OK. A bit of a rant bringing together a few threads on here. I'd really like a woman's point of view on this as I believe that it affect you in how some men view women and their place in society.
Watching the video in Davina's post 'Footballer Transformed' is is obvious that making him dress as a woman is a punishment. It is a humiliation for him to be made to dress and appear as a woman. The undercurrent is that appearing as a woman is below a man, some how making him second class, inferior or gay. His team mates groped him!
I was watching 'Harrys Full English' and Robbie Fowler was made to wear a flamenco dress as a punishment. Lower key but still the same message. It maybe a bit of 'banter' but the underlying message is clear. The wives seemed OK with it and joined in the 'laugh'. Is that because they feel they have too or because I'm just too sensitive about it?
The whole 'Trans talk at work' is to do with this attitude. 'How can man demean himself by wanting to dress as a woman'. If men continue to think this way then women are never going to reach equality.
A lot of the time the feeling is deeply ingrained and can sometimes be expressed as violence https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-47799288.
Somehow we need to change peoples attitude, both men and women, if things are going to change. I know the women here are enlightened but the message needs to get out in someway. I also appreciate that I am part of the problem in keeping myself hidden from my wife and the public but we need to give our support to those who are out and about in the forefront.
Rant over.
Katie x
Just thought I'd add this from an article I read:
Females as well as males have been involved in cross-dressing, but there is often a different judgment laid upon them. Women who have passed as soldiers have often been praised and applauded, though not uniformly (as for example in the case of Jeanne d'Arc). The Western patriarchal subordination of women means, on one hand, that it makes sense for a woman wanting freedom from oppression to try to pass as a man; but, on the other hand, she may well be attacked for trying to rise above her “rightful” place. Men, on the other hand, have no such justification, since by cross-dressing in a patriarchal society they are placing themselves lower on the power ladder, a move that is specifically against the very idea of masculinity and hence traitorous.
Full article https://read.dukeupress.edu/tsq/article/1/1-2/65/92027/Cross-Dresser