Brandon Teena internet paragraphs

How the internet has affected the transgendered community

		What was considered transgender then is vastly different to what it is now. Ten years ago, transgender meant that you identified as one gender but had the genitals of the opposite gender. Now, transgender can mean a plethora of things. Thanks to the rise of blogging website tumblr.com, some people want to say they’re transgender even though they don’t exactly identify with the opposite sex. Some people are also becoming cynical with human beings that we’re born normal. Now, normal people are called “cis-gendered” meaning that they’re comfortable with the gender they were born with. Back then, transgendered people just wanted to be accepted by society and weren’t even worried about pro-noun usage. Today, a transgendered person and/or activist would snap off on you simply for calling someone a pronoun that could possibly indicate their gender.

		Brandon Teena’s case was a bit different. All he really wanted was to be a man. Today, people want all sorts of labels. People want to be known as a “tri-gendered pyrofox” among other things. Facebook recently made it so that users have over 56 genders to choose from. Today’s world is certainly very different and progressive compared to then. Transgendered people today also have much more freedom and are more accepted in society. Big name companies such as Chevron and Apple Inc. have been adjusting their policies to include transgender people and to make them feel at home and natural.

		Another thing that happened as a result of the internet, is the unwarranted self-importance of some of its users. While there are mostly good-natured people in any following, there will always be a bad apple or two. Some people give themselves ridiculous gender titles, that it almost seems as if anything can be a gender these days. Except, if you try to call someone out on this behavior, you’ll immediately be lauded as a “misogynist” or “cis-scum”. Sadly, I can’t cite any professional sources on this because tumblr is an in-appropriate website to cite in itself, but if you would like examples, just go on tumblr.com and in the tag search box type in “cis-scum”. You will see a list appear of users either using the term ironically, or talking about their experiences of the word being used against them.