GLB ......... T

My friend Joe and I have similar views about the gay community and with the recent controversy involving ENDA and transgender people, the subject of the inclusion of transgender people with gays, lesbians, and bisexuals came into play once again. We love our transgender brothers and sisters, but we don't understand how they got grouped in with us.

During my junior year of high school, I would always get in trouble during my first period French class for eating my breakfast during one of the lectures. The punishment for manger dans la classe was being put on "la liste," a list on the chalk board for detention after class. I had so many check marks by my name that my teacher kicked my punishment up a notch by forcing me to sit in on a month's worth of meetings for the Indian/Pakistani/Fijian club, which she created and organized.

There was something about the IPFC that just didn't seem right to me. I get India and Pakistan, but Fiji? I'd sit in on the IPFC meetings and wonder why Fiji was included in the name of the club. First of all, there were no Fijians in the club or in our school for that matter. It's also a country in the South Pacific, thousands of miles away. My teacher said that it was because India had an enormous influence on Fiji and that Indians make up about 25% of the Fijian population. That may be true, but I still don't see why they had to include Fiji in the IPFC. If that's the case, then where's the Roman Empire/Moroccan/Turkish/Armenian club?

I feel the same way about the T in GLBT (or LGBT depending on which area of Chicago you live in). Transgender does not belong in the Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual group. Gays, lesbians, and bisexuals are people with different sexual orientation than heterosexuals. Transgender people have a different gender identity than the one that they were born with. See? Totally different. It's one of those things that people assume because if it's not heterosexual, it belongs in the same group.

If people are so intent on including transgender people, then what happens to asexuals, pansexuals, and hermaphrodites?

I don't think that trans people shouldn't be protected against violence or discrimination. I just think that a gender is a gender, sexual orientation is a sexual orientation, and ne'er the twain shall meet.