Re: Bradley Manning, convicted of WikiLeaks disclosures, announces desire for gender reassignment
To Lex's point, his older relatives may always think of him by his birth name. Hell, parents have to remember to introduce their married children by their new names, so it doesn't follow that thinking of him as Leo or Reginald or whatever, is disrespect. They call him Lex, no matter how their brains fire. His sister-in-law is another thing entirely. She's made it her mission to be a dick and irritate him because she could.
I never considered my parents or my old friends to be dicks when they called me by my birth name by accident. And I think most transgendered people are quite aware that it's tough to immediately flip over to a new name and/or gender for anybody after years of being used to another. At least, the ones I know can accept the accidental use of an old name or pronoun if it's done out of habit.
But I don't feel your examples are apt in the slightest. In two of the cases, you've got people trying to "get away" with calling themselves something they don't "deserve" - the car dealer saying he's "honest", and the child saying he's been "good". In the third, you're talking about somebody displaying modesty. Now, let's throw my example into the mix, along with the transgendered person, and let's see if they sound at all similar.
"This child says he's been good, although obviously he hasn't been, so I'm going to continue to call him bad."
"This guy wants to be called Lex, although obviously that isn't his name, so I"m going to continue to call him his birth name."
"This person says she's a man, although obviously she isn't one, so I'm going to continue to call her a woman."
"This singer says she's just OK, but honestly, anybody who's paying attention can see she's a virtuoso."
"This guy says he goes by 'Lex', but honestly, anybody who's paying attention can discover that's not his name."
"This person says he's a woman, but honestly, anybody who's paying attention can see he's a man."
The top sentence in each follows your examples, and I've applied it best I could to the both a transgendered person and to my own situation. I don't see anybody really having an issue with the top sentences - one might ARGUE that the child is was good or the singer mediocre, but they wouldn't have issues with you making your assertions. The second sentence involves me and my name. And notice in this case, the sentences sound a lot more dickish. Because you're no longer arguing against factual things ("the child was misbehaving") or even generic opinions ("I think she's a great singer"), but about how I've expressed I wish to be conveyed to the world. And you're actively arguing against that. "You don't get to choose your name - no matter what nickname you choose, no matter if you change it on your drivers license or birth certificate, you will always be (birth name)."
Whether the third one is more like the first or the second example, I guess, depends on how you view gender. To most people, it's a simple either/or. If you got the dangly bits, you're a man. If you got a hoo-ha, you're a woman. And if you go do hormone therapy or transgender surgery, to many people, you're not suddenly the other gender. You're a man with a hatchet wound, or a woman with a stapled-on penis - end of story.
But as far as I'm concerned, gender is a lot more than that. It's far more between the ears, not between the legs. And it's not as simple as "accepting your factory-installed equipment," or "why don't you just be gay?". The transgendered people I know didn't think it'd be "fun" to be the other gender, because "you get to wear fancy clothes" or "you get to belch at baseball games". Their brains are specifically wired another way. They ARE the other gender, and somehow got the wrong factory equipment. And I often see people acting like gender reassignment is like slipping on a jacket. It's not. It's a process that takes years, that is painfully slow, and usually exceptionally awkward. For years, they usually end up looking somewhere in between. The breasts show up but the deep voice and facial hair is still there, say. And they're stuck either trying to act like a guy with breasts, or like a woman with facial hair and a bosso profundo. Many if not most will lose friends, family members, and jobs - far more often than gays or lesbians do. And this all to get to an undetermined place. They don't know if they'll look "good" at the tail end, or even if they'll be able to easily pass for their true gender when all is said and done. And even after all this, people seem to think they're doing it so they can ogle guys or girls in the fucking bathroom...
Lex
