What battle, you may ask? The one for recognition? the one for acceptance? Perhaps, the one where we don't have to pass in public because it's simply not an issue. Winning that fight is a long way off. We have, in the Western Democracies been granted some political rights. Gay marriage, as it is commonly known ( note the epiteth gay ). Or same sex partnerships, again there has to be a differential. In Britain it is known as a Civil Partership. They cannot bring themselves simply to treat it as marriage. Because marriage is between a man and a woman and spawns children. It forms the bedrock of society and those people that grant us political rights are the same as those who cannot see past the fact that are mere existence undermines the great marital social more. But we're lucky to live in the societies we do. But privileges granted can always be taken away. History is full of examples. The Jews were entirely assimilated into German society until their rights were removed, and we know where that led. This may be an extreme example and you may say similar couldn't happen now, well it couldn't happen then, but it did. Not so long ago we had in Britain Clause 28, now revoked. We have undoubtedly made progress on the legal front but equal rights is an on-going issue because what may have been achieved in law hasn't been achieved in society. In a previous thread Josie and Marsha ( I apologise if I have you wrong girls ) mention that they fear physical assault. But why should they when they have the same legal rights as anyone else. Why should my primary concern when I go out not be simply looking nice, why should I or anyone else have to dress according to the need not to be recognised as something unacceptable to someone else. Because scratch beneath the surface and that unacceptability is still there, that hatred is still there. How many times have you been called a pervert or a wierdo or worse, because I have. We may find acceptance within our small circle of friends and everything is just peachy. But that's not the real world. The fact is in mainstream society we are still considered to be figures of fun. The amusingly camp gay man in a sitcom, giggles all round at the man in a dress. There was an episode of some American crime drama or other, where the main suspect turned out to be a transsexual, but the joke seemed to be that this red-blooded cop had spent the entire episode flirting with this girl before finally getting her on a date where he kissed her. The question at the end being, from a woman - so what was it like to kiss a man? He gagged. Is that acceptance? So we want, no need, to pass in public out of fear as much as anything else. Fear of contempt, fear of ridicule, fear of physical assault. The hatred is out there, many religions actually teach and promote it. There's much more to this but I'm not feeling well, so I'll have to curtail it, sorry.