So, Sacha Baron Cohen’s  fagsploitation schtik is about to hit the big screen, and folks have been wondering: hey, is this good for the gays?  Some say the film deploys stereotypes of gay (white) men as vapid, sexually depraved, child endangering bigots for cheap laughs, and other people are wrong.

Don’t call it a comeback.

But since I’ve spent a whole year on manjuice without my wordy ladybrain withering after all, you can expect more posts in this space soon.

Meanwhile, please address the following in 200 words or less: How are masculinities visually and verbally signified in the performance below? Consider the relationships between race and “realness.”  Your discussion should not ignore footage from The Hard Way (1991) included in the video.

Warning: contains action movie violence, anti-sissy lyrics, and brief images of potentially toxic neon.

Extra credit: Are you convinced? Why or why not?

Like Fugazi said

I am a patient boy. I wait, I wait, I wait, I wait for the testosterone to do something besides make me greasy and lascivious.

Meanwhile, gender continues to exist.

Exhibit A:

My neighborhood, sidewalk, 8 pm. I’m walking to a party carrying a tray of hors d’oeuvre. A movie is being filmed on my block, and one of the crew mistakes me for set catering. I mistake (?) him for drunk, since he keeps lurching at my tray and mumbling at me.

Mgsha? saith he.

Wha? quoth I.

Lasmanaha?!

Lughnasa?

LAZUGNA!? Pointing. Grimacing.

Lasagne? Lasagne… Oh! Oh no. Quiche.

Kid, men don’t eat quiche. Revolted Expression.

Uh…. Have a good night!

I wonder what he would have said if I’d've told him they were vegan quiche?

T+2

I am by no means needle shy. I’ve got my fair share of tattoos and facial piercings, I’ve given dozens of insulin injections to a diabetic cat, heck–I’ve even undergone a play piercing or two just for the endorphine rush. Yet strangely, all these experiences left me mentally unprepared to plunge a 22 gauge needle into my own thigh this morning.

Before the doctors will provide a prescription for needles, they require you to successfully self-inject twice in the presence of a nurse. Some people never get around to it, but in the interest of saving time and money, I was eager to start DIY-ing it right away on shot 2.

I got the needle loaded up with no problems, dropped trou, disinfected my shapely thigh, positioned the needle, took a breath & prepared–

took another breath & lowered the needle half way–

took another breath–

Thought about maybe letting the nurse do it–

Thought about how ridiculous it was to be sitting there unpantsed & dangling a syringe over my leg–

Remembered those $15 copayments–

Dropped the needle right where it needed to be, aspirated, & injected with no pain, a little blood, and a heck of a head rush. Rarrrrrr!

For your viewing pleasure, a primer on self-injection.

Homework

In 250 words or less please address the following question:

Nurse Vivian’s outfit–mood-lightening whimsy or femme-as-guarantor of masculinity against the homoerotics of plunging a needle into dudely ass?

TGs on the TeeVee

I tend to avoid mainstream media, mostly because it makes me want to murderize people. Life’s too short to scream at Oprah you know? Even if she is the well-meaning snake oil saleslady who inflicted Dr. Phil on the world.

Generally, I let liberal bloggers and aroundthebend read the NY Times so I don’t have to. With one exception: I like to keep up on mass media depictions of trans folk so I can gauge the base level of mis/information the average person has about me. (A topic that merits its own post some day.)

Ever since I came out to mom a few months ago, though, trannies in the news make me nervous. It’s hard not to imagine every English-language piece on trans people being beamed directly into her head as she struggles to make sense of the Whole New (to her) Me. Thus, the growing OMG! Preggo Man-Woman!11!!1! media frenzy is filling me with unease.

Although the US is pretty familiar with some strange concept of transwomen at this point, transmen often seem to remain a mystery. But now, Lettermen is calling one an androgynous freak in his nightly Top Ten list! (mmm…the sweet smell of progress.) Oprah herself is devoting a whole hour to the expectant couple today, with a People magazine exclusive to follow tomorrow. Meanwhile, commentators can’t agree on whether Beatie is a man, a “man,” a man who was formerly a woman, an ex-woman, an ex-lesbian, or just plain a woman. Or possibly, a hoax.

That last bit is the most interesting, I think. Amidst the astonishing ignorance, vituperation, derision, and even hate, a lot of people are apparently confused unto the point of cognitive overload Pregnant…man…pregnant…man?!… impossible…beep beep beep system shut down. KABLOOEY!

Is this an FTM Christine Jorgensen moment? And if so, what does that even mean?

leave husband, kill children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism, become lesbian…

All items sadly not included on Cosmo’s List of Single Girl Things to Do Before You Get Married. The items which are listed can be boiled down into a simple injunction guaranteed to make the modern lady ten times more Empowerful: Enjoy yourself while you can–but not in a way that is actually enjoyable. Or scares off men.

I was going to make a list of single-girl things to do before becoming a dude, but everything I could think of either is something done *to* single women rather than by them, could still be done by a dude, or flat out isn’t worth doing. Patriarchy, man. What the fuck.

T + 1.

That’s right, yesterday was T day. A sudden case of night-before jitters set me to second guessing, until I remembered feeling exactly the same before getting every piercing & tattoo I am currently delighted to have. The big moment itself was utterly forgettable, lost in some surprising other news from my doctor.

Afterwards, a friend and I hopped between flame-y gay bars and butch gay bars, alternating manly shots (get it?) with the fruitiest drinks the bartender could devise for us. Despite all that dudejuice rolling around in my thigh, I resisted attempts to drag me to a bikini bar on the specious grounds that their jukebox would definitely feature “Friends in Low Places.” (Nearly 24 hours since my first shot, and I still haven’t ogled a lady in a bikini or violently assaulted anyone. Was it really testosterone in that needle, Nurse John?)

When I woke up this morning, there was only a subtle bruise–and an unsubtle headache–to remind me that any of it happened. Life goes on as ever. Just as it should.

A further sign of the impending apocalypse:

I joined the university gym.

It seemed like a shame to put all those sweet sweet anabolic hormones to waste, ya know?

I’m signed up for a Basics of Weight Training class, starting Monday. After a lifetime of cutting phys ed, I too will finally encounter the dreaded tranno locker room dilemma.

Stay tuned/stock your fallout shelter.

Update: Spoke too soon. Apparently so few people want to learn how to lift weights at 7:30 a.m. that they’ve canceled the class. I substituted yoga instead, which is one of the top three girliest things you can do in a gym (along with pilates and aerobics). Go me! Still have access to the weight room, though. If I can get a crash course on how not to injure myself in the pursuit of musculature, maybe I’ll write that ethnography of the locker room yet.

Hey! Guess what I have in a vial on my dresser right now?

Biweekly intramuscular injections of .5 cc testosterone cypionate 200. And don’t share it with any of your muscle queen buddies, okay?

Having finally jumped through the requisite hoops, last night I was rewarded with a prescription for a half dose of T. Twenty-nine dollars later, I’ve got a month’s supply and an appointment to have some poor nurse go all Brian McNamee on my ample ass next week.

Here’s hoping s/he gets hazard pay.

Birth, rebirth, and other medical mysteries.

Tranny bladder, the ability to hold one’s water for extraordinarily long periods of time, had never been anything but a blessing until the moment the lab tech asked me for an unanticipated urine sample just fifteen minutes after I had visited a rare porcelain safe haven.

Sitting on the clinic toilet, trying to think watery thoughts, I got to wondering: So if they make estrogen from pregnant mare urine, what do they make testosterone from? Are there animal products involved? Is T even vegan? Damn. There’s a whole nitty gritty biological side to this undertaking which I hadn’t considered until now.