by James Baba

Created on: February 05, 2010

The discrimination faced by transvestites

Let me begin by stating I used the article title as it was given.  While the term "transvestite" is not entirely inaccurate to describe those who wear the clothing traditionally ascribed to the opposite sex, it is a very simplistic label.  My personal experience, as well as current literature and studies, indicate that transvestism is part of a broad spectrum of the human experience of gender and sexuality.  That being said, there can be no doubt that those who dress in clothing traditionally associated with the opposite sex experience various forms of discrimination on a fairly consistent basis. 

Discrimination against those who "cross dress" can be seen regularly in news articles.  In recent years many articles have appeared incidents in which students have been denied access to school unless they wore what school officials determined to be gender-appropriate clothing.  People have been fired from their jobs when employers learned of their employee's cross dressing, even though it was only done on the employee's personal time.  Of course, the most extreme examples of discrimination against gender-variant individuals are the numerous documented cases of murder and physical assaults.  These, however, are only the examples or forms of discrimination that are extreme enough or newsworthy enough to gain the attention of the media.  I suspect most most gender-variant people experience a lifetime of much more subtle types of discrimination.

From birth we are all taught that blue is for boys and pink is for girls.  Boys play with G.I. Joe and girls play with Barbie.  Boys play football and girls play house.  Girls wear dresses and boys wear pants.  Girls wear makeup and boys don't.  If girls do play sports, they have to play non-contact sports in separate leagues from boys.  Boys who join the drama or glee club are labeled sissies.  Movies, television and magazines bombard us daily with images of what men and women are supposed to look like.  We learn at a very early age that any departure from these socially defined gender roles is not only unacceptable, but wrong. 

If you still doubt such discrimination exists, consider these scenarios.  Have you ever been with a person or group and observed a female dressed in jeans, boots, a flannel shirt, wearing little or no makeup?  Did anyone make a comment that contained the words "butch" or "dyke"?  Have you ever heard anyone make derogatory comments about a drag queen or cross dresser?  If not, try an experiment.  Dress in the clothing of the opposite sex take a walk down main street.  Chances are, even the thought of doing this brings on a feeling of dread.  Now imagine what that must feel like for those who do experience gender differently from the mainstream.

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