"Becoming Chaz"

[EnderD_503]

Originally Posted by apretty

Also, it's bizarre to me that Chaz has a sports-bra tan line. I have never been with any butch/transperson or otherwise that would go out in a sports bra--In the sun! I am sure that I'm not saying this right but it seems to me that there are so many incongruences with his presenting "maleness" and his ease and comfortability with his female-parts. --It's like I blinked and missed that part of the documentary.

Just wanted to talk about this part of your post. I originally raised an eyebrow myself when it came to the sports bra tan lines, but then checked myself. I do know some transfolks who are not as dysphoric as others or some who are barely dysphoric at all. Some transguys might have a male identity and want to have top surgery, but don't feel the same kind of nausea around seeing or exposing their chest pre-op that others feel. We have to be careful not to put all transfolks into the same bucket, so to speak. Extreme dysphoria doesn't necessarily go hand in hand with being trans. Also, I don't think transfolks should be judged on how they bind or if they bind at all, or what they happen to wear/expose etc. It's a bit like transwomen who never have bottom surgery, but who may not entirely exclude their natal sex organs during sex (though it's evidently a different experience on estrogen than without). Or transguys who are ok with using the sex organs they were born with during sex, while others like myself can't stomach the thought of doing so themselves. Everyone's different and I don't think it's possible to judge one's "transness" based on that.

I think what confused me mainly was that Chaz said that since puberty he had suffered a lot of dysphoria and still did up until his op, and that didn't seem to go with the whole tan line thing. But at the end of the day that's really his business and not mine, and all I have are my own feelings as a point of reference and not his.

Anyways, that's my two cents on the sports bra tan line issue.