Feminist Depictions of Trans Women
There are numerous parallels between the way trans women are depicted in the media and the way that they have been portrayed by some feminist theorists. While many feminists—especially younger ones who came of age in the 1980s and 1990s—recognize that trans women can be allies in the fight to eliminate gender stereotypes, other feminists—particularly those who embrace gender essentialism—believe that trans women foster sexism by mimicking patriarchal attitudes about femininity, or that we objectify women by trying to possess female bodies of our own. Many of these latter ideas stem from Janice G. Raymond’s 1979 book The Transsexual Empire: The Making of the She-Male, which is perhaps the most influential feminist writing on transsexuals. Like the media, Raymond virtually ignores trans men, dismissing them as “tokens,” and instead focuses almost exclusively on trans women, insisting that they transition in order to achieve stereotypical femininity. She even argues that “most transsexuals conform more to the feminine role than even the most feminine of natural-born women.”8 This fact does not surprise Raymond, since she believes that femininity itself is an artificial by-product of a patriarchal society. So despite the fact that trans women may attain femininity, Raymond does not believe that they become “real” women. (To emphasize this, she refers to trans women as “male-to-constructed-females” and addresses them with masculine pronouns throughout the book.) Thus, Raymond builds her case by relying on the same tactics as the media: She depicts trans women as hyperfeminine (in order to make their female identities appear highly artificial) and she hypersexualizes them (by playing down the existence of trans people who transition to male).
Unlike the media, Raymond does acknowledge the existence of trans women who are not stereotypically feminine, albeit reluctantly. She writes, “I have been very hesitant about devoting a chapter of this book to what I call the ‘transsexually constructed lesbian-feminist.’”9 Because she believes that lesbian-feminists represent “a small percentage of transsexuals” (a claim that she never verifies), she does not seem inclined to discuss their existence at all except for the “recent debate and divisiveness [the subject] produced within feminist circles.”10 Being that Raymond believes that femininity undermines women’s true worth, you might think that she would be open to trans women who denounce femininity and patriarchal gender stereotypes. However, this is not the case. Instead, she argues, “As the male-to-constructed-female transsexual exhibits the attempt to possess women in a bodily sense while acting out the images into which men have molded women, the male-to-constructed-female who claims to be a lesbian-feminist attempts to possess women at a deeper level.”11 Throughout the rest of the chapter, she discusses how lesbian-feminist trans women use “deception” in order to “penetrate” women’s spaces and minds. She says, “although the transsexually constructed lesbian-feminist does not exhibit a feminine identity and role, he does exhibit stereotypical masculine behavior.”12 This essentially puts trans women in a double bind: If they act feminine they are perceived as being a parody, but if they act masculine it is seen as a sign of their true male identity. This damned-if-they-do, damned-if-they-don’t tactic is reminiscent of the pop cultural “deceptive”/“pathetic” transsexual archetypes. Both Raymond and the media ensure that trans women—whether they are feminine or masculine, whether they “pass” or not—will invariably come off as “fake” women no matter how they look or act.
While much of The Transsexual Empire is clearly over the top (the premise of the book is that “biological woman is in the process of being made obsolete by bio-medicine”), many of Raymond’s arguments are echoed in contemporary attempts to justify the exclusion of trans women from women’s organizations and spaces. In fact, the world’s largest annual women-only event, the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival (often referred to simply as “Michigan”), still enforces a “womyn-born-womyn”-only policy that is specifically designed to prevent trans women from attending.13 Many of the excuses used to rationalize trans women’s exclusion are not designed to protect the values of women-only space, but rather to reinforce the idea that trans women are “real” men and “fake” women. For example, one of the most cited reasons that trans women are not allowed in the festival is that we are born with, and many of us still have, penises (many trans women either cannot afford to or choose not to have sex reassignment surgery). It is argued that our penises are dangerous because they are a symbol of male oppression and have the potential to trigger women who have been sexually assaulted or abused by men. So penises are banned from the festival, right? Well, not quite: The festival does allow women to purchase and use dildos, strap-ons, and packing devices, many of which closely resemble penises. So phalluses in and of themselves are not so bad, just so long as they are not attached to a trans woman.
Another reason frequently given for the exclusion of trans women from Michigan is that we supposedly would bring “male energy” into the festival. While this seems to imply that expressions of masculinity are not allowed, nothing could be further from the truth. Michigan allows drag king performers who dress and act male, and the festival stage has featured several female-bodied performers who identify as transgender and sometimes describe themselves with male pronouns.14 Presumably, Lisa Vogel (who is sole proprietor of the festival) allows this because she believes that no person who is born female is capable of exhibiting authentic masculinity or “male energy.” Not only is this an insult to trans men (as it suggests that they can never be fully masculine or male), but it implies that “male energy” can be measured in some way independent of whether the person expressing it appears female or male. This is clearly not the case. Even though I am a trans woman, I have never been accused of expressing “male energy,” because people perceive me as a woman. When I do act in a “masculine” way, people describe me as a “tomboy” or “butch,” and if I get aggressive or argumentative, people call me a “bitch.” My behaviors are still the same; it is only the context of my body (whether people see me as female or male) that has changed.
This is the inevitable problem with all attempts to portray trans women as “fake” females (whether media or feminist in origin): They require one to give different names, meanings, and values to the same behaviors depending on whether the person in question was born with a female or male body (or whether they are perceived to be a woman or a man). In other words, they require one to be sexist. When people insist that there are essential differences between women and men, they further a line of reasoning that ultimately refutes feminist ideals rather than supporting them.
From my own experience in having transitioned from one sex to the other, I have found that women and men are not separated by an insurmountable chasm, as many people seem to believe. Actually, most of us are only a hormone prescription away from being perceived as the “opposite” sex. Personally, I welcome this idea as a testament to just how little difference there really is between women and men. To believe that a woman is a woman because of her sex chromosomes, reproductive organs, or socialization denies the reality that every single day, we classify each person we see as either female or male based on a small number of visual cues and a ton of assumption. The one thing that women share is that we are all perceived as women and treated accordingly. As a feminist, I look forward to a time when we finally move beyond the idea that biology is destiny, and recognize that the most important differences that exist between women and men in our society are the different meanings that we place onto one another’s bodies.