Shaving my legs is such a drag

Contributed by Julia Serano
I had about seven different conflicting thoughts/emotions upon viewing this video:

1) Oh my god, I *cannot* believe that companies are actually using personal endorsements from transgender-spectrum people to help sell their products to non-trans women. How groundbreaking!
2) And at the same time, how disturbing! I think I am experiencing the same queasy feeling right now that old-school gay/queer rights activists most certainly felt when beer companies first began offering to sponsor pride parades and queer events.
3) Great, just what we need: more fodder for feminists who insist that those of us on the trans feminine spectrum are all merely “parodies� and “caricatures� of women and that we propagate sexist stereotypes.
4) Haven’t I written about depictions like this one before?
5) As a transsexual woman, I can’t help but notice how dependent this ad is on the concept of “drag�—that is, the fact that the subject in the video identifies as a boy and that their feminine gender expression is depicted as a “performance� or an “impersonation.� The commercial would have an entirely different meaning (and would evoke a very different emotional reaction) if it featured a trans woman who fully and unapologetically identified as female. For this reason, this video will likely annoy a lot of transsexuals because it forwards the “trans = fake� trope that is too often used to marginalize us.
6) Memo to Phillips: The “Like all men he’s not great with pain� line isn’t funny. Making fun of men is just as sexist as making fun of women. And besides, when your commercial consists of nothing but stereotypically hyper-feminine imagery, you can’t make up for it all at the end with one, apparently ironic, pseudo-feminist dis on men.
7) And one more thing: I hope the makers of Secret deodorant sue you for essentially stealing their “Strong enough for a man, but made for a woman� campaign.
Thanks to Jessica for the link.
Julia Serano is an Oakland, California-based writer, spoken word performer, trans activist, and biologist.