The Politics of Sexuality in Latin America: A Reader on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Rights

Transvestism and Public Space: Transvestism and the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transvestite, and Transsexual Movement

Transvestism and Public Space Transvestism and the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transvestite, andTranssexual Movement Josefina Fernández Translated by Zoe Fenson The principle of our struggle is the desire for all freedoms. Carlos Jáuregui, gay-rights activist, died  T  organization of transvestites in Argentina is relatively recent, in comparison to that of other sociosexual groups, like gays and lesbians. By the s and s, some gay-rights groups already had their own modes of communication on which to rely, albeit in restricted circulation, and in the s a gay-rights group received legal recognition for the first time.₁ Associations of lesbian women, many of whom started their organizational careers within the feminist movement, made their first public appearance in . Paradoxically, this history refers to the s, a period in which Argentine society was immobilized, with weak or fractured social-change organizations. The social movements that, during the previous decade, with the opening of democracy, had possessed an important capacity to oppose and resist on different social, political, and economic fronts, began to unravel. Citizen participation in protests and petitions diminished notably during these same years in which, linked to gays and lesbians, 406 transvestites began to organize. The first group to do so was the Association of Argentine Transvestites (), formed in . Within a short period of time, as a result of internal differences,  divided and formed two new organizations: the Organization of Transvestites and Transsexuals of Argentina (), and the Association to Fight for Transvestite and Transsexual Identity (). The Fundamental Milestone At the tail end of a confrontation over a neighborhood denunciation of prostitution, a contingent of transvestite women approached the association Gays for Civil Rights, which agreed to assume legal defense of the case. In the process of interacting with this group, the women learned the first steps toward self-organization and formed .A little ways down the road, initial differences in the core of the organization surfaced over whether transvestite groups should accept the practice of prostitution. Some felt that the issue should not be defended from an institutional standpoint; for others, collectively denying prostitution among transvestites amounted to little more than a lie: We separated because we thought differently. I was not in favor of prostitution, nor did I defend it, but I support it as a way to make a living for the person who chooses it. N. was in favor of prostitution, she defended it and flew the flag of prostitution, and L. stayed in the middle, in the sense that she supported both positions. From this base, N. formed  for the girls who were prostitutes in Palermo. At the same time, L. formed , so that our identity could take whatever form, including that of prostitutes . Those were three ways of thinking. [. . .] At the same time that these organizations formed, transvestites began discussing different ways to be recognized in their identity. Without a doubt, their visibility as prostitutes was one of the cruxes of the dispute within the interior of these groups. For some, the transition towards social acceptance maintained transformism (whereby men wear feminine clothes for shows or special occasions, but still preserve a masculine daily appearance) as a party line, with transsexuality as the final destination and transvestitism as an intermediate point; for others, this proposition constituted a deception in the same vein as denying prostitution. A different project altogether was promoted by a third group, who warned of a need for self-examination of a socially situated identity that fell on the side of abject self-hatred, examination that sought acceptance not on the part of society, but on the part of the questioners themselves. [. . .] The impetus that they embodied seemed to impugn symbolic violence , to question those dominant schemata that had driven them to perceive and apTransvestism and Public Space / 407 preciate themselves according a devalued image, and so to subscribe to the views of a system of domination (Bourdieu ). The impact that organized participation has had on the personal lives of transvestite individuals is an aspect that deserves to be highlighted. In the vast majority of cases, these collective spaces constituted spheres for sharing experiences and, in the discovery of similarities, to find relief from suffering. But the associations were also valued as places where rights were recognized, and where erroneous ideas about transvestite identity could be dismantled, places where, according to Bourdieu () and as illustrated in the following testimonial, the...