If every CD came out at the same time would it change public acceptance?

[Jenny Gurl]

When a CD is outed on the news the public seems to gang up on them. They believe it is such a rare thing and must be wrong . Many stay in the closet for their own reasons, and very good ones many times. Many don't know how those close to them will react and are not willing to take the risk. Given many stories here where someone has come out and the results have varied from full acceptance to divorced, fired, etc. it is a valid apprehension. The ignorant public usually associate the CD with the usual misinformation, must want to transition, must be gay, etc. I wonder if all CD came out if the public would see how much more common it really is and be more accepted.

[Stephanie Miller]

How long did it take after the slaves were free, before they were accepted into society?
Indians accepted off the reservations?
Gays accepted, let alone in the military?
Women in politics?
Margarine instead of butter? ( where the hell did THAT one come from? Sorry, got carried away.)
Yep……. We got a long time to go.

[Intertwined]

You mean ALL 5 of us...? All at the SAME time...? that would might trigger the apocalypse....!

Sorry, actually, I do not think that even if was one family, known to have a CD on every street on every block in america, at this point & time, it would still be frowned apon and feared... If it happened like you say, we all come out, it would still take years to be seen as an acceptable and normal activity. It's not understood, and that which is not understood is feared...

[Samantha43]

Public perception is a difficult thing to change. I doubt crossdressers will be accepted as a normal part of society in my lifetime. Most of us are perfectly happy in our closet and aren't willing to take the risk of pushing the issue.

[Iskandra]

Acceptance is such a variable beast I'm realising..
A guy at work, who comes across as someone who may or may not be gay, does ballroom dancing.. Many at work mock him for that more than possibly being gay.. His response, "hey, my hand has touched more female butt than yours ever will!" He is however (mockingly) accepted.. He is himself however and doesn't care..
Then there is a guy at work who is gay as, doesn't flaunt it, but doesn't hide it, he loves to party, happy all full of jokes, smiles and laughter.. I can't think of a single person who does not like him..
There's guys like me who don't know a thing about cars, don't care for sports, don't swear, don't tell crass jokes who get along fine with everyone, but aren't in the 'boys club'..
I've seen women laughed at for the way they dress.. like my mutton dressed as lamb neighbour, a grandma that dresses like she's 16..
And lately since my trandar has been switched on, seen quite a few trannies out in public that don't get a second look and thus seem to be totally accepted..
I guess if all of us would come out at the same time, it would wake up many people as to it's commonality.. Some would be accepted, some would be tollerated, and then there will sadly always be some that would be ridiculed.. Society as a whole has a perceptive opinion that has developed over centuries.. Revolutions (rapid change) is dead, burried and gone.. Getting society to accept duality of gender will take way more than one event, no matter how big!

[Fab Karen]

Gay people figured out that the more that are out in the open, the greater the understanding & acceptance there will be. Same holds true for us. When I'm out & about, people get to see I'm just another person doing the same things they are.

Along the lines of what Iskandra said, there are still people in this day & age who find inter-racial marriage "disgusting", yet society overall accepts it.

[RADER]

You might have something their; So lets plan an "All Come Out Party", on December 21 ST. 2012.
That is to be the end of time as we know it. So we start the new "Time" with every human wearing
only one type of clothing. The type is what we now call Feminine Wardrobe. Is it possible???
Rader

PS Instead of burning bras, we can burn Drab Cloths. LOL

[Pattie O]

I think if everyone came out at once then public perception would change however it still may take time for full acceptance but what a great idea;more consideration may be worthwhile ie globally!! The internet is opening up many avenues for transpeople(maybe a better overall term than transvestite/transexual or transgender ) because thats what we are ;"normal"(what ever that means,really) people but with unusual qualities...that's my perception anyway.

[ReineD]

I wonder if all CD came out if the public would see how much more common it really is and be more accepted.

It will take more than that. The estimates vary in terms of how many CDers there are. Some people think it is 1:100, which may be true if you count the people who have no inclination to do anything other than underdress on occasion, or who genuinely prefer to keep their feminine presentation in the closet since they have no wish to present as a woman in public. I mean, realistically there is a large segment of the CDing population for whom the dressing is more sexual and who solidly want to lead purely male lives. So ... if you look at just the CDers who do want to present as a woman in public (it follows they want to be treated like one), I think the numbers are closer to 1:500 or perhaps fewer. This is not enough to alter society's perception, IMO. And if my numbers are conservative, I don't think even 1:100 is enough.

So, in addition to all these CDs deciding in concert they will dress regularly in public, there would need to be a massive increase in public education in sex ed classes and in the media including more shows that normalize the CDing and also the news, talk shows, and print media that discuss it. This would have to be done on a regular basis and not occasionally, using a sensationalistic approach. At the same time there would need to be changes in all state laws that protect against any discrimination against crossdressers, and also many more companies would need to have sensitivity training sessions for their employees.

I think that should do it, and I do think it is possible. I have no idea how long it would take though.

[5150 Girl]

Odd,,, I just made a simular thead this morning. (it's had 100 views, but no posts)
Anywho, To anser the OP's question, If we call came out at once, would it help to make mainstream socitey acept us? In a word, YES.... Will it happen oernight? no.
How-some-ever in this day and age of "political correctness" and with the tril beeing already blazed by many minority groups, (especialy gay rights groups) I think we could pull this off in 5 years or so.

[Cynthia Anne]

Geeish! I'm still having a hard time excepting daylight savings time! No! It wouldn't help! Sorry!

[Karren H]

Can we wait like 4 years?? I need to get my law degree... I'm going to be the richest crossdressing divorce lawyer on the planet!! Lol.

[NathalieX66]

I'm putting me on my guy FB page once again on halloween , and blocking out my co-workers,and professional contacts. Whatever consequences I suffer, I'm willing to accept.
Deal with it and go.....at least I'm honest. I am me.
It worked for me last time.
The reality is the term transgender comes up nearly every day in the news.
Who exactly is the T of LGBT? Many, if not most, are straight guys (married &with kids) who are crossdressers, not just merely folks who recieved a reference to an endocrinologist to prescribe hormones, and start going under the knife at some point.

[Chickhe]

All at once wouldn't work... It needs to happen slowly, but frequently enough so that people eventually start complaining...that its old news and who cares... and that is already happening to some degree. If you look back only 10 - 15 years the rate of acceptance is incredible.

[Kaitlyn Michele]

No..which is a shame

[Pythos]

I think it would help a great deal. Even 1:100 is a whole hell of a lot of people. I cannot believe the negative views here. I think this would be a tremendous thing to happen, ESPECIALLY if many of those people that surface are ones in positions of power, and are respected.

But it will never happen. Everyone will just continue to hide....which makes us, in the eyes of all the other groups that fought, look weak and feeble, and not worthy of support.

[DebbieL]

When Harvey Milk challenged the gay community to come out to their families and friends, it was a huge awakening for millions of people. About 80% of the population is less than 3 degrees of separation from a member of the gay community. I had at least 3 cousins who were gay, and one that was transgendered (besides myself of course).

If we really look at it, most people are normally transgendered. Given the opportunity, girls will want to play ball, and boys will want to play with baby dolls and try on mommy's dresses. The world shifts for the young boy when he begins to suffer consequences for these choices. When a girl wants to play ball, get rough with the boys, climb trees, play with trucks, and even play with guns, they call her a tom-boy, and it's pretty much accepted by parents and other kids alike. If a woman wants to wear pants most of the time, it's not a big deal.

On the other hand, the little boy who plays with dolls, wants to wear dresses, and wants to be pretty - is called a "sissy", and often the name is accompanied with other verbal abuse and even physical abuse. Parents can be even more cruel than the other kids. I preferred playing with girls instead of boys when I was 2 years old. In my case, I was born without testicles, and just didn't produce testosterone. There were boys down the street, but they played far too rough. Usually, I'd end up with cuts and scrapes on most of my body, because they did things like tie my wagon to their bike and tied me to the wagon, then didn't stop when the wagon rolled and I got dragged for 10-20 feet over concrete sidewalk. For my parents, and the neighbors, it was normal that I wanted to play with girls.

When I moved to a new neighborhood and an new school, the girls thought it was really great to have a boy who wanted to play with them, until I came to one of their houses and we started wearing each other's clothes. Suddenly, the girl's mother freaked out called everybody in the PTA, the teacher, and told them all that I shouldn't be allowed to play with girls, and the next school-day, I had no friends at all. I tried playing with the boys, and because I was a "sissy", it took less than an hour before they were pelting me with large rocks.

But the problem, for society as a whole, was that I was not the only one getting a not so subtle message. Every boy who even thought about playing with girls, doing "feminine" things, or even "woman's work" like folding the laundry or washing the dishes, there is always that very present fear that someone will do something really cruel even for the slightest infraction. At one point, I remember being told that if I wore a pink dress shirt to work again, that I would get a formal reprimand in my personnel file. Eventually, the company, run by a former Navel officer, tried for almost 9 months to force me to resign, and filled my file with so much paper that they could force me to quit. This was because I had come out and had gone to private parties in safe environments where anonymity was supposed to be honored - but one of the people there was sending reports back to his brother, who was dating a coworker who was up for a promotion in direct competition with me.

To many in the military, transgendered men are associated with the draft dodgers of the 1960s, or corporal Klinger on Mash. In the 1950s and early 1960s, the only public transgendered people in media, was "Uncle Miltie" looking ugly as sin. Maybe Jack Lemon and Tony Curtis in Some Like it Hot. And there was almost no information available on gender identity, transexuality, or even cross-dressing as a lifestyle. Eventually, movies like the Christine Jorgensen story and Myra Breckenridge came out, but even these were more fantasy than reality. Myra Breckenridge starred Rex Reed as the man to be transformed, and Raquel Welch as the woman, doing horrible things to men, and at the end of the movie, you find out it was all a dream, and there wasn't going to be an operation.

Even trying to talk to professional psychologists was nearly impossible. I had been part of a research project and it was totally obvious that I was more girl than boy, that I really liked playing with the girls, and didn't like the boys much. I had asthma, and they could tell from the severity of my attacks that probably the best thing they could do is let me live as a girl. But that wasn't an option in the 1960s.

The interesting thing is that when I DID come out, and started living full time week-ends and evenings (considering the change), I was astonished at how many men desperately wanted to talk with me about their own gender identity and sexual identity and sexual preference issues. I had been a sponsor in a 12 step program for 9 years by then, and had sponsored maybe 8 people. In the first 2 years after first coming out, I had taken over 50 people through the steps, both men and women. I was astonished at how many men and women were struggling with gender identity and sexuality issues. Today, I'm over 30 years in recovery, and I still have people who so much want to talk to someone like me.

I went public in 1990, and moved to the NYC area in 1992, but I was willing to go out and pass in places like Princeton New Jersey area. I probably helped create the space for more famous personalities like Ru Paul, who made national headlines by moving from the drag clubs of New York, to the shopping malls of New Jersey, and then the rest of the country.

One of the problems with the "Drag Queen" movies is that they still link gender identity to homosexuality. At the same time, credible personalities doing noble things - like the girls in "To Wong Fu", and how they helped the women in a small town, showed that gender identity and personality traits such as integrity, ethics, responsibility, courage, and even morality, and being transgendered - are not mutually exclusive.

If you do come out in a very public way, do it like you were representing not just yourself, but every boy who ever wanted to play with doll, like you represent a country, or a corporation. Let yourself be remembered for your compassion, courage, integrity, honor, and responsibility, not for whining.

[Badtranny]

Hmmmm, this is yet another thread I was ignoring because of the title but find myself intrigued by some of the clever responses.

This really is an interesting topic and I think the answer to the question is a resounding ...it depends.

I've spent the last year coming out as either gay or trans depending on the audience. (the official word in my office is I'm gay, because being trans would necessitate the involvement of HR and I don't plan to transition there) I'm a happy and proud girl in transition everywhere else. I only mention all of this off topic stuff because it sets up my point, ...really it does ;-)

My point is that while I'm coming out, or rather busting out I've noticed that my attitude is not just a factor in how people react to me, it is THE factor. If you come out to someone and act like it's a deep dark secret, than odds are they are going to respond to this dramatic news in a dramatic way. If every CD came "out" in confidence, I think nothing much would change. However if every CD came out as a confident and vibrant guy who is secure in his sexuality who happens to enjoy dressing up in women's clothes sometimes than I think acceptance would be a forgone conclusion.

I think women as a whole would not mind a CD'r in their lives as long as he wasn't weird or creepy. I happen to know first hand that chicks dig fun, confident guys who know how to have a good time.

[VioletJourney]

I think the best thing we can do for public acceptance is to feel no shame for who we are. I've mentioned several times before, people respond to the cues you give them, acting ashamed will imply that it's shameful and they will treat it that way, acting fun and casual about it makes people think it's fun and casual.

[girlygirly]

It might change "public" acceptance, but nothing could erase the image of me dressed like a girl from the minds of my family and friends.

I don't even want public acceptance, I can take care of myself in public just fine. I would be happier with not having to explain it to those who feel they already know me well, so I'll just keep it to myself and a few very trusted people I know.

[Jenny Gurl]

I probably should have asked the question a little different. I was not thinking so much of a big event where everyone set a date and came out. I was more thinking of a comparison of how it would be if all those in the closet were out where society would really see there are many more than they think compared to now where they only count those who are known. The question was worded how it was and the responses are enlightening. Many other minority groups had no choice in hiding so the numbers were seen as time went by. Skin color is hard to hide, if you are gay at least one other person knows if you are in a relationship, etc. Many of us hide the fact even from our S.O. so it is possible for many C.D. to have only one person who knows, themselves.

[dawnmarrie1961]

If every CD came out at the same time it would be very crowded. The public isn't ignorant or stupid...it's just uninformed or misinformed. Acceptance often over-rated concept. Far better that we learn to accept ourselves and our own limitations before demanding that the public at large put their stamp of approval upon our behavior.

[Badtranny]

It might change "public" acceptance, but nothing could erase the image of me dressed like a girl from the minds of my family and friends.

I don't even want public acceptance, I can take care of myself in public just fine. I would be happier with not having to explain it to those who feel they already know me well, so I'll just keep it to myself and a few very trusted people I know.

Something about this comment disturbs me. I can't quite put my thoughts into words yet, so I will ruminate and try to explain later this evening.

[dawnmarrie1961]

It might change "public" acceptance, but nothing could erase the image of me dressed like a girl from the minds of my family and friends.

I don't even want public acceptance, I can take care of myself in public just fine. I would be happier with not having to explain it to those who feel they already know me well, so I'll just keep it to myself and a few very trusted people I know.

I can relate to what you are saying. I get a little sick and tired of being asked the same questions over and over again like a broken record. But guess what? It just goes with the territory so get used to it.
The other day a very attractive young indian woman asked me what she can do to stop guys from constantly making inappropriate sexual comments to her all the time. I was honest with her. "Honey, there isn't anything you can say or do that is going to stop that." I said."That's just the way it always has been,is and will always be. That is just the way men are. That is the reality we deal with everyday."

[JiveTurkeyOnRye]

I agree with others in this thread that say that it wouldn't suddenly make it "ok" for us in the public eye, but it would be a huge step. I was talking to my aunt when I was home this weekend in Ohio and she mentioned how she never really understood gay people and was a bit hesitant about the way the culture was shifting in regards to homosexuality, but then she made friends with a woman who, although my aunt suspected it already, eventually came out to her as a lesbian. My aunt said that really did a lot to make her open her eyes and put a human face onto it, and now she's totally cool with it. (Sidenote, this conversation eventually led to me coming out about my crossdressing to my aunt, which she was very supportive about.)

Another example is that on the other side of my family, I have a gay cousin who didn't come out to his parents until this year, because they were very conservatively Christian and he feared their response. But once they got over the initial shock they have been loving and supportive of him. Not always the case in these situations, I know, but putting a familiar face on things does tend to help people with acceptance.

I can honestly say I didn't lose a single friend in the process of coming out as a crossdresser. The image of me dressed as a girl, or more often, of me as a guy in women's clothes, has not been something that my friends have had a problem with. Many people almost seem to forget about it, as a nonissue.

So would it make things better right away? No, but it would definitely be a start. And we sort of have to do it in baby steps anyway because it's hard to run in heels.