finally arrived. It’s time that I have to weigh in on that rainbow-colored elephant in the room, that I talk about one of the most (if not the most) successful and influential members of our community. A person who may be the only trans person the majority of Western society is familiar with, and a person who was inexplicably chosen to be the leader and figurehead of the millions in the trans community. So here goes.
I fucking hate Caitlyn Jenner.
I mean, yeah, it was great that she came out and everything. It was great that she got people actually listening and talking about trans issues for once. It was quite eye opening to see her Vanity Fair cover. Imagine that – a trans woman on the cover of one of the most popular magazines in the country, in every grocery store at the checkout lane, and it wasn’t some Jerry Springer-esque exploitation piece!
Just by the nature of who she was – one of the most successful athletes in American history, and a member of the Kardashian cabal – she was able to use her superstardom to launch a national conversation on transgender identities, and helped in a big way to get our lives in our stories in national media. Without her, who knows, maybe we wouldn’t be getting shows like Transparent coming out, or getting major legislation discussed to provide things like affordable health care to trans people or protection from being fired simply because of our gender identity.
But, have you heard the word vomit that comes out of her mouth every day? Like, seriously, have you read this shit? Specifically, the part where she says the following:
I think it’s much easier for a trans woman or a trans man who authentically kind of looks and plays the role. So what I call my presentation. I try to take that seriously. I think it puts people at ease. If you’re out there and, to be honest with you, if you look like a man in a dress, it makes people uncomfortable.
Oh. My. God. This is our spokesperson? This is the person that Farmer Bob and Jane the cashier at CVS are going to be listening to about trans issues? Why? What did we do to deserve such a shitty role model? Now I know how everyone felt when Bill Cosby (before it was revealed he was, like, the shittiest person on Earth) kept telling black people to “pull their pants up” because it would make white people respect them more.
Ms. Jenner, don’t fucking tell me what to do. First off, there is nothing wrong with being a man and wearing dresses. Eddie Izzard was doing that for decades before you came along. But more importantly, this quote pushes my buttons because she just reinforces this intense pressure trans people get to completely conform to their gender roles. If you’re a trans woman, you have to love makeup, have long hair, wear dresses, and be “conventionally” attractive (which usually means white with stereotypically feminine features). If not, you have a risk of being called out for not being a “real woman” or being a “man in a dress”, which, by the way, is a slur used a lot against trans people. In other words, if you want to be taken seriously as a trans woman, you have to look like Caitlyn Jenner.
It doesn’t work that way. There’s nothing wrong with being girly as a trans woman, but we shouldn’t force them to conform to that role if they don’t want to. For a lot of trans people (and many cis people as well), how they present is a huge part of who they are. It’s liberating to wake up in the morning and actually get to choose how you want to show yourself, beyond anyone’s expectations of how men and women are supposed to act. Hell, if you’re a non-binary person, part of the fun is being able to mix and match those gender roles and become something completely unique.
There’s something deeply unnerving about Jenner’s idea that you have to completely shape the way you show yourself to the world just to make other people more “comfortable”. I mean, if I really wanted to make others completely comfortable, I would just present male.
Not to mention the reality for most trans people is that they simply cannot afford to look like Caitlyn Jenner every day. I mean, she’s a celebrity, for God’s sake. This is a woman who can afford tons of expensive plastic surgery procedures, who can buy the most expensive dresses (and who has personal stylists who can help her make the best fashion choices), and, you know, has the body of a professional athlete.
Most of us could never hope to afford the luxuries Caitlyn takes for granted. I mean, do you know how much sex reassignment surgery costs? I’ll tell you. It’s up to $24,000 for male to female, and over $50,000 for female to male. 50k! That’s more than most people make in a year! But it’s a drop in the puddle for someone like Caitlyn Jenner. Having her tell trans people how to present is a little like Gwyneth Paltrow saying dieting is easy, when she can afford ridiculously expensive food and has nutritionists who work round the clock to make sure she stays healthy.
Now I don’t think Caitlyn is completely oblivious to the immense amount of privilege she gets as a celebrity. She later said in the interview that “I’m white. I make a good living. And I get all that. I’ve heard that right from the beginning. I’m not going to make excuses for myself.” And she does show some level of desire to use her status to help trans people.
But it’s not enough. Because for the many people, Caitlyn Jenner is the only trans person they are in any way familiar with. The average American may know of, say Orange is the New Black, but might not have seen any episodes or know who Laverne Cox is. But we all know Caitlyn Jenner because she is was in every grocery store in the country. And she is, to be entirely honest, a cartoon. Her comments make trans people into a joke, and she repeats the same bigoted quotes that we’ve been getting from most of society for decades. And to have her, who, by the way, is a Republican who doesn’t support gay marriage, as our spokesperson, is just horrible. We need better.
marissatheterrible 