Transgender Telethon
The Artist D
We used to know it as fund raising but now we call them kick starters, crowd funding, artist shares and pledgies! If you want something that you can’t obtain just ask the Internet to pitch in. People are asking for help all over the Internet these days and they aren’t ashamed. Articles of interest include artists producing new creations, moms asking for help with the electric bill and transgender people seeking sex changes! Nothing is off the table when it comes to the personal campaigns of the masses.
When I broke ground on the Internet in the ’90s we were cam whores. Mythical creatures sitting ourselves in front of a new device called a web cam. For doing as little as living our lives in front of the cam people would line our bank accounts and fill our homes with things from our Amazon Wish Lists. We were digital hookers doing it the right way. We worked hard for what we got and some of us worked harder than others. These days you don’t have to work for it, just ask. Of course asking doesn’t mean you’re going to get it, but that’s certainly the basis of many campaigns we see now.
It also brings back a feeling I haven’t really felt since the good old days of cam whoring. Back then you had to be the most creative, hottest most fabulous digital superstar to get the attention. Now you just create a campaign and ask for it. Where’s the competition? Surely there is only so much charity people can afford … or is there?
My concern with the personalization of the charity is the trivialization of it all. This is especially so when it comes to the private telethons of folks who really need something. Within the last month I’ve had three transgender friends start fundraising for their sexual reassignment surgeries. While it is great that we now have the platform to try, I don’t think we’ve really covered the psychological repercussions of these kinds of campaigns. Along with a nod towards the fact that not all that long ago we used to want to make it on our own! Why has it become quite so popular to fund the personal goals of everyone else? Is it desperation and coming to terms that a lot of us will never be able to afford some of these dreams on our own?
Being the executive editor of a magazine, host of a radio show and a mythical creature on the Internet brings me hundreds of emails on a daily basis from people wanting something. I see a very clear landscape crowded with people dead serious to “make it.” So much so that it only becomes more difficult to rank someone’s desires in comparison to the person standing next to them. This is part of what I mean by trivializing the cause. In a way it creates the wrong questions in people’s minds. Who deserves SRS more? Well, we all know that everyone who wants it should have it. But turning it into a crowd funding campaign forces you to ask if Melody deserves it more than Laverne. Do you give some money to Billy for a new penis or to Veronica for her shiny new vagina? I can’t afford to give to both or thirty of my friends this month, so eventually somebody is going to be pissed.
Then there are some who think we ought to leave the kick starters and crowd funders to the artists. But wait, maybe they don’t deserve it either. How many of your artist friends are asking for funds this month? Someone could say that it’s just as unfair to supply them with funding when there are bigger charities helping thousands who deserve even more. How can we weigh curing AIDS, housing the homeless, helping a young songstress get studio time or a transgender human undergo a crucial surgery to align their mind, body and spirit? We can’t.
You can’t ask everyone to choose big battles over little battles when all the battles are important. We can’t start asking what makes someone’s genitalia more important than somebody else’s. We just have to give when we can and hope it helps. So the next time you find yourself in need you may want to think about turning to the crowds for your lack of funds. Just never forget your battle is all your own and charity can only go so far.
Category: Transgender Body & Soul, Transgender Opinion
About the Author (Author Profile)
The Artist D is a true raconteur and provocateur! He has been performing online since the mid 1990s. A relic from the cam show age before MySpace was any space. Author of In Bed with Myself, an autobiographical tale of transgenderism and Internet celebrity. Executive Editor of Fourculture Magazine and host of the Kawfeehaus podcast.Subscribe
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