Transgender people often report having felt trapped in a different body gender than their actual identity. There was a “trans racial” NAACP official who identified as African-American though she had no black ancestry. Can transclassism be next in the battle for self identity and the right to live as we feel inside?
Trans-Privileged
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication, WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "The Stringer."
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“Can transclassism be next in the battle for self identity and the right to live as we feel inside?”
I identify as a hugely successful, white, male, not at all balding, septuagenarian than it is more fit than most thirty-year olds. I am certainly hetero male, and I can prove it if you have a cat that is worth grabbing. I am tormented at all times by riggers.
I do hope you haven’t copyrighted that spiel, transcendenttape – I want a part !… 😉
Henri
Especially since the entertainment industry pushes story after story where the protagonist may start of in normal conditions (lower-middle class, even working class, how gross…), but is somehow different from birth, cleaner, purer, more authentic, indeed touched by fate/Lord Voldemort/Crypton/mutant genetics. They then spend their youth waiting to be discovered/for a letter delivered by owl/for their superpowers to kick in.
As with all aristocratic entitlement, this never seems to be related to any insights or actions taken by the protagonist while (supposedly) normal. In fact, the true testing will commence only after their coming-out moment. So while the audience is supposed to put themselves into the shoes of the protagonist, there are no role-models in any meaningful sense, as their journeys cannot be emulated by us mere mortals.
The exceptions to this are the recent wave of movies glorifying con-men (and women) who merely bluff their way to chosen-people status but in so doing at least create their own openings.
I swear this comment wasn’t about HRC and Trump when I started writing it.
It’s not so uncommon, after all Craig Cobb identifies as white even tho he’s a shade darker than octoroon. How does one get to be 14% black, anyway? Seems you’d have to have multiple mixed-race ancestors to come up with a number like that.