Now you're not hard to understand

Middlesex has obviously changed Oprah's life, because she now seems to be obsessed with all things biological/medical gender related phenomenon. Last Friday was the book discussion, which included Real! Live! Intersex! people. Today was transgendered teens, and in a couple weeks are transwomen who are/were fathers and husbands. Damnit, I really should have written those producers earlier in the summer, I might have at least have gotten some free tickets to go to these shows live. I'm not sure I'd want to be sitting in those chairs on stage though. I didn't hate the show today, I mean, sure, there were some imbalances and superficial covering of complicated topics, because hey, it's a talk show. And sure, some of her questions were annoying, but, she didn't ask anything I haven't heard from people's mouths a thousand times. The guests handled themselves well I thought. Obviously, I'm having low expectations here, because as mentioned, its a talk show geared towards mainstream america (for the most part), but I don't know, maybe its not really so much low expectations as first steps. When I watch Oprah (and things like it), I don't always watch as myself now -- sometimes I'm watching as the person I used to be. I wasn't someone who was always this outsider with radical ideas of how the world is or can be. At some point in my life, I was afraid of gay people and thought they were icky. And then I advanced into thinking, well, they can't help it, they were born that way, and hey, they're kinda funny! So ok, as long as I don't have to watch them have sex, its ok. And then, and then, and then....progression to now. This is just queer stuff, this is lots of stuff. I was raised southern methodist by people who are general well-meaning types who think anyone can grow up to be President, so no, I never heard racial epithets or chauvinistic jokes in my house, but I was firmly entrenched in the status quo of what is normal, what is ok, what are the hopes and dreams one should have. I was never punk. I didn't drink or smoke until college. Sure, in high school I got into communism and socialism and astrology and vegetarianism and pacifism and art-making, but I was told (and understood) they were sort of quirky hobbies, not how Real Life is. At one point in my life, I aspired to be a yuppie. I thought Lincoln Park would be the ideal place to live. Ok, this phase didn't last very long, but still, I think its interesting to look at why I passed through these places of thoughts and why I kept going to something else. Because if I can figure that out, maybe it would be more useful in talking to people about the world and why we are in it and what we can do about things, rather than just make another snarky joke about soccer moms and trixies.

I'm getting a little kumabya here, I know. I wasn't expecting that my thoughts about The Trans on Oprah would go there. I guess seeing anything representing me, in some sense, in a mainstream forum is likely to think about the bigger picture though. I also don't mean that I'm giving people a pass either. Its more about ok, if I'm going to bother trying to challenge them, what's a way that might actually affect them and isn't just about being the biggest asshole possible. And not necessarily for their sake, but for my own. That isht starts to hurt my heart.

Time to go listen to some really earnest music now!

Happy Birthday louche!!

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