Most people are acquainted with t-ladies through porn, where the vocable "shemale" is omnipresent. We don't know much about the particular situation we all refer to, here, and God only knows what exactly was said and what precisely happened. But if anyone uses indeed this word, he should receive full explanations on the topic. The OP is at least commendable in what he tried to get a bit more of infos. The word in itself is an ugly hybrid which brought anything but a woman to the imagination. If you want to make a buck, yeap, it's surely the best way to present yourself indeed, lady Jodie, as everybody in porn has to be intrigued by such a concept.
But as you both just said, ladies, i can't think of it as being innocent for anything else.