Sunday 25 October 2015

Being disin-Jennerous

I don't usually like to focus on any one individual,
hiding as I am, and take pot-shots, so this is not
an attack, just a report. I think transgender people
should do what they feel they need to do. My
opinion doesn't even matter in such cases. I wonder
about how their mind/body are set up, as in "what does it
feel like to feel you're a woman while being a guy?"
but that's it. (I might take this up again if I can find
the article written by a trans guy who found all
his "adjustment group" were, like him, electrical
engineers.)

The Bruce/Caitlin Jenner is a low-brow car-crash
type story, equally salacious and stupid, cuz it looks
like it was designed for the
"Entertainment Tonight" generation. Whhhhuuum!
central casting, non-issue as serialised soap opera.
it has it all: father, athlete, national hero, transgender,
a real car crash (once he became a woman, BAM, he also
became a woman driver. #kidding), fake docu-dramas,
the fattest butt on a white woman ever, Kanye, cloying
family members, girly/women's mags. All it would need is
Bill Cosby. Therefore:

I just want to make two points.

As a neurotic kid, I had many thoughts, most of which
never saw the light of day, cuz nobody cared what I
thought, or whether I drew breath, frankly.

When I saw Jenner for the first time, he was a
decathlon competitor for the US. A Hero. Then he
became a bit of a celebrity for a while.
My thoughts at that time, espec when I saw
Jenner looking at the camera, were:

1. that's a woman
-not a gay man, a woman. This didn't make any sense
so I just filed it away, until this year. Though his
voice wasn't particularly effeminate, this was a
very homophobic era. I was still a kid. To me,
sex was playboy mags.

2. he really knows how to control a camera, an 
interview and he seeks this out
-In today's famous-cuz-I'm-famous attention-
grabbing era, the old Bruce would not have even
registered as being odd.

Ya. I used to watch a lot of tv. It's hard even for
me to believe that I had had those thoughts. Or
that I'm that neurotic that I can remember them.
Anyway, there. I said these goofy things and to
some degree, I think I was right.

So, the first one has been proved. The second one
is the more interesting one now. Luckily for me, a
mouthy Australian feminist has said publicly what
I've been thinking for a while. S/He either knowingly,
or "psychotically" chose the Kardashians because
they provided him/her/them/the personhood
with the stage upon which to make
the biggest public attention-grabbing act ever
(even for our insane time in history).
Like I mentioned, I think the trans thing is genuine. But,
if s/he had done this alone, or if s/he was a street-living bum,
then s/he would have made one of those wonderful
Buzzfeed stories like "Where da f*ckze now?"
That would have made him a freak, a blip, done.

S/He has actually waited (or just got lucky) until
transgenderism had become an accepted part of
most aware urban people's lives, and now, he's a hero
of sorts. AGAIN

[My Hero- the Foos: kick-ass song & interesting video]

Anyway, here's the story. Greer raises some, interesting,
some funny and some scary points. But, I don't
want to engage. I'm outta here.

checkit: Guardian
 http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/oct/24/caitlyn-jenner-wanted-limelight-of-female-kardashians-germaine-greer


Caitlyn Jenner 'wanted limelight of female Kardashians' – Germaine Greer

Comments by Australian-born feminist about US star likely to further alienate campaigners who object to writer’s views on trans issues
Damien Gayle
@damiengayle
Saturday 24 October 2015 15.22 BST
Last modified on Saturday 24 October 2015 18.51 BST
Germaine Greer has accused TV star Caitlyn Jenner of stealing the limelight from other female members of the Kardashian family, in comments likely to further alienate campaigners who object to the writer and commentator’s views about transgender people.
Petition urges Cardiff University to cancel Germaine Greer lecture
The Australian-born writer courted controversy in an interview with BBC2’s Newsnight by claiming that “misogyny played a big part” in the rumoured decision by Glamour magazine to give Jenner its woman of the year award.

Jenner, who was born Bruce, was married to Kris Jenner, Kim Kardashian’s mother, until they filed for divorce early last year.

She also refused to back down from her position that transgender women, who have begun life as men before undergoing surgery and hormone treatment to become women, are “not women”, saying they do not “look like, sound like or behave like women”.

Greer was speaking after it emerged that an online petition had been launched seeking to prevent her giving a lecture at Cardiff University. The organisers claimed her views were “problematic” for transgender people.

Asked to address the issue of Jenner being tipped for woman of the year, as reported earlier this week, Greer said: “I think misogyny plays a really big part in all of this, that a man who goes to these lengths to become a woman will be a better woman than someone who is just born a woman.
Germaine Greer says her views on transgender people is ‘an opinion, not a prohibition’
“It seems to me that what was going on there was that he/she wanted the limelight that the other, female, members of the family were enjoying and has conquered it, just like that,” she added, snapping her fingers.
Sign up to our Bookmarks newsletter
Read more

The petition on Change.org, which was started by Rachael Melhuish, women’s officer at Cardiff University students union, alleged that Greer has “demonstrated misogynistic views towards trans women, including continually misgendering trans women and denying the existence of transphobia altogether”.

It adds: “[H]osting a speaker with such problematic and hateful views towards marginalised and vulnerable groups is dangerous. Allowing Greer a platform endorses her views, and by extension, the transmisogyny, which she continues to perpetuate.”

By Saturday afternoon it had been signed by more than 800 people.

Greer has maintained her position on transgender women,saying: “I’m not saying that people should not be allowed to go through that [sex change] procedure. What I’m saying is that it doesn’t make them a woman. It happens to be an opinion. It’s not a prohibition.”

Addressing claims that she had been hurtful towards transgender women, Greer added: “People are being hurtful to me all the time. Try being an old woman. For goodness sake, people get hurt all the time. I’m not about to walk on eggshells.”

Greer, author of The Female Eunuch, a classic on women’s sexuality, had been due to speak on 18 November in a lecture called Women & Power: The Lessons of the 20th Century. She has now said she will not make the speech if the university cannot guarantee she “will not have things thrown” at her.

Asked about the petition, she told the Guardian on Friday: “I don’t really know what I think of it. It strikes me as a bit of a put-up job really because I am not even going to talk about the issue that they are on about.

“What they are saying is that because I don’t think surgery will turn a man into a woman I should not be allowed to speak anywhere.”