Current mood:

annoyed

Transsex, Lies and the Re: tag
Okay, this is semi-sorta fandom...it's from a fanlist for a webcomic (Venus Envy Comic for Venus Envy.) Venus Envy is a comic dealing with Trans* issues (the main character is a transsexual girl, who currently seems to be aiming towards a possible relationship with a transsexual boy) and, in case you're not familiar with the trans* community as a whole...we're talking well and nice steaming pot of simmering wank. It's FINALLY touched a fandom...

Now, a bit of background...well and a while away, (almost a month) someone changed the name of a thread after it had shifted and...well, here's the original post (edited for reasons of preserving anonymity...)

-----------------------------------------
Umm... the subject line here is "Re: [venusenvycomic] suspend elections in
'08?" which implies that it's a reply... Where's the original "suspend
elections in '08?" If you're starting a new thread, don't put an "Re:" in
the subject line! And if you're replying to a message but changing the
subject, don't put an "Re:" in front of it either, and leave the original
subject intact somewhere so it's easier for people to follow the thread. For
example, "New Subject (was: Old Subject)" with no "Re:" in front.
-----------------------------------------

Okay, fine. We have netiquette lessons. A little wierd in the subject, but go for it.

The "perp" responds, of course, rather sanely I believe...

-------------------------------------
I appologise for any confusion.

I left the 'RE:' because it was a reply to another
post...

I changed the subject because I felt I was departing
from the origional subject (more that the thread had
gone completely off topic).

I did leave what I felt was sufficient length of the
origional post for readers to derive the origin of the
thread...
-------------------------------------

So far, so un-wanky, right?

-------------------------------------------
This message was sitting in my Drafts folder for a while, and I wasn't going
to send it, but then I saw "Re: [venusenvycomic] Religion" without a message
starting a thread called "Religion." Without doing a little bit of
searching, I wouldn't know that the message was a reply to the latest "New
file uploaded to venusenvycomic" thread, and therefore should've had a
subject line like "Religion (was: Re: New file uploaded to venusenvycomic)"
and NOT "Re: Religion." "Re: Religion" implies that "Religion" (with no
"Re:" in front of it) exists somewhere. The "Re:" in "Re: random topic"
signifies that it's a reply to a message with the subject "random topic,"
not that it's simply a reply to a message; it signals a reply to a specific
message or series of messages, and not a generic reply. In short, if you're
changing the subject line, DO NOT put an "Re:" in front of it.

The rest of the message, written a while ago, relates to "Re: suspend
elections in '08?"

You just don't have a clue, do you? The "RE:" in front of a subject means
there's another message out there somewhere that has the same subject, but
WITHOUT THE "RE:." I did finally manage to figure out what message you were
replying to after I went back and started reading another thread which I had
skipped over, a thread with a subject line that is NEVER MENTIONED in your
reply.

"RE: [venusenvycomic] changing subjects..." means it's a reply to
"[venusenvycomic] changing subjects..." Put an "RE:" in front of a subject
line IF AND ONLY IF you're using the same subject line as the message you're
replying to. If you're going to change the subject line in your reply, take
out the "RE:" from the front and leave the original subject line somewhere
in the new subject, like the example I gave. The fact that your message is a
reply to another message is IRRELEVANT.
--------------------------------------------------

Now, that's nitpicky. That's not the wank.

--------------------------------------------------
[Name of previous poster here],

You can do two things...

1. Shut the hell up
2. Like it...

Im leaving this list and all other t* GAG lists for a few reasons. Mainly
because "skin transvestites" like yourself are rampant on the internet..
Have you gone FT yet or are you still lurking in the shadows having a good
wank when youput on womens clothes? Your kind disgusts me. You all act
like guys and it shows. You will never pass and neither will any of your
older secondary friends. Leave this poor person alone and stop beoing a
fucking nazi.

I figure if your gonna transistion you do it and get it over with and fuck
the T* community its a huge joke/excuse and an umbrella for people who
dont and can never pass to be able to hang with those of us who have
normal lives.
------------------------------------------

(Glossary:

FT: Full Time - living as your post-transition gender all the time. You have to have gone FT at least a year before you get surgery.

Passing: Convincing someone that you're the "other" sex/your post-transition sex.

Secondary: Fuck if I know...late transitioning, maybe?)

As a footnote: She really did it. Left the group, and deleted her lj.

(Post a new comment)

	eljuno 2003-07-05 10:09 am UTC (link)
	Okay, I messed up more in this post than I care to think about, most of it stupidly. How the bloody abyss do you edit posts in communities on jf? (Reply to this)(Thread)

	nevadafighter 2003-07-05 10:17 am UTC (link)
	At the top there there should be a box with several icons--two green arrows at either end, a heart, etc. Click on the pencil and you can edit your post. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	eljuno 2003-07-05 10:18 am UTC (link)
	As usual, it was staring me right in the face. Thank you. I'm an idiot. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	nevadafighter 2003-07-05 10:30 am UTC (link)
	It's okay. I didn't know what those icons were for for the longest time--I used to go through such a rigamorole to edit my LJ entries before I discovered that "Duh, you just click on the pencil..." (Reply to this)(Parent)

	beandelphiki 2003-07-05 10:43 am UTC (link)
	Yes, "secondary" refers to people who transition later in life, usually in middle age. "Primary" are those who transition right out of puberty. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	eljuno 2003-07-06 01:36 am UTC (link)
	I thought it was something like that...just don't think I remember hearing those exact terms before. Thanks. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	... feenix 2003-07-05 08:50 pm UTC (link)
	...I thought it was rare to "transition" right after puberty. I thought there was this huge self-denial gig for years before one decided that he wanted to be Jennifer Diane Reitz. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	Re: ... milkshake 2003-07-06 12:05 am UTC (link)
	I'd ask if this was the same Jennifer Diane Reitz who was the "Creatrix" (her word, not mine) of Unicorn Jelly, but the bouncing horned sperm at the top of the page pretty much confirms it. Small world. (Reply to this)(Parent)

	Re: ... beandelphiki 2003-07-06 03:57 am UTC (link)
	It's less and less rare. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

Re: ...

azusa
2003-07-06 08:37 am UTC (link)

Pretty much. That's really more the freakshow stereotype peddled to us by the media, to be honest-- the 40-year-old men who decide they're women trapped in men's bodies (it's never the other way around, for some reason) and even after full transition and surgery look like men in drag. To be completely frank, while there are some trans women like that, really most of them (both men and women) are not-- they're perfectly ordinary people. People are coming to self-awareness at younger ages because there's more publicity for trans* these days; because people who once would've seen themselves as odd, isolated freaks know what's going on with them now and that there are larger groups of people like them.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

Re: ...

beandelphiki
2003-07-06 10:08 am UTC (link)

Well. I think if I were a 40-year-old trans woman, I wouldn't see myself as any more a freak than an 18-year-old trans girl. And whenever I start to consider my own life hard, I just remind myself how much harder it would be to BE a 40-year-old MtF, and just transitioning.

But yes. The new publicity is a very good thing, if it means that people will no longer be coming out so late.

(it's never the other way around, for some reason)

Well, that's often true. "Women who want dicks" are not really as sensational as "men cutting their dicks off." All the drama surrounding the concept of masculinity, you know.

But that could be less true in the future as well. There was the movie Boys Don't Cry, after all.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

Re: ...

azusa
2003-07-06 10:43 am UTC (link)

Oh, I certainly didn't mean to imply that there's anything freakier about a 40-year-old going through transition-- just that they're played up as such by the media. Hell, I know several people in their 40s who are in transition or planning to do so.

As for the 'women who want dicks,' that's very true. For some reason FTM transgenderism is viewed as either less surprising by mainstream society-- because everyone knows women have penis envy anyway, Freud says so so it's gotta be true-- or something they would rather ignore because the idea of a woman trying to -be- a man is a threat to them (i.e. what happened to Brandon in Boys Don't Cry, though I've heard the filmmaker distorted a few of the real facts in that story). However, it seems to be MTF transgenderism that gets more people riled up because of the 'men cutting off their dicks' aspect (despite the fact that not all MTFs even have sex reassignment surgery) and leads to stuff like the director of psychology at Johns Hopkins claiming sex changes should be outlawed because it's 'all in the mind' (Then again, so's igorance) and comparing it to doing liposuction on anorexics. >_<

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

Re: ...

beandelphiki
2003-07-06 11:28 am UTC (link)

Oh, I certainly didn't mean to imply that there's anything freakier about a 40-year-old going through transition-- just that they're played up as such by the media.

*nods* Just wanted to check. And the media play-up - talk show themes like "my sister is a MAN!" - is probably the biggest downside to the greater publicity for trans people.

(i.e. what happened to Brandon in Boys Don't Cry, though I've heard the filmmaker distorted a few of the real facts in that story)

I understand they did, but I suppose that is what happens nearly any time you make a movie out of someone's life. And I think it could have been much worse. Hilary Swank did an amazing job, though. :)

'all in the mind' (Then again, so's igorance)

That deserves an icon, methinks. "Your ignorance is all in your head!" Better to make an icon, I guess, than to make myself ill worrying about all the idiots in the world.

*goes off to make an icon*

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

Re: ...

azusa
2003-07-08 12:57 am UTC (link)

Ooo. I want one too.

And iirc, the exact quote was "We don't do liposuction on anorexics. Why amputate the genitals of these poor men? Surely the fault is in the mind, not in the member."

When I think about the fact that this man is the director of the psychology department at a major university, it makes me start to hate people all over again, so I try not to think about it, like you said. >_

(Reply to this)(Parent)

Re: ...

aruru
2003-07-07 08:49 am UTC (link)

Oh god, Jennifer Diane Reitz - or as known on Portal of Evil, "Whiney McBlame-chan." That brings flashbacks.

Has anyone wanked her before? Because if you've ever seen either Kokoro Wish or Unicorn Jelly (particularly the UJ forums), then you likely know that she is one of the most gigantic buckets of wank EVER (and so are the greater majority of her fans, for that matter).

The test thingie on her Transsexual.org website annoyed me to no end, too. Apparently, JDR subscribes to those old bullshit beliefs about women being bad at stuff like math and spatial relationships, while guys aren't as good with stuff like vocabulary or whatever.

<-- scored as being "asexual" on that thing, btw, despite the fact that I consider myself to be fairly "girly" in some aspects :P

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

Re: ...

beandelphiki
2003-07-07 10:29 am UTC (link)

What "test thingie" exactly? The "brain-sex test"? There was a gender test very similar to that going around sections of lj like mad.

It scored almost everyone "asexual." Which, when you think about it, makes sense, because people function best when they are a mix between "male" and "female." You just are probably more at the "female" end of "asexual."

The whole "guys are better at..." <-- not even going to go there. :P

(Reply to this)(Parent)

Re: ...

azusa
2003-07-08 12:54 am UTC (link)

Yes indeedy, JDR is a big steaming bucket of wank. I've been told by a few people that "Unicorn Jelly" gets interesting if you sit through all 3000 or so episodes of it, but I couldn't get past the atrocious drawn-in-Windows-Paint-with-a-mouse art. (Has the woman never heard of a scanner? Good god.)

Also particularly memorable are her wanks about "The Matrix," which iirc came from her messageboard, but I'm not sure if they're still there. She also apparently believes transsexuals are T3H SOOPERI0R RACE or something, despite her (medically unprovable) conviction that transgenderism is a birth defect. (On a humorous side-note, though she claims her site is supposed to be about transsexuality in general, it's clearly catered to MTFs-- plenty of snarks about 'testosterone poisoning' and the like.)

(Reply to this)(Parent)

	nevadafighter 2003-07-05 10:53 pm UTC (link)
	So . . . she responds to a nitpicky post about subject lines by insulting everyone in the group and stomping off in a huff? o.O You're right--that IS wanky. (Reply to this)(Thread)

rann
2003-07-05 11:50 pm UTC (link)

Personally, I think the author of the webcomic in question would LOVE it if her list got extremely wanky. c.c For the past month or two (or more) she's been copping a HUGE attitude, this sort of disdainful/lazy/arrogant thing... and I don't think she actually means it. I think she's just trying to cop the 'tude because "All the really big webcomic authors have them!"
And, since "all the really big webcomic authors" have cult-like followings that will kiss their boots for anything, and start flame wars and generally be wanky at a moment's notice, the author in question is probably having warm-fuzzies at the thought of wankiness in her fandom.

(Reply to this)(Parent)

	Re: Who gives a fuck? raisedbyhyenas 2003-07-05 11:50 pm UTC (link)
	What the hell is his...her...ITS problem? That's about as wanky as wanky can be. Good find. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	Re: Who gives a fuck? beandelphiki 2003-07-06 03:58 am UTC (link)
	No need to be rude as fuck while commenting on the wank. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Regardez-vous my NAME, moron. raisedbyhyenas 2003-07-06 08:39 am UTC (link)
	Sweetheart, darling, lambikins, I'm ALWAYS this fucking rude. Get used to it or get out. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: Regardez-vous my NAME, moron. beandelphiki 2003-07-06 09:35 am UTC (link)
	I don't give a shit what your name is. There's no need to refer to any human being as an "it." People think I'm a rude asshole too, but boy, if I had called someone something so dehumanizing as "it" I'd be fucking ashamed of myself. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

LOL! Hit a nerve, eh?

raisedbyhyenas
2003-07-06 11:47 am UTC (link)

Did you mistake this community for a NICE one...or me for a nice person? Oh, dearie me, I'm sorry, what's the politically-correct term this week? "Shi"? "Hir"? Whatever. If I can't tell from here - and from here, without reading the thread, without knowing the person, guess what, I can't! - there's nothing wrong with "it." You can call ME "it" all you like, as you can't tell what gender I am. Have fun.

It's all fun and games to point and laugh until YOUR sacred cow gets jostled, eh?

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: LOL! Hit a nerve, eh? beandelphiki 2003-07-06 11:56 am UTC (link)
	What is it with morons today? I've got this one and another one elsewhere, all in 24 hours. What gives? My "sacred cow" is basic human respect? Okie-dokie then. And it's usually "hir." That's my personal fave. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: LOL! Hit a nerve, eh? feenix 2003-07-06 10:36 pm UTC (link)
	WANKERS. starts regressive wank cycle a la Mandelbrot's snowflake (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: LOL! Hit a nerve, eh? beandelphiki 2003-07-06 11:33 pm UTC (link)
	snort (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: LOL! Hit a nerve, eh? feenix 2003-07-07 12:08 am UTC (link)
	Um...make that Koch's snowflake. /pseudointellectual math whore (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: LOL! Hit a nerve, eh? beandelphiki 2003-07-07 12:26 am UTC (link)
	I was wondering... 'S okay, I like your icon, 'n' shit like that. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	Re: LOL! Hit a nerve, eh? aruru 2003-07-07 08:34 am UTC (link)
	squeals @ your icon Someone's using it after all! Whee! >D (Reply to this)(Parent)

	virago 2003-07-06 01:14 am UTC (link)
	Wow. The last part amazes me in that there truly is "____er than thou" wank everywhere. ...educational. I don't mean to sound snarky about the subject matter itself, but...yeah. (Reply to this)(Thread)

	eljuno 2003-07-06 01:32 am UTC (link)
	You don't know the half of it. You should see what goes on on some of the activist-type lists I belong to... (Reply to this)(Parent)