Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Media Presentation

From Lily:

I am planning to do a media presentation about an article I found in the news. It's really heartbreaking but I hope it can bring up some illuminating topics on education and justice to talk about in class. Here is the link.

Morty Diamond, Performance Video of FTM identities:

1 comment:

Charlie said...

It took me a while to bring myself to make a comment on this entry. I was unsure whether to respond to the video from an academic or personal point of view.... But I realize it's hard to not talk about this subject from a personal point of view. Because it's so relevant to my life, I can't not compare myself to it and to their experiences. So here you go.

On the subject of chests, I relate so much to Morty. I got top surgery this past December, and, like him, I consider it one of the best things to ever happen to me. And even though I am so happy about it, I do feel a little bit of shame about it all. Not only was it too expensive, but my mother is still trying to... "cope," you could say. I would have gotten some sort of reduction eventually, anyway (large chest + small body = back problems), but I'd wonder whether I could be happy just binding. Could I? Looking back, and seeing how much happier I am now, I realize that I couldn't. Like Morty says, I could bind as tight as I could, restrict my breathing and bruise my ribs, but it would never be tight enough. I think there was more of a sense of shame with binding than with anything else - this act would be repeated every morning, of tucking away and hiding what would normally be a very, er, prominent feature. A very self-conscious act - when out with friends, or elsewhere, I would constantly be checking to make sure the seams of the binder weren't visible, that there was no bump, etc... While getting surgery has created many unnecessary problems within my family, it eliminated a huge source of shame, insecurity, and... guilt, almost, of not being happy with what I have.

The third part of the video, about periods, though, I could not relate to at all. I despise my period, and I honestly have trouble understanding those who like them. I don't know whether this is related to my gender identity - because it's very feminine or because it's very painful and inconvenient. I'm sure it's some mixture of both. However, I'm sort of grateful for Morty's opinion and decision to take a low enough dose so that he still bleeds. It reminds me of the part in Sandy Stone's essay "The Empire Strikes Back," when she talks about (sort of?) how there is no "right" or "wrong" body. Like Glenn says, there are a million ways to be a "tranny," and it should not be seen as unnatural or strange or freakish for a man to have a low voice, a beard, and also be menstruating. It's just one more type of body.