Majority Issues and Minority Effects

Sometimes, issues which most people view as being minor, but affecting the majority of people, can be major issues for minorities.  I was thinking about this primarily due to a conference I recently attended about sexuality and gender identity.  One thing I noticed at this conference is that there were a lot of transwomen who, due to their height or bone structure, looked less than totally feminine.  While these women may have been perfectly satisfied with their bodies and appearances, society's views on femininity could easily lead others to view them in a negative light.  This is closely related to the 'majority' issues of the supposedly ideal type of female appearance, and of men who cross-dress.

The first issue can lead to women without genetically determined 'ideal' body structures being viewed as inferior to those with those societally determined ideal bodies.  In addition to the obvious problems for a majority of women, however, this can particularly lead to discrimination against transwomen, who rarely have an 'ideal' female bone structure.  As such, this issue can cause an already marginalised group to suffer more discrimination unrelated to the original cause of discrimination - certainly a bad thing.

The second issue may be even more detrimental.  Of course it does restrict the freedom of men who may wish to cross-dress, which is unjust and undoubtedly a bad thing, but it can lead to actual violence against transwomen.  While transmen who do not 'pass' (that is, appear male to all observers) usually suffer the inconvenience and embarrassment of being wrongly referred to as female, but are subject to no other negative effects (due to being thought merely tomboys or, possibly and slightly more dangerously, lesbians), non-passing transwomen are sometimes attacked, on the assumption that they are cross-dressing men.  It is true that actual men who cross-dress can also become victims of attack, such men typically suffer much less from refraining to cross-dress than transwomen suffer from dressing as men - the women have to actively hide an important part of their identity.  While I do not mean to marginalise the negative effects of men being denied the opportunity to cross-dress when they wish, it is undeniable that the deaths of women perceived as cross-dressing men are a much more serious issue.  However, due to the fact that transgendered people are a minority, society usually only focuses on the more minor issue.