Transgender Discrimination Essay

In order to be more aware of what things play a part in privilege, power, and inequality , we covered quite a few topics related to the privilege non trans people have and how certain parts that are normal and taken for granted are used to hold power over and discriminate against trans individuals. One of these topics being the that some medical professionals act as gatekeepers to the medical necessities of trans individuals. Trans people are required by some professionals to prove that they are trans but dressing a certain way that matched up traditionally with the gender you identified as (Serano, 2016). For these situations trans people were required to pass as their gender though not for their sake but for the sake of non trans people who would be made uncomfortable by the knowledge or presence of a trans person. Another problem tied in with the medical aspect of transgender discrimination
Along with this, non trans people are not required to pass, aren’t subject to ungendering, and don’t have to be interrogated over why they are the gender they are (Serano, 2016). The other subjects that we were made more aware of that go kind of hand in hand are stereotyping and discrimination. We got a look at how trans people would experience discrimination at work, costing them jobs or promotions (Beemyn & Rankin, 2011), how they lose some aspects of being treated like a person by being ogled at “like if I was a circus freak” (Nadal, 2013, p. 24), made comments about, and not taken seriously by others. The stereotyping described by Serano (2016) refers a lot to the media depictions of transgender women (it is mostly women due to the under representation of trans men) as either deceivers or pathetic transsexuals while Bettcher (2007) explains in her writing of how this stereotype or view of trans people gets used as an excuse for