Trans vs. HRC

This post doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the content of the class itself, but I do feel it's kind of relevent.

Recently a link to a page for the Human Rights Campaign appeared on the "recommended pages" section of my Facebook, indicating that over a sixth of my friends have "Liked" them. A few names were displayed, and my immediate response was to balk at the sight of a trans-person's name next to that little thumbs-up symbol.

Why is this?

Let me start off by saying I actually don't know much about the HRC. I have their increasingly ubiquitous bumper sticker (the dark blue square with the yellow equal sign [=] on it) on my laptop, but I don't like it being there, and it would seem my aversion to associating with the HRC has become almost "instinctive." Something unconscious bothers me about seeing a trans person (but not non-trans folks) associating positively with HRC. But whyyyy???

I don't know if it's something you can be expected to be aware of if you're not inside the trans community. Basically this is something which is pretty common and a sensibility which is beginning to be passed from older (by which I mean "been in the community longer") trans folk and new ones without much explanation. Young trannies like myself find in ourselves an unexplained anger with and distrust of HRC.

This blog post does a pretty good job, in my opinion, of explaining the history behind the strife between HRC and the broader transgender community. Their agendas have included blatant trans-exclusion (most notably in their backing of a version of ENDA in 2007 which specifically excluded addressing gender identity and trans issues, "to get it passed quicker") and individual members have exhibited unrepentant transphobia.

(Note: The blog author employs the term "Macchiavelian", a word I previously did not have a concept of until this past class!)

The truth is, I'm actually not very familiar with all this history, and the vast majority of it is "before my time" even though it all affects me today. What I'm saying is I don't necessarily carry that baggage; nevertheless, I have inherited a prejudice against HRC from my fellow transfolk.

It reminds me of the Jewish story about the roast [link] [link] and inevitably results in the fallacious argumentum ad antiquitatem. Trans people I believe are inherently called to question and problematize any ingrained concept, whether it be "you are a girl therefor you must love/wear pink" or "you are a transgender therefor you must hate the HRC."

Now, from my personal experience, the HRC has actually pissed me off concerning trans rights quite a few times, and the reason I don't like that their sticker is permanently affixed to my computer is because while I may not be totally against them, I don't want to be perceived as supporting them until I really do.

Nevertheless they are prominent and do a lot of good stuff, so I will leave their link up on this journal page for the time being.