We are what we are
AGROMENES rather sympathised with the man who has gone to court to demand ‘age reassignment’ on the basis that he feels more like a person 20 years younger. However, it did seem rather costly when he could simply have copied actors, who reassign by assertion. Not that taking a few years off is without its problems, as one famous stage star discovered when the press revealed she had a long-lost twin.
Kicking against the ambiguities of life is an age-old activity, ranging from simply writing under a man’s name—as Amantine Dupin, best known as George Sand, did—in order to get your books published, to spending your life as an officer in the army and no one spotting you were a woman.
In these cases, the women remained women, but rightly used subterfuge to gain the privileges that, in their lifetime, were only accorded to men. It’s one of the real improvements of our present age that, in large part, discrimination has been removed, together with people’s prejudices about sexual orientation and racial origin. The disadvantages these women felt were societal and society could and should remove them by changing its behaviour and legal structures.
The difficulty comes when we want to reassign something that seems pretty well immutable—such as age. If we feel and act like someone 20 years younger, that’s all to the good and society shouldn’t penalise us by age discrimination. What we clearly can’t say is that we are 20 years younger, which is a bit of a bore because, otherwise, Agromenes could go in for ‘height reassignment’ and be 2in taller.
Then, there’s ‘voice reassignment’—i’d like to be able to sing—and ‘hair reassignment’— I’ve always envied those with thick, curly locks. Sadly, the courts could come to any decision they might like on these matters and reassign to their hearts’ content, but I wouldn’t have added one cubit to my stature, sung a single aria in tune or produced any waves whatsoever.
Putting up with what we can’t change is a necessary condition of life. Indeed, it’s our ambiguities, disconnections and failures that are often the source of our strengths.
This makes me wonder about Emmerdale, a popular television soap that’s an expression of Yorkshire country life. In much-publicised recent episodes, Hannah Barton has returned to Emmerdale from London as a man. The plot demands that we accept that she has changed sex and that decent country people should take that as a fact, just as they accept that some people are gay.
However, in this case, what we’re being asked to accept isn’t a fact. We understand and sympathise with those born as hermaphrodites, for whom modern surgery can, increasingly, be a help. Agromenes understands those who choose, either behaviourally or through medical intervention, to live in the sex they feel they are, rather than the one into which they were born. What is difficult to say is that Hannah is now a man.
This is not an issue of acceptance, but of fact. Society has had to get rid of its prejudices and recognise facts—just as I have to recognise that I’m not 6ft 1in, can’t sing and have straight hair. We should never discriminate against people who are physically one sex, but feel emotionally the other, but choosing to change sex doesn’t change the fact of birth.
Our acceptance of transgender should be an acceptance of the right to choose, not, even in Emmerdale, a pretence about fact.
I have to recognise that I’m not 6ft 1in, can’t sing and have straight hair