Treat transgender women as sisters

Re: Transgender president of Quebec women’s group faces backlash, Jan. 9

I’m dismayed to read that transgender woman Gabrielle Bouchard has mainly “been left to defend herself ” against a splinter feminist group who have challenged her presidency of a women’s advocacy group.

Well, let me at least add my voice in support of her.

A transgender woman is a woman. She has always been a woman. She may not have realized it right away, since as a transgender woman, she was born with male genitalia. Consequently, she would have been perceived as a boy and then a man, until such time as she was able to present herself to the world as who she is and was all along — a woman. She did not choose to be a woman. She has been a woman in self-concept and way of mind since birth. Unfortunately, she suffered the pain, confusion, and frustration of her genitalia not matching her gender. Those of us women fortunate enough to be born with genitalia that did match our gender have had it easy.

Bouchard, as she shares in your article, is in a unique position of having experienced both the privileges of being regarded as male, and the loss of those privileges once she presented her harmonized female self to that same world. This gives the women’s group she leads the precious opportunity to learn from this remarkable woman. It gives all of us women the opportunity to embrace this woman as a sister. Monique Kok, Orléans