The weaponization of "tranny" - from term of endearment to hate speech

Transgenderism: Bibliography | Issues | Peace Plan | Tranny |

Contents

1. Hate speech?
2. Why?
3. The case against
4. Wikipedia - Truth as distraction
5. Origins
6. Conclusions
7. References
8. Postscript - Blaire White

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Abstract: "Tranny" was a common and positive descriptive cover-all term used to indicate a member of the transgender community in Western society from the 1960s, with widespread acceptance at the time and over a period of some five decades. However, around 2010 it was weaponized as part of the highly politicized, aggressive, post-gay marriage transgender agenda. It went almost overnight from term of endearment to derogatory slur. The transformation appears to have originated in the United Kingdom amongst radical transgender activists, and was initially, and at later stages, rejected by sections of both the transgender and their supportive communities, and by many others in countries such as Australia and the United States. Despite this, the slur factor became embedded in transgender texts and policy documents. It remains in place through sources such as the Tranny entry in Wikipedia, wherein - according to the former CEO of Wikipedia - truth is considered a distraction. The present article outlines the case for consideration of the term as generic and endearing, as opposed to the claim that it was primarily derogatory and a slur, and for which no substantial body of evidence was ever produced to support that claim, though discrimination obviously did occur and remains in place. It also raises a question as to who has the right to alter the meaning of language in such a confrontational and oppositional manner, and is such an unnatural alteration sustainable? Also, the case is made that in publically declaring the word a slur and derogatory, this has given rise to normalization of that interpretation post-2010, and a resulting increase in instances of use in that objectionable manner by those who are opposed to any and all aspects of the transgender movement or, through ignorance, are generally intolerant and discriminatory.

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My Turn, Little Girl Likes Her Brain, Thirroul, 16 May 2006. An "all femme" band from Wollongong.

…in Australia the word tranny is not a slur but is used as an umbrella term encompassing drag queens as well as post and pre-op transsexuals. (Gregoire 2014)

[Identifying the word tranny as a derogatory term or slur "... steals a joyous and hard-won identity from those of us who are and have been perfectly comfortable, if not delighted to be trannies." (Justin Vivian Bond in Lowder 2014)

Tranny is a word that I have always associated with overly made-up men in garish costumes and dramatic makeup and have always considered it a term of endearment. (Bass 2016)

Tranny is a derogatory slur for a transgender person, often specifically a transgender woman (Wikipedia 2026).

Prior to 2015 most members of the trans movement were men, as transvestites; now it is mostly women (Maeve Halligan, London, 2026)

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1. Hate speech?

A fair dinkum fiction follows ..... it occurred sometime during May 2026, in a nondescript Aussie town located close to Sydney......

"You can't say that! It's hate speech!!!"

"What the heck was she talking about?", he thought to himself, with furrowed brow.

The writer had attended a pub gig the previous evening, where three bands were performing. The first was an "all-femme" rock band called Little Girl Likes Her Brain (Nadia / vocals and guitar; Samantha / drums and vocals; Tilly / bass; unidentified woman / keyboards); the second band Sister Paul consisted of a male and a female performance duo from Japan; and the third - the main attraction - was The Leftards, a well-known punk band playing their final gig after a decade on the road performing at select eastern Australian venues.

The soon-to-be accuser was encountered the day after the gig, at a work conference. She was in her late twenties and according to allocated name plates, the pair were seated next to each other. In idle conversation mention was made of the gig at a nearby hotel the previous evening.

"What was it like?" she asked.

"I only saw part of the first act, which I liked a lot. It was three women and a tranny," he stated in a purely matter-of-fact manner, holding off on any detail regarding their musical content and colourful presentation. For example, the singer sported bright turquoise hair flowing down her back (possibly a wig), and a similarly coloured rhythm guitar, which she played with vigour whilst strutting around the stage.

There was no other consideration of the information provided, or a hidden agenda. It was simply descriptive information, straight and simple. The only contentious point was the assumption that one of the members of the "all femme" band was transgender - a tranny - but that had not been confirmed.

"What? You can't say that," repeated the conference colleague.

"Say what?" he responded in surprise.

"Tranny. It's a derogatory term."

"No it's not," he replied without equivocation, thereby revealing an apparent ignorance.

"Yes it is. You're a transphobe."

"No I'm not," he said, as they both now got rather agitated.

"You obviously hate transgender people," she spat out with a venom, and turned away dismissively.

So much for any further light-hearted banter. However, at the time he could not understand the extreme reaction to the use of the word tranny.

He was somewhat elderly, raised during the Sixties and Seventies in an era of immense cultural change. During the move from teenage to adulthood he had occasionally encountered transvestites, transsexuals and "drag queens" in Sydney, and knew about those people who liked to cross-dress or present as the opposite sex. Trans was a catch-all term commonly used and an abbreviation, as was common in the Australian language. Tranny was also one of those words - a simple, generic term referring to transvestites or those others with forms of the behaviour where original sex is rejected or ignored to varying degrees, and where one sex usually presents as the other.

Being a child of the Sixties, the writer was raised to accept all sorts of people, races and identities. It was not cool to do otherwise during a period which was very much a decade of cool, even for a young man from the suburbs who was moving through primary school, into high school, and then work and university. The writer clearly remembered that tranny was both generic and a term of endearment, commonly used in Australia from the early Sixties through into the new millennium. In no way at all was it a derogatory term or slur - at least, not as far as this writer was aware. Of course it could be used by those who were homophobic or simply hateful, as could any such term describing a person who was "other" or not the same as the observer in any specific way. If so, it would need to be uttered along with a variety of words or an attitude which clearly indicated the negative thoughts that person was attempting to express, such as: "That awful, disgraceful tranny. I hate them."

As far as this writer was concerned, tranny was not, by its nature, singularly derogatory, and he had never heard any person use the word in that manner. Also, he did not foresee using it that way in his remaining years and had not used it in any other than a purely descriptive manner in the conversation referred to above. So it was with a degree of bemusement that the writer sat there and listened to the charge of uttering hate speech, and to be informed that tranny was now considered a slur. Needless to say, an argument ensued in which the writer rejected the accusation out of hand, not only in regard to the implied behaviour in mentioning the identity, but also because he truly believed tranny was simply an innocent descriptive, catch-all term commonly used throughout his lifetime, and championed by the transgender community. He saw no reason to change this view, despite what he was now being told.

"You cannot say that!" she repeated, getting quite upset at the writer's defence of the word as non-derogatory and, in fact, respectful.

It seemed that the offence taken was not only over use of the word tranny, but also in the fact that they should have simply been referred to as a man or a woman or even a person. Unfortunately, it was to a degree unclear to the writer on the night, though the wearing of makeup, a skirt, and a large transgender flag draped over the headstock of the bass guitar pointed to the transgender aspect and of a male presenting as a female. And so that argument went on for a minute or two more, until both realised any further discussion at that stage would prove fruitless.

As the next break in the conference agenda approached, she turned to him as she got up out of her chair and, with real emotive force, uttered in almost a whisper: "I hate you!"

"WTF!" came to mind in response, followed by utter bewilderment. Perhaps a new dawn would bring some understanding in regard to what had just come to pass between young and old.

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Tranny Boys float, Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras, Sydney, 1999.

2. Why?

The aforementioned incident was very upsetting, obviously for both of those involved. The next day the writer awoke concerned over what had taken place, and wondering why it had happened as it did. An answer was soon found when reference was made to that modern era font of wisdom and truth - or should one say "dispenser of disinformation" - namely, Wikipedia. Therein was an entry for Tranny which clearly stated at the outset that, as of May 2026, the word was considered a derogatory term and a slur. However, upon further reading of the entry, there was a caveat. Apparently - as the writer already knew - prior to the 2010s and the rise of the modern transgender movement, tranny had been a commonly used descriptive term in Australia and overseas, plus also in the context of reflecting endearment, such as with a phrase: "My tranny friend" or similar. As evidence of this - and here's the kicker - during the early 2010s a group of modern transgender agenda supporters and influencers sought to continue to use the term in that way, namely generally and with affection. Unfortunately this was not accepted by another, more radical faction within the transgender movement, and the word was weaponized.

What do we mean here by weaponized? In connection with the rise of the transgender movement around this time (circa 2010), and in an effort to promote the issue and gain political support for change, an active campaign was launched concerning the word transgender and its derivatives. The campaign sought to heighten the need for transgender-support and anti-discrimination legislative action on the part of government and society in general. In order to move this along, an effort needed to be made to show that the transgender community was subject to extreme negative discrimination. It could be argued that this was not actually the case, especially as a result of the campaign since the 1960s to normalize the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual) community and generally improve their acceptance in the West, to the extent of supporting gay marriage at least, but also bringing those other groups along to a degree. Therefore, in the battle anew, transgender-related words and phrases came under consideration, and a search for the hateful and the acceptible was begun.

It is apparent that in such a toxic atmosphere, the innocent use of the term tranny could not continue. It was therefore decided by some person or group within the London-based and wider transgender community that it should be presented as being only ever a derogatory slur. Clearly it was not generally that at the time, and had never been for the previous half century. No substantive body of evidence was ever presented, as far as this writer is aware, to support such a claim. However, it became so according to certain people setting the transgender agenda, and in this way was weaponized. From that point on it would be used as an example of discriminatory language to support the calls for stronger action on the part of society towards a section of the transgender movement which sought to remove any and all real, and in the case of tranny unfairly claimed, forms of discrimination.

The commonality of the use of the term tranny in Australia prior to its transformation and weaponization around 2010 can be seen throughout the following university student newspaper article from 1994, wherein all manner of modern era transgender issues are discussed, the definition of transgender is expanded to include gays and lesbians, and the transgender individual is more often then not referred to as a tranny, and not done so in any derogatory manner.

* TRANS, Tharunka, University of New South Wales Students Union, Sydney, volume 40, special issue 6, 19 May 1994. Text:

TRANS

The term transgender is becoming a fashionable word, even in polite society, but what does it really mean? Commonly used as a pseudonym for transsexual, it has the ability to cover a much wider field of gender diversity. A leading trans spokesperson believes that it should not be considered as a label at all. Rather, that we can only talk of people with a range of transgender issues. This point of view occurred when the cross-gender community came together to discuss issues we thought were really important to our lives. We found that rather than there being a focus on medical definitions and explanations, which had kept our community apart for so long, we could really find common ground in social issues such as those of marginalisation, invisibility, discrimination and isolation (Sydney Star Observer, 25 June 1993).

While the transgender community can be seen to be made up of transsexuals, hermaphrodites and transvestites (usually hetero, but also gay and bisexual), it actually includes anyone who lives outside the gender norms which our society constructs. That is, anyone who transgresses or transcends the defined gender boundaries. Indeed one radical tranny has gone so far as to say:

"The definition of gender in this culture includes a) the assumption by the person of any of the characteristics of the other sex whether by means of medical intervention or otherwise; or b) the identification by the person as a member of the other sex; or c) the living or seeking to live by the person as a member of the opposite sex" (Sydney Star Observer, 17 September 1993).

This need for a precise definition is caused by the massive discrimination against the transgender community. A recent study has shown that a third of trannies reported rape by a single assailant, one in eight reported pack rape and about forty percent reported incest. Ninety percent reported discrimination of some form with many reporting systematic discrimination (Sydney Star Observer, 22 April 1994).

This is especially true with regard to employment but also in daily dealings with landlords, government agencies, the police, the medical profession, and even various gay and lesbian organisations (although this is decreasing). Similarly, the restriction of transgender issues to the sphere of the medical profession has seen the massive neglect of our needs in other areas. Probably the most critical one is our identity as regards to the law.

Because of the mandate of heterosexuality, to be a woman means to love men, and to be a man means to love women. So in fact, every lesbian and every gay man is transgressing gender roles and gender rules. Whereas not all transgendered people are lesbian and gay, all lesbians and gays are transgendered. It is not a matter of lesbians and gays including transgendered people. It is a matter of transgendered people including lesbians and gays, and no one is going to like that" (Kate Bornstein quoted in Shannon Bell, "Kate Bornstein: A Transgender Transsexual Postmodern Tiresias, A. & M. Kroker (editors), The Last Sex: Feminism and Outlaw Bodies, Macmillan, London, 1993, p.116).

But there is still some debate about this within the community. Camille, from her perspective as an hermaphrodite for instance, sees transgender as being the 'other' of the gender boundaries (see her poem), as it encompasses everything contained with the normal definitions but at the same time also transcends them. While I like this view, my own is more conservative (I would say Virgo-ian) and is based on the realities for the present situation.

Our drive for basic recognition and human rights from the bureaucracies means there will need to be a fixed definition of transgender identity. The relevant paragraph from the recent proposed amendment to the anti-discrimination legislation (which unfortunately failed to pass) describes transgender this way:

"Transgender in relation to a person of one sex means: the law only recognises two sexes which are assigned at birth (or as soon after as possible in the case of intersex children) and which determine the way society sees us."

Any change in gender identity causes the establishment of a large number of problems. Currently no state in Australia will issue a new birth certificate for trannies (Isis Dunderdale, “The Human Rights of Transsexuals", Alternative Law Journal, vol. 17, no 1, February 1994) so that any process which requires that one be produce (e.g., opening a bank account ) is a potential source of embarrassment for all of the parties concerned. Consequently many trannies try to avoid such confrontational situations and miss out on many opportunities available to everyone else. Another problem has been the treatment of tranny prisoners. A tranny may be fully socialised as one gender and living completely in that gender identity but s/he is usually put into the prison of her biological gender rather than the one suitable for her social gender.

Probably the greatest cause of distress occurs in the realm of relationships. A case was recently contested where a tranny who was given a pension suitable for a woman in a defacto relationship, had the decision suddenly reversed because she was not post-op. Even though she had been living as a woman for over ten years. Because she didn't have the twelve thousand dollars for the sex change, she was still considered a man under Australian law (Sydney Star Observer, 10 December 1993).

The strangest case regarding this two gender blinkered view of the law occurred in Brisbane in 1979. An hermaphrodite (gender identified as male) had his marriage annulled on the grounds that he was not a man. The judge in his statement said, "I am satisfied on the evidence that the husband was neither man nor woman but was a combination of both, and a marriage in true true sense of the word ... could not have taken place and does not exist" (“In the Marriage of C and D”, 35 Family Law Cases 340, 1979). The decision leaves this person without any sort of legal identity, neither male or female.

Some transgender people are still being made invisible. There so much more which can be said. However, these are some of the issues which face the transgender community today and which force us to stand up and challenge the system. The needs are so great that the potential of transgender, as a process of transcending the constructed gender boundaries, still remains in the future. But in concluding it is interesting to note the promise of transgender was seen many years ago by Kate Millet who said that as long as we still retain the categories of masculine and feminine "each personality becomes little more, and often less than half, of its human potential" (Kate Millet, Sexual Politics, Abacus, London, 1972, p. 32).

Roz Kaveney, 1988.

It would appear that the weaponization of the word tranny came from Great Britain around 2010 and not locally, as in Australia. One individual who can be identified as playing a key role in the term's transformation from endearing to hateful was the elderly transgender woman (born male 1949; transitioned to female 1982) Roz Kaveney. In what seemed to the present writer a rather bitter article published in the London edition of The Guardian newspaper on 30 June 2010, Kaveney outlined the internal machinations within a certain section of the transgender community and its supporters regarding the use of language going forward in support of a political campaign which brought about significant societal and legislative changes across the Western world. Kaveney also referred to personal experiences of misgendering and failure to use appropriate pronouns. Kaveney stated the following:

Why trans is in but tranny is out

To outsiders, debates over the language of transgender may seem trivial. In fact, says Roz Kaveney, linguistics is a vital battlefield. As a trans man or woman, you soon notice how many people have what Daffy Duck called 'pronoun trouble'. No matter how supportive of your transition they claim to be, and how much well-intentioned advice they give you about your new hairstyle, or the name you always used in your head but only just told them about, they misgender you every other time they open their mouths, and get quite upset if you call them on it. You're being too sensitive, they say, or it's too soon. Families, in particular, think it's too soon even after years. Getting your name right is a minimum requirement of respect - referring to you in the third person by the wrong pronoun means that respect is only superficial politeness. I used to think that straight men particularly tended to misgender me if they were losing an argument; now I've seen them do it to trans men too. Misgendering is sometimes cluelessness, but more often it's quiet, hostile aggression, especially if we aren't gratefully deferential for whatever crumbs of acceptance we are thrown - if we speak up as freely as if we were actual, you know, human beings. Oh, and a word to far too many columnists and pub philosophers: the only time 'it' is acceptable is with neurosis-identified people, some of whom regard it as mandatory. And if that's one rule too many to keep in your social vocabulary, well, tough.

The trans community's internal debates about language, and our preparedness to be fussy about what people call us in public, have grown ever more intense, even acrimonious. One way of looking at this is to say that when trans people are being murdered all over the planet, arguing about words is staggeringly trivial-minded. Another way is to say that when people are dying, you can't let any slur go unremarked. Trans people's battle for language is no different from the struggle against other sexist language; we're not just being picky. It's mostly working-class trans women and men of colour in the developing world that are actually being killed, but no matter how middle class and white one is, almost every trans person sooner or later realises we walk on thin ice. You can be a famous astrophysicist and still find people campaigning for you to lose your job. More often, we have to worry about groups of drunks guessing our past on the tube. It starts with name-calling, but it doesn't always end there.

Some terms were always insulting. 'She-male' has the interesting distinction of being simultaneously used by the pornography industry and radical feminists such as Janice Raymond. 'He-she' is unpronounceable when sober. Raymond's terms, like 'male-to-constructed-female', were always so unwieldy that they disappeared even from the language of abuse. The tabloid-beloved 'sex change' lacks a sense of nuance - not everyone wants, or can get or afford, surgery that is seen as putting us where we should always have been, not somewhere new. Yet we use words that involve the notion of crossing over - language is all about paradox. There are words used in the community that almost no one else wants or needs. People 'pass', and some of those who pass decide to 'go into stealth' and sever all ties with the trans community. Some stealthers snipe on the internet at everyone else for making their lives more difficult, for being inferior failures; others are just getting on with their lives in privacy. Yet all stealthers, just like those of us who want social acceptance on our own terms, are at risk of being 'read' and outed. Most trans people can agree on 'transition' at least - for the moment. On the other hand, MTF and FTM were for a while standard, then got into the personal ads and disappeared from respectable usage. 'Transsexual' is too medicalised for a lot of people's taste, and 'gender dysphoric' plays the pity card. 'Transgender' is a useful portmanteau term for a coalition of almost everybody unhappy with rigid unalterable binary gender roles, but rapidly became too vague to be entirely useful. Right now, trans is just about universally acceptable - though in recent years there was a fight over whether it should be an adjective or a prefix. A trans woman, the argument goes, is a woman who happens to be trans as she might be, say, blonde, but a trans man is some special and distinct order of being.

For a while, it seemed as if some younger trans men were going to successfully reclaim 'tranny', at least as a 'smile when you say that' epithet, or a 'we can say that about ourselves; you can't' in-group word like 'queer'. It didn't take, though, partly because it had never stopped being used by would-be hip lad journalists to abuse not only actual trans people, but a list of 'weird' people seen as non-gender-conforming.

Unwieldiness is always going to be the thing that stops some of the currently modish terminology catching on. Once you start using self-descriptions like 'male-identified, female-assigned-at-birth, female-bodied (currently), non-operative', you are getting into a place where the map is as big as the territory and you hand out a CV every time you have a conversation. The thing about just saying you're trans is that it tells people we're here, get used to it. That's why, particularly for younger trans people, writing and activism are one. Old-school language such as 'trapped in the wrong body' was always sentimental twaddle, but spoke to how life felt. Now young trans poets are trying to make new language for their situations. As a recent play about trans male life and genitals put it, "There is no word for it." There is, however, now a word for people who are not trans. Amazingly, there has recently been a controversy in feminist blogs about the term 'cis', popularised by Julia Serano, which is about as value-free and non-derogatory as you can get - it's a standard Latin prefix, as in 'Cisalpine Gaul'. This exemplifies the fact that language is a battlefield for trans people: we can find ourselves in a row just for having our own word for everyone else.

Kaveney refers to tranny and its apparent "continued" use as a term of abuse. The only evidence provided is the statement that it is:

.....being used by would-be hip lad journalists to abuse not only actual trans people, but a list of 'weird' people seen as non-gender-conforming.

This article sounds like the opinion of a somewhat bitter individual who is prone to exaggerate and make statements without having to prove them. Unfortunately, it is cited by Wikipedia as some of the "evidence" for the claim that tranny is a derogatory term, though no real evidence is presented and therefore Kaveney fails to address the title in regards to Why trans is in but tranny is out.

Despite this attack on the word tranny by people such as Kaveney, other individuals within the transgender community did not accepted this categorization, preferring to support its continued use and call for an end to its recasting as derogatory or slur. As transgender entertainer Justin Vivian Bond noted, the weaponisation of tranny:

"... steals a joyous and hard-won identity from those of us who are and have been perfectly comfortable, if not delighted to be trannies." (Lowder 2014)

Australian Kate Bornstein flip flops around the significance of the term, pointing to its long use in the 1960s and 1970s in Sydney by the trans community as "a name for the identity they shared" (Bornstein 2009). This widespread, and generally positive use of the term reveals that Kaveney's comments were not relevant to the Australian situation at least.

Christan Williams, in his search for the origin of the word tranny, went back as far as 1983 (Williams 2014).

Once the term had been weaponized, there followed over the years articles supporting that change, ultimately resulting in the aforementioned Wikipedia reference (Molloy 2014, Bass 2016, McCallum n.d.).

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3. The case against

A number of articles are presented below which outline some of the context around the contentious change of meaning of the word tranny.

The first article, from 2014, raises the issue of redefining the word tranny, and in part defends its ongoing use in print and public discourse, if only for reasons of historic accuracy and relevance.

* Noah Michelson, The trouble with Tranny, Out.com, 14 November 2014. Text:

The trouble with Tranny

It's been a long couple of weeks for the word tranny. First Glee came under fire for using it in its Rocky Horror Picture Show episode, when a student said he couldn't take part in the musical because his parents didn't want him "dressing like a tranny." GLAAD discussed the incident in a blog post saying, "The word tranny has become an easy punchline in popular culture, and many still don't realize that using the term is hurtful, dehumanizing and associated with violence, hatred and derision against transgender people -- a community that is nearly invisible in media today." And last week, after we used the term tranny in a story on President Obama's gay drag queen nanny, we received some heat, too, and several people asked us to delete the word. I pushed to keep tranny in the headline for a variety of reasons but mostly because as a writer and editor, I know that words have power. While I agree with GLAAD that too often (especially within mainstream media/culture) the word is used pejoratively, we must always take into account the context in which the word is being used and who is using it. In the right hands and mouths (hint, hint: ours) the word becomes powerful -- liberating, even -- and loses the sting and stigma others want us to feel when we hear or read it. I am also of the mindset that we should look for opportunities to open up discussions about difficult subjects instead of simply erasing or deleting something (or maybe even worse -- replacing letters in a word with asterisks or hyphens in a misguided attempt to soften the word's blow, which, in my opinion, just makes it look that much more perverse and thuggish). Because of how challenging -- even downright scary -- the word and the shadow it casts can be, this seemed like the perfect chance to give a little more attention to a very controversial and misunderstood term. So, I reached out to both GLAAD and activist and gender theorist Kate Bornstein to see if they would weigh in on this subject. Bornstein was quick to give me permission (and her enthusiastic blessing) to run a version of her piece "Who You Calling A Tranny?" which was originally published in July 2009 and which I think eloquently explains the word's origin and argues for a reclaiming of it by "gender and sex positivists." GLAAD put me in touch with Justin Tanis of the National Center for Transgender Equality who sent me a short statement explaining why the organization opposes the use of tranny due to its power to demean and harm trans people. Give them both a read and then let us know how you feel about the word tranny (or fag or dyke for that matter).

The following article, also from 2014, questions the change in categorization of the word tranny.

* J. Bryan Lowder, Is "tranny" a slur or an identity? Who decides?, Slate Magazine, 30 May 2014. Text:

The “Tranny” Debate and Conservatism in the LGBTQ Movement

It’s an interesting moment, to say the least, for the T in LGBTQ. Laverne Cox, an outspoken transgender woman and star of Netflix’s acclaimed Orange Is the New Black, will command attention at newsstands and grocery store checkouts across America from the cover of the June 9 Time magazine, acting as the entry point to an in-depth article on the improving lot of transgender people and policies across the country. And Cox is not alone — other transgender figures have gained visibility and influence with heartening speed in the last year or so, including Redefining Realness author Janet Mock and outspoken activist/model Carmen Carrera But even as the needs for basic respect as much as fair legal treatment of transgender people come to be acknowledged and better understood in the mainstream, a furor is growing within the queer community around the idea that progress means abandoning words and cultural affiliations that a vocal subset of trans people deem offensive. Tranny, the highest-profile of these words, is both a slur and a term of endearment, a brand that can sting and a badge that can be worn with pride. And when some people cherish a word that others despise, who can be said to own it, to possess the authority to declare it fair or foul? It’s a vexing question, but one that we must consider, because the answer will go a long way in determining what the LGBTQ liberation movement — and liberation is the key word — looks like after gay marriage.

For outsiders, the contours of this debate are surely hazy, so here’s a rough sketch. Tranny and words like it have long been used within the queer world, among many transgender people and especially in the drag subculture, as signs of appreciation or friendship, much in the same way that some African Americans employ the word nigger. While tranny can also certainly be used as a slur (outsiders should not use it for this reason), it is the kind of term that has been claimed by many as a celebration of their own queerness, an indication of their intention to futz with our society’s deeply ingrained gender binary. Other trans people, though, have always found the term derogatory, rejecting it out of hand. Given the growing prominence of RuPaul’s Drag Race, it’s perhaps not surprising that the recent controversy was spurred by the show’s playful use of words, as we previously covered in Outward, like she-male. (Another precipitating factor was the renaming-under-duress of the Trannyshack, a famous San Francisco queer performance space.) Under pressure from activists and many fans, Drag Race producers and broadcaster Logo TV apologized for the offending segments back in March, editing out a “Female or She-Male challenge” and removing the long-running “You’ve got she-mail” bit from later episodes. But after the finale earlier in May, RuPaul himself has begun pushing back against what he sees as censorship, responding to a question about tranny on Marc Maron’s WTF podcast that “You know, I can call myself a nigger, faggot, tranny all I want to, because I’ve fucking earned the right to do it. I’ve lived the life …” RuPaul’s comments have joined impassioned missives from trans artist Mx. Justin Vivian Bond, trans author and artist Kate Bornstein, and drag performer Lady Bunny, all of whom in their own ways echoed RuPaul’s view that “banning” tranny was an example of a conservative minority speaking on behalf of — and doing a certain kind of violence to — those for whom the term is, in the words of Bornstein, a “valid, vibrant, and vital identity.” Bond is particularly blunt on this point:

"What [critics of the word] fail to recognize is that by banishing the use of the word TRANNY they will not be getting rid of the transphobia of those who use it in a negative way. What it does do is steal a joyous and hard-won identity from those of us who are and have been perfectly comfortable, if not delighted to BE TRANNIES."

Of course, there are compelling arguments against the word — that using it encourages outsiders to sling it in hate, for example, or that it implies all trans individuals are sex workers — many of which Bornstein thoughtfully considers in her post. It’s hard to see a resolution to all this at present. Spend a few minutes in the comments sections of any of the aforementioned pieces, and you will see self-identified trannies accusing their critics of PC tyranny, while the other side accuses them of internalized transphobia.

As a non-trans gay man, I don’t feel it’s my place to declare either side of this debate “right” or “wrong,” because tranny is not an identity I would claim for myself, I am not a part of the drag community beyond fandom, and I am sensitive to the fact that too many ignorant gay men throw the word around in ways that are not welcome nor totally benign. That said, I think at least one helpful thing to emerge from this uproar is a reminder that it is possible to be physically queer and culturally conservative. Indeed, it does not seem inaccurate to me to interpret some transgender people’s insistence on transitioning seamlessly from one gender to the other — to reinforce the gender binary, in effect, by eschewing the conceptual friction that third-way terms like tranny and even she-male engender — as a conservative impulse. Bond seems to recognize this as conservatism in disguise and has little patience for it:

"If you don’t wish to own [tranny] or any other word used to describe you other than “male” or “female” then I hope you are privileged enough to have been born with an appearance that will allow you to disappear into the passing world or that you or your generous, supportive family are able to afford the procedures which will make it possible for you to pass within the gender binary system you are catering your demands to. If you’re capable of doing that then GO ON AND DISAPPEAR INTO THE PASSING WORLD!"

While it’s entirely possible that a person could “pass” for their chosen gender and remain queer in their approach to the concept of gender in general, I can’t help but find much of the anti-tranny rhetoric to be supported by a curiously conservative set of assumptions. That does not necessarily invalidate the anti-tranny point of view, of course, but I do think that many taking up the cause might reconsider whether they are standing as close to the cutting edge of queer civil rights as they might have imagined — dismissing the deeply felt identities, histories, and understandings of others as “offensive” somehow doesn’t exactly feel progressive. And, as Lady Bunny suggests, we might think about whether expending this much energy on semantic infighting is distracting from more important battles elsewhere. I’m personally not sure if it’s a zero-sum game, but I am troubled by how, in our zeal to create a so-called “safe space” for ourselves, safe can so easily become code for ideologically pure. As history has borne out time and again, that’s not a space that’s safe for anyone.

The following 2016 article by gay American Lance Bass reflects some of the experience of the present writer in being shocked that the word tranny had gone from being a term of endearment to what is now referred to a decade later as hate speech.

* Lance Bass, Why We Shouldn’t Use The Word ‘Tranny’, Huffington Post, 2016. Text:

Why We Shouldn't Use the Word 'Tranny'

I'm sorry to anyone who was offended or hurt by my use of the word "trannies" while appearing earlier this week on Access Hollywood Live. Let me start this off with two very important words that I truly mean from the bottom of my heart: I'm sorry. I'm sorry to anyone who was offended or hurt by my use of the word "trannies" while appearing earlier this week on Access Hollywood Live. Let me share what I have learned in the last 24 hours. I have learned, thanks to Glaad.org's website, that the term "tranny" is used as a dehumanizing slur to describe transgender individuals and is oftentimes the last word someone hears before they are brutally attacked. Similar to the anti-gay F-word [fag], the term "tranny" is commonly used to humiliate and degrade transgender individuals.

I can tell you with all sincerity that I had no idea. I often hear the term used on Logo's RuPaul's Drag Race and spent an entire summer listening to Christian Siriano use the phrase "hot tranny mess" on Lifetime's Project Runway. In my definition, I was referring to the flamboyant and hilarious drag queens and transvestites who play on Christopher Street in New York City, some of whom I even call friends. When I use the word "tranny," I am picturing Tim Curry's Frank-N-Furter character in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, or the wildly hilarious Eddie Izzard. I certainly don't think of Chaz Bono or someone questioning the body they were born into. It is a word that I have always associated with overly made-up men in garish costumes and dramatic makeup and have always considered it a term of endearment. It had never crossed my mind that it was a slur against those who are transgender and fighting for their identity. I am incredibly sensitive to anyone's feelings, especially anyone who has been made to feel less than or humiliated. I have nothing but respect and empathy for anyone struggling with, or who has had to struggle with, finding peace in the body they were born into. I know my own struggles that I had to go through just to find peace with my sexuality; theirs is one I could never imagine.

Words are incredibly divisive as it is, but when you add media into the mix, the lines are blurred when it comes to who can say what, how, and where. The word "retard" has been declared inappropriate at all times. People argue to this day that when the Dixie Chicks made their statement, "We are ashamed the president is from Texas," it would have been OK had it been said on American soil, but because it was said overseas, they are un-American and should be chased out of our country with a shotgun. Even Oprah and Jay-Z have recently joined the ongoing debate over the fact that black people are allowed to call other black people the N-word [nigger], gay people can get away with calling other gay people the F-word [fag], and Jewish people are allowed to sling Jewish stereotypes at one another, but should anyone outside the tribe say such things, they are racist, prejudiced, and offensive.

I have a friend from Chicago who is your stereotypical, macho "guys' guy," born and raised on the South Side in an environment where they constantly say "that's so gay" about anything and everything. Nevertheless, he has many gay friends. Does that mean that he is homophobic and hates gay people or just needs to be educated and learn to use a different word to describe a situation? When you think about it, choosing the wrong word only makes the person using it look stupid, even though it wasn't done with malice. At the end of the day, these are all just words. It is the meaning and the intent behind the words that should always be questioned and examined. People do need to be held accountable for the words they use, but the rules of political correctness by which you are and aren't allowed to use them have become so confusing that often we should be relying on common sense and taking into consideration the person's purpose behind using the word. I am sure many of you reading this have a grandmother who can give you a look without using any words, and you know she will give you a whoopin' if you don't behave. It isn't about the words; it is about the action behind the word.

I cannot say it enough, but I am sorry to anyone whose feelings have been hurt by my comment. I recognize in retrospect that it was ignorant and insensitive, and I will remain conscious of keeping that word out of my vocabulary, as well as of correcting anyone around me who uses it. But there is something that is bothering me about all of this, and I feel I would not be doing my part if I didn't bring it up: I am extremely disappointed with the gay media, which has chosen to turn this into a headline that will garner more attention for their websites and help sell more of their magazines and disregard the irresponsible effect they are having on our community. Within an hour of the show being over, I knew what I had done and was immediately brought up to speed on the fact that in recent weeks, Kelly Osbourne and Neil Patrick Harris had both used the word "tranny" and were immediately, publicly slapped on the wrist, and I immediately apologized over Twitter. I had not heard about the recent instances; if I had, I am sure I would have added that word to my "things not to say on live TV" list. Kelly Osbourne is, and has been, a very vocal supporter and ally of the LGBTQIA community. Neil Patrick Harris has arguably and single-handedly done more for the image and public perception of the gay community than any public figure before him. I recently wrote about my coming out experiences right here on The Huffington Post and have publicly pledged to do what I can not just for our community but for human equality. I am not defending any of us for the misuse of the word, but I am disgusted with how the gay media has pounced on us as though they have been waiting for us to misbehave and spun it to make us look like the bad guys. Yesterday, The Advocate wrote, "Lance Bass Uses Transgender Slur On Air." Regardless of the article that followed the headline, guess what the mainstream media will pick up and turn into the public's perception in the process? Lance Bass hates transgender people.

In my opinion, a slur comes from a place of hate and intolerance. Go back and read the police report from Mel Gibson's arrest and the things he said to the female officer. I consider that slurring. I never see a headline in The Advocate that reads, "Lance Bass Wants You To Join Him At The Russian Consulate In New York City To Help Protest Anti-Gay Propaganda Laws Being Passed In St. Petersburg." But you can check my Twitter feed back on Nov. 28 and you will find that I posted just that and did indeed go speak to the Russian consulate. But I bet if I had written, "Hey, fag lovers, come join me," it would have been picked up by everyone. Who knows, maybe we could have actually had enough people to make a difference? I am disappointed that the media outlets don't reach out to me, or Neil, or Kelly, when something like this happens, but instead post their headlines first, excited that it will mean that they will get more traffic and possibly even picked up by a nightly entertainment news show. I am disappointed that our community isn't ever able to come together and educate each other and educate everyone else in the process from a constructive place, always coming instead from a defensive place. No matter what I say or do now, it will look as though I am trying to spin the situation and save face, when had we worked together, we could have put up a united front and shown that we make mistakes, but that we are in fact a community that supports its own.

I may be a bit naïve in my thinking, but imagine the headline "Lance Bass Would Like Us To Know Why We Shouldn't Use The Word Tranny." That is what could have happened if The Advocate had called me first and we were able to work together. It's time our community stops bullying ourselves, especially our celebrities who do so much for civil rights. They need to learn that they are in the wrong to spin stories like this and harp on something that was obviously not malicious, because the more we become afraid to open our mouths for fear of backlash, the less likely we will continue being a voice for our community. So to the gay media, we need to work together, because it will happen again. We live in a soundbite world. Everyone is tweeting their thoughts, 140 characters at a time, all throughout the day and night. Once it is out there, it is available for everyone to dissect and interpret. There are plenty of media outlets ready to tear us down, humiliate us, and make us feel less than. Why can't you be on the front lines to help defend us or educate and set the example instead of tearing us down? Again, to be clear, I have no problem apologizing. I unknowingly used an inappropriate misuse of the word. I am horrified that I said it knowing what I know now and would be devastated to find out I hurt anyone's feelings. I take full responsibility for the words coming out of my mouth. The first people to report on the story were The Advocate, Instinct, and Queerty, not any mainstream media. My community were the first ones to attack me. The Huffington Post is the only outlet that reached out immediately and suggested I write something to help educate. That to me is responsible journalism, and everyone should follow suit. I just believe there are better ways to handle the distribution of press and would appreciate it if the media, especially the gay media, could be more responsible in how they report a story.

Bass's comments are sobering, not only in regards to the transformation of the word tranny, but also how the gay media had continued to weaponize the term in cases where its traditional use came up, and where it was in no way presented as a derogatory term.

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4. Wikipedia - "Truth as distraction"

Why does the Wikipedia entry for tranny open with a statement that the word is derogatory and a slur, when the historic evidence proves otherwise? The answer lies not only in the actions of a select group within the recent transgender movement, but also in the following comment from the former CEO of Wikipedia, Katharine Maher, suggesting that, when it comes to "finding concensus and getting things done", truth is a distraction:

The Wikipedians who write these articles aren't actually focussed on finding the truth; they are working for something that is a bit more easily attainable, which is the best that we can know right now .... that for our most tricky disagreements, seeking the truth, and seeking to convince others of the truth, isn't necessarily the best place to start. In fact, I think our reverence for the truth might have become a bit of a distraction that is preventing us from finding concensus and getting things done. (Katherine Maher, Wikipedia CEO, August 2021)

Katherine Maher, Crisis of Truth - How accurate is Wikipedia?, TedX Talk, August 2021, YouTube, duration: 24.25 minutes.

The truth must never be considered a distraction. The truth must always be seen as a foundation, and the only place from which to take actions and "get things done." Maher's suggestion that truth can be replaced by beliefs, or take precedence over them, is not something that Wikipedia should be engaged in. Like the encyclopedias of the past, it was always meant to be an independent source of truth, with beliefs and opinions cited, but only to be used as resources in the process of discovering and identifying truth. The truth about the word tranny is other than what Wikipedia declares within its entry as of May 2026.

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5. Origins

The actual word tranny came into general use during the 1930s in association with the creation and popularization of transistor radios, and especially their portable form from the 1950s onwards. Tranny was also used as an abbreviation in regard to photographic transparencies. Within this present article it is only used in reference to transvestism and its variants.

1960s

* Kate Bornstein attributes use of the word tranny to transsexuals and drag queens working in Sydney, Australia, in the 1960s. It is used to identify a group and also as a term of endearment. It may have initially appeared during the previous decade.

1983

* Christian Williams suggests the word tranny came from gay men during this period.

1994

* Tharunka article, Sydney, makes frequent reference to tranny and trannies in a non-derogatory manner.

1997

* Tranny Fest - the so-named San Francisco Transgender Film Festival runs through to 2003.

2010

* Tranny initially cited and promoted as a derogatory term by The Guardian, London. Subsequently promoted as such by the UK transgender movement.

2014

* Public and transgender community questioning of the weaponisation of the word tranny, away from its traditional use as a generic term and also term of endearment.

2016

* Gay man Lance Bass refers to tranny as a term of endearment of long standing.

2020

* A middle-aged Philadelphia transgender person is attacked at home when intervening in a brawl among young people, and in turn is called a tranny as a slur.

2026

* Wikipedia continues to state that tranny is a derogatory term and a slur.

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6. Conclusion

Tranny never was a derogatory term or slur, at least prior to its declaration as such during the 2010s by a faction within the transgender agenda community who sought to weaponize it for their political advantage. Sections of the transgender community have unsuccessfully sought to reclaim it as a term of endearment and for general use. Unfortunately, with young people being informed that the word tranny is a derogatory slur, it becomes so to them and can be used by them if they wish to express hatred or other negative attitudes towards a transgender person. Here we now have a so-called catch 22 situation and a variant of the Streisand Effect, whereby the promotion of the term as derogatory increases its use in that regard. Furthermore, as the Lance Bass article reveals, it is the gay media which is further promoting the term tranny as hate speech, whereas as recently as 2016 it was rightly considered a term of endearment (Bass 2016). As noted in the following interview with a young British university student and two journalists, the arguments presented above relate to present day (June 2026) experiences amongst the gender critical movement. It is also noted therein by two of the speakers, the significant changes in language and behaviours which occurred around 2015.

Maeve Halligan, The trans debate no one dared to have ... until now, The Telegraph, 30 May 2026, YouTube, duration: 43.48 minutes. Interview.

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7. References

Most beautiful tranny, Sydney, 2012.

Bass, Lance, Why We Shouldn’t Use The Word ‘Tranny’, Huffington Post, 2016.

Grace, Laura Jane (Tom Gabel), Tranny: Confessions of Punk Rock's most infamous anarchist sellout, Hachette Books, 31 October 2017, 320p.

Gregoire, P., Is ‘Tranny’ a Derogatory Term?, Vice, 2014.

Halligan, Maeve, The trans debate no one dared to have ... until now, The Telegraph, 30 May 2026, YouTube, duration: 43.48 minutes.

Kaveney, Roz, Why trans is in but tranny is out, The Guardian, London, 30 June 2010.

Little Girl Likes Her Brain, My Turn, Thirroul, 16 May 2006, YouTube, duration: 2.29 minutes. 

Lowder, J. Bryan, Is "tranny" a slur or an identity? Who decides?, Slate Magazine, 30 May 2014.

Maher, Katherine, Crisis of Truth - How accurate is Wikipedia?, TedX Talk, August 2021, YouTube, duration: 24.25 minutes.

Mahmoud, Jess, Lets talk slurs: On the term "Tranny", Medium, 29 April 2017.

Most beautiful tranny, pre Mardi Gras parade [photograph], Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras, Sydney, 2012, City of Sydney Archives.

McCallum, D., Please Don’t Say Tranny, Queer Life, Medium, n.d.

Molloy, P. M., Op-ed: It’s Time to Stop With the T Word, Advocate, 2014.

Serano, Julia, A Personal History of the “T-word” (and some more general reflections on language and activism), Whipping Girl, 28 April 2014.

Some observations on the tranny word, A Gender Variance Who's Who, 1 May 2014.

Tranny Boys [photograph], Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras, Sydney, 1999, City of Sydney Archives.

TRANS, Tharunka, University of New South Wales Students Union, Sydney, volume 40, special issue 6, 19 May 1994.

Transgender woman brutally beaten by mob inside home: "They called me a tranny", 6abc Philadelphia, 26 August 2020, YouTube, duration: 2.46 minutes.

White, Blaire, Joe Rogan said he'd sleep with me, 26 May 2026, YouTube, duration: 0.27 minutes. 

Wikipedia, GLAAD, Wikipedia, accessed 19 May 2026.

-----, Glee (TV series), Wikipedia, accessed 19 May 2026.

-----, Roz Kaveney, Wikipedia, accessed 19 May 2026.

-----, Streisand Effect, Wikipedia, accessed 22 May 2026.

-----, Tranny, Wikipedia, accessed 17 May 2026.

Williams, Cristan, Tranny: An Evidence-Based Review, The Trans Advocate, 28 April 2014.

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8. Postscript - Blaire White

On 26 May 2026 Blaire White - America's most famous and well respected transvestite, and a sometime critic of the modern transgender agenda - made the following comment in a podcast interview which was titled Joe Rogan said he'd sleep with me (White 2026):

"The comedy scene is so interesting to me. First of all, I don't understand why they're all tranny chasers ...."

The everyday use of the word tranny by White points to its ongoing application in the United States outside of the bubble that is modern transgender politics. White applies the term in a manner in which it has been used for decades, and apparently - and hopefully - will continue to be used and eventually restored to its rightful place as a coverall term and term of endearment for at least a section, if not all, of the transgender community. The use of the term can often be in what conservatives, religious, and transphobes would consider outrageous - such as tranny chasers - but which the actual community uses in a matter-of-fact manner, and often with glee and humour. In this instance, the general physical attraction, or attraction by a certain group of people such as comedians, to transvestites, is somewhat a mystery to White. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder obviously comes to mind here.

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Transgenderism: Bibliography | Issues | Peace Plan | Tranny |

Last updated: 4 June 2026

Michael Organ, Australia