Beauty Pageants and Natural Women

05/22/2012 — Suzan

One of the big raps directed at Jenna Talackova and her participation
in this pageant is that she is “not a natural woman.”

Which is a little strange since not one of the women in that pageant
was a natural woman.

Every one of them wore make-up.  Many had breast implants and other
plastic surgery.

Their hair was styled by experts.

A make-up free, unplasticized, hippie woman, with a tangle of hair and
natural beauty wouldn’t have stood a chance against the women who
enter these contests.

I’ve even heard some snots saying that Jenna was “double dipping” by
having competed in a transgender pageant prior to this.  They ask
should “natural women” be allowed in those pageants.  Which is sort of
like over-privileged white shits claiming scholarships directed to
minorities are discriminatory since they favor groups of lesser
privilege.

“Transgender Pageants” are the way a “despised and dispossessed”
minority group celebrated the beauty of a few of its own.  An
alternative to the world they were denied entry into.

I have a confession…

From the time I was a teenage transkid I have been awe struck by the
absolute beauty of some of my sisters.  It doesn’t matter that beauty
pageants and fashion magazines trivialize women.

The mere knowledge that there are a handful of sisters out there at
any one time, among those publicly considered  to be among the most
beautiful women in the world makes me feel good inside.

I modeled for a short time in 1974.  Something that a number of
sisters in the Hollywood TS/TG community knew about.  On a few
occasions I was approached on the street by sisters who told me how
much they admired me and how proud they were of me.

Of course, sisters also told me how proud they were of me for speaking
at the Gay Pride Rally and of my work as an activist and photographer.

Being part of a minority community is why we look up to other members
of the minority community who excel.  I’d be a liar if I said I
didn’t.

Which bring us back to Beauty Pageants and natural women.

Beauty pageants aren’t about natural women. They are an art form,
performance art perhaps but an art form nonetheless. Like formal dance
or the tea ceremony.  Like high opera they are an anachronism.

The women who perform in them are performers in a stylized
presentation of a concept of femininity. A presentation of gender if
you will.

This is something some of my sisters have turned into high art.
Others have turned it into low art and that is perfectly fine too.

I never managed to pull off the artifice of presenting that sort of
femininity.  Sisters labeled me a “natural born beauty.” Every Day
People Some sisters with that natural beauty also have the skill to
pull off the presentation of stylized femininity as well.

When I hear objections from assigned female at birth women directed at
sisters participating in any thing that puts them in competition with
AFAB women, I smell the same sort of fear that a member of a minority
group might be able to not only compete but win a competition with
members of the dominant culture.

PBS has documentary they show occasionally “Unforgivable Blackness:
the Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson.” None of the white heavy weight
champions wanted to face him out of fear they would lose and their
loss would threaten the foundations of white supremacy.

I sometime think, transsexual and transgender people in general, but
more sisters than brothers threaten a lot of the pillars of belief
regarding the differences between the sexes and proper gender roles.
That is why we aren’t supposed to be included in the class women, but
rather set aside in a separate and unequal minority class suitable for
abuse and not for equality.

As I said most TS/TG women will never compete in a beauty pageant,
only a minority will even compete in a TS/TG pageant put on by members
of this minority class.  Just as the chances of one of us ever
competing in the Olympics is slim, while some may compete in the
minority community Gay Games.

The sisters who inspire me tend to be those in the arts who manage
their lives with grace and aplomb.  They are a pretty diverse group
including poets, writers, musicians and performance artists.

A Miles Davis album during his fusion period was titled, “Tribute to
Jack Johnson.” On it James Earl Jones speaks the lines: “I’m Jack
Johnson, Heavy Weight Champion of the World. I’m Black, they never let
me forget it. Yeah, I’m Black, I never let them forget it.”

I’ve been disgusted by some of the filth I’ve seen directed at not
only Jenna but at almost any transsexual or transgender person who
does anything of which they can be rightly proud.

Now some would say that we should just disappear and live our lives
never doing anything that would bring any scrutiny into our lives that
would expose the dark horrible secret of our having been born
transsexual or transgender.  Even though that means never doing
anything in the arts or even seeking a promotion at work that might
attract attention.

After all damn few of us want to wear transsexual or transgender as an
honorific in place of Ms. (or Mr. in the case of brothers).

But the press is nasty and the British Press seems worse even than the
American in that respect . They seem to think transsexual or
transgender is the appropriate title for those of us born into this
minority class.

Those of us who write, or are out when we do our art, even if we keep
some separation from the issue in our daily lives are saying we too
are human and accomplished.  You may not ever let us forget what we
are, but we are not ashamed and will not let you deny us our right to
be part of the entire culture.  We will not stay in our minority
culture just so the dominant cultural paradigm may go unchallenged.

See: The Vancouver Sun:  No such thing as a natural-born woman: The
category of women – and men, too – are human inventions, not facts of
nature … and many of us do not fit those categories
<http://www.vancouversun.com/health/such+thing+natural+born+woman/6649...>

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