Feeling the Gender Gap Firsthand

Having Worked in Science as a Man and a Woman, Ben Barres Has Experienced Its Gender Divide From Both Sides
By JUJU CHANG
From ABC News.com

Sept. 27, 2006 — Ben Barres is a world-renowned neurobiologist, whose quiet demeanor is off-set by the twinkle of intensity in his eyes.

With an M.D. from Dartmouth and a Ph.D. from Harvard, Barres is a respected scientist who is known on the Stanford University campus as a great mentor, especially to women.

Barres, a staunch feminist, is deeply offended by the insinuation that women are less talented in science. That may be because Ben Barres spent 40 years of his life as Barbara Barres.

Growing up, Barbara Barres was a tomboy and math whiz who wound up at MIT, despite the fact that her high school guidance counselor discouraged her from applying there.

It was the 1970s, when only 11 percent of MIT's students were women, and Barres described the atmosphere as occasionally sexist.

Once, Barbara Barres solved an equation the professor had designed to stump the class, and was the only one who got it right. But the professor didn't believe a woman could solve the puzzle.

"He looked at me with sort of this disdainful look and said, 'Well, your boyfriend must have solved that for you,'" Barres recalled.

Barbara Barres didn't get credit. And yet, it was the accusation of cheating that got under her skin, not the blatant sexism.

"It was only years and years later that it occurred to me, 'Gee, this was sexism,'" Barres said.

It's possible the sexism didn't register because Barbara Barres never really identified with women. "I certainly did not feel comfortable wearing makeup, wearing jewelry. High heels, things like that, were agony," Barres said. Ironically, the only problem she couldn't solve was deeply personal.

As Barbara Barres in college, she dated only briefly, Barres said. "If anything, I have weak attractions to men. But I really don't have strong attractions to either sex," Barres said, describing himself now as a contented bachelor. His passion, aside from science, is roasting his own coffee, which fills his kitchen with a rich aroma.

Receiving More Accolades as a Man

Today Ben Barres seems comfortable in his skin, but his was a long journey toward self-discovery. It took a breast cancer scare and a mastectomy when Ben was still Barbara to make Barbara realize she'd been living in the wrong body for 40 years.

"I remember that my doctor was kind of horrified at my suggestion that he cut 'em both off while he was at it, and another doctor, a year later, saying, 'Well, don't you want to have reconstructive surgery now?' And I was like, 'No, I am not gonna let anybody put those things back on me.'"

It's been 10 years since Barbara Barres became Ben Barres, with hormones and surgery. And Barres' unique perspective has turned him into a fervent crusader in the debate over whether gender matters in science. In one of the first lectures after his sex change, Barres spoke at MIT.

"Afterward, somebody who was familiar with the work of Barbara Barres apparently was heard to comment, 'Gee, that Ben Barres' work is so much better than his sister's.'" The person said this, evidently not realizing that Ben and Barbara were the same person.

That's a telling anecdote about the way men and women are perceived in the field of science. "There is a presumption that work being done by a man is better than work being done by a woman," said Barres.

When former Harvard president Lawrence Summers caused a firestorm last year by suggesting that women are less innately talented in science than men, Barres called it verbal violence and felt he had to speak up.

"If people treat women as if they are less good, that treatment in itself causes them to be less confident, to choose to leave science," Barres said, adding, "I am always amazed when Larry Summers and others make this comment, because it so flies in the face of the data. A little bit less arrogance would go a long way."

In an impassioned response just published in the journal Nature, Barres references a slew of academic studies that found that women who applied for grants had to do more than twice as much work as men did, and that women at MIT were not getting equal resources, such as lab space.

His point: The gender gap in science has less to do with subtle differences in brain power and much more to do with bias.

Last week, a panel convened by the National Academy of Sciences said women in science and engineering are hindered not by lack of ability but by bias and "outmoded institutional structures."

The report recommends altering procedures for hiring and evaluating scientists, changing typical timetables for tenure and promotion, and providing more support for working parents.


Barres helps to fight bias by lending his hand to the respected Pioneer Award program, the National Institutes of Health's most prestigious prize. As a judge, he worked to make the application process more open, which led to important results.

Barres said the number of women and minority winners shot up from zero percent to nearly 40 percent. "The very best part was that we only discussed who was the best scientist and what was the best science."

And in Barres' perfect world, that's all that should matter.

Pumping Up-Beauty To Die For

TransGriot Note: Transwoman J. Middleton testifying in a 2002 pretrial hearing related to Miami's Vera Lawrence case

One thing that has concerned me over the last few years is silicone pumping parties and the rising number of deaths that have been occurring in various parts of the country as a result of them.

It's not a new phenomenon to me, but I recall being introduced to a young transwoman at a Transgender Initiative meeting a year after I arrived in Louisville. The first question she asked me after the introductions and noting my prominent cheekbones and C-cup breasts was, "Did you get pumped?"

Some of my young sistahs that wish to transition either don't have the funds or don't want to give hormone replacement therapy the time required to make them look 'fishy'. In order to achieve that feminine look they will have (they hope) medical grade silicone injected into their lips, buttocks, cheeks and breasts in order to enlarge them and give them that feminine appearance.

Pumping is also popular among the pageant girls seeking a quick and inexpensive way to enlarge their breasts, hips, and cheeks without resorting to surgery. An underground network of unlicensed providers has sprung up in various parts of the country to provide those services at 'pumping parties'. At these parties groups of people gather at a central location to get injected or share at prices ranging from $250 to $1000 a shot.

But as the 2003 Vera Lawrence case pointed out, it's not just transgender women who are doing it. Genetic women are also going to pumping parties to enhance their looks. But that desire can have fatal consequences.

Vera Lawrence died after having 12,000 cc of industrial grade silicone injected into each of her buttocks at a Miami area pump party. The case garnered media attention because the person accused of administering the fatal injections was transgender. In July 2003 Mark Hawkins was sentenced to 30 years and Viva Hendrix to 5 years for their roles in Ms. Lawrence's death, but Hawkins' conviction was overturned.

The FDA has never approved the marketing of injectable liquid silicone for any cosmetic purpose, including the treatment of facial defects or wrinkles, or enlarging the breasts. Besides the risk of death, the adverse effects of liquid silicone injections have included movement of the silicone to other parts of the body, inflammation and discoloration of surrounding tissues, and the formation of granulomas (nodules of granulated, inflamed tissue).

One of the other risks from pumping is the possibility of acquiring HIV. If one of the participants is infected and shares a needle with another person, then that infected person will spread the virus with everyone who shared a silicone shot with her.

I'm not a fan of pumping parties. My advice is to use hormones to get the desired look. It took your mothers, aunts and sisters about 10 years to get their curves, breasts and hips, so why rush the process? I do understand the overwhelming desire to look as realistic as possible, but long-term health problems or death as a result of a short term desire to look 'fish' is a losing proposition.

But to all the transwomen (and genetic ones) reading this, if you insist on doing so after all the warnings that myself and medical professionals have given about the dangers of loose silicone roaming through your body, then that's on you.

I want to look my best, too. Using loose silicone to accomplish that isn't part of my game plan and never will be. Beauty is not worth dying over.

New Game Plan

Another guest column I wrote that was published by THE LETTER in August 2003
-----------------------------------------
New Game Plan
By Monica Roberts
Copyright 2003, THE LETTER


During the summer of 2002 I wrote an article directed at the
Caucasian male to female transsexuals in the community. I stated to
them that they are now considered whether they like it or not,
minorities, and the old rules of white male privilege that they are
used to operating under don't apply. Some of my own people have hard
heads too, so I'm now going to turn my attention to African-American
transgendered peeps.

I've been observing the Black GLBT community since the early 80's, and
I've been considered one of the trail blazing leaders in the national
trans community since 1998. One of the things that I admire about the
Caucasian trans community is that there is far more discussion and
information sharing concerning the process of transition than among
my own people.

And why is that happening? I believe that too much time is spent in
the African-American trans community focusing on having sex and
partying instead of intelligently discussing the process that leads
to us becoming recognized in the eyes of mainstream society as a
female. I witnessed too many Black T-girls who allow their lives to
get wrapped up in the short term pleasures of having a 'husband' or
finding 'trade' to sleep with for the night. There is much more to
being a woman than swallowing estrogen, developing a feminine body,
and spreading your legs or bending over to screw everything that
moves. That short-sighted thinking is dangerous, and has probably put
the entire African-American community at risk.
When studies like the 2000 Washington DC Transgender Needs Assessment
show that 32% of our sisters are HIV-positive out of a sample group
of 250 people, it's time to consider a new game plan.

Another is the fact that those T-girls who have acquired the
knowledge on how to transition jealously guard it like the secret
recipe for Kentucky Fried Chicken. The persons who've already
transitioned want to cut out the potential competition. I remember
bumping into that problem when I was trying to find out how to get
the process started back in 1981. Most of the girls I asked were
tight-lipped on where they got their hormones, who did their hair,
or the other points of Transition 101. They ignored me instead
of seeing me as another human being who wanted to get to the place
where they were. They had forgotten the cardinal rule of the African-
American community: Each one, teach one. The spread of the
Internet has largely eliminated this problem, since much of the
information that I was seeking at that time is readily available
online.

Just once I'd like to see discussions for example, on what's
happening with T-sistas in various parts of the country. I'd like to
see us form our own organizations so that we can openly discuss
what's on our minds, and try to bridge the gaps between the
professional T-girls, the club T-girls, and the street T-girls.

I'd love to see T-sistas show up in significant numbers one
September at Southern Comfort in Atlanta or have our own.
I'd love to have conversations with them about aspects of the
transition process that are working their nerves. I've love to be
able to network with other T-sisters to build a foundation for a
nationwide support apparatus. I'd like to see African-American T-
sisters write about their feelings, how they grew up,
what drama they dealt with, what age they started the change, and
have them published in gay and straight media.

Most of all, I'd love to see the professional T-girls come out, if
possible,and become role models for the next generation of T-kids.
I'm in contact with many African-American T-girls who are college
educated. Some are holding advanced degrees. They are working in
various professional fields, and a few I know are wives and mothers
successfully raising children.
It's sad that unlike Caucasian T-kids, many of our T-kids have never
been exposed to a successful professional T- person who looks like
them. That's critically important in building our T-kids self esteem
and showing those kids that there is another path besides sex work
to a better life.

Finally, we need to impress upon people that transition is a slow
time-consuming process, and a major life altering decision. There
are no shortcuts, so put the silicone away. Your mother and your
sisters had years to learn everything about Femininity 101, and their
bodies developed over time. In my case, I started transitioning at
age 27, so I not only had to learn everything about femininity (and
I'm still learning at age 40), but at that moment I needed to have
the level of knowledge appropriate for a 27 year old Black woman.
The rub was that I didn't have 27 years to learn it.

How I did it was asking questions of my genetic female sisterfriends,
accepting the advice that they gave me, and observing their behavior
in various social situations To paraphrase the old joke about
getting to Carnegie Hall, the best way to become a woman when you
weren't immersed in femininity at birth is practice, practice,
practice. Much of my early progress in assimilating into Black
womanhood happened because of the help I received, and still get to
this day.

We Black T-girls have a lot to live up to. Black women are the
mothers of civilization, and we have a long, proud history of
achievement and success despite tremendous odds. I look at it as an
honor and a privilege to finally become part of that sacred circle
after being on the outside looking in for so long.

Anybody else care to join me?

The Recruiting Visit

A short story by Monica Roberts

Dedicated to all the GLBT peeps either deployed in Iraq or serving in the military.








Paula Morgan was in the bathroom applying her favorite shade of lipstick when the doorbell rang. She put on a final coat and checked her appearance in the mirror before heading over to answer the front door.
“Yes?”
“Good evening ma’am. Sorry to disturb you. Is Tracy home?”
“Yes, but we’re leaving in 30 minutes. Who are you?”
“I’m Sergeant McGill from the Armed Forces Career Center. I would like to talk to him about possible career options in the military.”
“I know he was thinking about that during his freshman year. Come on in.”
“Thank you ma’am. Since y’all have somewhere to go I’ll be brief.”
“Would you like something to drink?”
“Water would be just fine for me, Ms. Morgan.”

Paula returned with two glasses of water as Sergeant McGill took a look around the modestly decorated living room of the Morgan home. In one corner were several large trophies in addition to the academic awards that Tracy had earned. He also took a look at the family photos perched upon a bookshelf. In addition to pictures of Tracy at various ages he noticed several pictures of an attractive young woman who resembled a younger version of the curvaceous lady sitting next to him. There was a large one of the same young woman wearing a cap and gown. But as he recalled his earlier conversations with Tracy he never remembered him mentioning that he had a sister.

“You must be very proud of Tracy.”
“Yes, I am. My baby’s graduating with honors.”
“Yes ma’am. We noticed that he had excellent scores on his SAT and ACT tests. He also scored very high on the Military Aptitude Test.”
“Tracy’s always been a smart child. Couldn’t understand why he wanted to join the military.”
“It’ll give him an opportunity to travel the world and develop his leadership skills “
“That is true. Tracy’s grandfather was in the Marines.”
“Really?”
“Montford Point Marine. He fought at Iwo Jima.”

Paula checked her watch. They'd been sitting there talking for fifteen minutes and Tracy still hadn’t appeared yet. “Baby, we need to be leaving soon. What’s taking you so long?”
“Just packing the rest of my stuff, Mom.”
Paula returned her attention to the handsome recruiter sitting on her couch as he asked,” So you two are leaving on a trip?”
“Actually, it’s for a competition here in town.”
“A competition?”
At that moment Tracy yelled from the bedroom, “Mom, I can’t find my black pumps.”
“Oh, I’m sorry baby, I borrowed them for my date last night. Check my closet”
“Okay.”
“And hurry up. You know you need to be checked in for the pageant by 7.”
“Pageant?” stammered Sergeant McGill. He took another look at the graduation photo and realized the young woman he was looking at was Tracy.
“Yes, Tracy’s so talented. Does a killer Patti LaBelle impersonation and is building quite a reputation in the femme queen ranks in the ball community. Those are his trophies in the corner.

Sergeant McGill tried to digest the news as she continued. “I always knew there was something different about him when he was growing up. Not long after he took that military test I caught him dressed in my clothes. When I asked him why, he confessed to me that he was unhappy as a boy and wanted to be a girl."
Paula took another sip of her water as she continued. "All that matters to me is my child's happiness. If that means he becomes my daughter, so be it. The only reason that Tracy was considering joining the military was that he thought it would make a man out of him.”
“Ms. Morgan, no one needs to know that Tracy's transgendered. Just looking at that graduation photo I couldn't tell. It would still be a wonderful...”
“Spare me the sales pitch, Sergeant. I’m not allowing my only child to join the military for that superficial reason so he can be shot at in Iraq. If this so-called War on Terror isn’t important enough for rich folks kids to fight in it, then I’m not sending my child over there, either.”

There was silence for a few moments before Paula checked her watch and said in an urgent tone, “Tracy, let’s go.”
“I still can’t find my black Nine West pumps.”
“Then get my J. Renee’s. But make sure those thieving queens don’t get their paws on them while you’re onstage.”
“Yes ma’am.”
Sergeant McGill turned to Paula and said,” Ms. Morgan, thank you for your hospitality, but I need to go.”
“Yes, you do. Goodbye, sergeant.”

Sergeant McGill rose to leave. Just before he opened the front door Tracy emerged into the living room carrying a hanging bag. Tracy’s face was perfectly made up and she was wearing a short Baby Phat top with jeans that hugged her unmistakably feminine curves. Tracy's shoulder length black hair was bone straight and nails were freshly done in a French manicure.
The sergeant pivoted to leave, closed the front door of the Morgan home and walked to his car.
“Damn, looks like I won’t be making my quota this month, either." he muttered to himself as he got behind the wheel of the car and slammed the door shut.

I Am A Houston Sistah

An MKR Poem

I am a Houston sistah that’s strong, proud and free
I am a Houston sistah that’s as fly as she can be
I am a Houston sistah cognizant of her history
And striving to live up to that powerful legacy

The ’Yellow Rose of Texas’ song is legendary
Cause Emily Morgan’s beauty changed the course of history
She mesmerized Santa Anna, let the historical record show
Just before the decisive battle at San Jacinto

Debbie Allen and Phylicia Rashad are the sistahs that we see
In front and behind the cameras doing quality TV
They both have style and grace, shoot they were born that way
They’re homegirls that grew up in the ward that we know as The Tre’

Barbara Jordan has her roots planted in H-town, too
She moved from Wheatley High school to the campus of TSU
Her distinctive speaking voice rang out so eloquently
On a political journey from the Nickel to DC

There’s another sistah that hails from the 7-1-3
Moved on from teaching ‘cause her heart is grounded spiritually
For this statuesque woman it really ain’t no thang
But people sho’ love to hear Yolanda Adams sang

Oops, there’s another sistah that I almost failed to mention
She has Jay-Z’s and many peeps undivided attention
My comments about sistah girl will definitely be non-malicious
Beyonce Knowles is a beauty that puts the booty in bootylicious

To all the Houston transplants, on y’all I’m not gonna hate
Cause some of y’all weren’t blessed to be born inside of Beltway 8
Mad props to our congresssistah who was born in NYC
What up to the Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee

Before I go gotta send some love the Houston Comets way
The first dynasty that dominated the WNBA
Much love to our evacuee sistahs who are moving here to stay
From New Orleans L-O-U-I-S-I-A-N-A

I am a Houston sistah, too that’s strong, proud and free
I am a Houston sistah that’s as fly as she can be
I am a Houston sistah cognizant of her history
And always striving to live up to this powerful legacy

Y’all Love Madea But Hate on Me

An MKR Poem

Black America, I hate the hypocrisy
Of you loving Madea but hating on me
It’s clear for the whole wide world to see
How you treat your transgender family

Spending the cash to see a drag show
But if your child’s transgender, out the door they go
To a cruel and tragic street way of life
Filled with anguish, torment and strife

Homies riffing on transwomen every day
Then roll into gay nightclubs and wanna play
Desiring the gurls with something extra
And begging and pleading for her to sex ya

Black churchgoers sending love Tyler Perry’s way
How much love would they show him if he were gay?
RuPaul’s already answered your question, silly
Miss Thang’s reception has been quite chilly

You Black gay peeps ain’t off the hook
Time to read y’all like a discount book
We’re not mocking gender roles, boo
Wanna honestly live our lives just like you

Whether you’re butch, femme or SGL
We’re Black, proud and all catching hell
Our enemies think we’re all lower than maggots
And just like you they call me faggot

Taking a moment to shed a tear
For my sistahs that are no longer here
For many reasons they met an untimely demise
My transsistahs be happy, be careful, be wise

We ain’t asking for much, don’t want any pity
Just show us some love in all the chocolate cities
Now run tell this to your daddy and mama
We’re sick and tired of all the ignorance and the drama

Black America, please don’t be so mean
Y’all show Madea much love on the silver screen
Your transgender brothers and sistahs hope and pray
You’ll show us the same level of love someday.

I pray that I live long enough to see
The day y’all love Madea
And unconditionally love me

I Am Woman

By D. Cookie Fields as told to Michelle Burford
from Essence Magazine
November 2006 edition


As a man he joined the Marines, married the love of his life and had two children. All the while he struggled with the sense that he was meant to live his life as a woman. One day he decided to make a change.


As far back as I can remember, I had felt like a stranger in my own body. As an only child growing up among rambunctious boy cousins and friends in a working class Chicago suburb, I knew I wasn't quite 'right.' I think my mother suspected something, too. When I was 4 she found me coloring my fingernals with crayons.
"Little boys don't do that," she whispered as put away the Crayolas and scrubbed my nails clean. Later I would borrow her skirts, earrings and shoes to play dress up. I often told her I that I felt different, not like other boys. "What do you mean," my mother would say. "You fit with our family." I know she had no idea how it felt to me-a girl trapped in a boy's body. Back then my parents could not have conceived that I would one day board a plane to Thailand as their son, D, and return as their daughter Cookie.

By the time I reached adolescence, I regularly dressed up as a woman, though I knew enough then to hide it. If Mom discovered my stash of heels, dresses, bras and makeup hidden in the house, she admonish me by saying "You've got to stop this!" But neither she nor my father ever had a direct conversation with me about my cross-dressing. Maybe they thought it was a phase I'd outgrow. I never did.


LOVE AND MARRIAGE

I wasn't gay. I've never once been drawn to a man, nor have I ever had sex with a man. I am only attracted to women. At 17 I had intercourse for the first time. What I recall most was the feeling of intimacy-the kissing, the caressing, the closeness. The only part I didn't enjoy was the penetration. When I was still living in a man's body a girlfriend once told me, "Making love to you is like making love to a woman."

And yet I did everything possible I could to seem as manly as possible. After graduating from high school in 1977, I joined the Marines and moved to South Carolina. Within months, I had worked my way up to the head of uniform inspections. I still felt a compulsion to cross-dress sometimes, but I'd sneak off the base to do it. Then in 1980, when I was 20, the military relocated me to Los Angeles. There for the first time I met other cross-dressers like me. And I met transsexuals-those who'd had sex-change surgery. Though we all fell under the acronym LGBT(lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender), I discovered that even in this group I was atypical, in that most male cross-dressers are attracted to other men. Still for the first time in my life I felt understood. It was such a relief to know I wasn't alone.

In Los Angeles I also met the woman I would marry. I saw her sitting with her sisters at a military social and asked her to dance. She turned me down, but her sisters, both military wives, urged her to give me a chance. I must have seemed perfectly respectable with my short Marine Corps fade. We exchanged phone numbers, and soon I was seeing this woman with the unforgettable smile every weekend. Eventually moved in together on the military base. That's when she found my women's clothing.

"Whose are these?" she asked me. Nervously I told her the truth-that I liked to dress up as a woman. The obvious questions followed: "What do you get out of it?" "Are you gay?" I tried to reassure her that I simply felt most comfortable when I cross-dressed, and that I'd never had sex with a man or been unfaithful to our relationship. She was confused and disturbed by my desire, but our relationship was so good in every other way that she stayed, and in 1982 we got married. We had a son soon after, and two years later a daughter.

I would sneak off to Hollywood at least one weekend each month dressed as a woman. In the first few years of our marriage, my wife stumbled across more and more of my women's clothes, and with each discovery, the strife between us intensified. "Just don't bring your life into our house," she'd tell me. I began keeping my wigs, heels, purses, earrings, nail polish and lipstick in the garage. I understood why she and almost every other person in the world would never get it, but I felt so compelled to cross-dress that I couldn't give it up. The most I could do was promise my wife that I wasn't sleeping around. Even with my secret hovering over us, we enjoyed a fulfilling sex life. So we each did what we had learned how to do: live in the space of denial.

DON'T ASK, DON'T TELL

Then came the night that my 11-year old daughter saw me dressed up as a woman. I'd come home late to find the garage door locked, so I'd gone to another door. When I passed my daughter's bedroom, she woke just in time to glimpse her father in a skirt, wig and red lipstick. The next day she said, "You we're dressed as a woman last night." She didn't seem upset, but I insisted she was mistaken. I felt so guilty about lying to my child, but I was convinced she would find my behavior confusing. I told myself I was protecting her.

In the months that followed, I escaped to Hollywood with increasing frequency. Somehow I felt more myself with my transgender friends than I did anywhere else. One Sunday, sitting in church with my family, listening to the minister preach about living an authentic life, I felt as if my heart would shatter from the pain of living such a lie. I knew then that I would never be happy as a man. That was the day I began to think about becoming a woman.

Though I still loved my my wife deeply, our marriage, undermined for so many years by my secret excursions, finally collapsed under the weight of them. I'll never forget the night we told our children we were separating. "Does this have anything to do with that night I saw you dressed up?" my daughter, then 12, asked me. I confessed that it did. My son, who was 14, looked at me in stunned silence. I can only imagine how difficult it must have been for him to grasp that I didn't want to be a man. Even now, though we have a pleasant relationship, he won't discuss it.
I wish I knew how to explain it to him.

By the time we got divorced, I had started taking hormones (progesterone and estrogen pills) to grow breasts. The hormones also made my voice higher, and I underwent electrolysis to remove my facial hair. After four months, my C-cup breasts were definitely noticeable. Since I was still in the military, I wore a sports bra to flatten my chest and used a stall when forced to change clothes at the base. But the strain of hiding was getting to me, so after 15 years of active service, I joined the reserves and applied for a job as a police officer with the LAPD. During my required physical I had to take off my shirt for an EKG. The technician was shocked to see my full breasts! But after an awkward moment she never said a word.
I still don't know why she never told my supervisor. After that, I wore bulletproof vests on duty, so my secret remained safe.

MY NEW BODY

I decided to go ahead with a sex change in 2001. I told my wife ex-wife and my children first. At the time my son was 19 and living with his mother, and my daughter was 17 and living with me. Maybe because she'd seen me all those years ago, she supported my choice to have a sex change. My ex-wife and son were a little more distant, but they, too, promised to be there for me.

Next I wrote a letter to my parents explaining what I'm sure they had expected: I was living as a woman everywhere, except at work. After my marriage ended, all my relationships had been with lesbian or bisexual women. I was so exhausted with my double life. I wanted to align my exterior with who I'd always been inside. The news must have roked my parents to the core, but when I telephoned them later, my mother simply said "I always knew," while my father was characteristically silent. I didn't expect either of them to understand or accept my choice. I'm just grateful that they heard me.

I know there are many who would call my lifestyle a moral abomination. But at my church, Unity Fellowship, I've been taught that we're each here for a unique purpose. God could have created me as a woman, but for some reason didn't. That's why I'm so sure I was put on Earth to take this journey. It's not as if I heard God speak through parted clouds, but in my heart I just knew a sex change was the right path for me.

My surgery lasted five hours and cost $5,000. I chose to have it done in Bangkok, Thailand, because one of the pioneers of transgender surgery operates there, and his price is half of what I thought I would pay in the United States. My friend Stephanie came with me. Together we boarded a plane and landed halfway around the world so that I could become a woman. If this isn't the journey you want me to take, I whispered to God during the 26-hour flight, then please just let me die on the operating table.

The doctor explained the procedure. They would remove my testicles, scrotum and half my penis using a laser, then invert the remaining skin to create a vaginal cavity. I signed the waiver and checked into the hospital early the next day. Five hours later, I awakened on a gurney with a row of bandages across my pelvic area and no pain. I stayed in the hospital a week, marveling at the possibilities of my new life. The afternoon I was released, Stephanie and I went shopping. I know it's hard to believe, but the only soreness I experienced was when the doctor pulled off the bandages. What I saw in the mirror amazed me, a vagina so perfect it looked like I'd been born with it.

I've since retired from the LAPD and now work as a security guard. I date women exclusively, and I alwys tell them about my surgery. Sensation has returned to the tissue used to create my vagina, and sex with my new body is exponentially more satisfying. I feel blessed because I have the most any transsexual can hope for: a family that stands by me. When people see me in my uniform now, I let them refer to me as whatever gender they believe I am. Most suspect that I used to be a man, but how they see me doesn't really matter. What matters is that at last I am a woman at home in her body.


D. Cookie Fields lives in Los Angeles. She told her story to Michelle Burford, a writer who lives in New York

November 2006 TransGriot Column

Justice? Or Just-Us?
Copyright 2006, THE LETTER

November is a bittersweet month for me. I’ll be taking part along with other transgender community members November 20 in the local Transgender Day of Remembrance ceremony. It will happen at the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

What is the TDOR? It’s an event that takes place to memorialize the more than 200 plus people we have lost due to anti-transgender violence. It was started in reaction to the November 28, 1998 murder of Rita Hester, a Boston African-American transwoman. This homicide happened seven weeks after Matthew Shepard’s slaying in Wyoming.

When Rita was disrespected in the gay and straight press by being called ‘he’, having her name placed in quotation marks and being called a sex worker despite living 20 years as a woman, local transactivists erupted in outrage. They were already upset over the verdict that was handed down in the May 1997 Chanelle Pickett trial. She was an African-American transwoman killed in her home by William Palmer after being picked up by him at a Boston GLBT club. Palmer was only convicted of assault and battery, given a 2 ½ year jail sentence with six months of it suspended and five years probation.

Rita Hester’s death gave San Francisco activist Gwen Smith the impetus to begin the Remembering our Dead web project. She also helped organize a 1999 San Francisco candlelight vigil that has grown into a worldwide event. The LPTS has sponsored an observance since 2002 and I was honored to be the featured speaker for the inaugural 2002 event and the 2003 one.

How big a problem is anti-trans violence? According to a September 2005 Amnesty International report, over 3068 people worldwide have been killed due to anti-transgender violence over the last 30 years. 92% of those cases are still waiting to be solved.

One distressing aspect of the 11-page AI report is police misconduct and abuse of transgender people. It contained summaries of the testimony of 23 New York City transwomen who described mistreatment at the hands of police officers. Those stories combined with the cavalier way that many police departments handle assaults and crimes committed against transgender people have contributed to a climate of mistrust, loathing and fear of the police in the transgender community.

An example of this is a recent July 10 attack in which transwoman Christina Sforza was attacked by the manager of a New York City McDonalds with a lead pipe for going to the women’s bathroom. The staff allegedly chanted ‘kill the faggot’ during the assault. When the victim’s friend called NYPD, the officers arrested Ms Sforza and charged her with assault.

When she was released from jail, according to TransJustice she attempted to file a complaint at the NYPD Midtown South Precinct against the manager on six separate occasions. In addition to each request being denied, Ms Sforza encountered harassment, extremely long wait periods, and was threatened with arrest for "filing a false report."

Unfortunately that’s the reality that transpeople deal with. It’s never far from our minds that each and every one of us could one day find ourselves in a similar situation facing a potentially violent and possibly fatal confrontation with a transphobe. We bow our heads, say a prayer that it doesn't happen and exhale. When we do hear about cases like Ms Sforza’s we shake our heads and say to ourselves ‘there but for the grace of God go I’.

You have to ask yourself; what about this transwoman so threatened this guy that he assaulted her just for going to the bathroom? And what's up with NYPD not doing their job and investigating the assault or allowing the victim to press charges?

I don't care whether you hate me or not, I do have the constitutional right as an American citizen to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Just because you hate me doesn't give you the right to assault me, kill me or jack with my civil rights to make you feel superior.

Welcome to Minority Status

Transgriot Note: One of my first published articles. I was expressing my frustration at the time (2003) with white transwomen and my perception that despite transitioning to womanhood, they were desperately attempting to hold on to White Male Privilege.)

Congratulations! If no one else has done so, let me be the first person to welcome you to minority status. You are now about to experience firsthand what I and other people of color have seen and grown up with since birth. I know you are a little disoriented trying to adjust to being transgendered, so I will happily help you out by giving you the four-one-one on how to cope with your new station in life.

The first order of business is to get it through your heads that you are no longer part of the white male clique, so quit trying to hang on to white male privilege like a wino clutching his last bottle of MD 20/20. News flash: You gave up your claim to white male privilege the second that you took your first hormones and began developing a feminine body. Your former colleagues now see you as a confused soul who surrendered your membership in the fraternity, and worst of all is getting rid of the Almighty Phallus. You are nothing more than a traitorous queer, excuse the expression, to them and you will be severely punished for your 'crime'.

Get used to the fact that you will be looked upon as 'the enemy'. You are more dangerous to your former gender colleagues because you were once one of them and know their secrets. They are going to do whatever is necessary to ensure that you are NEVER their equal. That includes negative comments, stereotypical statements, disinformation and outright lies told about you by them in the print and broadcast media outlets they control.

Let's touch upon the financial aspect of your new minority status. You are now going to have to work twice as hard for less pay. If you mess up at work, you will not get multiple chances to hang on to that job. In some cases you can compile an exemplary work record and still be terminated. When you begin searching for employment, you will constantly run into the maddening situation of being passed over for jobs that you are eminently qualified for in favor of someone who doesn't have your educational background or experience. The same dynamic will apply when you are employed and get repeatedly passed over for promotions.

I know it's going to be tough on you, and unlike transpeople of color you're not used to being in this situation. Hey, I've never been part of the brotherhood, either. One advantage that I've obtained over you is that I along with many other people of color have been equipped since birth with the coping skills and mental fortitude necessary to operate in this problematic environment. This is the first time in your life that you have had to deal with discrimination, less-than-equal treatment, someone discounting your intelligence, or the realization that someone hates you simply because of who you are.

Speaking of someone hating you for who you are, as a new minority member you must be vigilant about your personal safety. There are some people out there who will read that cultural disapproval of transgendered people as a signal that it is okay for them to do whatever they want to you, up to and including murder, without fear of retribution.

Think I'm kidding?

Ask Chanelle Pickett's family in Boston what her killer was sentenced to. Ask Tyra Hunter's mother in Washington DC what happened to the EMT who stopped treating her after a car accident once he found out that Tyra was transgendered. If you have an Internet connection, check out Gwen Smith's Remembering Our Dead list. It has grown to over two hundred names and counting, so watch your back when you go out.

As a minority an understanding of politics and how it works is now essential to your survival. You can no longer afford to be apathetic to what goes on in City Hall, your county courthouse, your state capitol building, or Capitol Hill because you don't have the influence you once had. You can't ignore the court system, either. If you do, yo do so at your peril. Just ask the transgendered people who have turned to the legal system expecting simple justice and gotten screwed in the process by judges injecting their personal biases in their opinions.

Politics and the law will now be used as a weapon against you. You must concern yourself with electing candidates whose primary mandate is to strengthen civil rights laws in this country, not weaken them. It is vital that you know the difference between your friends and your enemies. You will now have to immediately learn how coalition politics works and how to come together with your partners to fight a common foe. Unfortunately that's something the T-community still hasn't learned how to do, and we're running out of time to get it right.

You will hear in the course of your interaction with other transgendered people the term 'horizontal hostility'. It refers to he vicious cycle of good people putting their necks on the line and offering their talents to help lead this community, and then quitting in frustration. Many times it is because they are tired of defending themselves from the very people that reap the benefits of their hard work, the street trannies and the stealth trannies quivering in their closets. Neirher group is doing anything constructive to help us gain our rights, but excel in posting destructive comments on transgendered Internet lists criticizing the people who are.

The street trannies rail about 'elitist' sellout conservative trannies not caring about the plight of their poor brethren working the streets. When those so-called 'elitist' trannies call their bluff and offer their help, they'll defiantly huff that they don't want their handouts. The stealth trannies want nothing more than to protect their closeted status. They whine that if the activists would just leave well enough alone and stop rocking the boat, everything will be fine and our enemies will move on to other targets.

Hate to tell you this, but it ain't happening. The high yellow passing argument in which this misguided lament is descended from didn't work during the Civil Rights Movement, and this one won't fly either. The Religious Right doesn't have 'godless communism' to pick on anymore. They tried to take on the feminists and have been battled to a standstill. We are now the people that the Pat Robertson's and Jay Sekulow's of the world are gunning for. They are turning transgendered peeps into the bogeyman they need to generate the funds they require to keep their organizations viable. We are the peeps that they are going to use to justify to their money men (once again predominately white males) that they can win for a change and we'd better be ready to oppose them.

Before we can even think about building a community, we T-people must overcome the shame and guilt issues that plague us. We need a new attitude. We should be mature enough to realize that we are not going to be in lockstep agreement on many issues, and we must respect our fellow T-people who express divergent opinions. We need to accept constructive criticism that comes from individuals within the community instead of viciously attacking the messenger.

We must also stress personal responsibility. Like it or not, you must conduct yourself as a role model. My behavior in society reflects on you as a transgendered person, and what you do reflects on me. What we both do impacts the entire transgendered community, and we need to be sensitive to that. That 'rugged individualist' John Wayne mentality no longer applies. You are now a minority and you must be better than the society at large that we interact with.

We must be proud of being transgendered human beings. There is an old African-American saying: Nothing you know is worth anything if you don't know how to be proud of yourself. In terms of expressing that pride, we must not only talk the talk, but walk the walk. Too many of us are content to hide in the closet. Thanks to the Littleton and Gardiner cases and the Religious Right retraining their targets on us, that will not be a viable option much longer.

If the Right is going to come after me, I'd rather be in a fighting stance battling tooth and nail for my constitutional rights than in a kneeling position submitting to whatever evil they have planned for us. I hope you feel the same way, too. Your life depends on it!

Welcome to minority status.

The Night I Almost Became A Hate Crime Victim

In 1996 I almost became a hate crime victim.

I was visiting a friend's apartment after coming back from my session with my Galveston based gender therapist and endo. We were having such a great time running our mouths that I didn't leave her place until a little after ten pm.

I was a half mile from my complex and had been picking up some weight from the HRT, so I decided to get some exercise and walk down Bissonnet. It's a heavily traveled four-lane divided major street in SW Houston. The traffic in that section of it between Fondren Road and the South Braeswood split after ten p.m. is pretty light until you get past the Southwest Freeway and it picks up again.

I was still clad in the nice dress, hose and heels I wore to my appointment and was headed westbound on my merry way home when a car passed me with four young brothers in it. They slowed down to check me out, then did a U-turn and headed eastbound.

At that moment my intuition kicked in at red alert level. I was alone and still a long way from home. Bissonnet has a METRO bus route that runs until 2 AM but that bus wasn't due at my location for at least 30 minutes.

While I was considering my options I noted that the car had executed another U-turn and was headed back in my direction. I had to move fast and decided to immediately cross the street and duck into a condo complex.

I watched in horror as the homeboys parked in a lot precisely where I would have to walk to get home. I could see them but thankfully they couldn't see me and I decided to wait them out.

After a nerve racking 20 minutes I watched them start the car, pull off and head eastbound on Bissonnet. When they were out of my sightline and I was certain they weren't coming back, I emerged from my hiding place just in time to see the westbound 65 Bissonnet bus letting people off at the stop just two blocks up the street from me. I quickly walked to the next stop and caught it the rest of the way home.

I have no doubts that if I hadn't crossed the street I would have possibly become a victim of a sexual assault. That assault would have turned even uglier once they found the little surprise hiding in my panties. There is no way with my reduced strength level I would have been able to fight four pissed off guys.

That night permanently drove home the message that safety was now a major priority in my life. The Lynn Vines incident in Baltimore, Amanda Milan's murder and the Tyra Hunter tragedy underscored the fact that some of the violence and ignorance that has been visited upon African-American transpeeps has unfortunately been from our own people.

If I hadn't listened to my instincts, I might not be here typing my story right now.

Being True To Themselves

Transgender people are born one gender but identify with other

By Angie Fenton
afenton@courier-journal.com
The Courier-Journal

Monica Roberts gently circled a fingertip around the lip of her
coffee cup, the perfect manicure a stark contrast to such large,
strong hands.

"Gender is who you are," said Roberts, 42, an organizer of a
conference this week in Louisville for transgender people. "Sex is
what you do and who you do it with."

For the past 16 years, Roberts, who was born male, has been living as
a female, since finding the ability to accept herself, with the help
of a therapist, and receiving hormone therapy.

As to whether she's undergone sex reassignment surgery -- a procedure
that alters a person's physical appearance and function of their
existing sexual characteristics to that of the other sex -- Roberts
considers that her personal business.

She does admit that once the body matches the internal feelings, it's
a huge relief.

"When we finally do get to the surgery, it's icing on the cake," she
said.

"I've always looked at life through a feminine prism. It's nothing I
did consciously," Roberts said. "The only thing that's wrong with us
is the discrimination that's happening to us."

No one has hard, fast statistics on the total number of transgender
people -- individuals whose gender identity and the way in which they
express it differs from the gender they were assigned at birth.

But according to the World Professional Association for Transgender
Health, a 500-member organization whose mission is to further the
understanding and treatment of gender identity disorder, one in
11,900 males and one in 30,400 females are transgender individuals.

"We don't know" what causes transgenderism, said Dr. Jack Drescher,
distinguished fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and past
chair of the group's Committee on Gay, Lesbian & Bisexual Issues.

The official diagnoses for transgender individuals can range from
gender dysphoria, an uncomfortable feeling about one's gender
identity, to gender identity disorder, a condition in which a person
is born one gender but identifies as belonging to the other.

One problem is that the psychiatric association "offers no guidelines
on what to do about it," said Drescher, who is also a
psychoanalyst/psychiatrist in New York City.

"People in the deaf community don't think that deafness is an
illness. It's just who they are," he said.

Likewise, there is no consensus as to whether transgenderism is
really a disorder.

Are transgender people ever really able to live fulfilling lives?

"Psychiatrists should never be asked that question," Drescher
said. "You ask the transgender people themselves. They'll tell you if
they can lead happy, healthy lives."

At least 70 transgender people will meet this week at the second
annual Transsistahs-Transbrothas Defying Gravity Conference 2006 at
the Galt House Hotel and Suites to discuss how to live such lives.

The conference, which Roberts and her roommate, Dawn Wilson, helped
organize, will address issues and concerns of the African-American
transgender community.

Wilson, 39, says the weekend is important to her because she'll have
a chance to serve as a role model for younger transgender attendees.
Even though she has been "out" as a woman since 1998, she also
expects to reap the benefits of being around others who understand
her experience.

"You grow up wondering, where are the people who look like me?"
Wilson said.

For some, like Wilson and Roberts, who live in Louisville, you also
grow up aware that you were born one gender, but you feel differently
inside.

Roberts said she "always knew there was something different, and I
was out of sync."

"I knew at age 5 something wasn't right," Wilson said.

Roberts and Wilson recall being told they carried their backpacks too
effeminately and raised their hands in class like girls.

Kids can be cruel. Roberts said she lived that reality every day,
averaging a fight a week, usually battling an aggressive group of
three male classmates who picked on Roberts for being different.

Although Wilson said she "grew up in a household where radical
thought was encouraged, not discouraged," she, too, faced hardships
when trying to get a grasp on who she was.

Known then as "Don," Wilson said she was raised by an aunt and uncle
after her parents died young. Still, family members teased her for
having "too much sugar in the gas tank."

When Wilson played dress-up and opted to wear women's clothes, "they
figured I'd grow out of it," she said.

Instead, Wilson grew increasingly comfortable as she adopted a more
female-oriented persona.

So did Roberts, who said that in college "people wanted me to join
Alpha Phi Alpha (fraternity) when what I wanted to do was join Alpha
Kappa Alpha (sorority)."

Roberts and Wilson -- who met in 1999 while lobbying for transgender
rights in Frankfort and became fast friends -- decided to seek
professional help and transition from males to females in the
early '90s.

First, they underwent intensive counseling from certified gender
therapists. Then, they began living like women and undergoing hormone
therapy that brought about physiological changes, including the
growth of breasts.

"I'm a 38B and damn proud of it," said Wilson.

"I'm a 38C and damn proud of it, too," said Roberts, before high-
fiving Wilson.

As proud as they are, neither was willing to go into detail about the
rest of the physical aspects of their transformations.

"That's part of my past," Roberts said. "It wasn't horrible for me.
Did I have some rough times? Yeah."

"Did it cause me to appreciate what I have now?" Wilson asked
rhetorically.

"Oh yeah," she said, before adding, "We're not typical."

Only God has the right to determine gender, said Albert Mohler,
president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He said any
attempt to alter that creation is an act of rebellion against God.

Regardless of how others define human sexuality and
gender, "Christians are obligated to find our definitions … in the
Bible. What the activists want to call 'sex-reassignment surgery'
must be seen as a form of bodily mutilation rather than gender
correction. The chromosomes will continue to tell the story," Mohler
said.

"Gender is not under our control after all. When a nation's moral
rebellion comes down to this level of confusion, we are already in
big trouble. A society that can't distinguish between men and women
is not likely to find moral clarity in any other area of life," he
said.

Some transgender people also struggle with how their families are
affected.

None of Roberts' or Wilson's relatives wished to speak to The Courier-
Journal. Both women admit some family members are more accepting than
others.

One thing Wilson said she's learned is "family is more than just who
you happen to be related to."

But that's beside the point, said Roberts. "We have a blast just
being out."

Since transitioning into a woman, "I've lived more of a beloved and
healthy life, because I'm not afraid to dream anymore," said Roberts.

That's the key to happiness for transgender people, said clinical
social worker Richard Coomer.

"When they're living to be who they are, yes, they're very healthy
individuals," Coomer said.

The Louisville-based counselor added, "What (transgender individuals)
mainly want to do is be who they are and live life just like all of
us."

That's exactly what Scott Nilsson, 27, an Indiana resident, is doing.

Born female, Scott has undergone what he said is a physical and
spiritual transformation that has allowed him to "look myself in the
mirror and be proud of who I am."

Engaged "to the most beautiful girl in the world," Nilsson shared his
story with several of his coworkers, who were "astounded" their
colleague was once known as "Amy," a heterosexual female.

In turn, Nilsson said he's "still astounded" to be successfully
living as a male.

"I am finally who I knew I always was," he said.

Babies In Womb Exposed To 'Gender-Bending' Chemicals

By EMILY COOK
Last updated at 22:58pm on 10th September 2006
Courtesy of the Daily Mail, London

Babies are being exposed to "gender-bending" chemical pesticides
before they are even born, disturbing new evidence has showed.

Tests on blood taken from the placentas of pregnant women revealed up
to fifteen different types of pesticide, the research found.

Worryingly, the chemicals were found in every single one of the 308
women tested.

The findings will fuel concern about the chemicals, known as hormone
disruptors or EDCs - endocrine-disrupting chemicals.

High levels of exposure have been linked to reproductive
abnormalities - so-called gender-bending - because they upset the
hormonal development of the embryo.

The effects are already being seen in nature where some species of
fish and animals with deformed sex organs have been found.

Scientists blame agricultural pesticides and other hazardous
chemicals such as those found in flame retardants which have leaked
into the environment.

Last year a similar report by WWF-UK and Greenpeace found that babies
are being exposed to a whole array of chemicals at the most
vulnerable point in their development.

Tests on the blood of 30 newborn babies found the presence of eight
different groups of chemicals, ranging from cleaning products to
chemicals used to make plastics and non-stick waterproof coatings.

A study led by scientists at the University of Rochester in New York
also found that common chemicals found in thousands of household
products such as soaps and make-up can harm the development of unborn
baby boys.

The results reinforce calls for pregnant women to be especially
careful about their diet and for the reduction of chemicals in food
production.

The latest findings were made by the Department of Radiology and
Physical Medicine at the University of Granada in Spain.

Analysis of the placentas revealed the "presence of seventeen
endocrine disruptive organochlorine pesticides" - the so-called
gender benders.

Some patients' placentas contained 15 of the 17 pesticides tested
for.

Maria Jose Lopez Espinosa, who headed the research, feared that the
chemicals could cause health problems for children who suffered
exposure in the womb.

She said: "The results are alarming: 100 per cent of these pregnant
women had at least one pesticide in their placenta but the average
rate amounts to eight different kinds of chemical substances."

She warned, "We do not really know the consequences of exposure to
pesticides in children but we can predict that they may have serious
effects since this placenta exposure occurs at key moments on the
embryo's development."

The modern, chemical-laden environment can be especially harmful to
pregnant women. During the gestation period, contaminants which
accumulate in fatty tissues, access the unborn child via the blood
supply and the placenta.

The Spanish research was carried out at San Cecilio University
Hospital among 308 women who had given birth between 2000 and 2002.
Tests were performed on 668 samples.

The study also found a higher presence of pesticides in older mothers
and those who had a higher Body Mass Index.

Miss Espinosa believed that a healthy lifestyle with plenty of
exercise, good food and no smoking would help combat the effect
of "inadvertent exposure" to the chemicals.

She added, "It is possible to control pesticide ingestion by means of
a proper diet, which should be healthy and balanced, through
consumption of food whose chemical content is low.

"Moreover, daily exercise and the avoidance of tobacco, which could
also be a source of inadvertent exposure, are very important habits
which help to control the presence of pesticides in our bodies".

The Trouble When Jane Becomes Jack

From the New York Times
By PAUL VITELLO
Photo of Shayne Caya by Darcy Padilla
Published: August 20, 2006

SAN FRANCISCO

In the most recent season of the lesbian soap opera, “The L Word,” a new character named Moira announced to her friends that, through surgery and hormone therapy, she would soon be a new person named Max. Her news was not well received.

“It just saddens me to see so many of our strong butch women giving up their womanhood to be a man,” one friend said.

The sentiment was a tamer version of what many other women wrote on lesbian blogs and Web sites in the weeks after the episode was broadcast last spring. Many called for the Max character to be killed off next season. One suggested dispatching him “by testosterone overdose.”

The reaction to the fictional character captured the bitter tension that can exist over gender reassignment. Among lesbians — the group from which most transgendered men emerge — the increasing number of women who are choosing to pursue life as a man can provoke a deep resentment and almost existential anxiety, raising questions of gender loyalty and political identity, as well as debates about who is and who isn’t, and who never was, a real woman.

The conflict has raged at some women’s colleges and has been explored in academic articles, in magazines for lesbians and in alternative publications, with some — oversimplifying the issue for effect — headlined with the question, “Is Lesbianism Dead?”

It has been a subtext of gay politics in San Francisco, the only city in the country that covers employees’ sex-change medical expenses. And it bubbles to the surface every summer at the Michigan Womyn’s Music Festival, a lesbian gathering to which only “women born as women and living as women” are invited — a ban on transgendered people of either sex.

Barbara Price, a former festival producer, said the uneasiness has been “a big topic among lesbians for quite some time.”

“There are many people who look at what these young women are doing, and say to themselves, ‘Hey, by turning yourselves into men, don’t you realize you’re going over to the other side?’ ” she said. “We thought we were all supposed to be in this together.”

Beyond the political implications, the sense of loss is felt most keenly in personal relationships.

“I am a lesbian because I am attracted to women, and not to men," said a 33-year-old woman who broke up with her partner of seven years, Sharon Caya, when Sharon became Shane. The woman, who asked to be identified only as Natasha, to protect family members who are unaware of her lifestyle, said that she was ultimately faced with the reality of her sexual orientation and identity. “I decided I couldn’t be in a romantic relationship with a man.”

The transgender movement among men is at least as old as the pioneering surgery that turned George Jorgensen into Christine Jorgensen in 1952. Among women who wish to become men, though, the movement has gained momentum only in the last 10 years, in part because of increasingly sophisticated surgical options, the availability of the Internet’s instant support network, and the emotions raised by the 1999 movie “Boys Don’t Cry,” based on the true story of the murder of Brandon Teena, a young Nebraska woman who chose to live as a man.

The word for the process is “to transition,” a modest verb for what in women usually means, at the minimum, a double mastectomy and heavy doses of hormones that change the shape of the face, deepen the voice, broaden the upper body, spur the growth of facial hair, and in some cases, trigger the onset of male pattern baldness.

Politically and personally, the change has equally profound effects. Some lesbians view it as a kind of disloyalty bordering on gender treason.

The Census Bureau does not try to count the number of transgendered people in the United States, and many who make the transition from one sex to another do not wish to be counted.

A European study conducted 10 years ago, and often cited by the American Psychiatric Association, says full gender reassignment occurred in 1 in 11,000 men and 1 in 30,000 women, a ratio that would place the number of men who have become women nationally at only about 13,000 and women who have become men at about 5,000.

Transgender advocates, however, say those statistics fail to reflect an increasing number of people, especially young people, who call themselves transgendered but resist some or all of the surgeries available, including, for women becoming men, the creation of a penis. Some delay or avoid surgeries because of expense. For women especially, the genital surgery is still risky.

“There are tens of thousands of us, probably more than 100,000,” said Riki Wilchins, the executive director of GenderPAC, a lobbying group in Washington, citing the looser definition of being transgendered.

Dr. Michael Brownstein, a surgeon in San Francisco, said he had performed more than 1,000 female-to-male surgeries in the last several years, and transgender advocates say there are a dozen surgeons specializing in the work in the United States.

The numbers are slight, considering the estimated five million gay men and five million lesbian women in the United States. Still, coupled with a simultaneous trend among the young to reject sexual identity labels altogether, some lesbians fear that the ranks are growing of women who once called themselves lesbian but no longer do.

“It’s as if the category of lesbian is just emptying out,” said Judith Halberstam, a gender theorist and professor of literature at the University of Southern California, San Diego, whose books include “Female Masculinity.”

Leaders of some lesbian organizations dismiss the idea of a schism or contend that it has been resolved in the interest of common human rights goals among lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgendered people.

“The view in some lesbian corners that we are losing lesbians to transitioning is absurd,” said Kate Kendall, the executive director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights. “Given our history of oppression, all lesbians should encourage people to be themselves even if it means our lesbian sister is becoming our heterosexual-identified brother.”

But in private conversations and in public forums like women’s colleges, the questions about how to frame the relationship among lesbians, former lesbians and young women who call themselves “gender queer” rather than lesbian at all, seem largely unresolved.

“There is a general uneasiness about this whole thing, like ‘What are we losing here?’ ” said Diane Anderson-Minshall, the executive editor of Curve, a lesbian magazine. The issue stirs old insecurities about women being “not good enough,’’ she added.

Koen Baum, a family therapist in San Francisco who is a transgendered man, said the anxiety some lesbians feel has complicated roots. Some, he said, believe that women who “pass” as men are in some ways embracing male privileges.

Ben A. Barres, a professor of neurobiology at Stanford and a transgendered man, recently provided fodder for that view in an article in Nature and an interview with The New York Times. “It is very much harder for women to be successful, to get jobs, to get grants, especially big grants,” he told The Times.

The idea of male privilege was also part of “The L Word” plot: When Max learns he is to be offered a job that he was rejected for as Moira, he promises that he will refuse it and tell off the would-be boss, but he later decides to take the job and say nothing.

Mr. Baum said the anxiety also stems from fear over the loss of an ally in the struggle against sexism. “The question in the minds of many lesbian women is, ‘Is it still going to be you and me against sexism, you and me against the world?’ ” he said.

There are also practical questions: What place should a transgendered man have in women’s spaces such as bathhouses, charter cruises, music festivals and, more tricky still, at women’s colleges, where some “transmen” taking testosterone are reportedly playing on school sports teams?

Laura Cucullu, a freelance editor and recent graduate of Mills College in Oakland, Calif., phrased the question this way: “When do we kick you out? When you change your name to Bob? When you start taking hormones? When you grow a mustache? When you have a double mastectomy?”

The fact that there is no apparent parallel imbroglio in the gay community toward men who become women is a subject of some speculation.

“There is the sense that a transman is ‘betraying the team,’ joining the oppressor class and that sort of thing,” said Ken Zucker, a clinical psychologist and a specialist in gender research at the University of Toronto.

Despite the tangled set of issues involved, the survival rate of lesbian couples seems higher than among gay couples when one partner changes gender, advocates say.

After Susie Anderson-Minshall became Jacob several years ago, he and his partner of 15 years, Ms. Anderson-Minshall, the Curve editor, decided to marry. Their March 19 wedding was actually their second union. The first had been a partnership ceremony as lesbians; the second was as legally recognized husband and wife under the laws of the state of California, where they live.

Other couples, like the former Sharon Caya and Natasha, found the transition much rougher. Sharon’s decision to become Shane coincided with Natasha becoming pregnant, having conceived with donor sperm. “When the baby came along, I wanted to become myself,” Mr. Caya said. “I wanted the baby to know me as I truly am.”

She began taking testosterone about three years ago, then had “top surgery” — a double mastectomy — and is now a muscular 42-year-old of medium height with long sideburns and a goatee.

For financial and practical reasons, Mr. Caya, the legal director of the Transgender Law Center in San Francisco, decided to forgo “bottom surgery,” which could cost as much as $100,000 and would involve two or three operations to graft on an ersatz penis.

According to the standards of the European study, Shane Caya would not be counted as a transgendered person.

Natasha, a financial manager in San Francisco, still cries when describing Sharon’s decision to become male.

“You’re in love with a person, but there is something about gender that is so central to identity it can be overwhelming if the person changes,” she said.

“When she told me what she wanted to do, I was completely blown away at first,” Natasha said. Then, “I thought to myself, ‘All right, we’re good lesbians. We should be able to figure this out.’ ”

But after a month of struggling with the idea, Natasha said she could not make the adjustment. The breakup occurred when the child was 5 months old. The couple remain on friendly terms and share custody.

And when Mr. Caya attended a lesbian organization’s lunch recently, he recalled, he was welcomed by a woman who said she was “pleased to see a man supporting us lesbians.” His reply, he said, was quick and to the point:

“Of course I support lesbians,” he said. “I used to be one.”