I haven't been here as often as I'd like lately for several reasons. Among them would be that I've been busier with work lately - that's partially due to us getting ready to move the latest versions of our software out of beta and partially because of J's new schedule. With her working nights I tend to do spend part of my evenings working to pass the time.
The other, and really bigger reason is that I've been trying to avoid Reddit somewhat, especially the Trans-related subreddits. And I know it's not just me, I've observed plenty of fairly active and helpful people more or less disappear from there as well and a couple of those particular people that I am friends with have done so for the same reasons. I'm not a huge fan of "over moderation", but it sure seems like some of those subreddits really are in dire need of more active moderators, but I digress.
That all being said, I do still visit there every so often, and I ran across a topic a few minutes ago that sort of struck a nerve and I thought I'd expound on it here. Now as this was posted on the MtF subreddit I'm going to make the assumption that the OP was a Trans-woman and refer to her with the appropriate pronouns for the rest of this post; hopefully that's a fair assumption. The gist of the post was a rant against Discover Card over getting her name changed with them. She apparently was able to get her *full name* changed via a marriage license in lieu of a court order, which is something I'm not sure is normal in her state (Illinois) or if it slipped through the cracks; but regardless she did it. Well Discover has apparently given her a bit of run around over them changing it as they require a court order for "legal name changes".
Now let me say a couple of things before I go on. First off I have been through the process myself and they did require a copy of my court order (and my license for that matter); but truthfully the process was very easy. I sent them a short note with copies of each and a week or two later I got a phone call saying it was done and asking if I did want new cards shipped out. Frankly I thought that was a given, but I guess not everybody would and either way I appreciated the call. Secondly, I have no love loss for Discover themselves. When I went away to college (27 long years ago) my Mother had a Discover card and got me a "secondary" card in case there was an emergency. I *never* used it, not once; nor did I ever sign anything, etc. Well fast forward maybe 10 years and my first wife (M) and I are closing on our first house. Now why this didn't come up earlier in the process I do not know, but my loan wasn't going to be approved because Discover had put a negative entry on my credit reports when my Mother filed bankruptcy a couple of years earlier. My options at the time were to wire them the money (about $2k if I recall) so they would remove the entry (or whatever exactly it was that they did back then) or the loan would not have gone through - at least not with that lender. Could I have fought it? Definitely. Would I have been successful? Maybe, who knows. But we would have very likely lost out on the house we wanted; so we did it. Now over the years the grudge has faded enough that I do now have a Discover Card again (obviously since I said I've dealt with them over my name change); but I've never really forgiven them for that. Although, it was in reality my Mother's doing I suppose.
So that being said, what sent me off? The fact that this Trans-woman framed this as a "Trans issue" as well as a "discrimination issue"; and I firmly believe it is neither. The rules are simply that a court order is required. It doesn't matter if you are a man or a woman, cis or trans, or anything else. The requirement is easily accessible via their website and probably buried in the terms and conditions that have to be agreed to in order to use their card. It's not like this is something that was made up on the fly, or is just applied to a random trans-woman. I get that she's in a bit of a bind since her name was changed without a court order; and I understand she's upset over how they've supposedly dealt with her; but just because the rules in place don't work for her - well they don't make them a trans and/or discrimination issue.
So the fact that she was trying to frame this as such does really bother me; and from the comments I saw I obviously wasn't the only person who felt that way. But it also made me think about how often I do see people try and frame things as either/both "trans issues" or "discrimination" when they really aren't; and the amount of disservice that this really does cause. "Cry wolf" enough and people will quit listening and there are far too many legitimate cases of discrimination in general, much less discrimination against those of us who are part of the trans community to have these things marginalized by stuff like this.
I think as a whole, the trans community really needs to toss those phrases around a lot more carefully and perhaps before doing so, give the situation some objective thought before doing so. And don't get me wrong, when there is a legitimate issue then by all means it should be brought forth. I just don't feel this - or a lot of other things I see - are legitimate issues and I feel that's wrong. Of course, as always that's simply my opinion. But in this case, to me it's as simple as it's "Discover's ball" and if you don't like their rules, then go play somewhere else. Now, I will say that I do think that the "right thing to do" would be for Discover to work with this woman; but regardless of if they chose to or not, I can't fault them for this policy.
- M
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