XQQ-Pride-edition-Almost-final-Draft

Cross Queer Quarterly
Pepper & Pearl
Dear P&P: I’m a trans woman. Recently I’ve gotten to know someone who is male, but enjoys dressing as a woman —
but they don’t call themselves trans. HE says he’s a transvestite. My understanding is that means he cross dresses to get
sexual pleasure or gratification out of it, which kinda creeps me out, considering that neither of us would necessarily
“pass” if seen together, but yet we are completely different. And it’s not like I can wear a T-shirt that explains the difference
to others. How should I deal with this?
-No T for Tea
Dear Tea,
Your question was deceivingly complex to tackle. Not because of the question itself, but because there seems to be a
lot going on, in terms of semantics, possible misunderstandings and misconceptions. But don’t worry — your friends
Pepper and Pearl will get you sorted out!
Rephrasing your question, all what you’re saying (in far fewer words, and much more simply) is that if your friend is
not trans, what the heck is he? Because we seem to be wired somehow to require labels and categories that everyone’s
supposed to fit into. (Don’t even get me started). But that’s where we get hung up with definitions of words that we may
not all be using in the same way.
HE uses the word “transvestite,” and unfortunately neither one of us can say for certain what that means to him. In the
strictest and most technical sense, historically, transvestism simply meant to dress, behave, and present as a member of
the opposite sex (if we assume a binary system for gender). It was originally used as a descriptive, observational term,
coined by German sexologist Magnus Hirschfeld. In his observations, he noted that transvestism could also be correlated
with sexual arousal, so “could” immediately got reinterpreted as “did” and Bob’s your uncle — transvestism now
meant that if you were a man who put on a dress, you had a sexual fetish. And hey, would you look at that! It’s even in
the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual) to this day! (Just look up “transvestic fetishism”). So of course, the term
“transvestite” quickly turned into a pejorative (because obviously) since any kind of sexually-associated term outside of
heterosexual, missionary-position sex between married people would clearly represent a form of deviancy and perversion.
As a result, the number of people who actively use the term “transvestite” has dwindled, because of its reputation
as a(n unreclaimed) derogatory term. In that sense, the term “crossdresser” is preferred. Although, I don’t know about
you, but for me, even “crossdresser” kind of gives me the heebie-jeebies, because it still presents an unbalanced, patriarchal
(read: misogynistic) binary view of the world. Why misogynistic? Nowadays, only MALES can cross-dress, and
the act of doing so is seen by many as problematic. Females are generally accepted regardless of whether they pull on a
pair of trousers, or into a dress on any given morning. The same cannot be said for males, who are still expected never
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