Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Pam's House Blend, Sandeen ,and hijacking the word "Tranny"

Well here we go again with some revisionist history from Sandeen and her followers.


Which perjorative do we get to vote on?

Well I guess I get to date myself again but I was there and I was part of the culture where the term "Tranny" was first used and even though Virginia Prince had used the term Transgender sometime in the late 60's it was NEVER used by anyone and the term "tranny" was used well before transgender was coined and had ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with transvestites.  In the "alternative lifestyles" world of NYC tranny was a pre-op transsexual and it was in use from the late 50's at least.

The first time I heard the term tranny was my older brother Ray commenting on the transmission in his car as a piece of crap tranny. The second time I heard the term used for other than a car transmission was in a private meeting at Dr. Benjamin's office when I was 14 years old.  Because I was still recovering from being raped several months earlier by my neighbor Dr. Benjamin brought someone special in to meet with me and talk with a scared kid and it was someone that had gone through the entire process.

The person was quite famous but I had zero idea who she was considering I had only 3+ months earlier heard the term transsexual. She asked how I had started on hormones and I told her and she found it interesting. She said to me and I am paraphrasing, "most kids find a tranny at a drag club to obtain hormones or find Harry", and that was the first time I heard the term and it was 1960 which is well before a transvestite created the term transgender for heterosexual transvestites that were not transsexual and did not want surgery. That person I met was Christine Jorgensen by the way.

My roommate for surgery grew up in Spanish Harlem and found her hormones by asking the drag queen hookers on the corner where to get them and she was pointed to a drag club and told to ask a certain performer who was a "tranny". That was 1960 and there was no term transgender. The term tranny was in common use in NYC and I must assume Frisco because of the  "tranny" community that was beginning to grow and the simple fact Harry had an office in Frisco.

Over the years when I went to NYC for an appointment with Harry I often heard other transsexuals use the term tranny. I sheepishly asked one, I was timid then, why they used it and she said because openly using transsexual was not wise so slang took over and someone shortened transsexual to tranny so they could easily talk about themselves but of course with all slang it became part of the language of the NYC culture and I assume Frisco.

When I moved to NYC in August of 1969 every transsexual I knew used the term tranny and it was not a pejorative and never has been until an attempt was made to hijack it sort of like some want to eliminate the term transsexual for transgender. Kids went to Tranny clubs or Tranny bars and this was 1969 just after the time of Stonewall. It was never a derogatory term and was used for transsexuals or pre-op transsexuals to be more accurate which I was then and some post did use it also since being politically correct was not as important as being "correct".

the term transgender is defined here and if one looks in the notes it will be "noted" Virginia Prince first used the term "transgender" in print in 1969.

Common refrains among us all used the term tranny and I had 5 close "tranny" friends and there was the "Tavern" (name could be wrong) near the Empire State Building that was a big diverse club where you needed a scorecard to tell who was what and the ladies room had Ladies and Trannies scribbled beneath it which is relevant for my previous post.

My friend Oscar took me to Max's Kansas City Steakhouse where I met Andy Warhol and the term tranny was thrown around the back room liberally and referred to pre-op transsexuals or those trying to make people "think" they were pre-op transsexuals. There were a lot of them claiming to be a tranny but few were but who cared was how I felt if it made them feel better and Andy and Oscar were the only ones that knew I was transsexual so it was interesting in that backroom.

Now I have someone like Sandeen and her sycophants and some in the GLB trying to hijack the term "tranny" and claim it refers to the transgender crowd she thinks she speaks for and is a pejorative or for the simple minded a bad word like "fag" or "dyke" if used by others, Why don't you go to Britain and cuss them out over "fag" which means a cigarette or did last time I was there?

Let me make this totally clear Sandeen it was NEVER used for those transgender folk because the term transgender DID NOT EXIST. I have my differences with Aria about some subjects and have avoided you because Aria debunks you as do others for the ignorant know-nothing professional transgender activist you are.

There is NO VOTE NEEDED because it was taken and  passed unanimously 40-50 years ago by those of us that were actually there so you do not get the right to steal the word "tranny" which is just another attempt by you to destroy the concept of transsexual and subsume it under transgender and make it disappear and that is not your right nor is it the right of the GLBT alliances and except for fringe members of the transgender movement I honestly do not believe most people under the transgender umbrella feel this way.

I have never been quite sure what you are other than a self promoting blowhard professional spokesman for your particular brand of transgender gibberish which is sad because it is people like you that destroy and damage an alliance that could have been beneficial.

Go hijack something else because you do not have priorities on "tranny" fool. I do as do my fellow sisters and brothers that coined this term and used this term 40-50 years ago. Find another word to hijack like "nitwit" or "idiot" since they are accurate descriptions of you. In my day we would have simply said "not a tranny" for you and in that case the phrasing was meant to be derogatory.

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