Are We an Ignored Minority?

[tgsexual]

There is a lot of talk on forums about what we perceive ourselves to be. By we, I mean the group of people who have a sexual preference for trangendered male-to-female persons.

Are we gay, straight, fetishists? Where do we fit into the LGBT spectrum? It seems we don't have a seat at that table, or any other table. There isn't even a name for us. Should we have one? If so, what?

Hermosexuals? TGsexuals? Suggestions?

We suffer prejudice as do lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgenders, yet no one seems to be acting in our defense, not directly. There seems to be no campaign if help people understand us.

If anything, it seems common for gays to look down on us, like we're closeted gays, many others see us as some kind of perverts or desperados, who can't find a real woman to love us, and tragicly, even some transgender people see us as sexual deviates, or unreliable lovers or incapable of offering them real acceptance.

It probably has a lot to do with the fact that our only visible communities seem to exist in internet pornland. If we judged straight men on the discussions they have on internet porn forums I think we'd also walk away with a somewhat less rosy view of what straight men are like.

Some might say that more labels lead to more incorrect sterotypes of what is really a vast continuum of sexual preference characteristics, but if we're to be accepted, we must be able to present ourselves in a way that people can understand and respect, and to start to do that, we need an umbrella under which to gather, so that we can begin to be recognized and understood.

We may even need it, to begin to understand ourselves, and where each of us fits into, or how we vary to certain extents, within that umbrella.

While we remain a people of mystery, widely scorned or mocked, then there will remain a great barrier between the transgendered and those who seek to love them. What good is merely focusing on the acceptance of transgenders while those partners they long for, are afraid to come out, for fear of being harshly judged and misunderstood.

Is it time for a new movement to evolve? One that represents us and adds us to the hub of the wheel of diversity? A movement that identifies and spreads our differences and commonalities with other human conditions? A movement that has a voice that represents our finest attributes, our affection, our compassion, our struggle to be accepted for what we are and who we love.

Excuse me if my rant is long winded or boring, I'd just like to stimulate some discussion on these issues with some like minds.

TGsexual.