Something quick for everyone's consideration.............

Comment by Caroline Grace on September 29, 2012 at 1:20pm

For some of us surgery IS life saving... Because it does not have that same effect on you doesn't mean that it isn't required medical treatment for you. I spent almost 5 decades without need of this surgery, and I do know people who go a lifetime without it...

Not everybody needs the same treatments, and not everyone is afflicted the same. But be careful here. You are judging another person person's medical need without very examining their situation and you are doing this simply because that person is in jail.

Who needs which kinds of treatments should be between a doctor and their patient. And to argue that surgery isn't medically necessary sets back all of those who have pushed employers to include coverage in the health care plans.  Why should an employer cover something that it is not critical, especially when they know the whole world isn't accepting of TS period, let alone think healthcare money should be spent "elective" stuff.

So I believe you are starting from a wrong premise... and using a case that concerns many because of a murder conviction to setup something that affects far more than this one convict. Do not erode the progress that has taken TG folks years to obtain by watering down the importance.

43% of admit attempting suicide. What percentage were successful?  That number along should convince you that in many cases it is a matter of life and death...  "A bullet or a dress" is a great way to describe how some feel...

Comment by Dal Maxwell on September 29, 2012 at 9:19pm

Actually Caroline, what I think we have here is the equivalent of a mixed metaphor.  Make no mistake;  nothing would please me more than to be able to get my SRS.  I don't feel 100% complete.  However....... I have managed to cultivate quite a nice life for myself and I don't bank on that surgical procedure for my quality of life.  What I said basically is that there are worse things in life, and I happen to believe that  there is a difference between an emotionally driven life saving procedure and one that will truly save your life.

In speaking on the specific topic of a convicted felon/killer; I am an advocate for humane rights for prisoners, not special rights in defiance of the law.  My opinion is that when free, unmarked, and unconvicted trans people have the legal right and access to quality healthcare that includes SRS, then I suppose I can re-visit the issue of the convicted felon's rights.  She gets adequate medical treatment, which is what the law requires, and it includes her hormones.  Whay I want to know is that if the State is prepared to alllow SRS for this one prisoner, why is said same prisoner still in a men's facility.  It doesn't speak well of the need for SRS. 

I believe my premise was entirely correct and I was on track with a singular issue.  I didn't bring in suicide statistics; I am painfully tuned into the flow of (lack of) progress on some fronts in the rights for trans people; free ones!  I'm not a public advocate but I know bucketloads of people and I do plenty of arm-twisting and lobbying in my own way.  Since I'm not a registered 'anything in particular', I choose to fly under the radar, especially since I don't have a 501c3 or anything to answer to. 

I don't think that my argument in any way erodes any progress we may or may not have made.  Some of my most intense efforts is to get the LGB folks to stop dumping the T's by the side of the road in a nasty 'neighborhood' rather than to keep us in the mix, doing the whole rights thing once and moving on.  That includes, by the way, some serious confrontations with HRC and their habit of exercising political expedience.

But most of all......unless you know me, who I am, and what I do try to accomplish, I don't think any of you are in a position to tell me how wrong I am and how damaging my position is to the future of the transgender population of the U.S. or anywhere else.    Being beaten over the head continuously with one statistic isn't going to change my or anyone else's thinking. Other than that, if you want to know what really drives me, you'll have to contact me personally.  I'm trying to not pour napalm on the fire but sometimes the thought process seems to veer so far off course that I feel compelled to say something.  Now.......I'm gonna stop and go about my business.

Comment by Erin Detty on September 29, 2012 at 10:47pm

I feel its important and necessary for some not all, some girls don't feel the need where I do. I really want the public to know and understand that it isn't a fetish or something that we woke up one morning and decided SRS just sounded like a good idea that particular day.

I just want people to understand...... that might be too much to ask I'm afraid. Sad to me that a so called free country would limit its freedom in the way that it dose.

It seem to me its as free as you can afford it to be, ask OJ Simpson, he ran out of money, or someone who worked all there life and can't afford health care and is suffering because of it.

I love my Country but I don't understand it or the prestigious nature of its policies! (I hope I got my spelling right:)           

Comment by Caroline Grace on September 30, 2012 at 4:52am

"...I am an advocate for humane rights for prisoners, not special rights in defiance of the law...".

SRS is not in defiance of the law but rather in compliance with the law. Please read Smith versus Fields for what mulitple courts have said about the necessity of SRS for prisoners, not just your local one. You may also wish to read the AMA amicus brief in this case, that also included the prison doctors association and others. Then you might wish to find out why the Lambda Legal and the ACLU support the "Let doctors decide who needs SRS, based upon medical considerations, and not politics."

Sorry that I am pushing so hard here, but since you are a media member, I am hoping to convince you to revisit your thinking and perhaps reconsider or at least share opposing points of view.  Maybe you could get somebody from Lambda Legal to explain on the radio why they took the position they did?

Please note that the courts did not say if you are TS and prisoner you automatically have access to SRS.  It is "your doctors must decide"  Then you have a find a doctor willing to do the SRS under terms acceptable to the prison system. To my knowledge, as a practical matter, that has not yet happened.

Here's a link to the court's thinking in the 7th Court of Appeals which affirms the prisoner's right to SRS...  and overturned a Wisconsin law banning SRS for prisoners.

http://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.ca7.uscourts.gov/fdocs/docs....

Comment by Caroline Grace on September 30, 2012 at 5:34am

One correction on my first comment:

I accidentally said, "Because it does not have that same effect on you doesn't mean that it isn't required medical treatment for you."  when I meant to say, "Because it does not have that same effect on you doesn't mean that it isn't required medical treatment for others. "

BTW, there is no fire here on my part. I believe we can disagree, engage in a conversation designed to highlight points worth considering, and then fully consider one another's viewpoints - all without being disagreeable. And I believe we can agree on that, can't we?

Comment by Rachel King on September 30, 2012 at 6:58am

'Fraid I am totally on Daralyn's take on this.

SRS IS life-affirming.

If you believe that it is life-saving, then your reality does not match your fantasy.

That, is when I believe that therapy is necessary because I firmly believe that we do have a medical condition and it becomes a mental condition because of the bigotry and hatred that is bestowed on us by a less than understanding Joe and Jane Public.

The example once again became the focus of the blog, which is a shame  because I do believe wholeheartedly, in the premise of the blog.

Perhaps some can look past the one-line and focus on the whole.

It makes sense to me and I am big on things making sense.

After all, it only took 60 years or so, for my own life to make sense........

Comment by Erin Detty on September 30, 2012 at 9:04am

Sometimes I feel silly with some of my replies but I don't know much if anything about laws and such that pertain to us, so its nice to read the replies and post that are here for all of us to read, I have learned a lot. 

It beats just being frustrated over the general attitudes I see and hear from time to time, sometimes life is just hard anyway let alone being trans.

There are big cuts coming to our school district at the end of this school year which is July 1, of next year, I don't know how this may effect me financial, the thought of looking for another job doesn't sound like a lot of fun. 

This could effect my plans as far as when I can get SRS done, thank god I have a good retirement that I can live on, I'm lucky there. As we all know there is nothing cheep about transitioning. I will find my way, I know me!    

Comment by Dal Maxwell on September 30, 2012 at 9:44am

Caroline - I don't believe for a minute that your reply was ill-intended any more than my observation was made maliciously.  But I do know that many pin their hopes for a better future on SRS, and that I believe is the heart of the matter (and problem).  SRS is a physical re-manifestation of your existence; it doesn't resolve anything else.  If you had poor social skills, it won't fix that.  If you hated your job, ditto.  When you recover, to the best of my knowledge, you will still have to generate income, wash your clothes, mow the lawn, clean the house and, unless you want to be that island, have a life. The only thing that really changes, other than one's potential loathing of themselves for having a penis, is that you no longer have one. 

So my statement wasn't really about whether or not SRS was truly life saving; it was more about people pinning all of their hopes on SRS changing their lives. In my opinion, if it wasn't fixed by the person before surgery, it won't have been fixed by the surgeon after surgery!  It is why I truly and firmly believe in substance over form, and why I also think that too many  transgender-claiming people think that transgender and transsexual are identical; and why the emphasis of the components of transition are all out of balance.

But everyone is entitled to operate their lives as they see fit/necessary and I have no right to tell anyone exactly how it should be done.  I try to recommend the path of least pain and failure.  Sometimes it works; other times it falls on deaf ears. 

Comment by HELEN BRADY on September 30, 2012 at 10:23am

The only thing I would expect from SRS is simply that my body would be like it should be. I wouldn't expect any other changes from it. But then, I am a very happy woman already.

Comment by Dal Maxwell on September 30, 2012 at 10:25am

Okay, sorry to post again but I forgot the part about the legal aspect of the original topic.  My intent was not that SRS is not legal, only that it is not covered by just about any health insurer anywhere!  So if free citizens are not entitled to it, as productive members of society, then I am not inclined to feel as though a convicted killer has more rights to exclusions than you or I do.  Plus.....making a legal judgement that they should be entitled does not compel a surgeon to perform the surgery.  In my mind, it is a truly hollow victory.  Plus, what image does it leave with the unfamiliar public who only sees a killer, claiming to be a woman, being afforded an expensive, (possibly elective) surgical procedure at tax payer expense, to ............. what end?

And as a media person, I also believe that random, unfair, and sensational portrayals of transgender people have done far more damage to the image of transgender people that I ever could. My intention is to paint the world of transgender people in a real light; the struggles across the globe in cultures we couldn't imagine surviving in,  the stupidity of people's miscomprehension of what being a transgender is all about, the successes we have in the unlikeliest of places, and the antics of people allegely in the name of being transgender.  My viewpoint for the broadcasts is warts-and-all, but never have or will I ever represent the global transgender population as anything other than another oppressed, mis-understood, and maligned minority struggling for our equality. 

I may editorialize (which I frequently do) and make light of the antics of someone whose conduct is outrageous (which I also do) but I will never ignore that we are get the short shrift on almost every front, including our own inclusion under that LGBT umbrella.  While I believe that in many cases we are on our own, I also hold out hope for the future and that is the message that I broadcast!

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