Holy crap! Maybe I'm not lacking in drama but I certainly must be a glutton for punishment or self-inflicted mental abuse?
Why else would I sign up for
another trans forum? I simply must be out of my mind or the lockdown and isolation from the COVID-19 fiasco has somehow damaged the remaining miniscule part of my brain that knows how to make smart decisions? Maybe it’s just the beer, whiskey, weed and lack of good judgment but I’m going to make another stab at this forum thing and see how long I last
this time?
Most here already know me from other places as Lisa_K or more recently and briefly as Elisabeth_K. I was at Susie’s a year or two and kept running into brick walls and lovely chats with the staff and I became so fond of the experience of nonsense, I stopped posting for well over a year.
Probably out of the lunacy of spending 34 days alone in my house by myself and not even seeing another living breathing human being and having a nagging feeling that maintaining some kind of contact with the outside world be another super swell idea, I popped into the Suzsphere and posted a few of my ever so appreciated comments, hit the brick wall doing about 90 and promptly was permanently and forever banned. Thank the lard for small favors.
So my friend Jess T., another Susie casualty, tells me about transrefuse. Out of some morbid sense of curiosity and a perverse desire for self-flagellation, I took a look and saw a lot of familiar faces and a lot of the same nonsense. I saw Complete had posted a few things she would never have gotten away with at the Suzefest and thought maybe this joint ain’t so bad? Complete and I go back a couple years and share a lot of the same attitudes and perspectives and tend to be a bit, ahem, outspoken which is no surprise considering we’re both positively Jurassic with few filters so I hit the register button.
I briefly picked up on the schmozzle and accusations of what Dena and Christine supposedly did. Dena? We kind of know each other, heck we live on other sides of the same town and I didn’t think she would do something to heinous so I figured there was just some kind of catfight going on and overlooked the drama. Thinking this was more of a community where independent thought not bogged down with trans rhetoric and dogma might be less sanctioned, I made a post or two before it becoming readily apparent I was dealing with some of the same personalities, mindsets and nonsensical views many trans people take as gospel. Recognizing I was probably going to end up not playing nice, I politely excused myself from the forum and asked that my account be deleted. Whew! I felt lucky to be out alive and free and had survived my brush with the dark side!
Then good ol’ Complete emailed and linked me to this here place and I took a look around. I got perspective from the other side of the who did what when debacle but saw there were only about 16 registered members. I’ve run a forum before for a couple of years and know how building membership can be a challenge so I decided to bless all you fine folks here with my adorably warm presence and charming personality. Yay me!
I’ve really gotten crotchety in my old age or maybe it’s just the onset of dementia or maybe just the feeling that being of a certain age and experience grants one privilege to say what one damn well pleases but like Complete, I have some perspectives and observations that a few may find to be out of the mainstream approved narrative of acceptable and popular trans ideology and I think both her and I think exposing others to things beyond the programmed groupthink to be a good thing. Out of favor views and opinions beyond the narrative are quickly cancelled these days and debate and discussion is commonly suppressed when it falls outside the box or is deemed controversial and triggering to those with thin skin sheltering from the harsh realities of the big old, mean cruel world.
The online trans communities I have encountered are particularly guilty of this type of controlling the narrative in the name of inclusivity and conformity resulting in a subsequent echo chamber of back patting, blowing smoke up people’s arses and virtue signaling where walking on tippy toes as not to rock the apple cart or offend anyone’s delicate sensibilities is the norm but life isn’t always flowers and rainbows and sometimes having a person’s bubble burst is the best thing that could ever happen to them.
I’m not talking about being mean or rude to anyone unless they’ve really got it coming. Within civil discussion and discourse, there’s really no reason for that but what I’m a advocate for is getting people to think critically which by nature involves exposure to opinions and views often contrary to one’s prevailing mindset or paradigm.
For me, that means having as much information, knowledge and differing views, opinions and perspectives from as many angles as possible in order to formulate my own views and opinions even if I’m challenged by them and it’s hard for me not to think others might work the same way? Echo chambers are not good nurseries for independent thought however, for those that are comfortable and safe without thinking on their own, they can be a bias confirming respite.
Would you prefer your significant other to tell you that yes, that outfit
does make your butt look big or tell you a fib that everything is perfect to not hurt your feelings? At least if they tell you the truth, it gives you the option of changing into something else after you have finished punching them in the nose.
What I hope to bring to this board is discussion of and around the unique ideas and feelings from the point of view of someone trans but outside of the trans community for well over fifty years who is not completely indoctrinated by the propaganda of modern trans ideology while trying not to be a total jackass in the process. Wish me luck in that endeavor.
Oh wait! This was supposed to be an intro? Damn! Off to a good start!
Here goes for those that haven’t had the misfortune of knowing me before:
I was a very atypical gender inverted child that understood myself to be a girl in spite of the obvious and did everything I could so that others understood me in the same way and some like my parents and grandparents fortunately did. My school years were sh!t. By 12, people could not tell if I was a boy or a girl. At 15, I was living as a girl publicly but still known as a very peculiar boy to stay in school. That was a lot of fun. I started HRT at 17 before my senior year of high school and immediately after graduating in 1973, was never seen or known as a boy again.
I had SRS 43 years ago when I was 22. I got married at 30 and divorced twelve years later. My ex-husband is still in my life with him and his wife like family to me. I’ve had several long term relationships since that time but have been single for the last twelve years or so but wouldn’t mind that changing.
I’m self-employed, semi-retired and work from home. Before the crud hit, my entire social life centered around a small neighborhood sports bar and grill with an environment like on the show Cheers where everybody knows your name. I miss my friends and miss doing it up on Friday and Saturday night and going out to have fun and can’t wait to get back to it and my normal crazy and boring life.
Okay, I left a few things out but you get the gist of it.
Hope to see how it goes here?
--Elisabeth
PS
That is my first name in real life and I appreciate not being called Liz because there is no “z” in the way my mom wanted it spelled.
