[MaggieL]

Originally posted by dave

Maggie - I guess we look at male and female differently.

Oh, I'm *certain* of that. :-) Having been down the road I have certainly does provide a unique point-of-view.

[
I'm not saying that Brandon didn't live as a man, just that they had the physical characteristics of a female.

That's the thing, though. Until they're actually climbing into the sack (or at least considering it), whether he has a penis or not isn't really relevant. Especially if he was on testosterone, (which I kind of doubt given his economic status at the time). I'm sure there's a good "Schrodinger's cat" joke in here somewhere.

[
As for the relationship... well, I feel bad for the girl involved, 'cause she was deceived (apparently), and that's not real cool.

"Deceived"? What if Brandon had been born male but lost his penis due to a mishap? Would his girlfriend have been "deceived" because he didn't introduce himself "Hi, I'm Brandon, I lost my dick in a harvester accident."?

We don't know how far their relationship had gone (well, actually we do know how far it *hadn't* gone), or even in what direction it was going.

Exactly at what point a transsexual person "should" disclose their backgrround to somebody else is a real conundrum. If it' s the first words out of their mouth when they meet someone, it gives the issue an importance that it doesn't deserve, and probably *does* rise to the "getting people's faces" level. If it's *never* disclosed, the TS is exposed to your charge of "deceiving" others. So it looks like the "right" answer must be somewhere inbetween...but where?

I certainly know of transexual women who got married and lived a happy life without ever telling their husbands. Assuming they *did* disclose that they were sterile before the marriage, I'm not sure I can criticize them, although it's not something *I* would ever do--too much of my life happened before my gender transition to simple pretend that it never happened and invent some "cover story" to explain my entire life "before".

So no, I wouldn't consider it a lesbian relationship either. I'm not sure what I'd consider it.

Having been in somewhat similar situations myself, I can probably speak with some understanding about what Brandon was feeling. Neither of the people in the relationship saw *themselves* as lesbians, so any claim that they "really were lesbians" is kind of empty.

And given that Brandon was raped and murdered essentially for standing by his belief that he was neither a lesbian nor a woman, I think his opinion in the matter should be given considerable weight.