Interview: Transgenderism Emerging on the Heels of Homosexuality in Media
By Lillian Kwon
Christian Post Reporter
Thu, Jun. 07 2007 04:59 PM ET

The issue of homosexuality has gained increased exposure and acceptance by the media and American public, respectively. Now, as the Senate reviews a hate crimes legislation that would add violent attacks against individuals on the basis of gender, sexual orientation and gender identity, the transgender is emerging in the media with more reports laying out the struggles of persons with gender identity disorder or those who have already made their transition.

Dr. Robert A.J. Gagnon, associate professor of New Testament at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary

Media Bias on Transgenders Raising Concerns
Dr. Robert A.J. Gagnon, associate professor of New Testament at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, shared his concerns about the media bias on transgenderism and explained that there is more to being a male or a female than a minute portion of the brain, as some experts have argued about the cause of gender identity disorder.

CP: Pete LaBarbera, executive director of Americans for Truth, had mentioned how media has been glorifying the transgender movement. Major news media such as ABC and Newsweek have been reporting on the transgender movement and the reports have seemingly drawn sympathy towards this community. And a popular TV show Ugly Betty added a transgendered character to its cast this year.

Gagnon: This is just what they used to do about homosexual practice earlier.

CP: So do you see the transgender issue emerging on the same path that homosexuality did through the media?

Gagnon: Yes, of course they’re trying to normalize transgender existence. There’s no question about that. That’s why you have the GLBT (Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender) movement.

Initially, for example, even [Congressman] Barney Frank even said with regard to hate crime legislation and employment non-discrimination legislation, the transgender community would have to forget about that including them because America was never going to accept that. They were just going to work on getting approval for gays and lesbians. But now that’s changed because the culture has changed and now they’re going to try to get in the transgender too.

It’s always been pushing for the homosexual agenda with the attempt to eventually – once they get that accepted – move into the acceptance of bisexuality and transgenderism.

CP: LaBarbera also said that mainstream media is justifying its biased reporting on the transgender movement in the name of compassion. Is that how you see it as well?

Gagnon: Yes. They’re trying to present a case where they’re able to demonstrate that these persons cannot help themselves; this is not something they asked for; if you don’t allow them to become transgender, they’ll probably kill themselves.


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Man [...] must count no one but himself; that he is alone, abandoned on earth in the midst of his infinite responsibilities, without help, with no other aim than the one he sets himself, with no other destiny than the one he forges for himself on this earth." (Jean Paul Sartre, 1943)

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Man [...] must count no one but himself; that he is alone, abandoned on earth in the midst of his infinite responsibilities, without help, with no other aim than the one he sets himself, with no other destiny than the one he forges for himself on this earth." (Jean Paul Sartre, 1943)

Every day I appreciate the existence of the Atlantic ocean a bit more acting as a huge (and very wet) barrier seperating me from that hardcore of religious nuts that seems to blight the US. They give the US such a bad reputation drawing attention away from the more positive things that I'm sure must happen over there.

I won't deny the UK has its fair share of idiots and bigots. I'm very concerned that religious fundamentalism might be on the rise in the UK.

well I think the churches have the whole comcept of "loving one another" into a hypocrite statement, and it is aload of crap that they think they can fix everyone up, my experiences as a christian would be to "Care about other people and not shunn them down as outcasts" I think they need to get their bibal facts corrected, and yes I totaly agree that gender IS seperate from sexsuality, it's just an excuse for the churchies to bibal bash people who have no real understanding of the Transgended people.

my mother and father are christians with the old fashond morals but they accept me because they know I had this problem and it made them realise that it's better to love their TG daughter than to realise that she could endup in jail because she's not coping with life at all with her male status.

and I know there are some who have been though so much hell with family and I'm sorry that it's a problem that won't go away


one of my brothers has cut off contact with me because he was told I was crossdressing at the time.

but the rest of my family has been coping with me changing and I'm glad they try not to let it get to them.

but getting back to the topic, I think the media needs to have it's ass kicked and be told that we do NOT transition to have gay sex that's not the reason for why we are doing this, we transition so we can exsist as human beings and have a happy life.

I hope this all makes sense.

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Misery is my company, why do I stand out from the rest of the people around me.

I would say me because I'm not sexsualy attracted to anyone until I've had the surgery then my sexsuality will reveal itself to me.

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Misery is my company, why do I stand out from the rest of the people around me.

um, but by placing those kinds of limitations on your sexuality you have distinctly gendered it. you've suggested that it won't be possible to manifest itself until a certain set of gendered criteria are fulfilled. or am i reading which surgery you're talking about wrongly.

basically, if it wasn't gendered then you pretty much utterly wouldn't care what gender you were or what gender your partner was and you also wouldn't even notice that you didn't care. i know i'm splitting hairs here, but i think some peoples squeamishness to consider that trans bodies can and do experience their own sexualities, and that those are influenced by the individuals gender *and* trans experience, is a little bit boring.

ok I'll be alittle more specific.


I'm at the moment on Androcur and this medication has pretty much lowered my sex drive and attraction.

"but by placing those kinds of limitations on your sexuality you have distinctly gendered it."

genderded what exactly?? what dose this have to do with my sexsuality

"basically, if it wasn't gendered then you pretty much utterly wouldn't care what gender you were or what gender your partner was and you also wouldn't even notice that you didn't care."

sorry to say this hun but if I didn't care why the hell would I even bother in Transition for 5 years should I quit and just be a bisexsual male???

"but i think some peoples squeamishness to consider that trans bodies can and do experience their own sexualities, and that those are influenced by the individuals gender *and* trans experience, is a little bit boring."

it's up to the individual and how they feel about themselves it's fine for some to have a cock and move on but to put a statement on me like that is just a big insult to me and my choice in life.

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Misery is my company, why do I stand out from the rest of the people around me.

i'm perplexed as to how having a sexuality instantly conjures up images of living as a bisexual male and having a cock and 'moving on'. because of this i get the feeling that you've misinterpreted me a bit. at the risk of sounding like a bolshy arse i'm going to outline my entire perspective for you. then i'll be quiet.

also, this is not a personal attack, so please don't feel insulted. it's just my own feelings and thoughts from a whole bunch of observation, both theoretical and practical.



until trans people can be open and honest about experiencing their own sexualities in all their fantastic diversities we're going to be continually on edge and afraid that people are going to be mistaking us for 'just gay men' or 'just lesbian women'. we're going to continually respond to articles like the one above with horror that we're being lumped under the homosexual label. trans women and trans men all have sexualities and some of them even have pretty active sex lifes, at all various stages of transition. i mean, otherwise the implication is that only gay people can have sexualities (which would be a bit unfortunate for the hets). the further implication is that sex and sexuality are dirty words that we should try and dissociate ourselves from. come on, get real.

sex is different to sexuality is different to gender, but the three are deeply linked. however, trans people still fight inherent hypersexualisation by the media / porn industry / general collective nasty people by denying all links to anything that has the word sex in it. i mean, for chrissakes, some people argue about how many s's are in the word transsexual, thinking that having one s will remove sexual implication due to the pronunciation of the word. trans-exual. yeah, that helps a bunch. argh, is the first thing i think. our immediate response is to desexualise ourselves and make ourselves safe and palatable by society at large. basically, we disappear behind our own shame. but the misconceptions just keep on coming, no matter how many times we cry that sex and sexuality and gender are not the same! we're not perverts!

i'm transitioning so that all aspects of my life can feel healthy, including my sexuality.

virtually everybody else is allowed to get on with having a sexuality without being afraid it might be misinterpreted. why not trans people?

i mean, i'm on zoladex and estrogen, and my sex drive has diminished massively too. but, believe it or not, that has helped me realise my sexuality as a (mostly) straight woman. that's because the health and state of my sexuality depends on me alleviating my gender dysphoria. hence it's tied into my gender, thus it's gendered. it's not the be all and end all of my transition, but it's a nice perk.

Oh I have a good laugh when I hear the ultra right religious contingent banging on like this, ironic when you consider that trans people have been closely linked to spirituality for tens of thousands of years before the Bible was a mote in God's eye. The Book of Deuteronomy refers specifically to pre-existing trans spiritual practitioners (including followers of Baal) when it bans

Quote:

wearing that which pertaineth to

another sex. The book of Genesis, when read in Aramaic, refers to people being created

Quote:

male and female

in the pattern of (in the image of) the God Elhoim (another name for JHVH - Jehovah), a god who encompasses all opposites, including male and female. Which explains male nipples.

One could begin to think they doth protest too much. The Catholic attire is based on a Roman Stolae, a female garment, and the pope wears a metal tiara modelled on the trans-shaman's tiara, postdating the shamanic headgear by, again, thousands if not tens of thousands of years.

Trans is not directly related to sexuality in a purely analytic sense, but in real life sexuality vectors through bodies, which may or may not be trans. There is a very good historical reason for trans folk distancing themselves from sexuality; that we are still bordered by fetishes and perversions in diagnostic terms. If we admit to the wrong sort of desires we are classified in a way that barrs us from the treatment we seek. And of course, ones claimed gender defines ones sexual preference; men who have sex with men are homosexual, men who have sex with women are hetrosexual, etc. My mum was fine with my transition as long as it didn't mean I was gay. I didn't bother pointing out that (mostly) sleeping with women makes me - yes you guessed it, a lesbian.

And I certainly didn't bother telling her that i self-define as a TransDyke GenderQueer

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Do the opposite of the current fashion and you will nearly always do right - Jean Jacques Rousseau

Hey nice to see you back Chrissy.

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Check out the Tzone team bios (including mine!) at: http://www.transgenderzone.com/bio.htm

Supporting the family, friends and partners of trans people in the UK: http://www.depend.org.uk/support.html
If you are struggling we will support you
If you are celebrating we will join you

Hey Dread, good to see you too. I got bored of enraging my chief exec with unreasonable demands and driving my manager to fury on a daily basis. They don't seem to react anymore. So I thought I'd come back here.

Some people are born bloody-minded, and some have bloody-mindedness thrust upon them.

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Do the opposite of the current fashion and you will nearly always do right - Jean Jacques Rousseau

I think you mean 'Elohim' or 'Elim'. Never heard Elhoim before.

I need to stop reading my mother's study books when I get bored.

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Pay no attention to the moderator in a gimp mask behind the curtain.

There seems to be an obsession in our society with categorisation. Everything has to be named, defined and approved by a team of experts. If something hasn't been categorised then it's seen as less valid or just ignored. There is an absolute fear of self definition. I suppose it isn't suprising. Psychological experiments have shown that people will put the opinion of the group before their own even if they suspect it's wrong.
I think the problem is a symptom of our time. People are too lazy to get to know other people. They want a neat definition no longer than a sentence that fits socially accepted categories.

I refuse to explain myself.

Whatever happened to existentialism?

That's my rant for the day.