I am glad that Caitlyn Jenner can be who she really is, but this image brings up a few important points about who else she really is.
One other thing about the cover photo bugged me: if we’re going to celebrate acceptance of her identity, shouldn’t we note that she’s older than I am (she’s 65), yet she gets the full fashion photoshop treatment to make her photo look half her age? Apparently there’s still something shameful about reaching a distinguished age.
Question – Does Caitlyn Jenner carry a Y chromosome? If yes, how can anyone assign a female genotype strictly on the psychological and empathetic desire to do so? Or, does the line separating male/female phenotypes become merely a diffuse individual choice.
Fuck off, esmith4102.
I second @2.
It’s only a quarter to eight and you’ve already won the prize for stupid, clueless comment of the day, esmith4102.
Gender is the result of a complex cascade of developmental and neurological events. You can’t reduce it to a simple chromosomal binary, much as people would like to. Humans are not robots with a switch that’s either off or on.
Ok, who’s going to be the first do a Photoshopped Vanity Fair cover with PZ on it?
That’s just what mainstream magazines do to older women. Magazine Cover Madonna looks nothing like Real Life Madonna.
@RettopNoj, #5:
I’ve been working on it for a few hours already, but despite my best efforts to replicate the Jenner cover, PZ’s dress consistently comes out black and gold!
@lindsay, #6:
And so PZ **shouldn’t** call it out, since it happens to lots of women and not only to Jenner?
I really don’t get where you’re going with that.
Caitlyn who?
Sorry, I don’t get it. Gender is not binary. It is complex and developmental and neurological.
And to show this example of non-binary and complex gender structure, we get a picture of a Marylin Monroe wannabe.
I may be old-fashioned and backwards… but even I can accept that some people don’t want to be reduced to stereotypes (gender or otherwise).
What I cannot understand it when these same people reduce themselved (or let themselves be reduced) to these same stereotypes… only of the opposite binary gender.
Gender may not be “a simple chromosomal binary”… but obviously it can be reduced to tits, shaved legs and long flowing hair.
I heard you can find all sorts of in formation on Google. Useful, that.
Considering that Jenner lives in a reality TV bubble I am not at all surprised that VF chose to make her look as youthful as possible for her grand entrance. My larger concern is what her next steps will be. Is this going to be all about her, or is she going to use her platform to work for transgender acceptance for those who don’t have access to all the best makeup and clothes? And, i prefer to think that Annie Leibovitz uses GIMP instead of Photoshop.
It’s a shame, because someone on another site pointed out that having someone transitioning at Caitlyn’s age is important to say ‘it is never too late to do so’.
Holy fucking shit, so much stupid…
Excuse me while i call some people to show them this stupid so that we can all laugh.
On one hand really happy for her, on the other hand I’m not sure she could possibly be more repulsive as an individual from my perspective. Perhaps if she announced she was a hardcore transmedicalist? I don’t know.
I’m majorly concerned about the inevitable lashing out at the community that seems to happen any time we get any sort of visibility and extremely annoyed, even after one day, with how Caitlyn’s narrative is getting pushed so hard. Her experience couldn’t be any more different from the norm and is so far divorced from the typical trans experience that it really, really worries me that every cis person in existence will be latching onto her as the One True Leader Of The Trans. Also, stay classy #1 and #10, I’m sure the nuance and understanding you can bring to the trans community as a whole is simply invaluable and I absolutely cannot wait for your further involvement.
From the image:
To the butthurt individual who wrote that, I’d like to ask what the “proper” way to be out looks like.
…just so I can laugh in their face.
To answer your apparent confusion… it would be really foolish and reductive to assume that a single transgender person in the media, no matter how unusual or famous or whatever, could possibly be representative of all other trans people? Trans people are actually a lot more diverse than you will find in the media: given the narrow range of acceptable pigeonholes that the media generally use to portray trans people, that suggests a rather basic problem with the media as the conduit for such representations, rather than trans people as a source.
(Apologies if this is a double-post…my browser had an aneurism just now)
From the image:
To the butthurt individual who wrote that, I’d like to ask what the “proper” way to be out looks like.
…just so I can laugh in their face.
clueless me chimes in:
Isn’t Vanity Fair all about Vanity, and being Fair(ly beautiful)? Isn’t it the role of the cover photo to make the model look as beautiful as possible to lure in all those eyes to cause the purchase of the magazine. The print version of “clickbait”?
…
errccchhh, seriously, though:
maybe Leibowitz and Jenner cooperated on the resulting image to project onto that cover. After a long time of dysphoria (and Olympic medals to boot), I think Jenner is entitled to look however SHE wants to be seen. And everyone should respect her wishes, as everyone’s wishes should also be respected (and accepted).
#10 Freodin: It’s safe to assume that Jenner has almost absolute control over those images, and that this is how she chooses to present herself. And whatever her conception of her own gender might be, I can definitely understand wanting to go full out glamour for her coming out event.
Has anyone proposed her as a transgender role model in the same way as Laverne Cox (other than people promoting Jenner’s show)?
PZ,
As someone who has reached a more distinguished age, I don’t care that much about looking young or dressing attractively (much to the dismay of my wife, at times). But that’s me.
For some, appearance is a big part of a person’s self esteem. She can make her debut looking however she likes. Her call.
#17 tove: According to wikipedia, the phrase originally comes from:
The book’s title comes from John Bunyan’s allegorical story The Pilgrim’s Progress,[2] first published in 1678 and still widely read at the time of Thackeray’s novel. In that work, “Vanity Fair” refers to a stop along the pilgrim’s route: a never-ending fair held in a town called Vanity, which is meant to represent man’s sinful attachment to worldly things.
And Thackery’s novel (haven’t read it) is a satire of 19th century UK society.
I get that some people are recieving the message “Now that Caitlyn Jenner embodies the patriarchal physical stereotype of a woman, she IS one!” It shouldn’t take a glamour shoot in which gowns and flowing locks and shaved legs and cleavage and high heeled shoes are featured for someone to be accepted as a woman. That’s how some people seem to be interpreting these images and their association with Caitlyn Jenner at the same time first identifying herself with a female given name and pronouns.
By the same token, its perfectly OK for any woman to want and choose to adopt a very glamorous, commercial version of femininity.
I think it is a really nice example of intersection
She is much more privileged than me in many, many aspects.
But still nobody will ever spew the bile on me Fox and associated scum are currently spewing.
And while it is important not to turn her into an impeccable heroine, I’m also wondering if her being trans doesn’t have something to do with how her actions are being scrutinised while about every cis woman with a similar history gets a pass.
a8mew @ # 15: Perhaps if she announced she was a hardcore transmedicalist?
A clue about that word for a poor boy, please? urbandictionary.com calls it undefined, and a more general search only produces a list of various health-care companies.
Repeated in several comments
Hmm. I’d rather say sex is.
As for gender, you’d have to add on psychological (was that what what meant by “neurological”?), sociological, cultural and political elements.
Unsure where biological influences leak into that mess of possible intercorrelated potential and non-exhaustive non-exclusive causes, but even if there were none and gender were purely an individual choice, should it really matter to us?
Ahh, that’s what I was doing wrong! FIXED.
Pierce R. Butler #23: transmedicalists believe that you need dysphoria in order to be considered trans and in the more extreme cases adamantly cling to the gender binary. They tend to be really, really hard supporters of the medical establishment to the point of borderline worship of the DSM and they frequently insist the main problem keeping a dysphoric trans person from getting treatment is the “transtrenders” lying about it to be cool and get attention.
It’s inconsistent with all current medical knowledge, general consensus in the community and, oddly enough, the DSM itself. They’ve done quite a bit to earn the name “truscum” and, given the utterly absurd amount of harassment and abuse I’ve seen transmedicalists hurl at suicidally dysphoric acquaintances of mine for disagreeing with them, I [i]personally[/i] am not to fond of them and think of them like, say, anti-feminist women.
I find the several of the comments on the cover pretty nasty.
“Has never faced job discrimination, still hasn’t”.
Given the context, this seems to imply that she doesn’t face discrimination in general.
“Wants you to watch her TV series, we don’t have to”
… what?
The only relevant complaint could have been summed up as “is homophobic” (if that happens to be the case). Which could have been accompanied by some proof and a discussion.
I also find it problematic with comments about her not using her platform enough. Coming out this publicly in the face of bigotry is arguably a good use of her platform.
@CripDyke, #8
Yeah, kinda? If you never talk about destructive beauty ideals, but then suddenly bring it up when confronted with a photoshopped trans woman..? That’s the kind of thing bigots love to do, which is why you have to be a bit careful about it.
Genotype? What? Who’s talking about genotypes?
That’s not a line. The whole thing is a continuum, a spectrum; not every point in it is occupied by the same number of people, but none is completely empty.
Maybe start at this Wikipedia article?
a8mew @ # 26 – Thanks for the clarifications!
No matter what the issue, there are always people working to make it worse…
You can’t. Gender =/= sex, you clueless wazzock.
Re #1 comment… Out of interest does anyone reading this know if they have XY, XX, XXY, XO etc etc configuration of chromosomes. I thought you needed a karyotype for that and it’s pretty rare?
@tuibguy #12
I’m not being funny, but she totally has every right to make this all about her. If, after the media fanfare has blown over, she decides “Right, transition done. 65 years of dysphoria finally over. Now I get to kick back.”, then she would be totally within her rights to do so.
Much as I hope she does become supportive of LGBTQ issues, I’ve noticed a disturbing trend recently for people to assume that “out” celebrities, whichever letter of the LGBTQ spectrum they happen to identify as, have some sort of obligation to become activists. They really don’t. Just a famous person coming out helps to normalize the LGBTQ community, and I imagine thatt’s scary enough in and of itself, especially at Jenner’s age.
I know that I’m an XY — I’ve done my own karyotype, many years ago (I also used it to test some chromosome analysis software I developed for amphibian measurements — I know that not only are my chromosomes boringly symmetrical, but that I am not a newt.)
It’s actually fairly easy to do a chromosome squash, although a bit tedious and hard to do well — we thought humans had 48 chromosomes, until 1956, when Tijo & Levan finally got the number right. We could do human karyotyping in basic genetics labs — and I was a TA in class that did that many years ago — but the practice was discontinued for practical and ethical reasons.
1. It’s hard to do right, so students doing it are going to generate a lot of false positives for chromosome aberrations. It might be a fun exercise, but dealing with students freaking out because they think they have Down Syndrome is no fun (No, you don’t. You just screwed up the prep.)
2. Sometimes students will get it exactly right and discover that they have a chromosome abnormality. Trust me, the middle of a noisy group of 20 students who are chattering about their funny chromosomes is not the place to do serious genetic counseling for a student who has just discovered they may be sterile. Also, I’m not qualified to do that.
So bottom line is that you need to get a serious professional to do it. And there aren’t all that many situations where it’s necessary — fertility clinics may offer the service, and it may be done when studying the histology of cancerous or precancerous tissue, but otherwise, it’s mainly a matter of curiosity.
But curiosity is fun. I know I’d love to have a FISH staining of my own karyogram to hang on the wall at home. I’d like to have that even more than an MRI of my brain.
“this image brings up a few important points about who else she really is.”
In a way, that other stuff makes her more of a role model not less. Gender identity doesn’t have a political affiliation. I have some friends who work for a woman who transitioned in her mid-60’s. She’s a total raving gun net and rabidly conservative, with all the baggage that entails. She owns a construction company and drives big trucks. I totally disagree with her politics, but have tremendous respect for her courage and sheer gut-level tenacity.
@27 Daniel Duner — those comments aren’t on the Vanity Fair cover. I’m not sure if PZ photoshopped them in, or whether he found an Internet image that had them on it, but the cover just says “Call Me Caitlyn”.
:O I am so terribly sorry, PZ…
@Daniel Dunér, #29:
Ah, now I understand the criticism. Sure, and I agree that the dynamic you describe is a harmful dynamic.
I would, however, disagree that it applies in this instance.
@Dersk, #14:
And why should they be exempted? All the people who propose her as a “transgender role model” have performed the same act, regardless of motivation.
So are you trying to make a motivation-based distinction? If so, why? And if some US Senator tells her son that he can’t use masculine pronouns in public unless and until he wins an Olympic gold medal in something to prove he’s not a fucked-up, faddish dilettante, why is that senator exempted from motivation-based criticism that you level at those who are employed to promote a television show?
Matt #34
Sure. If you were refering to my comment, I meant that gender identity had a political component in the very broad sense that you* can choose it despite all other considerations (the first is biological -how you were born) up to standing against local societal norms that most people probably won’t regard expressing your inner gender as acceptable. In this sense, gender is also in part a political construct. But this is a local western process of something political. Some cultures have already integrated gender as something more flexible than sex assigned at birth, so that transgender folks are generally accepted as part of society**. (Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean these cultures are devoid of transphobia, but it generally makes the acceptability of being trans much easier).
**If you ask, Polynesian for e.g.
@PZ
So, uh… you got better?
I just know that there may be more kids alive at the end of the year because they saw a successful trans women and learning disabled Olympic superstar looking gorgeous and triumphant on the cover of Vanity Fair.
…in her 60’s.
That can be done badly and still be better than nothing.
The personal is political. She may be a conservative and being stereotypically feminine, but by coming out and being feminine on her own terms and as glamorous as she wants to be she’s being subversive. Yeah, there are other ways to be a woman, but if this is hers, more power to her.
I used to point at her and say, “Honey, there goes a dyslexic who didn’t learn to read until he was an adult. He did great things an you can too.”
Now I can say, “Honey, there goes a trans woman who didn’t come out until her 60’s. She survives, thrives and did great things and you can too.”
She ain’t the hero Gotham deserves, but…
Meanwhile, Marilyn Monroe would probably have loved to overcome her personal struggles and lived to be an overcomer at Jenner’s age.
@41 Crip Dyke
Jesus, how did i miss the “symmetrical” bit?
@37 anbheal
Well, yes, obviously. I was talking about the “fake” cover that PZ posted. Which I’m pretty sure is something he found online.
@39 Crip Dyke
I went through all those search results. All of them were false positives, due to people mentioning photoshop in the comments. You may still be right in that the criticism doesn’t apply, but none of the search results support that. The only post I found that remotely had anything to do with destructive beauty ideals caused by photoshopping was this one:
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2013/02/22/maybe-the-counterbalancing-would-ease-back-pain/
I’m not claiming that PZ is coming from a bad place on this, just that there is a risk of playing into a destructive narrative.
@Jackie:
Trying to be subversive is not the same as actually being subversive.
That said, actual subversiveness depends on what you’re trying to subvert. If Jenner is so immersed in a particular worldview that she thinks it’s a huge priority to subvert the idea that private, household chefs aren’t worth employing if they don’t speak French, well, she can “subvert” that cultural belief, in that tiny culture where it holds, and yet in the process of delivering that message to the masses (because who doesn’t need to hear about the importance of French language skills in your potential chef-hires?) can still be acting in a manner that is regressive as fuck in (sub-)cultures that aren’t the ones she is targeting.
I’m not saying that no trans* kids will be positively affected by Jenner’s publicity-infused coming out. I’m just seriously less optimistic than you about how broadly (inter/culturally speaking) Jenner can effect any subversions.
@Daniel Dunér, #44:
Thanks for your work.
I think we’re each coming from the same place on this, save that I’m certain that PZ has talked about this before.
Maybe, however, I’m hallucinating. Unfortunately it’s been known to happen.
QFT.
Cheers PZ, interesting. I am in the curiosity crowd, although I suspect my chromosomes are also pretty boring it would be interesting to see.
This has all been very triggering for me. I am happy she has been able to come out, and super angry at the same time. I am a student of Crip Dyke’s gender thread and have been lurking about learning and reflecting and hurting so deeply. So I am just gonna say it, about two weeks ago I came out to myself and I am a bit of a mess. I could not have gotten here without FTB community. GULP. I am going to go breathe into a paper bag now. They say it get’s better, I hope so.
@46 Crip Dyke
Sure, there are a few examples. But it’s not a common theme on the blog.
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2014/05/19/why-did-the-old-masters-waste-their-time-painting-fatties/
http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2014/05/20/the-sexbots-are-everywhere/
Usernames @18:
bolding mine.
Please don’t use that word.
Daniel @29:
No, it really doesn’t. The comment specifically refers to job discrimination, which is not the only kind of discrimination that exists.
****
Thumper @34:
QFT.
Caroline @49:
I’m sorry you were triggered.
Thank you for delurking and sharing your story. Feel free to join us in the Lounge, where all manner of topics are open for discussion. Some of us talk about recipes or favorite books. Some of us talk about politics in the US. Some of us post links to interesting news. Others discuss aspects of their personal lives. There is no obligation to comment. Nor is there any obligation to comment on anything specific. One thing that is a hallmark of the commenters in the Lounge-we are very supportive of people.
sez usernames! (ᵔᴥᵔ) @18:
Beggin’ yer pardon, but I’m pretty sure that the phrase “out for herself” in the bit you quoted was intended to mean “mostly/entirely concerned with herself alone”, hence was an accusation of selfishness on Jenner’s part. Kinda doubt that this use of the word “out” was intended to refer to the process by which Jenner revealed her trans*ness to the world-at-large.
That’s a very good question! It’s a bit tricky to work with in this form, because it’s tangled up with gender issues and for cultural reasons it’s hard for people to think clearly about those right now. So let’s move it to some other genetic domain. Suppose a person has gene that guarantees, let’s say, kidney failure at a young age. Would we be justified in giving that person a kidney transplant based on psychological desires (“I don’t wanna die!”) and empathetic desires (“Well, since you feel so strongly about it, I’m motivated to help!”)? I’m going to go out on a limb here and say, yes, that would be justified if the resources were available.
That does mean that the line between people with/without working kidneys is a matter of diffuse individual choice. I imagine that old people had a lot of trouble accepting this back when it first became an possibility – but younger people who grew up with organ transplants can’t even understand why they were ever controversial.
@51 Tony
That’s what it literally says, yes. But my subjective impression was that it tried to imply that she has so much privilege that she doesn’t know what discrimination is. “zomg, she doesn’t even face job discrimination!!!”.
It’s how lists like that work, at least for me. They try to list all the bad things about someone, which creates the impression that the person is generally terrible. It’s an emotional/rhetoric trick.
Daniel @54:
I think you’re reading a subtext in there that doesn’t exist.
@55, Tony
Maybe. I don’t think it’s subtext that PZ would inject if he had made the image. But I think it’s a weird thing to put on that list in the first place. Why list that one discrimination that she (allegedly) doesn’t face? It just stands out to me, as something you’d only list if you wanted to imply that someone doesn’t know what discrimination feels like.
@49, Caroline
Thank you for sharing. Coming out to yourself and being able to speak these words sounds like a really important step. <3
Usernames! (ᵔᴥᵔ)
The phrase “To be out for yourself” has nothing to do with metaphorical closets, you twit. It means looking out for number one first, last and only, and devil take the hindmost.
Daniel Dunér
She’s explicitly stated that she’s a Republican. Voting for people who enact (or try to) homophobic laws makes someone guess what? Why, it makes them homophobic, doesn’t it?
Matt
The hell with her too, then. I have zero respect for her throwing every other trans* person (and gay, bi, female, and nonwhite people) under the bus because of her bullshit. I am at a point now where I cannot respect anyone who identifies as a conservative, full stop.
Thumper
Obligation to become activists? No. Obligation to not go out of their way to fuck other people over? Yes.
Caroline
Best wishes.
Usernames! (ᵔᴥᵔ)
The phrase “To be out for yourself” has nothing to do with metaphorical closets, you twit. It means looking out for number one first, last and only, and devil take the hindmost.
Daniel Dunér
She’s explicitly stated that she’s a Republican. Voting for people who enact (or try to) homophobic laws makes someone guess what? Why, it makes them homophobic, doesn’t it?
Matt
The hell with her too, then. I have zero respect for her throwing every other trans* person (and gay, bi, female, and nonwhite people) under the bus because of her bullshit. I am at a point now where I cannot respect anyone who identifies as a conservative, full stop.
Thumper
Obligation to become activists? No. Obligation to not go out of their way to fuck other people (especially but not limited to people who face similar challenges) over? Yes, same as anyone.
Caroline
Take care. I hope you can really be yourself from now on
+++++
Gender is in 99.99% of cases assigned without looking at somebody’s genitals. That includes all those babies that get pushed around in strollers.
Sex is in 99.99% of cases assigned without looking at somebody’s chromosomes.
Even when you know all this, you can still be wrong.
The best you’re getting anyway is some statistical probablility, so maybe stop treating it as some hard fact.
All I know is that, photoshop or not, Bruce Jenner looked better than me before transitioning, now Caitlyn Jenner looks better than my ex-wife.
She will be discriminated against. At her country club for starters, where there is a male/female segregated pair of restaurants. No idea if she is planning to appeal the decision to relegate her to the less luxurious and not as star-studded portion of the dining facilities.
The expression “twice as good and half as black” comes to mind. I think Caitlyn can be cut a little slack for the need to be twice as conventionally attractive (and perhaps “half as trans”, though parsing exactly what that means is treading on some sticky territory).
If her cover weren’t photoshopped, then mainstream America would just have its assumptions confirmed that trans women look less photoshoppy/”hot” than cis women do. Of course all beauty standards themselves need to die. But we can’t have everything bad die at once; there are complex interdependencies.
Thank you to all the people who responded with kindness and support. I posted a little more on the gender thread and I don’t feel so claustrophobic and panicky. I will check out the lounge.
It seems that her real problems are only just beginning:
http://www.gocomics.com/mikeluckovich/2015/06/02
@ Dalillama #59 & 60
Well yeah, everyone has that obligation. That’s just being a moral human being. But if you read tuibguy’s comment, or even mine where I quoted him, you’ll see we were discussing actively “use her platform to work for transgender acceptance”, rather than passively just not fucking other people over.
@ Caroline #49
‘Grats on coming out; I hope you get all the support you need.
Photoshop can only do so much, she actually must be reasonably attractive in real life to get those results. Also, I imagine pat of her coming out is that she intends to date some people, so appearing attractive will probably help a little with that. I wouldn’t think that wanting to appear attractive implies that getting distinguished is shameful.
I don’t really think it’s a problem to have photoshop on the cover. She’s already putting herself out there, might as well do it in a way that people are accustomed to. Seems perfectly normal to me
#39 Crip Dyke: Well, put it this way. If her publicist says “Caitlyn is a huge transgender role model,” I would be much more skeptical than if you said it. You don’t stand to profit from the perception of her as a role model. It’s really not much in the news over here, so I’m wondering what the tone in the media is back in the States.