Trans: When Ideology Meets Reality

by Helen Joyce

A final, remarkable aspect of this link between homophobia and transition is that organisations that purport to campaign for gay rights seem blind to it. Trans in America: Texas Strong was produced by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). When Pakistan’s government decided recently to start funding sex-change surgery for gay males – a decision inspired by the mullahs’ belief that homosexual desire indicates that you have a brain of the opposite sex – Pink News, a British website founded to cover issues relevant to gay people, described Pakistan as ‘making history with this move for trans rights’. This is despite ample evidence that some gay men in Pakistan, and in Iran, which has similar policies, undergo such surgery unwillingly rather than risk the penalties for gay sex. These include beatings, imprisonment and even execution. A growing number of gay people are waking up to the link, however. I have heard gender affirmation described as ‘postmodern gay conversion therapy’.