BayWindows.com – Ethan Jacobs
Helen Boyd, author of the 2004 book My Husband Betty, a memoir about her experience as the wife of a cross-dresser, had one overriding message for the 350 people who turned out for the Tiffany Club?s First Event banquet Jan. 20: to put aside the division and the backbiting among different factions of both the transgender community and the larger LGBT community. She said when she and her husband first began connecting with the transgender community they found a world where cross-dressers had their own separate circle, transsexuals had their circle, ?and never the twain shall meet.? She said the division was particularly glaring on the various websites and message boards that form the heart of the online trans community.
?But what I find online is we still do a lot of that, separating people out according to where they are, if their transness is serious enough, kind of games of who suffers more, who suffers most, which I don?t particularly find productive,? said Boyd.
She compared the constant questioning within the transgender community of other people?s identity and commitment to the community to a troll who lives under a bridge and forces people to answer three questions before allowing them to pass.
?And in this case the questions are often things like, ?What have you done for me lately?? ?Are you trans enough??… And that always drives me crazy because partners don?t really pass any of the tests, and yet we?re a part of this community,? said Boyd.