The Existence of Trans People is Very Cool

I was just thinking about how it’s really, really cool to live in a world with trans people. Here’s a quick post for my fellow cisgender readers, about what I mean.

I’m blown away by how amazing it is that transgender people exist. Trans people don’t owe cis people information, which means we’re so lucky — just really, really lucky — that thanks to trans people and their willingness to share, our world is learning truly wonderful stuff about all human bodies.

As a small example, several years ago, I learned that a trans woman’s breasts are medically indistinguishable from a cis woman’s breasts — a fact I had not known before. A trans woman’s breasts are mammary glands in the same way a cis woman’s breasts are — they can produce milk! That’s amazing! And of course if I think about it for second, it makes perfect sense. No matter what their sex or gender, the chests of all human children look the same, indicating similar parts in those chests.

Learning that trans women’s breasts and cis women’s breasts are the same, brings up all sorts of interesting ideas that we get to think about regarding sex and gender, like how all human bodies are more similar than we like to admit, and that hormones are like switches that we can use to turn on and off certain aspects of our bodies at will. Certainly that knowledge about hormones isn’t necessarily new, but to see the switch metaphor play out so plainly and vividly is really remarkable. Again, so cool!

Another small example, sometimes I’ll see trans women on social media talking about temperature changes they are experiencing — that after transitioning, they find themselves bundling up and wanting to turn up the thermostat. This of course brings up the question: do men and women experience or process temperature differently? And is it simply a matter of hormones? I’d love to see research on all sorts of gender stereotypes and find out which ones are based on something physical and medical, and which ones are based on being raised with strict gender norms. I would be so fascinated by that kind of research.

Think about how extraordinary it is that we get to hear about the experiences of trans men and trans women. If a trans man who transitioned as an adult, say in his late 20’s or his 30’s, tells us what hanging out with a group of cis men is like — what they talk about, what they do and don’t share — the trans man will have much more interesting insights, compared to reports from a cis man, because the trans man has also spent some of his life presenting as a woman, and being excluded from men-only conversations.

Trans people have always existed, but this seems like the first time in any of our lifetimes that they’ve had so many options to present themselves as the gender they identify with. And maybe it’s wishful thinking, but it seems like cis people (or at least a considerable portion of cis people) are ready to understand and accept and even embrace the existence of trans people in a way that hasn’t been true in the past.

A quick sidenote: In Latin, “cis” means “on this side,” while “trans” means “on the other side.” The prefix “cis” has been around for millennia, but hasn’t been in common use in our culture. I suppose that’s simply because our culture only recently started acknowledging the existence of trans people in a widespread way, so there was no need to use the term cisgender, because we assumed everyone was cisgender. If you are cisgender and are offended when someone refers to you as cisgender, there’s no need. That would be like being offended if someone pointed out you are a mammal or that you have teeth and hair.

We are really lucky to live in a world with transgender people. The trans community is precious and vulnerable. We need to protect our trans friends and family members. Anyone who is trying to scapegoat them, deny their existence, or remove their rights, needs to be corrected.

It’s not asking a lot: Just let trans people be.

kisses,
Gabrielle

P.S. — I turned off comments because it was late when I published this and I was headed to bed and wouldn’t be able to moderate them. But I’ve turned them on now for paid subscribers.