Around the beginning of this year, I made a decision to refrain from any crossdressing activity, including visiting any internet discussion sites, or shopping for clothing, for the next three or four months. My decision was predicated by my growing sense of frustration with the whole transgender movement and a feeling that I was once again alone in the world as the only guy who did what I was doing. I wanted to just have some time to clear my mind of all my frustrations and devote my thoughts to my other interests in life.
Cycles of activity/inactivity have always been normal for me, but this was somewhat different. The length of abstinence was becoming much longer than I had anticipated, and I seldom had any thoughts about crossdressing at all. When it did cross my mind, it was simply to wonder why I was losing interest in something that had always occupied such a large part of my thoughts, and provided me with so much enjoyment.
So a few weeks ago, on a rainy day when nothing much was doing, I dug out some of my femme items and made a conscious decision to wear them while I sat around not doing much. I then decided that I should check in on some of my old internet haunts to see if there was anything new going on. Nope! Same old, same old stuff. Interspersed among all the posts about such important issues as "If there was a magic pill...." etc., were a few intellectually challenging posts dealing with issues that affect our ability to be understood and accepted by society, which should be our primary concern. Unfortunately, most responses are very subjective and simply state the posters own personal take on things or get into debates about labels and the degree of hatred of them. These posts are then usually closed with comments such as "this is getting monotonous".
So why do these topics create such an ambiguous love-hate situation over things that should be of great interest to us, even to the extent of taking time to post that they are not even interested in the topic? The obvious example of this is the subject of labels. Without labels it is impossible to have a meaningful discussion about anything. However, when we extend that to the application of labels to individuals we create serious problems. Labels can be degrading and hurtful. Even when they are well meaning and describe a good quality to possess, they can still be very limiting and can tend to overpower other, more descriptive qualities that we possess. They tend to draw attention to that one fact which by itself can never fully describe any individual.
What should we, as members of this community, call ourselves? It doesn't matter as we are all individuals and are entitled to our own views and opinions. What should the community collectively call us? This is where the problem arises. Despite attempts to create an "umbrella" term, no single word can satisfy such diverse views and opinions, not to mention how diverse our involvement can be.
It is not my intention to allow this post to degenerate into a meaningless argument about whether we are transgendered or crossdressers, but rather to point out some of the considerations that always fail to enter into such arguments. All labels do not take on the same form. Some of them, when applied to individuals are in the nature of a condition, and apply regardless of how that condition might affect the person's activities, lifestyle, well-being and so on. When you apply such a term to an individual you are saying that that is what he is and not what he does. An example would be he is left-handed. Other labels are oriented more toward what people do. In these cases the emphasis is on the activity and not on the individual. An example would be golf. If you golf, you are a golfer. It says little about you other than the fact that you sometimes play golf.
So why is this distinction important? Every label carries with it certain images, false stereotypes, superstitions, myths along with some basic facts. When a label is a condition, the public sees all of those images, stereotyopes etc. as applying to the individual, but when the label refers to an activity, all those images and myths apply to the activity. Our primary concern should be the promotion of understanding of who we are and what we do, followed by the use of that understanding to create acceptance. The labels we use to describe both ourselves and our activities should be chosen very carefully because of the message they impart about us both individually and collectively. It can be much more than whether you think TG or CD sounds better. Neither word adequately describes all of us, or what all of us do. I am not sure that such a label could ever exist.
I am beginning to think that all of us really are the only guy in the world who does this and that there is no "community" at all.
Veronica
Originally Posted by Veronica27
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but from the U.S.A. that resides in North America..
You wouldn't want me to mistake you for a Canadian would ya?
