Community Drama?

I often have conversations with people about “community.”  I have it in quotes because I feel like it’s really hard to quantify what community really is.  People talk about “trans community,” “gay community,” “leather community,” etc.  And we all know that there isn’t just one trans/gay/or leather community.  So what are we referring to when we use these terms?  And what do we want from these communities?  And then then the question that spurred the title of this blog – is there more drama is some communities than in others?

Based on what I’ve learned as a social worker and as a person living this long in the world, I believe that community is a group of people who have similar concerns and care about each other.  This makes sense to me.  I can picture how this kind of community operates.  It all gets mushy though when we throw in the drama.  Which is often connected to an online forum these days.  What is drama really?  Let’s say drama is when people’s feelings get hurt.  Often because their expectations have not been met. This is beginning to sound a lot like “family,” not just community.

I know this blog hasn’t been updated often and so I probably don’t have many folks reading it.  But if you’re out there – I really want to know – do you think some communities have more drama than others?  Are some people more likely to get their feelings hurt than others?  And in that case – is there a correlation between communities where people let themselves be vulnerable and the amount of drama in that community?

Old School Archive: The Faggot & the Femme

This piece isn’t new, it’s been sitting in the hard drive for a while. It’s not where I am now, but I thought I’d like to post it.

Last night my girlfriend was on the phone with a trans-masculine friend who recently broke up with his girlfriend. I heard him comment to her, “I guess testosterone makes everyone gay but your boy.”

I found myself upset about this statement.  What DOES my relationship with a femme mean to my sexual orientation?  Before trans I was a dyke.  A pretty dykey dyke.  And adored female masculinity. Or more accurately, feminine masculinity. With my gender transformation from Lesbian to genderqueer transman came testosterone and top surgery.  These are not prerequisites to be a transman, but for me they were important.  Now my body felt like my own.  Bring on the yoga!

And the sex!  I had a high sex drive BEFORE T, now it was crazy. The first few months were actually difficult, until the sex drive settled out a bit. And did my sexual orientation change with my gender? If I wanted to be with women, was I now a straight man? And could I never be the faggot I felt inside?

Before trans there was dyke.  And before dyke there was Lesbian. And before Lesbian there was bisexual. And before bisexual there was an adolescent girl who loved Judy Garland, collected musical theatre cast recordings, was an avid hiker, and fit nowhere. A little snip here, a little shot here – now i’m a 30 something feminine man who has a hot Femme girlfriend, is turned on by flat chests and dicks of all shapes and sizes, slipping my hand into my lovers, and has a preference for the color pink. And I fit nowhere.

What does it mean to be a fag?  I think sometimes about how different it feels to be snuggled close to another transman than to a woman. Shapes are different.  Sensations, prickly vs soft. Hard vs curvy. And sex is different. One is full and sweet. One is desperate, hot, and heavy.

But the thing that I dwell on the most, is what it MEANS to be (or be read) as a gay couple vs a “straight” couple. I’ll be looking over my shoulder for the rest of my life.  Thanks to an efficient societal system that makes sure masculine women and feminine men know their place I’ve developed a highly tuned vigilance to protect myself and my tribe. So, when a co-worker told my love, “I don’t think it’s fair that you identify as a lesbian since you get  to kiss your boyfriend in public,” I felt like her comment was misguided. I don’t believe in perpetuating a hierarchy of oppression.  And I understand where her comment came from.  But what is mapped on to me and what I hold inside me are two different things. AND I don’t know that the tall voluptuous brunette in cowboy boots kissing the short faggotty feminine looking guy wearing a pink belt and a tie that says “suave faggot” blends in as well as the co-worker assumes.

I miss being queer.  Being with a man, having a family together, moving through life together – seems like it would feel really different then The Faggot and The Femme. And I yearn for it.  I yearn for people to see me how I see me. And so what becomes of The Faggot and The Femme?

This morning, after a night of tossing and turning, I asked my love, “Can I be a faggot and still be your boyfriend?”  She bent down to look into my eyes and said, “I always knew you were a flaming bisexual faggot!”

” Of course you can!  Like what I said the other night… my boy didn’t turn gay when he took testosterone because he was already a queer and kinky bisexual!”

Fucking Unicorns

I was suddenly single again and my younger brother had come to help me move my stuff from the home I had shared with my now ex-lover to a one-bedroom apartment in a different neighborhood. He was driving and we were having one of the few and far between conversations that we’ve shared about feelings and identity. I was surprised when he asked, “But who are you going to date? It must be hard to date lesbians and be a guy”. I was struck and touched by both his caring and his insightfulness. In my best big brother/sister/genderqueer sibling voice I threw out , “Don’t worry, there’s lots of people who want to date me”. But he had touched on a fear that I harbor even when I’m feeling my best. Three decades of social conditioning is a hard thing to overcome. Who wants to fuck a unicorn?

The trans folks in my life conceptualize their sexual attraction in many creative ways. After all when you fuck with the gender binary you are also fucking with our reliable LGB acronym. If you’re a female bodied genderqueer transman who is attracted to lesbians, what is your sexual orientation? Suddenly sex and love and relationships and dating become complicated in a whole new way. One friend I have has labeled trans sex Rocket Ship sex. There’s a logo and everything. Recently I’ve been thinking about Unicorns.

My conceptualization of Unicorn sex has been greatly influenced by my new lover, who has taught me that Unicorns can come in all sorts of shapes sizes and genders. This morning as we took an urban morning walk with her dog, two well-meaning guys nodded in our direction and said, “Good morning ladies”. Just a block before, I had exchanged a manly hello with a passerby. Within one hundred feet we had gone from being a heterosexual couple to a lesbian couple as I had gone from being read as a man to being read as a woman. I like to think that both times we were also clearly a queer couple, but who knows what other people see. Seriously though, what’s more magical than changing your gender and sexual orientation just by taking a walk in the city? Unicorns.

Unicorns are fantastical creatures that exist only in legend. They posses properties unknown in today’s world, but also realistic enough to easily imagine them as part of our landscape. Lots of animals have horns? Why not just one single one? Many animals have become extinct, why not the Unicorn? Unicorns are rare. They are also beautiful. They embody magic and mystery. They are also strong. And often alone.

As my lover and I walked away and continued on our morning adventure I thought about what I saw when I looked in the mirror at us. Two unicorns. Finding their way, unafraid of their own beauty, embodying their own power, queering the streets of the city one block at a time. Leaving a little magic behind.

Artwork from www.threadless.com

In (Group) or Out?

Humiliation during sex play can be really really hot.

Humiliation on a trans listserve about sex – not so hot.

I recently posted to said list serve about being a fag in a relationship with a femme. I wanted to hear form other guys out there who have similar experiences with their identity. What I got instead is a shit load of “trans-enough” except it was masquerading as “man-enough.”

That’s not fair, I did also get a couple of very nurturing responses from guys who are part of the leather and gay communities. And then a response questioning my gender identity as a transman, my membership in the trans-masculine community, and accusing me of making trans guys with stealth identities look bad.

Two things happened when I read this post, and both of them were un-expected.  The first thing was that I didn’t take it personally. As someone who doesn’t fit in, I’ve gotten attacked in this way before.  From the very beginning of my trans identity I didn’t feel included or supported in spaces that I thought would be friendly.  Usually this reaction was one of great sadness and anger and not a little bit of self degradation. This is the first time I’ve read such a post and been able to take a breathe without pausing to “recover.”

The second thing that happened is that I thought about the Eliason model of lesbian  identity development.  Before I lose you in academia babble let me briefly explain the part that i think is important. Michelle Eliason’s model includes in identity development the impact of living with an identity that causes a person to experience oppression. Each identity has under it other identities that have less privilege.  Each identity is “trying” to achieve the privilege of a mainstream identity – the act of which pushes others in that identity further down the ladder and causes them to expression oppression even within their own community.  Think about how leather folks are often not included or asked to “tone down” their appearance in gay pride marches. Gay people of power (often white gay males) don’t want other gay’s to make them “look bad”, aka look less mainstream.

One of the things I see happening in “trans-enough” conversations is people who hold power in trans communities trying to hold onto that power. There is rarely a discussion of how this action oppresses or disenfranchises other trans folks. And it’s a great reminder that there are all kinds of trans folks, just like everyone else.  Some share a passion for social justice, and for some it’s not on their radar.

There’s another piece here about seeing gender as binary and fixed which I’ll save for another post.

(Pic from flickr.com/photos/thisnik/2265851465/)

What Will Your Fortune Be?

Bad blogger, no Valentine’s day post.  Perhaps that’s for the best though.  In life, I like the idea of celebrating your love with a special someone or someones, but I don’t think that expectations created by an essentially capitalist holiday is healthy for anyone’s relationship.  Instead, let’s celebrate our love’s when we’re moved to and when it makes sense for us!

And so in that spirit, I share with you a find from Penny Nickels on Estsy, The Delta of Venus Fortune Teller, an embroidered work of erotic art.

The embroidered fortunes are quotes from Anais Nin’s “Delta of Venus”, an erotica classic!

“Hmmm, Right Now I’m Having Sex…”

Ok, so not RIGHT now. But recently – and combo of sex and mindfulness was pretty awesome.

I’ve been spending a lot of time lately thinking about mindfulness. Mindfulness is the practice of being in the moment, right here, right now.  For example, I’m aware of the feeling of the keys under my fingers and the music coming out of the speakers.  What I’m not doing is making a grocery list in my head, thinking about what I’m going to do next, or worrying about how things went this morning.  Those things are about Before and Later, but not Now.

Sometimes I love practicing mindfulness.  For example, walking to work in the morning I like to look at the sky and how beautiful it is and just focus on that.  But sometimes, I really don’t want to be in this moment.  Tired at the end of a work day on crowded public transit – I’d rather check out.  We all do lots of things to check out, for example television is in essence checking out.  We’re not engaged mentally, physically, or spiritually with other people -  instead we’re passive, taking in and checking out.  This isn’t to say that all checking out is bad, it’s not.  And neither is all TV. But it was really shocking to me, when I started paying attention to when I was and when I wasn’t being mindful, how often during a day I’m checked out.

Which brings me to sex.  Everyone has a whole mess of feelings, thoughts, predictions, concerns, and expectations around sex.  It’s supposed to be like _______.  Go on, fill in the blank. Even us queers who aren’t part of that mainstream heterosexist GQ and Bridezilla world have our own assumptions of what sex should be. Most recently, while perusing transguys.com, I noticed guys letting other guys know that they’re not supposed to post for dates on women seeking women.  Sex isn’t supposed to be like that. You’re not really trans if…..

Even if we can’t agree on what trans sex is supposed to be, we all hold our own interpretation tightly and sometimes we don’t even know it. I am not immune.  My sex life is supposed to be great.  Since I’m a sexologist it’s supposed to be fantastic, perfect, and happen often. And when it isn’t or it doesn’t not only am I cranky but then carry all my messy expectations into the bedroom/car/floor/bathroom/kitchen with me.  It’s amazing how much baggage we can carry around even with our pants off.

Trans folks also often carry with them shame about their bodies. Maybe we don’t want to be there during sex.  Maybe we can only get off if we imagine we’re someone else or that our bodies are different than they really are.  And that’s ok.  Mindfulness during sex isn’t for everyone.  In fact, I don’t think there’s one good way to have fantastic sex, it’s about what works for you. But what would happen if we went into sex without our usual expectations? What would we see?  What would we notice?

During my own recent foray into sex and mindfulness, I noticed that I might not be able to “leave my baggage at the door,”  but that my baggage didn’t seem to matter as much when I was focused on how our queer bodies found each other in that moment.

Thankful…

Some of the things I am thankful for:

- the love of family and friends

- trans guys in leather

- hot femmes

- amazing artists and activists

- tit-tilating erotica

- dirty movies

- glass dildos

What are you thankful for?

Remembers.

Below is a blog from feministing.com that talks about the Transgender Day of Remembrance.

But I’d also like us to take a moment today to not only remember the lives that trans folks have lost, but also the lives that they’ve lived.

Remember fabulous queens, quirky queers, beautiful femmes, handsome butches, daring transmen, strong women, and the collective courage and love of life that our community embodies on a daily basis.

With warmth, love, and pride,

Sexnerd

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Feministing: Transgender Day of Remembrance 2009

Today is the 11th annual Transgender Day of Remembrance. This day was created as a time to grieve trans and gender non-conforming people killed over the past year because of fear and hatred. It also serves as a time to raise awareness about violence against trans folks. The event was started by Gwendolyn Ann Smith following the murder of Rita Hester on November 28, 1998. Every year since the day’s founding vigils and memorial events have been held in the US and increasingly all over the world.

This year the TGEU Trans Murder Monitoring project TDOR 2009 update has collected information about over 160 people killed because of other people’s violent reaction to their trans presentation or identity. These numbers represent only those people we know about. We don’t know how many trans folks were actually murdered this year – our identities are so rarely recognized and there is still so little awareness about trans issues and the violence trans folks face that it is safe to say many murders of trans folks went unreported.

Complete article…

Bodies and Bits

Bodies are always complicated. For trans folks this is no exception.

Sex is often complicated.  This is true for lots of trans folks.

Bodies and sex? Well…for some people that combo is a no-go. If you hate your body fully clothed you’re sure as hell not going to be excited to share it with another person. Except for the people that sure as hell are. And sometimes, there’s a rule, an unspoken rule about how trans folks are supposed to act when it comes to sex.  What they’re supposed to like.

In some communities the rule for masculine trans folks is stone. You’re not gonna let anyone up inside you. No sir (or Sir, or Ma’am, or ma’am). Cause if you like to take it in your girl bits, you are not a real transman.  Sound famliar? Transguys have to cope with and sift through the same mascluine stereotypes as every other person who identifies with the masculine.

In some communities the T guys are supposed to be super horny, doing everything in sight. And if you’re not, dude you’re so not a real T-man. Feminine trans folks have history of sexualization to color all of their own personal wants, desires, and fantasies. Being your own woman is no small feat and for trans women this is especially true.

And now we’ve strayed so very far from the amazing pleasure and eroticism that sex can hold. But what if sex had no shoulds? And what if it wasn’t always tied so closely to gender identity? Where would we be without school girl/teacher or daddy/boy fantasies? Two people fucking. Or three. Making love. Doing it. And enjoying themselves. Maybe.

The Birth of a Sexnerd

Sexnerd is a queer, transgender, genderqueer, dyke, butch, sexologist, therapist, social worker, and artist who lives and breathes East Coast.  And not for want of trying.

Transition into first person – I’ve been a sex nerd for years. My writing has sat in obscurely named files on my computer or in re-used file folders in the back of a drawer labeled “writing” or “inspiration.” Last night I received my first copy of Original Plumbing, a zine-like magazine that celebrates the sexuality and culture of transmen. Bam! This mag is different than On Our Backs, whose print passing I’ve beenmourning for several years now.  On my couch, thumbing through this first offering of spreads and interviews I remembered how the sex nerd was born. I remembered that before graduate degrees and sex therapy what I wanted to do was provide a space for sexuality education and conversation that included the people who looked likeme.

So, whether this is read by a few folks or no folks, here we go on a sex nerd-a-licious adventure!