Oh how exciting, another first.
Delaware state Sen. Sarah McBride won the state’s only House seat Tuesday, NBC News projects, making her the first openly transgender person elected to Congress.
But so very much not the first man elected to Congress.
There are a lot of available firsts in this kind of thing. The first person from an obscure small town in Iowa; the first person who failed algebra in 9th grade; the first person who has a cat named Ronald Krump – one could go on in this vein forever.
Meanwhile, McBride is a guy elected to Congress and women continue to be both ignored and mocked.
Comments
7 responses to “Fir stopenly”
Isn’t “performativity” the whole point? Are there such things as closeted trans people?
twiliter, I think the wording reflects the current ideology: presumably, there have been many trans congresspeople over the years, but social restrictions and proto-transphobia prevented them from living as their true, authentic, glorious selves. To suggest otherwise would imply that transness is a fad or subject to social contagion at the present time, and we can’t have that.
Helicam, it would also not support the narrative that trans are the most marginalized group ever. There are closeted gays, closeted atheists, closeted religious minorities, etc. If there are no closeted trans, they couldn’t be the most marginalized group ever.
I suspect some of it is also trying to pretend that ‘trans women’ pass as women, so you sort of have to be ‘out’ and ‘open’ for someone to know you are trans. That’s BS, especially for MtF, but they don’t want us to point that out.
You can pretty much be certain that there would have been some closeted transvestites (as they used to be called), or what we’d probably be more likely to call AGPs now. There were probably closeted transexuals (or wannabe TS). Of course they’re all lumped under T now with no differentiation. Indeed, trans people who think the full sex and hormone therapy is important are now derogatorily called tru-scum by many trans activists. So much community.
Just like votes for women, New Zealand did it first, and if I may say so, better.
Georgina Beyer, Maiden Speech after being elected to New Zealand parliament in 1999.
Born George Bertrand, Beyer was a homosexual, drag performer, and prostitute before entering Parliament. This was a ground breaking achievement by someone who campaigned on policy and public benefit, not genderism and fee fees. Beyer won an electorate that was mostly white, rural, and conservative; redneck adjacent if you like, and defeated a very high profile media personality.
Also interesting to note that in the above speech Beyer uses the term “transsexual” and also refers to fellow MPs as “ladies and gentlemen”, something that today would lead to excommunication. Beyer had genital surgery in the 1980s. I recall Beyer as being a relatively moderate MP, not a shrieking harpie who centered gender in everything. Of course, there are now revisionist histories.
I didn’t agree with Beyer about everything, but they were indeed moderate and a very thoughtful and carefully expressed person.
Incidentally, here’s an interesting brief transcript of an interview with Beyer, talking about her views on gender identity.
https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1807/S00244/qa-georgina-beyer-interviewed-by-corin-dann.htm