Inviting a Crossdresser on your Hen Night

[rachelmonday1]

I'm actually a guy that enjoys crossdressing and am very fortunate to have a number of female friends, one of whom is getting married and has invited me to join her friends on her Hen Night. I don't look too bad when I'm dressed as Rachel and often go out with the girls with no problems.

I'm happily married and my wife understands the "Rachel" side of me, but thinks it's odd that a girl would invite a crossdresser on her Hen Night.

Any views out there?

[Offred]

Beachcomber has it right actually.

The point is I feel that if you are going to put on a skirt and a wig and make up and call yourself rachel and go out with the girls and have a different 'girly' personality, adopt this silly lads/girls language and go to hen dos which you could never attend as your 'male' persona (rather than just happen to be wearing an item of clothing you like) what you are doing is making a determination that men and women are inherently different and separate.

A less extreme version is the idea of things being feminine or masculine and people having masculine and feminine sides, women being 'one of the lads' - drinking pints, laughing at sexist jokes, men being 'in touch with' their 'feminine sides' - doing the ironing, rather than people just being different. You create gender roles - women are to look sexy and do the cooking (heaven forbid a real woman look like gollum in a frock) and men are red-blooded and do sports.

Men who 'crossdress' buy so much into this sexist stereotyping fallacy that they feel they cannot just exist as a person with different attributes, they have to split their lives completely into 'male' and 'female' polarised personas. Hanging out with women - that's the female persona, playing sport - that's the male. The male persona is 'red blooded', the female goes out with 'the girls'. They simply cannot deal with people being people they have to have an outlet for the parts of them they consider female. They reduce both men and women to separate and mutually exclusive beings but as they are crossdressing rather than transgender they view the male persona still as the dominant one.

When expressing the female persona this is why they adopt wholeheartedly all the horrible sexist bullshit that has been pushed onto women because they equate womanhood with this crap, because whilst they see themselves as male and female (although with this duality and still with male dominance) they see women as no more than this superficial crap and they often believe what they are doing is loving women when they do this.

And yes it is offensive even on a basic level when a male fetishises tools partriarchy has used in order to oppress women. Yes it is depressing when women are still unable to face the day without make up and wreck their knees wearing high heels but women do it because they are under pressure from society. Men who do it through crossdressing are further imposing this ridiculous view of what womanhood should mean on women.

[Beachcomber]

Yet again, I agree with Offred.

[Offred]

And the clothing thing is really interesting. Women through history were bullied and threatened sometimes with death and violence into wearing ridiculously impractical clothes which physically restricted and damaged them. They had to fight to be allowed to where 'men's clothes' which in fact were just clothes which were more practical. They eventually won this right. Now women can wear practical clothes without, for the most part, facing discrimination. Men have no reason to want to wear less practical basically stupider clothes and when they do they are laughed at and considered weaker and less powerful really because that's the view of women, that they are a step down from men and a man who is trying to ape a woman is lowering himself.

[Offred]

There's nothing preventing men from wearing 'women's clothes' they choose not to because it is disempowering and less practical.

The lack of pockets in the style of clothing that was traditionally male I always think harks back to that. Women's clothes should make them look attractive and be impractical. Heaven forbid you have an unsightly bulge in your suit jacket where you store things like money or a phone!

[Offred]

And stuffing a bra pisses me off mightily. A bra can be practical for a woman. A man wearing a stuffed bra is just aping women.

[badbaldingballerina123]

I've never thought about from that perspective before , but now I have I agree with Offred and beach comber.

I also think it's telling you've only been invited if your dressed up as a woman .

[Offred]

Yes, because the women going on the hen do are also subscribing to the sexist stereotyping and viewing men as somehow inherently different and dangerous to them. That the only way the threateningly more powerful man is allowed is if he disempowered himself by aping a woman.

[rachelmonday1]

Offred: Wow!!! Where did all that come from? I'm very pleased and proud to say that although I have a very wide circle of friends, no woman that I know feels forced into wearing pretty, feminine clothes and heels. As for having to wear makeup during the day....ditto! I feel really sorry for any woman that truly feels like that, but would suggest that they are in the overwhelming minority.

You are, of course, entitled to your opinions and, whilst I respect them I cannot in any way agree with them.

[Offred]

They either like the op or they don't. He should be able to be 'richard' or 'rachel' with them.

[Fairenuff]

Why don't they like you as a man OP? And why do you want to be friends with people like that?

[eddielizzard]

well i basically agree with offred.

however, i'd not have a problem with going out with you. as long as you're good company, i don't care what the hell you wear.

i also hate this girls only hen night crap although i embarrassingly had one of them myself.

[Benchmark]

He never said they don't like him as a man. They invited him as a woman to a hen night because... well... It's a hen night.

[Offred]

As for having to wear makeup during the day....ditto!

No-one has to wear makeup during the day but I'd be willing to bet that you don't feel compelled to wear makeup when being Richard, or a bra. I'd be willing to bet that you only feel you have to wear makeup (like skirts etc) when being Rachel because if you wore makeup and skirts when you were Richard you would just be a person who liked makeup and skirts and not a crossdresser. That that would be very confusing to your masculinity. That really exposes that you are in fact subscribing to these sexist stereotypes and that it is difficulty in dealing with a world where men and women are people and not men and women that is behind it. A difficulty reconciling the fact that as Richard - the person you have 'male' characteristics and 'female' ones.

[Offred]

I bet they do like him as a man, just not on a hen do (which are typically very sexist).

[Fairenuff]

He said he wouldn't be invited as a man Bench. Why not? They either like his company or they don't. What difference would it make whether he was wearing a skirt or trousers if they actually liked him?

[rachelmonday1]

Fairenuff: It's not that they don't like me as a man, they've never met me as a man! It's a long story as to how I got to know them, but they accept me as "Rachel" and it's "Rachel" that has been invited, as "one of the girls". It's in no way a slur on my male self, in fact for a person like me it's actually very flattering.

[Fairenuff]

But how are you any different, just because you're dressed differently?

Do you behave differently and adopt a 'girlie' giggle or something?

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

Sorry, I've only skimmed ... but personally, I don't really get why a hen night needs to be all women anyway. So what the heck? That'd be my main thought.

I do think performing gender is a bit dubious, since it reinforces stereotypes we can all do without, and when men do it, they're doing it from a position of power so it's the more objectionable. But that's for you to think about, not for another guest to object to, IMO.

[rachelmonday1]

Offred: Far too deep for me! Maybe it's because I just love people as people and don't so far into such physcological stuff, and vice-versa.

[dawntigga]

Surely, when you are Rachel, you identify your gender as female and when you are not you gender identify as male. At least, that is how it works with the cross dressers I know. Why wouldn't you invite a good woman friend on a hen night?

Expect some TERF's to turn up soon, they represent themselves and not feminism as a whole.

Doesn'tGetTheProblemTiggaxx

[rachelmonday1]

Fairenuff: Yes I do. Whether that demeans me as a man or not, in my opinion, no more the dressing as a woman. It's harmless, something I enjoy and also something that others can accept.

[rachelmonday1]

Dawntigga: exactly :)

[Fairenuff]

Interesting that you suggest it demeans you as a man.

I was thinking more about it being insulting to women. Just because, you know, all the parody that has been explained already.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

Erm ... rachel, I hope this doesn't seem rude - but, well, you're very lucky that you don't feel demeaned and that you don't feel the need to get 'deep'.

It's only harmless to you.

But performing gender is harmful to people who're less fortunate than you.

It's a bit like me saying I find blackface fun because I just so love all people, so why shouldn't I do it?

[rachelmonday1]

If my friends felt insulted or demeaned, would they invite me????