I was contacted several weeks ago by a 'lady' who stated my MeetUpGroup, Crossdressing Connect, in defining crossdressers and transvestites as transgender was incorrect and in some way diminishes the rights of true 'transgender women.
Here are some of her messages...
Please stop lumping trans women and crossdressers together. It is extraordinarily damaging and plays into the invalidation of our identities by virtue of conflating the two. You are a heterosexual male who likes to wear dresses, the use of the trans flag gives an extremely misleading impression and co-opts trans identities for a cross-dressing habit.
Crossdressers are not transgender, by your own self-identification you are a heterosexual male. It is this exact stereotype which has been used to deny us care for so long. There is no identification of crossdressers in the LGBTQ+ because they do not fall under those categories, and to conflate the two is extremely damaging to trans people.
She stated my personal identity did not fit into the dictionary definition of transgender, shown below..
'Designating a person whose sense of personal identity and gender does not correspond to that person's sex at birth, or which does not otherwise conform to conventional notions of sex and gender.
Although now typically used as an umbrella term which includes any or all non-conventional gender identities, in wider use transgender is sometimes used synonymously with the more specific terms transsexual or transvestite'.
Unless, something bypasses me this very specifically notes 'personal identity'....
This topic seems to feed into the whole debate as men who identity or re assign as women should be seen as female. It is clear biological women are women, the ability to bear children unique but should this deprive those who genuinely believe themselves to be female as being considered women, when presenting as such.