Rant on Gender & Sexuality: There is obviously a difference, people!

i probably overreacted to this whole thing because lesbians used to see my transition as a betrayal and as a failure to come to terms with my sexuality and confront my fears about openly living as a homosexual. but yeah, just a little late-night rant about how sexual identity and gender identity/gender transition are really two fundamentally different things. wish it were a little more coherent and concise, but i hope i made my point well enough.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• gender
• identity
• sexuality
• homosexuality
• transsexuality
• transexuality
• transsexualism
• transgender
• transexual
• transsexual
• FTM
• F2M
• female-to-male
• MTF
• M2F
• male-to-female
• transition
• transitioning
• queer
• gay
• lesbian
• LGBT
• LGBTQ

[dracojjfan]

I dont want to push a sore topic, but should you also then be concerned with the difference between the terms transgender and transexual? i agree completely with what you are saying btw

[yak1987]

@dracojjfan sure, but i don't really see how the difference between transgenderism and transsexualism is relevant to this discussion.

[Liyiemen]

Great video.

Ah. I wish more people could understand this. When I try to explain these things to people they just stare at me with a blank/confused expression... or just deny it. Even my psychologist(whom i do not intend to visit EVER again) did NOT get it at all when i told her. In fact she insisted that gender+sexuality are like... immediately and completely linked, and she missed the point all the time. It was AWFUL. And then they say i'm confused. I'm not. THEY don't understand. Aargh.

[BillyJoel1985]

a friend of mine (ftm) had his coming out in front of his parents and his parents said "thank God! We always were afraid that you might be a lesbian"

[codyAaron64]

amazing. thanks jak always a pleasure watching your vids.

[yak1987]

@Johnson210000 also: in some sense, the way that some people who share our culture view sex change isn't all that different, and that's exactly why i made the video. so many people, both within and outside of the queer community, act like people transition in order to avoid being homosexual. that's why people like my step-mom are so shocked and confused when someone is still gay after transitioning. that's the kind of ignorance that i'm trying to fight against here :)

[yak1987]

@Johnson210000 of course, my culture has shaped the way i feel about this, & i hadn't really taken cultural differences into account when making this video, so i'm glad you brought it to my attention. still, i want to say that even though their country may employ sex changes as a way to "treat" homosexuality, that doesn't mean that the people going through it view it that way, agree with it or even choose it freely. that's why i'm curious to hear their perspectives & experiences. shame we can't.

[Johnson210000]

@yak1987 I throughly agree with you that gender and sexuality are different. I don't want to leave the impression that changing gender can compensate for having a different sexual orientation. My only point is that in some cultures, it may not be seen the way you and I see it.

Since these parts of the world do not have a free press, we are unlikely to ever be able to evaluate the results of these efforts.

[yak1987]

@Johnson210000 this is fascinating, albeit in a sad & disturbing way. i still stand by what i said in the video, though. sexuality and gender are very different things, but i'll admit to at least one strong similarity: you can't just change the gender someone was hardwired to be, the same way that you can't just change someone's sexuality. i'd love to hear what people who have gone through this have to say, because while i'm glad that they are still alive, i personally couldn't be very happy.

[yak1987]

@Johnson210000 so, the decision to change sex is made after the court's verdict, but before it's approved by the mullah? to me, then, it sounds like the choice isn't really a free one at all; it's either die or change your sex. of course, given the fear of persecution, the decision still wouldn't be completely free if they made the choice BEFORE a charge/guilty verdict was dropped, but i wonder if there are cases where people pursue sex changes simply/mostly in order to be with who they want