When it comes to expressing your gender identity, navigating labels can be tricky. For those identifying as transgender or non-binary, finding the right words is essential.
Obviously, it’s important for people to use language that respects and reflects your identity. Outdated or offensive terms can be hurtful.
However, it’s important to remember that you’re more than just a label!
Ultimately, what matters most is how you personally want to be addressed, regardless of where you fall on the gender spectrum.
So, let’s talk about it!
Do you have a particular term or label that resonates with you – such as crossdresser, transgender woman, non-binary person, or something else?
I’m eager to hear your thoughts, so let’s continue the conversation in the comments below!
Love,
Lucille
I identify myself as simply a woman. If I am close to someone, I will them I am a transwoman, or transexual woman, or “formerly a guy.”
The few women I have told treated before and after as a dear lady friend,and never made any mention of it again.
As to dating, if I do, I certainly know I should tell the person at some point. Not sure when that point would be, but believe I would know when, and I am sure that it would be just as it was with the few I have told. One actually said:
“that doesn’t matter”
I label myself as a woman. I feel like a woman and I am accepted as a woman. If I get close to someone then I will tell them that I am transgendered. I hate the fact that we have to have “labels” at all. I think that the world would be a lot better off without them.
Marcie
Too many Lables that society needs to keep order… I prefer to be considered as a Caring Person…1st and foremost… then whatever the clothing (or look of the day) society wishes to lable me as…
With Love and Respect…XOXOXO…Marsha
Dear Lucille,
I think that society has to put lables on everything to maintain a structured order. Many Women, Men, and Transgender Persons are the result of a Human desire to blend the best of each.
I feel that when Marsha is “in the Mirror” the world feels as though it has gained another perspective to beautify her enviroment. And when in the “male mode” conformation into what society deems needed to maintain the social order.
As a Married (to a wonderful woman) Transgender person, I feel closer to my spouse as Marsha. Working in Enfemme around the house or going out in public draws me to a better understanding of the Daily Life of women and their efforts.
Praying that someday we won’t need lables but can all be veiwed as Caring People… (which is in itself a lable)…
I bid everyone Happiness, Love, and Peace…XOXOXO…Marsha
The whole label issue is one I’ve grappled with since I was a child. I was around 9 when I discovered I wasn’t the only one who felt this way (because of a documentary on TV), and having discovered I was a ‘Transvestite’, I was not too happy with the title. I’m a little more comfortable with the more generalised term ‘Transgendered’ as this allows more flexibilty.
I have at various points in my life felt variously like a simple occassional cross dresser, and at other times a full blown trans sexual contemplating GRS. I expect I will swing gently between one position and the other for the rest of my life. I’m gradually learning to accept myself as being both male and female at the same time, and labels are in the end, other people’s problem. I am me, for better or worse.
Labels are bad. I don’t mind words used to distinguish different types of gender-variant people. However, they should be used as adjectives and not labels.
Some people are tall, but it depends on the context. A short basketball player may still be taller than most people, but that doesn’t make the term “tall” invalid. But, you also wouldn’t use “tall” to define a person, just to describe one of their physical aspects. IMHO, gender terms should be used the same way; they can be descriptive, but are incorrectly used to define a person, and implies all sorts of misguided assumptions about that person.
The terms “transgender woman” or “T-girl” are acceptable because the trans part is an adjective. “Transvesite” tends to be offensive because it is a label, implying a whole lifestyle, and not just one of that person’s attributes.
The problem is that the meaning is not always clear, even among the gender-variant people. Most of the confusion is because there is a large variety of people, and no distinct boundaries. There will always be conflicts in usage until these terms are better defined, and people are comfortable using them.
I do not label myself but my other half does with names like transvestite or pedifile person.Along with a few choice words in which I will not repeat.
Hi,
I lebel myself as a trans woman, and if people need to know what that means, I explain that I am a woman and was born a little girl with a birth defect, which I’m now dealing with.
I hope this helps someone
Jo