Hungry ghosts are a Buddhist concept (see Wikipedia) Thoughts Without a Thinker, Mark Epstein :
The Hungry Ghosts are probably the most vividly drawn metaphors in the Wheel of Life. Phantomlike creatures with withered limbs, grossly bloated bellies, and long thin necks, the Hungry Ghosts in many ways represent a fusion of rage and desire. Tormented by unfulfilled cravings and insatiably demanding of impossible satisfactions, the Hungry Ghosts are searching for gratification for old unfulfilled needs whose time has passed. They are beings who have uncovered a terrible emptiness within themselves, who cannot see the impossibility of correcting something that has already happened. Their ghostlike state represents their attachment to the past.
I find myself thinking of the”hungry ghosts” metaphor every time I hear people say “GRS didn’t change my sex, I was always female.” Of course “sex change operation” is to coarsely vulgar and working class, cuts too close to reality, punctures too many fantasies to be acceptable as a description of what being born with and treated for transsexualiity actually involves. Even the the more medically correct description of what the operation is about, “sex reassignment surgery” cuts too close to the bone.
Hungry ghosts wear many different disguises.
Some make unsubstantiated claims to obscure intersex conditions, even though these conditions only seem to appear in middle age after the fathering of children. At the same time those who come out young with obvious physical traits suggesting the hormones associated with the sex assigned at birth do not function as expected, rarely show the obsessive interest in finding their true intersex nature.
Could it be that those who just accept their transsexuality for what it is and deal with it have a better outlook on life than those who flood the blogs and mailing lists with details of their biology that embarrasses even a potty mouthed old dyke like me? I suppose it could be that those of us who come out young have a more seamless way of approaching being born transsexual than those who up end their lives in middle age, and less need to rationalize the major turmoil changing sex can present in established adulthood. Perhaps having less guilt or shame permits us to both come out young and accept being who we are.
Today on a mailing list some one held up as evidence of their intersex condition their having a scar like line down the underside of their scrotum. They claimed this was “abnormal” and that normal men didn’t have this. Groan, I had the same basic reaction I had when I had to teach basic biology of sex to people who wanted SRS and had never actually seen a pussy. My first reaction to today’s gaffe was, “Obviously this person has never given a man, a blowjob.
Again Wikipedia:
The perineal raphe extends from the anus, through the mid-line of the scrotum (scrotal raphe) and upwards through the posterior mid-line aspect of the penis (penile raphe).
It is observed as a noticeable line.
It is the result of a fetal developmental phenomenon whereby the scrotum (the developmental equivalent of the labia in females) and penis close toward the midline and fuse.
The resulting ridge of tissue is evident as the perineal raphe.
Now I believe that transsexualism is in and of itself an intersex condition, one that probably has something to do with how hormones are processed. But why obsess on it? Aren’t there better things to do with your time like learn to play a musical instrument or down loading porn to masturbate with?
Then there is a separate gaggle of hungry ghosts. The ones who are more transsexual than all others who had the exact same sort of sex change operation everyone else had. Damn, their shit not only doesn’t stink but smells like designer perfume. They don’t have transsexualism like the common peasants, oh no, they have HBS or Harry Benjamin Syndrome.
But it is the same sort of hungry ghost eternally searching for something that makes them other than what they were born.
Now the “classic transsexuals” are sort of a variation on the theme. Their premise is that anyone who doesn’t fit their vary narrow definition of a real transsexual isn’t. Of course they may be the only person who fits that rigid definition. This is kind of amusing in a reality TV, mixed martial arts cage fighting sort of way, since there are a number of different personal definitions of what constitutes a “classic transsexual”. Considering photos I’ve seen of several of these people beauty is not one of the deciding factors, nor is being particularly feminine.
The main food hungry ghosts seem to be searching for is validation. Society is really short on external validation when it comes to validating the lives of people with transsexualism. Anyway if you lack internal validation then you will never be satisfied with the junk food of external validation.
The other thing hungry ghosts are often seeking is authenticity and authenticity cannot be found through identity or word games. Authenticity comes through action, accomplishments and living a life that is successful by your own standards.
The quest for authenticity leads us to the Transgender Borg.
While those post-transsexual women who embrace “HBS/Classic Transsexual” act as though they are the only true transsexuals, therefore tend to not even get along with each other. Those who embrace the “Transgender as Umbrella” are more like the Borg of Star Trek: the Next Generation.
When I lived in East Hollywood I was surrounded by Scientologists. Over the years Scientology had become like a cancer buying up real estate and thereby removing it from the tax rolls.
The weird thing about them was how much they resembled the Borg, another science fiction creation. They all had the exact same answers on almost any topic.
Dealing with the Transgender Borg is like that. Push the right buttons and their program spits out the exact same response.
Like the Borg, “Resistance is futile, you will be assimilated.” Listen to our wisdom and hear us demean and abuse you if you do not agree to be assimilated.
Now some post-ops get sucked into this and become model Borg to those of us who go, “Piss of, we don’t want to be part of your freaking cult.”
Then the Transgender Borg say, “Well, we defined you as a subset of the TG Borg Collective, resistance is futile, you will be assimilated.
Now, Virginia Prince is to the Transgender Borg Collective what L. Ron Hubbard is to Scientology. That is to say the basis for much of the ideology although people have added to the dogma since.
Mostly the dogma of the Transgender Borg says you can be a woman though male as long as you claim to identify as female. It also says there isn’t any such thing as a sex change operation, only an inverted penis. Oh and, “Even though we have penises, we are real women and those who had SRS are not unless they stay part of the Transgender Borg Collective.”
The Transgender Borg demand that devotion to the collective be the central focus of the lives of those they have assimilated or marked for colonization. There too, the resemblance to the church of Scientology is remarkable.
There is actually a much saner path one can take if one is post-transsexual and that is to opt out of being a part of either group.
With very few exceptions I think people get sex reassignment surgery for pretty much the same reason. The screening procedures mostly work and stop people who are walking into disaster. Does this mean there aren’t people who fool the gate keepers? No a motivated person can scam their way into surgery. Samantha Kane is a prime example but there have been others. Were I on the civil jury I would find for the Doctors. Common sense should tell people that it is not hair and won’t grow back.
I don’t feel like I want to be a part of either faction.
I’d rather self-validate and get my strokes from friends. I’m secure enough in my own being to not want to run around proclaiming how I am the only real transsexual and I don’t want to be part of the Transgender Borg Collective.
Women Born Transsexual 