Sunday 7 December 2008

The Cure

Like economists if you ask 10 transgendered people their opinion of something you will often end up with 11 different views*. All honed independently and often developed by looking at the same source material yet coming up with a different conclusion.

Some are flexible in their ideologies than others like the great John Maynard Keynes said "If the facts change, I change my mind...", others are ridged zealously defending their view.I would like to think I'm the former rather than the latter. Always open to new ideas and adjusting accordingly.

You may be wondering where am I going with this? Personally I have no idea.

However there are issues which everyone seems to agree on. With economists it doesn't matter if you adhere to the Chicago school or are a neo-Keynesian, you agree that free trade is good thing. The extent and implementation is debatable but on the principle it gets your seal of approval.

In the trans grouping the thing which gets similar agreement is that there is no cure. A brief search will turn up lines like, "there is no cure" numerous times. Allowing for the fact that if anyone has been cured then they are no longer in the community, there is the belief that the statement is true. But if true why are there individuals offering hope to vulnerable people like myself. At times I want to believe them.



* I haven't asked any transgendered economists, there must be one as I'm sure not every tranny works in IT (though sometimes it seems so).

Did I disappoint anyone who saw the title and were expecting to read some words on Robert Smith et al?

9 comments:

  1. Hey, I don't work in IT, I'm a skilled factory chick specializing in cnc machining, so there, ha!

    And anyways, there is a cure we all like to bitch about called transitioning. Or if you want to be sarcastic there is also a cure for the flip side of the coin as long as you don't have an extremely high tolerence for being brainwashed (I sadly do which is why I'm stuck with the first option.)

    Give in to our side, you know you want to, you will feel soooo much better when you submit. And by the way, could you sign this contract for me on the way out of guyville, oh, and be sure you use a bit of your own blood as ink. Thanks girl ;)

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  2. There are people out there that will tell vulnerable people anything they want to hear, to use them for their own ends. Bogus psychics to grieving widows, religious cults to the lonely, "miracle diets" to the self-loathing etc.

    It only works on us because society tells us we are "wrong", or "broken". If we could be comfortable with ourselves, they would have no power over us, and a cure would be irrelevant. If we are not "sick" we don't need to be "cured".

    As for economics, I studied it at college, and think the free market is a crock. Notice all the companies who want deregulation are the ones screaming for bailouts right now? What they really want is power without responsibility

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  3. All I can tell you is that I care, I regret my absence of late, and that my e-mail is on my profile anytime you'd care to write...

    Not that I have any answers, large or small, but just a friendly ear and a shoulder if you need one.

    alan

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  4. I find it helpful not to talk of "cures" so much as "solutions".

    Look on it this way, suppose you were left handed in a world thats mainly right handed; I don't think anyone tries to cure those who are left handed, but there is a market in left handed scissors, left handed cheese knives, etc. A solution rather than a cure.

    So with T* life, except I see the solutions as reaching a place of acceptance with life, a place where life goes on but with the trans ID threaded through it, a place where trans no longer pre occupies the mind.

    I don't for one minute think there is a cure, but a solution seems to me to be infinitely possible.

    I hope these thoughts help, rather than hinder.

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  5. Hi Lucy
    Jess has said it beautifully. If you can just find a place where you mind is no longer dominated by GD & you are at peace & can find acceptance with that, you are doing all you need to. There is no right or wrong way, just whats right for you.

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  6. On a more flippant note, as the majority of TG folk are male - and as many men do like to brag - if there was a cure, we'd have heard about it again... and again. :)

    I think Jess is on the money tho. What if the cure isn't to stop but to accept yourself as you are?

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  7. Thinking of you...missing you...hoping all is well...

    You're probably very glad I don't have your e-mail address!

    alan

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  8. One transgendered economist here - in fact I'm such a sad individual I've just been re-reading Keynes on the banking crisis. Nice blog,
    take care, Carol.

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  9. There was a postcard on the postsecret blog which read: 'You need not find a cure for everything that makes you weak'. Which probably sums it for me. Thanks for the comments they were all really useful.
    Lucy x

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