海角大神

Caitlyn Jenner鈥檚 Vanity Fair cover is raising the visibility of transgender issues to mainstream America, which could mean relief for non-celebrities in the transgender community who suffer abuse and discrimination.聽

This week Caitlyn Jenner (the former Bruce Jenner) made her gender identity, new name and appearance public on the cover of Vanity Fair magazine. The appearance came on the heels of a聽two-hour TV interview with ABC鈥檚 Diane Sawyer on April 24, in which Jenner, who聽referred to himself using male pronouns throughout the interview,聽came out as transgender and detailed his lifelong struggles with gender identity.

鈥淔or all intents and purposes, I鈥檓 a woman,鈥澛�. 鈥淧eople look at me differently. They see you as this macho male, but my heart and my soul and everything that I do in life 鈥� it is part of me. That female side is part of me. That鈥檚 who I am.鈥�

罢丑别听, a gender studies and sexual orientation think tank at UCLA's School of Law, estimates there are 700,000 transgender people (or 0.2 percent of the total population) in the United States.

Yet some experts say the issues facing the transgender community are only just being introduced to middle-America via Ms. Jenner鈥檚 transition.

鈥淚t鈥檚 a historic moment in the press world, having someone transgender on the cover of such a prestigious magazine, but on top of that, someone people knew publicly before transition is a huge milestone for educating people as to who transgender people are,鈥� says Sylvain Bruni, president of聽聽in an interview,

Mr. Bruni points out that while other celebrities such as聽, tennis player聽,聽and Matrix film trilogy co-director聽聽have transitioned publicly, 鈥淭he big difference is that pretty much everybody knew of Caitlyn Jenner as Bruce Jenner, an identified male, an Olympian, in the collective consciousness in the US. She was the epitome of what a male athlete was, and the whole idea built around her that basically cemented an image and it is such a difference now in terms of physical appearance and who she really is, that it has more impact.鈥�

Jenner was the face of the Wheaties 鈥溾�� 1977 TV commercial celebrating his decathlon triumph at the 1976 Montreal Olympics.

Laura Durso, director of the LGBT Research and Communications Project at the聽聽says that the increasing of visibility of transgender Americans thanks to Jenner and other celebrities is vital to moving transgender rights initiatives forward.

鈥淲e have the cover of Vanity Fair, but transgender people lack significant rights in most of the country and experience really, truly, heartbreaking levels of poverty, housing instability, and violence against the community,鈥� Dr. Durso says.

In a 2009 , some聽13 percent of respondents were unemployed, nearly double the national average at the time of the survey. 聽Forty-seven percent of those surveyed said that they experienced an "adverse job action" 聽鈥� 聽meaning that they did not get a job, were denied a promotion, or were fired.

The survey also found that 97 percent聽of those surveyed reported experiencing harassment or mistreatment on the job.聽Fifteen percent of transgender people surveyed lived on $10,000 per year or less 鈥� double the rate of the general population.聽

Bruni agrees adding, 鈥淭here is a huge gap between Caitlyn who is wealthy and has access to the press and those living in poverty, abuse, and rejection in the trans community. The idea is for us [the LGBT community] to use this opportunity to foster that education and bring light to those issues and to make sure those issues don鈥檛 get forgotten.鈥�

In April, a White House聽executive order banning discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity by federal contractors went into effect. The order was hailed by LGBT advocates a step forward, although that "92 percent of employees of federal contractors in the Fortune 1000 are already protected by a company-wide sexual orientation nondiscrimination policy and 58 percent are already protected by a gender identity nondiscrimination policy."

While LGBT rights are often considered a liberal issue, Jenner revealed in the. When Ms. Sawyer asked 聽if he would ask GOP House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to 鈥渃hampion鈥� LGBT rights, he replied:聽鈥淚 would do that, yeah, in a heartbeat. Why not? And I think they鈥檇 be very receptive to it.鈥�

In Norfolk, Va., Glass Artist聽聽(also known as Avery Shaffer) is one of those in the LGBT community who is striving to make sure the struggles of transgender people are not overlooked.

In his May 鈥淪tarseed鈥� exhibition Mr. Valerie created a聽聽to memorialize聽聽a transgender woman of color who was shot and killed near Valerie鈥檚 home/studio on聽January 17.

鈥淗er death was reported in male pronouns by local media and some even used old mug shots, rather than images of her as a woman as representations of the victim,鈥� Valerie says in an interview.

While Valerie didn鈥檛 know the victim, he says, 鈥淚 heard that someone was killed in my neighborhood and wanted to learn more about her so I looked at her Facebook page and realized that she was being somewhat misrepresented and not being appreciated for who she was.鈥�

鈥淚 have the ability to make works of art that may be seen as beautiful by some,鈥� he adds. 鈥淚 thought that would at least be something.鈥�

Asked about the Jenner transformation, 聽Valerie says that 鈥淎mericans really love makeover shows and this [Jenner鈥檚 transformation on 'Keeping up with the Kardashians'] was a really successful makeover, with the transgender issue piggy-backing on a makeover show format.鈥�

鈥淢iddle America is being introduced to trans issues through the makeover of Bruce to Caitlyn. It鈥檚 not much different from when Will and Grace introduced middle-America to gay issues,鈥� he says. 鈥淚t should, ultimately be a positive thing for the transgendered community, but it鈥檚 not immediately helping the Lamia Beards of the world.鈥�