Saturday, November 10, 2007

to each his own

The day after the diwali celebration i was feeling pretty listless at home... i explored all the possibilities of passing time... but all in vain...
Somehow at last i caught hold of a fren of mine who had a bit of time to spare & went out wid her for a drive.... we werent really sure where we were heading towards.... we just stopped at a nearby mall to do some window shopping... Basically we were just busy catching up on the lost times (due to change in jobs & cities) chatting all the way looking at things & ppl & just passing empty comments... since our sole motive was to PASS time... we were doing just that....
whilst in the midst of the conversation i saw some female at the mall... or i thot i saw a female who was soo not like a female.... finding something weird i decided to investigate & follow tht person a bit to get a better look... to my surprise tht person was a male in an attire of a women....
It was not only me but several others who were staring at that female cum male personality at the mall... he was carrying a ladies purse, was wearing high heels & was wearing lotsa make up & was dressed up like a complete woman...


i just blurted out the word transvestite... My fren along asked me wots tht???
I simply replied to her thts a man who likes to dress up like a women... or any human being who like to dress up unlike the sex tht they were born with....
naturally my fren asked me why wud someone do tht??? do u know anything more abt them??
well tht time i had no answer.... but now i do.
so this ones for u NEHA,


wiki says:
Transvestism is literally the practice of cross-dressing, wearing the clothing of the opposite sex, and transvestite literally refers to a person who cross-dresses.


The meaning of Transvestism has undergone quite a few changes since the time it was first coined in 1910.
Hence even today when we use the word its necessary to find out the context tht its been used in.


A dude called Magnus Hirschfeld coined this term tranvestism... this guy was a german physician, sexologist & a gay rights advocate...
he used this term to describe ppl who habitually or voluntarily wore clothes of the opposite sex.
but he knew tht tranvestism was not just all abt clothes.. its related to things & incidents beyond tht... it related to ppl who psychologically felt themselves as those of opp sex....
[can u imagine?????]
Herschfeld helped them get their first sexual reassignment surgery... or something called as a transgender ... or something more popularly known as third gender those dayz.....
[imagine waking up one fine day to find ur sex changed... oouch...in the morning ... yes.....
forgive my perversion to those who let their thots run wild until they heard themselves say yikes]


Hirschfeld also noticed that sexual arousal was often, but not always, associated with transvestite behaviour; he also clearly distinguished between transvestism as an expression of a person's "contra-sexual" (transgender) feelings and fetishistic behaviour, even if the latter involved wearing clothes of the other sex.


In the Nazi era the Hirschfeld concepts of transvestites came to an end & transvestite behaviour came to be observed as an expression of homosexuality or some kinds of suppressed behaviours within ppl.
In tht era another Greman sexologist called Harry Benjamin & his associates started working on these crossed dressed ppl and tried to fit them somewhere betn males & females [2 gendered framework as it was well know tht time] & came up with a new term called as transsexualism.
This term was totally against wot Hirschfeld wanted to establish. Hirschfeld strived to give these ppl some standard in the society where these ppl cud live the way they needed but Harry Benjamin's era forced these ppl to live like proper men or women. If a person cud not be cured of transvestite behaviour they were made to change sex & those who refused to do so were termed as homosexuals... so the nazis turned the transvestites into homos


Later in 1969 the stonewall riots [a series of violent conflicts between New York City Police officers and groups of gay and transgender people] brought to light a distinction betn homosexuals & transvestites since more & more lesbians & gays started becoming visible who did not show tranvestite behaviour.


This brought the humans to believe Hirschfeld's theory of transvestites & their role played in sexual arousal. Transvestites are basically MALES dressed like females because in tht era the western societies permitted women to wear clothes like men on grounds of fashion... & therefore male bodied species dressing up like women popularly came to be known as transvestites.
[PS: this does not mean there can be no female transvestites]


Today transvestites are often confused to be homosexuals. A person may not want to reveal his sexual identity due to social pressure.. In most cases this situation can become agonizing for him..
Its also said tht transvestite fetishes often fade away with time & if a person wants he can even get some decent counseling advice where he can meet other transvestites & discuss his problems or share his emotions perhaps.
Transvestism cannot hamper a personality of an individual who chooses to indulge in it... as rightly said its a fetish & it has all the possibilities of fading away with time.
One last note to ppl are who r still reading this piece...
Do not confuse transvestism with homosexuality... there is absolutely no link... most of the transvestites are often heterosexuals....
I Hope all my male friends are listening!!!! ;)


Cheers
Sne!!!

1 comment:

S.H said...

stop chasing cross dressers in malls!!!