Compassion and Gender

The recent high profile media reports regarding gender reassignment for Caitlyn Jenner and Kellie Maloney have highlighted issues which many of us may not have thought about recently. 

Gender identity seems to be more complex than a biological or physical given. This is shown in the case of trans women like Caitlyn and Kellie, but is true in the experience of most women and men. We see it in gender stereotypes. Aren’t all women supposed to like cooking and sewing? Aren’t all men supposed to like beer and fast cars? 

Not many of us fit these gender stereotypes… I find this every year when I look for a Father’s Day card for my dad. He doesn’t like beer. He doesn’t play golf. He doesn’t watch much football (though he might if mum let him!) He doesn’t like cars.

For Father’s Day Trentham Gardens hosted a transport festival – this held absolutely no attraction for me, and my family know me well enough not to ‘treat’ me to such an occasion!

I think we need to move away from gender stereotypes, and the assumption that just because someone has a certain biology, they must like certain things and act in a certain way.

This brings me back to where we began. How should we respond to trans women and trans men? There was some controversy on twitter when an automatic system was set up to respond to anyone calling Caitlyn “he”. A message was sent pointing out that Caitlyn is a woman, and should be referred to as such.

How would Jesus react? I cannot imagine Jesus debating with Caitlyn as to whether she is a man or a woman. I think instead that he would treat her with dignity and respect, and love her.

Too many Christians believe that part of our role is to go about judging people, and then telling them that God loves them, despite how evil or mistaken they are.

However, the Bible says that judgement is God’s job alone. Not ours. Our job is to love.

So what gender do we use when talking about a trans woman or man? The gender they want to be known as. This shows respect and love. 

Let’s remember to treat people with dignity as individuals. Let’s also be careful not to fall into all kinds of stereotyping and judgemental behaviours. It’s God’s job to judge. Ours to love.