Lifetimetv.com – A Girl Like Me: The Gwen Araujo Story
Let’s start with a Synopsis from Lifetime TV’s – A Girl Like Me: The Gwen Araujo Story
Imagine feeling like you’re trapped in the wrong body, that there’s been some sort of mistake ? that you’re supposed to be a girl instead of a boy. How would you tell your family and friends that you wanted to change genders? Would you bring it up with someone you had a crush on? And what would you do when society not only refused to accept the new you, but was violent toward you? Well, Eddie Araujo didn’t know the answers, but he did know he was supposed to be female, so he began to dress as a girl and changed his name to Gwen.
You won’t believe what Gwen endured just to live her life as who she was and feel normal. It’s a shocking true story about courage and tolerance, and is sure to stay with you long after the credits roll.
If you missed the original showing it’s on again next Sunday, June 25, 2006 @ 7:00pm or you can have a look at Lifetime TV’s Schedule for future showings.
Vicky and I both watched A Girl Like Me: The Gwen Araujo Story last night (Monday, June 19, 2006 @9pm) and we both Highly Recommend this movie to everyone and thought we’d just write a quick sentence or two about how the movie affected us.
Although the movie did gloss over quite a bit of Gwen’s life, for example, was she receiving HRT, did she plan on having SRS, what were her goals in life, etc., it did an excellent job of Humanizing Gwen and making you care about her, something I felt that TransAmerica did a horrible job doing in portraying Bree.
The movie left us both extremely Depressed and extremely Angry at Gwen’s ultimate fate. A large part of this was because J. D. Pardo, who played Gwen, did a wonderful job of making you care about Gwen as did Mercedes Ruehl who played her mother. You could see how she was torn between her love for Gwen and her concern for her. You will be Depressed, very Depressed, after watching this movie, as you should be, no one should have to meet a fate like Gwen’s just for being who they are.
This movie should also serve as a warning about the dangers out there. Vicky and I have both known several girls who’ve died over the years in similar circumstances. We both feel that if you are going to have relationships it’s best to be honest from the beginning. There are way too many people out there who can’t deal with questioning their sexuality. Don’t get us wrong, we’re not saying it’s okay for someone to attack someone who dates a TG without knowing it and then “flips out” when they find out. It is NOT Ok, but in reality, this happens way too often. Hopefully, humanity will evolve to the point where a persons Gender or Sexual Identity is respected rather than though of as a threat if it’s different from your own. I’m not sure I have that much faith in people.
Again, we both highly recommend you watch Lifetime TV’s – A Girl Like Me: The Gwen Araujo Story