What are the advantages of being transgender?

BY:  Alex Zorach
I am Nonbinary (Genderfluid, Mostly Agender), They/Them

My Note:  There is a lot of negativity about being transgender. This a long answer, but a good response to the question.  Worth you time.  

Please comment on why you may feel there are "advantages to being transgender".

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ALEX: I think being trans gives you unique insights into gender, in an intimate, personal way that most cis people don’t ever get to experience. The degree to which I’ve experienced this is limited — I’m trans and nonbinary, but I have not hormonally transitioned, and my social transition has been carried out only to the degree that I am only occasionally gendered female and more often confuse people, but am still usually gendered male.

But I have gotten a glimpse of some really deep changes in how people treat me and interact with me on the basis of seeing me differently on the gender spectrum, and from talking to trans people who have carried out a full binary transition, in which they go from consistently being gendered in one way, to consistently being gendered in the other, these people have experienced a lot of what I have but more thoroughly and with far more examples.

We see how people treat women and men differently. We see some of the many assumptions people make about people on the basis of their gender. We see double standards and hypocrisy. We see the little “inside” things, the things women only say to other women and men only say to other men. Frankly some of it can be nauseating, but I wouldn’t easily give up the ability to get this extra glimpse into gender dynamics.

Some of these things include people treating women with greater warmth, trust, and openness, and men with greater coldness, skepticism, fear, and aggression. At the same time people are often more likely to trust men’s technical competence, and either question or show surprise at women’s competence in similar areas. Certain subcultures have blatant double standards, with some of them being much harder on women, others of them being much harder on men.

There are other advantages to being transgender. For me, I think being trans has forced me to think about gender very deeply, and I like the understanding and wisdom I’ve gained from this process. I started feeling tensions with gender from a young age, and continued experiencing them over the years. I think I understand gender very well, and I find myself often able to raise interesting objections that throw a wrench in both mainstream conservative viewpoints, and mainstream liberal viewpoints. Sometimes someone will be saying something and I’m able to give a concrete example that really shuts down an untruthful argument, and that feels really sastisfying and empowering. I could have discovered many of these things without being trans, but I think it would have been harder…they would have been distant from me, and I might not have been as motivated to do the extra work I would have needed to do to get to where I am now.

There are obviously a lot of hardships associated with being trans, and I have experienced and still experience many of them, including bullying and harassment, people harboring gross misconceptions about you, body or social dysphoria, and many others.

I know a ton of trans people who see their trans identity as a source of nothing but hardship, and would give anything to wake up in a “cis” body that matches their identity. I’m nonbinary, so this isn’t even really possible (nonbinary people can’t be cis because people aren’t assigned nonbinary genders at birth) but even besides this, I like being trans, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything even if I could. Yes, it causes some suffering, some tension, some disconnect, some frustration. But it is also a source of insight and deep thinking.

And I’m weird in a lot of ways beyond just my gender identity and experience of gender…for me…it seems to really fit who I am on a deep level. I’m someone who crosses and defies a lot of categories, so it seems natural for me to experience gender the way I do

Transgender Rights as Human Rights

 

Tia Powell, MD, Sophia Shapiro, MD, and Ed Stein, JD, PhD
November 2016

Abstract

Arguments to support transgender rights often rely on “born that way” arguments, which assert that gender identity is innate, immutable, and unassociated with choice. These arguments are vulnerable to attack on several grounds, including on the basis of emerging scientific data. Stronger support for transgender rights arises from human rights arguments.

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Transgender Rights as Human Rights

We argue, in contrast, that transgender rights stem from human rights, i.e., those fundamental rights belonging to every person. Persons with either cisgender (in which assigned and experienced gender are the same) or transgender identities deserve to live and flourish in their communities—with freedom to learn, work, love, and play—and build lives connected with others at home, in the work place, and in public settings without fear for their safety and survival. These deeply personal decisions are and should be the prerogative of the individual and deserve the law’s protection. The United States protects religious freedom in the First Amendment, and religion is quintessentially a choice. 

We owe the same respect to all members of our communities. We don’t yet know if gender identity emerges from genes, hormones, environmental factors or, most likely, an intricate combination of all these factors and more. It is unlikely that people with a transgender identity simply choose their gender identity, any more than cisgender people do. However, it is crucial that associated choices about the expression of gender—affecting vital aspects of identity in school, the workplace, and the community—are supported by our laws and policies. 

Supporters of transgender rights should avoid arguments that are logically flawed and that fail to acknowledge current scientific evidence about gender identity. Our best arguments must rely on the concept of inalienable human rights, including the rights to live safely, freely, and without fear of discrimination.