Human Rights at Home and Abroad: Past, Present, and Future

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Those individuals who do not enact the gender that has been prescribed to them are often challenging to the structure of social order (Gagne et al. 1997). The pressure of being the poster-child for gender transgressions can be overwhelming to transgenderists who just want to live as a member of their intended gender. It is often more convenient to make the effort to pass than to constantly defend ones gender identity. ―Sexed bodies (male or female) are not the basis of gender identities (men or women); rather, our binary conception of gender produces these sexed bodies‖ (Namaste 2000). By enforcing the gender binary on transgendered individuals, the body of a transgenderist is often altered to emulate the primary and secondary sex characteristics of the gender which they identify with. Trans Erasure Trans erasure refers to the societal capacity to completely remove transgenderists from social, political, and legislative dialogue. Trans erasure denies the existence of trangenderists as anything besides freaks, perverts, and/or comic social actors. The successfulness of trans erasure is dependent not only on the lack of acceptance for gender deviance in society, but also the silence of transgendered individuals about their past and their experiences. Transgenderists are expected to keep silent about their other-gendered history and their transgendered status, particularly post-operative transsexuals (Bornstein 1994). The highest purpose of the transsexual is to erase him/herself, to fade into the ‗normal‘ population as soon as possible. Part of this process is known as constructing a plausible story- learning to lie effectively about one‘s past… Authentic experience is replaced by a particular kind of story, one that supports the old constructed positions (Gherovici 2010). To this end, some transgenderists not only hide their transgendered histories from cissexuals, but hide from other trans people in order to maintain anonymity. See, when we walk into a restaurant and we see another transsexual person, we look The other way, we pretend we don‘t exist. There‘s no sly smile, no secret wink, signal, or handshake. Not yet. We still quake in solitude at the prospect of recognition… (Bornstein 1994). 131
The fear of exposure leads some transgenderists to shy away from community building (Roen 2002). There is a common assumption that if one transgendered person (who might otherwise pass) is accompanied by a detectable transgenderist, that they are more likely to be read as transgender as well. For this reason, non-passable transgenderists are often seen as a liability (Gagne et al. 1997). ―Two or more transexxuals together, goes the myth, can be read more easily as transsexual- so they don‘t pass‖ (Bornstein 1994). There are transgenderists who are beginning to express discontent at the culturally imposed standard of silence. Kate Bornstein, a famous transsexual gender radical asserts that the best way for trans people to liberate themselves is to open up dialogue amongst themselves; to start asking sincere questions, and intently listening to each other (Bornstein 1994). Bornstein often participates in talk-shows where she is criminalized and ridiculed for being a transsexual, but finds that these outlets are the best way to educate masses of people about the plight of transgendered people. Of one talk-show experience she said, ―I was a freak all right, but I was only a freak to the degree that I remained silent. When I spoke, I had a chance to educate, and, paradoxically, I became less of a freak‖ (Bornstein 1994). Emotional Impact of Trans Erasure The societal standard of silence imposed on transgenderists deeply effects the emotional lives of trans people. Trans people are told by society that they should not exist, or worse, that they already are non-existent. In a study by Schrock and colleagues, they found that suicide was more commonly discussed in transgender support groups than transgender politics (Schrock et al. 2004). These kinds of emotional reactions to societal oppression and discrimination are common throughout the trans community. In the journal article entitled Coming Out and Crossing Over, the sample included many transgenderists that battled with drug and alcohol addictions as a reaction to the pain of being forced to enact a gender that they did not relate to (Gagne et al. 1997). A small portion of the sample even reported that they had mutilated their genitals in their youth in a puerile attempt to change their gender (Gagne et al. 1997). Because most of the participants in Schrock‘s study had contemplated or attempted suicide, it 132
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Proceedings of 11th Annual Frederic
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Introduction The 11 th Annual Frede
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Conference Presenters: Send a clean
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Friday, April 15 Session 6: 9:00-10
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dropped to 25% (50 Interesting Fact
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are not being received as a result
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system that would review all applic
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Conclusion Welfare programs are a w
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Pennsylvania Department of Public W
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going on in the south. An estimated
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wasn‘t nationally known, but it w
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and ―I Feel Like I‘m Fixin to D
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Works Cited "American Experience.Ey
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According to ―Child Labor in Indi
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called the Fair Labor Standards Act
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that the minor workers had lied abo
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It is said that a person‘s childh
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Works Cited ABC News. "The Blueberr
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"What Is Child Labor?" University o
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not to love? Family has become an o
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person is either a criminal being a
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immigrants have fled. With the cons
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Work Cited Our Dime, Dustin. "Anoth
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countries of Europe and is the desc
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then having to take a written test.
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America. It is committed to offerin
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collective work and responsibility,
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Morgann Goodling, Bloomsburg Univer
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estimated 14,100 foster children ar
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individual would be dismissed. It d
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denied and discriminated against. S
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have come into existence. The suppo
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the U.S. have become very controver
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Reference Page Badgett, L.M.V., & C
Page 82 and 83: dynamic that encouraged rapid and t
Page 84 and 85: y big businesses for allowing them
Page 86 and 87: ―Duke University study published
Page 88 and 89: Works Cited ―BP Gears Up to Plug
Page 90 and 91: (702). The information provided to
Page 92 and 93: on the Human Terrain System states
Page 94 and 95: Works Cited "American Anthropologic
Page 96 and 97: toll that they can take depending o
Page 98 and 99: individual‘s identity, the indivi
Page 100 and 101: found various minority stress facto
Page 102 and 103: The concealable nature of sexual or
Page 104 and 105: Concealment of one‘s sexual ident
Page 106 and 107: 18. How could the human race surviv
Page 108 and 109: Whitley, B, & Kite, M. (2010). Gend
Page 110 and 111: are in jail because they broke rule
Page 112 and 113: Prisoners refer to the new inmates
Page 114 and 115: guards view as consensual because t
Page 116 and 117: ―emergency grievance criteria‖,
Page 118 and 119: Even though the exact extent of pri
Page 120 and 121: Danielle Miller, Bloomsburg Univers
Page 122 and 123: That was a real problem because as
Page 124 and 125: harmed someone was high and even th
Page 126 and 127: we should not just walk by and beli
Page 128 and 129: At the age of 15 Brenda (Bruce) was
Page 130 and 131: Taylor Roberts, Bloomsburg Universi
Page 134 and 135: goes without saying that collective
Page 136 and 137: members of the trans community can
Page 138 and 139: Her emotional reaction to sharing h
Page 140 and 141: In trans support groups it is not u
Page 142 and 143: According to this quote, trans acti
Page 144 and 145: Valentine, David. 2007. Imagining T
Page 146 and 147: In June, 2003, the U.S. military re
Page 148 and 149: The Nuremberg Code was created in W
Page 150 and 151: health. Scientists can also create
Page 152 and 153: similarly to the Hippocratic Oath t
Page 154 and 155: working in the world now than ever
Page 156 and 157: available to protect people. This i
Page 158 and 159: Brandi Spencer- Phoenix, Bloomsburg
Page 160 and 161: Most six graders are between the ag
Page 162 and 163: White students, for instance, score
Page 164 and 165: Students should have more adequate
Page 166 and 167: References Abdul-Alim Jamaal, (2010
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Page 174 and 175: deep poverty. 2 Many historians agr
Page 176 and 177: As previously mentioned many Algeri
Page 178 and 179: personnel made it very difficult to
Page 180 and 181: of their European background. 30 At
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Bibliography ―Proclamation des R
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