What's worse?

[CaptLex]

Declaring you are heterosexual is not the same as homophobia!

It's not the declaration itself, it's how it's often said here - in a very defensive way. And I actually do believe there is such a thing as heterophobia - I've seen a good indication of it myself. But prejudice in any form makes no sense to me - especially between the trans community and the gay community.

Us CD's often try our damnedest to blend in and pass. We do not scream for attention.

Not sure what that means, Erin. Do you mean to say that gays scream for attention and CDs don't? If so, I disagree - some CDs sure do and some gays sure don't. Please clarify.

[Ema1234 GG]

I don't really get why people think CDs are gay. I mean, afterall a GG can be attracted to other women. Therefore why does a man who likes to wear women's clothing or a GM who is trans has to be attracted to men. Surely following that logic lesbians wouldn't exist.

From an outside perspective (i.e. someone who considers themselves to be neither CD, Trans or Gay) I personally have no problem with what a person chooses to wear or who they choose to sleep with. I think I'd even be quite flattered if a lesbian was to come on to me. So long as they aren't trying to push their choice of lifestyle onto others as far as I'm concerned it's live and let live.

[CaptLex]

I personally have no problem with what a person chooses to wear or who they choose to sleep with. I think I'd even be quite flattered if a lesbian was to come on to me. So long as they aren't trying to push their choice of lifestyle onto others.

It's neither a choice nor a lifestyle, but otherwise I agree with you.

Actually, I have yet to meet a gay, lesbian, bisexual or asexual person who thinks everyone else should be of the same orientation they are, but I've certainly met many heterosexuals that feel that way.

[Ema1234 GG]

It's neither a choice nor a lifestyle, but otherwise I agree with you.

Actually, I have yet to meet a gay, lesbian, bisexual or asexual person who thinks everyone else should be of the same orientation they are, but I've certainly met many heterosexuals that feel that way.

Sorry, my bad with my choice of terminology. Still learning with how to phrase certain things. What I should have said is that the clothes a person wears or the gender of the people they sleep with doesn't effect me, so why should I be bothered by it.

And by saying I'd be flattered if a lesbian came onto me, I'm sure they wouldn't if they knew I was straight but if they didn't know I'm sure it would be flattering. Just the same as how it's flattering if a man came on to me. Wouldn't be interested either way, but it's still nice to know you're attractive!!!

[goofus]

It's not only rednecks who feel CDs are gay. My wondeful, highly educated and loving wife thinks that all CDs are gay. I used to teach Sex Education and I've told her time and again that it is not true. The % of gay CDs is about the same as the % of males who are gay.

And some wonder why I don't tell her I'm a CD.

Obviously she's not educated enough!

[CaptLex]

Sorry, my bad with my choice of terminology. Still learning with how to phrase certain things. What I should have said is that the clothes a person wears or the gender of the people they sleep with doesn't effect me, so why should I be bothered by it.

It's okay, Ema, I figured that's what you meant.

And by saying I'd be flattered if a lesbian came onto me, I'm sure they wouldn't if they knew I was straight but if they didn't know I'm sure it would be flattering. Just the same as how it's flattering if a man came on to me. Wouldn't be interested either way, but it's still nice to know you're attractive!!!

I get what you're saying. I've been hit on by many lesbians because I've always looked like one of them and it was flattering, but I'm only attracted to guys, so I never took any of them up on it. But some people are threatened by others of the "wrong" group hitting on them, for some reason. You're obviously one of the cool ones.

[Mary Jane1]

Granted we have loved ones that we would want to spare problems for but if we're talking about people in general I could care less what they think of me,I have to live with myself.As long as you are a productive member of our world who would care what anyone is.

Ditto and Ditto again.

It's family, friends and other loved ones that are most of the reason I'm in the closet. The world really does need to sit up and give it's head a shake. But until it does, I am concerned about my children, other family members and friends that support me. If they're going to be hurt, insulted or ostracized just because they're related to, friends of, or support me ... then I'll be very careful.


As for the rest .... 'what's the word for when you push your tongue out between your lips and blow really hard?

[leesametz]

only 2 people know that i crossdress...

an ex-girlfriend from high school whom ive been sexually involved with since high school, and before and during this current marriage and a guy from high school who is gay...

the first time i got with Pam, i wore pantyhose under my jeans and had nearly my entire wardrobe present. i picked her up and we went to a hotel for the night. she and i have always been pretty comfortable with each other whether dressed properly or naked. as we laid on the bed i told her i had a secret i wanted to share with her. i told her to close her eyes and then i unzipped my jeans and placed her hand on my pantyhosed tummy and 'junk'...

Mike lives out of state now but i looked him up to tell him i would like to get together with him (thinking he was still living local) as a boy and girl. he obviously as the boy and me dressed. i explained that i knew he would be accepting of my fetish. we never did get together...

leesa

[Fab Karen]

Hi


But what confuses me are the ladies who respond to this by saying "what's wrong with being gay?" And I'm not referring only to this board. This is a reaction I've seen from many CDers.


But why is OK for a gay man or a lesbian to place a rainbow decal on their car bumper, but when a crossdresser says "I'm heterosexual" she's looked at sideways for being homophobic? Why is declaring you are gay not regarded as heterophobic (other than the term hasn't been coined yet)?



Personally, I find sexual orientation one of the least interesting things to know about a person. Unless I'm interested in having sex with someone, it don't matter!

Yvonne
(is now off the soapbox)

If someone makes a pass at you, or asks you in conversation for some reason, it's fine to state you're heterosexual. If however you go around announcing to everyone you meet that you're hetero, you're displaying homophobia.
Someone being open about being gay to the world is the same as being open about being a CD- it's about having pride in what you are, that it's NOT ok to oppress us anymore.

[Nicki B]

But what confuses me are the ladies who respond to this by saying "what's wrong with being gay?" And I'm not referring only to this board. This is a reaction I've seen from many CDers.

Because the emphatic 'I'm not gay' lobby so often sound as if they're saying it because they're afraid of being tarred with the same brush?

I don't see myself as gay or straight (for the record, I've only ever been attracted to women, one in particular), but if people want to lump me in with other people who have also struggled and achieved a great deal, then I'm cool with that?

I don't see it as any skin off my nose to be seen as under the LGBT umbrella?

But why is OK for a gay man or a lesbian to place a rainbow decal on their car bumper, but when a crossdresser says "I'm heterosexual" she's looked at sideways for being homophobic? Why is declaring you are gay not regarded as heterophobic (other than the term hasn't been coined yet)?

The rainbow is intended to include trans people, too??

If you wish to present as a woman (which given the obssessing about passing here, so many obviously do..) isn't it rather strange to see yourself as 'hetero' or 'straight' if you fancy women? Don't we as trans rewrite the rules?

Unless I'm interested in having sex with someone, it don't matter!

There I whole-heartedly agree with you - it shouldn't matter. So, it doesn't warrant any emphasis - so why do so many people here feel the need??

[PatriciaT]

I think that this discussion may have drifted a bit of the mark. It’s not a question how we feel about gays. It’s true that I’m not gay and don’t identify with this group, but I also have no feelings against them or anyone else who has a different life style or beliefs. I would just like to be called or labeled what I am, in this case a CD and nothing else. It’s a question of labeling.
I am not a racist and would be horrified to be labeled as such. I’m also not a male chauvinist, and for a CD to be one I guess would be odd, and would be revolted to be labeled as such, just as I would be horrified and revolted to be labeled a Republican….(If this doesn’t get listed, then I’ll know which party the moderator belongs to.) I just don’t want to be called something I am not.
Anyway, that’s why I would not like to see CDs labeled as gays or equated with the gay community. Most of us just aren’t. I am much more concerned about being label as sissies or fags, which we are also most certainly not. I am a CD, put very simply a very normal male but with a female aspect that needs to be expressed, most commonly by doing female attire. To equate CD with anything else is incorrect.
The question posed by this thread, whether it’s worse to be labeled as a CD or a gay is difficult to say, but as I noted in another posting, it seems that a CD has little trouble being accepted. We are fairly low key, and don’t advocate things such as same sex marriages which can rouse anger. We simply exist, try not to stand out, don’t make any commotion, and don’t hurt anyone or even engage in any but the least amount of interaction, unless those around us ask for more. A lot of people have only the smallest awareness that we exist.
This is why I feel it’s worse to be labeled as or equated with gays. They arouse more and stronger response from the world around them and have to struggle harder. We have it a bit easier.
I realize that I the end result it may not matter how we are referred to.
Perhaps in the end result, it really doesn’t matter what we are called.
As Salandra so nicely put it.

“Beats me Hon. They can call me a turnip as far as I'm concerned. Their problem, not mine. ”


Patricia
The hardcore CD

[yms]

With all due respect Karen, this sounds like "Don't ask, don't tell" for heterosexuals. It was a bad idea then.

If someone makes a pass at you, or asks you in conversation for some reason, it's fine to state you're heterosexual. If however you go around announcing to everyone you meet that you're hetero, you're displaying homophobia.
Someone being open about being gay to the world is the same as being open about being a CD- it's about having pride in what you are, that it's NOT ok to oppress us anymore.

[MarinaTwelve200]

I dont have a problem with gay people. I just dont happen to be one, and I dont want people to think that I am when I am not. LOL

That is MY attitude exactly. Whats worse is the crazy stuff lotsa foks wrongly associate with Gays---(child molesters, etc.) Being a CD is difficult enough without being subject to the prejudice reserved for gays.

[CaptLex]

I am a CD, put very simply a very normal male but with a female aspect that needs to be expressed, most commonly by doing female attire. To equate CD with anything else is incorrect.

I'm thinking "normal" is not an adjective most people equate with crossdressing.

it seems that a CD has little trouble being accepted. We are fairly low key, and don’t advocate things such as same sex marriages which can rouse anger. We simply exist, try not to stand out, don’t make any commotion, and don’t hurt anyone or even engage in any but the least amount of interaction, unless those around us ask for more. A lot of people have only the smallest awareness that we exist.
This is why I feel it’s worse to be labeled as or equated with gays. They arouse more and stronger response from the world around them and have to struggle harder.

Stereotype much?

[annekathleen]

I'm not sure what would disturb my adult children the worse,
I think if they found out (hypothetical) that I was gay or bi-sexual it would probably devastate them.
I think if they found out that I enjoyed the art of crossdressing, even if it was just wearing panties, they would not be as upset,
But if they found me dressed as a woman engaged in some sexual act with another man, they'd probably dis-own me or have me committed.

[Ema1234 GG]

I think to say that crossdressers are always low key is a bit of a generalisation. Similarly, to imply as such that anyone who is gay is highly flamboyant with it, again is a generalisation.

In any group of people there are those who will attract attention and those who will blend into the background, gay, straight, bi, CD, trans, white, black, asian, male, female, young, old... The list is endless. You can't pigeon hole a group of people like that.

Surely the most important thing is what people think about you as a person. I certainly don't judge people based on the sex of their partner, or the clothes they wear. Just the same as I don't judge them based on the colour of their skin or their age. I do judge them based on their personality and attitude and if I don't like them I couldn't care less what group you want to put them in, doesn't change the fact that I think their attitude stinks....

Flip it round, and if I think someone is a fantastic person again I couldn't care less what group they may be considered to be a part of, they are still a fantastic person regardless of those other factors. They really don't change anything.




ETA....

This is why I feel it’s worse to be labeled as or equated with gays. They arouse more and stronger response from the world around them and have to struggle harder. We have it a bit easier.

I'd actually disagree, I think in this day and age, particularly where I come from someone who is gay is accepted quite easily by their peers.

A dear friend of mine has recently come out as gay, we have suspected for a long time but he's only recently felt confident enough to open up to everyone. His group of friends include some pretty "butch tough straight young men" if you know the sort I mean, and not one of them batted an eye lid.

However, knowing that group of people, was my partner to come out as a CD I don't think he'd be accepted the same way.

Same sex relationships are pretty common place these days, crossdressing (or atleast those who admit to it) isn't.

[Eugenie]

I've seen a lot of talk about homophobia here because we don't want to be thought of as gay. But I've been thinking that I am really more afraid of being outed as a crossdresser than being thought of as gay.

Same here. This is in part why I don't go out "en femme" in the area where I live. I am almost sure that my former classmates would tolerate more easily if I was gay than they would my x-dressing.

I have also the example of my daughetr who came out to us as being a lesbian, this was accepted by the whole family, including aging grand parents.

This is also the feeling of my wife that I would be very badly accepted as a x-dresser in oure area... This the second reason I don't x-dress here: it was a deal with my wife....

Does society dislike shun or ridicule crossdressers and transexuals more than it does homosexuals?

On this one I have discussed with several representatives of LGBT organisations in Europe. They recognized that although the discriminatory attitude towards gays and lesbiens is far from being satisfactorily eliminated, the discrimination towatds transsexuals and more generally transgender people is even les favourable than that of homosexuals. I personally think that with some recent Television documentaries on transsexual situations, presented with some dramatic stories, transsexuals are starting to be a little more accepted. With regard to x-dressers, the prejudice remains very high in the general public. There is a lot of dysinformation circulating about x-dressers...


Eugenie

[Stephanie Anne]

To be honest I fear ridicule just as much as the next person. I don't like making a fool of myself in public and having too much attention.

It hurts me that many bring their prejudices with them of others and yet wish others did not discriminate against them.

I think I am more worried about being alone and harassed or hurt simply because I am not manly or look like a man.

I love being hit on by gay men, it makes me feel pretty to be honest. I don't have sexual feelings more toward one sex than the other and don't consider myself either straight or gay as I hate the limitations of either.

We need to get over as a whole community the feelings against homosexuality because no other community has tried to help us become accepted and it just seems a little too childish to hate based on old and tired prejudices

[valery]

Does society dislike shun or ridicule crossdressers and transexuals more than it does homosexuals?
B

great question, absolutely yes!!!
The gay community is so much more accepted, 'cause people know more about them through media etc. and we're still living in the shadow, so we can't be so accepted, as the unknown is always the enemy in our days.



Opener:
If people are not able to come up with a good argument they use plurality, that's the way things work in our days and for that you always need the enemy otherwise it will not work.

My personal Answer/Idea:
So here's my personal idea. politics, society etc. always need a good and a bad picture, that's very helpful. Fear is the energie of our days, it always was and it'll always be. So what we do against fear, we try to belong to a strong group, give our support to the group and get support and safety back. So what do you do to be a powerful person, to win the vote etc. when you're adicted to be a big whatever? First you start to make people being afraid of something, then you come up with a great security-idea and an enemy to fight against. To make people afraid you need this enemy, otherwise it will not work. Very easy to find one. There are endless opportunities - so if it has a color, or a gender, or a religion, or a special hobby, kids, no kids, money, no money, smal car, big car, hair, no hair, yes you'll find the enemy I'm absolutely sure and we'll be able to make people believe that they are in danger and that they have to sign up to our group and, ha, ha, pay our bills. That's politics and that goes through everything today, same function everywhere. The strongest tells the rest what's o. k. and what's not - remember when we were living on the trees, I think we still do. No question, you can call it family, you can call it country, region, fan club, passion, religion, or whatever you like, good art against bad art. Who the f. hell wants to assume to say what's art and what's not, what's God and what's not - but people do - to get the majority and feel the power. The thing is to belong to somewhere, otherwise you're out in this world (you studied at XYZ, so it must be art, good art - you did not....?????), the problem is that this in our genes, most of us are here to belong to something, to find others to be sure (to proof) that they're normal, same thing for me. What would be if you would be allone on this planet? You would decide what's normal, and what's not, hey you would not even think about it, you would just act. So why do we do, becaus we need this love, otherwise we can't survive (we're group-living animals). This is the sick group-power that rules and although we should really know better in our days - the bad thing is that it's for many people the easiest way and they stop thinking, they don't try something new when the big boss says it's a bad thing and they start to believe that things are o .k. if the boss say that's o. k. so we're also lazy and this world wasn't designed for us. So, I can't define myself (and that's the nonsense) without having an idea what I'm not, whhhooaa. If I say I'm a good person, I usually try to have a picture about a bad person. If I say I'm normal, people need a picture about what's not normal. If I say Ferrari is the greatest car of all times I need a car that is not the greates of all times. Aha... People stop to say I like, they say I like most or I like this because I don't like that. So they like something, because they dislike something else - now we getting to bottom - I like that. If we have the idea of beeing not normal, we're here to get the answer that we're normal, because a lot of others do/feel the same(group), so it can't be a bad thing (plurality). That's all crap in truth, but that's the way of this world and our education. I'm doing the same, damn I hate that.
But, if I'm the crazy artist (prince) I'm allowed to do whatever I like - because I'm not from this world, I'm unique, there's only one of me, so people will not see me as an enemy (I'm only one person), instead they'll decorate themself with me (trophy) because on one hand they wanna be normal and belonging to their group, on the other they wanna be special to be on top and that's so weird but it works for them.
If people are not able to come up with a good argument they use plurality.
So why it's easier for gays - they've been through all that what we still have in front. They still have big problems, but they're in all media (TV, Film) etc., so people start to accept that there's is another group that is not dangerous and we're still far away from that point. They get used to it that a lot of gay people are in this world, everybody knows someone. The Media started with that to come up with something new and they did it in a way, that people don't have a proplem with it. That typical gay-role in a movie. High voice, weakish, at sixes and sevens, allways a girl as best friend etc. That's not a picture someone must be afraid of. And a lot of musicians etc. have had their come out, so people start to accept. Think about the black community, biggest power for them to get more acceptance was media and music and they still have to fight for their rights. That's the way it works it's all the same. The unknown is always the enemy, that's in our genes as a protection and leaders today abuse this function to have their power. So for us the only chance is to get artists, filmmakers etc. to put us into public and media, that people get to know that we're existing and that we're normal lovely people.

take care

[Autumndawn]

I personally don't know. I have crossdressed on and off for over 37 years. I've been in and out of the "pink fog" so, so, so many times. It always returns. I lettered in both football and wrestling in highschool. I was recruited and joined a very "macho" fraternity in college. I have biological testosterone levels that denied me of being "fertile". Yes, you can have TOO MUCH of a good thing, so much so it simply shuts down the very mechanisms that allow for reproduction.
I love women, I love looking at attractive women, I will turn my head to look at an attractive woman walking by.
STILL...
I am enthralled with being "not like a woman" but with "being a woman". To provide insight, I fantasize during a hot shower as being a woman making love to a man.
A few years ago?
I would have found the idea, or simple notion of being with a man totally disgusting and repugnant.
Now?
I even fantasize about being enfemmed and being with a man, treating me as a woman. I don't think I really care if he is gay, bi-, or whatever. I do care if he is STD. Is it because my second marriage is on the rocks? Is it because I had a domineering father? What is the cause of these yearnings inside me?
I think I only care about it, because as I am now, I do not look like a woman without a TON of working on myself. That's a frustration too. How much time can you afford to spend on an illusion, and is it worth it?
My fellow "sisters" and "gg sisters" What is the mystery of man wanting to not only be like a woman, but to be a woman? Is it angst that isn't worthy to ponder? We all have such a short time here, how best do we use our time?
Kisses to all! As of now, if you know of any good looking and honest guys or gals out there looking for some "female" company let me know!

Autumn

[annekathleen]

So, what's worse?

Being gay, and having people calling you a crossdresser?

Being a crossdresser, and having people calling you gay?

Being a gay crossdresser?